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 ‘The Iran Agenda’Posted on Dec 3, 2007
By Reese Erlich In this excerpt from his new book, “The Iran Agenda,” veteran independent journalist and Truthdig contributor Reese Erlich challenges the conventional wisdom on Iran’s nuclear ambitions as he investigates the drive for war. United States Tells Iran: Become a Nuclear PowerTop Democratic and Republican leaders absolutely believe that Iran is planning to develop nuclear weapons. And one of their seemingly strongest arguments involves a process of deduction. Since Iran has so much oil, they argue, why develop nuclear power? James Woolsey typifies the view. The director of the CIA under both George Bush (the elder) and Bill Clinton said, “There is no underlying reason for one of the greatest oil producers in the world to need to get into the nuclear [energy] business ... unless what they want to do is train and produce people and an infrastructure that can have highly enriched uranium or plutonium, fissionable material for nuclear weapons."¹ In an op-ed commentary, former secretary of state Henry Kissinger wrote, “For a major oil producer such as Iran, nuclear energy is a wasteful use of resources,” a position later cited approvingly by the Bush administration.² But U.S. leaders are engaging in a massive case of collective amnesia, or perhaps more accurately, intentional misdirection. In the 1970s the United States encouraged Iran to develop nuclear power precisely because Iran will eventually run out of oil. A declassified document from President Gerald Ford’s administration, for which Kissinger was secretary of state, supported Iran’s push for nuclear power. The document noted that Tehran should “prepare against the time—about 15 years in the future—when Iranian oil production is expected to decline sharply."³ The United States ultimately planned to sell billions of dollars’ worth of nuclear reactors, spare parts, and nuclear fuel to Iran. Muhammad Sahimi, a professor and former department chair of the Chemical and Petroleum Engineering Department at the University of Southern California, told me that Kissinger thought “it was in the U.S. national interest, both economic and security interest, to have such close relations in terms of nuclear power.”4 The shah even periodically hinted that he wanted Iran to build nuclear weapons. In June 1974, the shah proclaimed that Iran would have nuclear weapons “without a doubt and sooner than one would think.”5 Iranian embassy officials in France later denied the shah made those remarks, and the shah disowned them. But a few months later, the shah noted that Iran “has no intention of acquiring nuclear weapons but if small states began building them, then Iran might have to reconsider its policy.”6 If an Iranian leader made such statements today, the United States and Israel would denounce them as proof of nefarious intent. They might well threaten military action if Iran didn’t immediately halt its nuclear buildup. At the time, however, the comments caused no ripples in Washington or Tel Aviv because the shah was a staunch ally of both. Asked to comment on his contradictory views then and now, Kissinger said, “They were an allied country, and this was a commercial transaction. We didn’t address the question of them one day moving toward nuclear weapons.”7 Kissinger should have added that consistency has never been a strong point of U.S. foreign policy. Nukes and Party-Mad Dictators To fully understand the hypocrisy of U.S. foreign policy, we must travel back to the era of bell-bottoms, funny-looking polyester shirts, and party-mad dictators. In the early 1970s, Iran’s repressive dictator was perhaps most famous for his prodigious partying. In October 1971, Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi celebrated the 2,500th anniversary of the Persian empire with a lavish, three-day party on the site of the ancient city of Persepolis. Luminaries such as Vice President Spiro Agnew, Britain’s Prince Philip, and Ethiopian dictator Haile Selassie consumed twenty-five thousand bottles of French wine, five thousand bottles of champagne, and massive quantities of caviar flown in by Maxim’s of Paris. Iran’s per capita income was only $350 per year; the party cost an estimated $100 million.8 The excesses of the party helped fuel anger against the shah at home and abroad. But in those days, successive U.S. presidential administrations were tickled pink with the shah’s regime. As far as the United States was concerned, the shah had a stable government that was modernizing an economically and religiously backward society. True, he ran a brutal dictatorship unconstrained by elections or an independent judiciary. The National Security and Intelligence Organization (SAVAK), his secret police, was infamous for torturing and murdering political dissidents. But the shah made sure that Iran provided a steady supply of petroleum to U.S. and other Western oil companies. He had his own regional ambitions and also acted as a gendarme for the United States. Need an ally for Israel in the surrounding Arab world? The shah entered into military and intelligence agreements with the Israelis starting in 1958. Got a rebellion in the Gulf state of Oman? In the early 1970s, the shah sent three thousand troops to put down the leftist rebels9 and to ensure the region’s oil fields remained safe for him and the United States. Iran became America’s single biggest arms buyer. It bought $18.1 billion worth of U.S. arms from 1950 to 1977.10 U.S. anticommunist diplomacy, military expansion, and business profit all melded together nicely. And that’s where nuclear power comes in. Beginning in the late 1960s, the shah began to worry about Iran’s long-term electric energy supplies. Iran had fewer than five hundred thousand electricity consumers in 1963, but those numbers swelled to over two million in 1976.11 The shah worried that Iran’s oil deposits would eventually run out and that burning petroleum for electricity would waste an important resource. He could earn far more exporting oil than using it for power generation. Hermidas Bavand, second in command of Iran’s Mission to the United Nations under the shah and now a professor of international law at Allameh Tabatabaee University in Tehran, told me that the position of the shah on nuclear power was almost identical to that of the current Iranian government. Back then, proponents of nuclear power said Iran had to prepare for the day when the oil runs out. Secondly, said Bavand, “Iran had to keep up with scientific and technological” progress in the world. And Iran craved international prestige. Bavand said, “Many countries—Brazil, Argentina, Israel—were developing nuclear energy. So they thought that Iran should have nuclear power” as well.12
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By Jkoch, December 13, 2007 at 12:27 pm # Aman asks: "What about whenAman asks: “What about when Iran declares to upcoming anihilation of Israel? Should we take that litteraly as well?” Answer: Not a day goes by without half the Muslim world making some sort of grumble or fulmination against Israel. Little will ever come of it. Iran would be crazy to launch a first strike against Israel. However, until Iran is convinced that the US or Israel is not about to attack it, it will crave a definitive deterrent. Israelis know full well the implicit target of any Iranian counter-threat to US action, so one can understand their concern. However, it is futile to think that Iran’s regime will cease to seek the one thing that would rid it of all the saber rattling. Remember, the technology is over 60 years old, not all that hard to replicate, and virtually impossible to extricate from a regime that is smart enough to spread out the targets. Finally, China and Russia will veto our actions if we swagger too much. Obviously, China is too smart to meddle in Mideast occupations and focused more on buying oil wherever it can.
By cyrena, December 5, 2007 at 9:32 pm # #117899 by 1drees 1drees, My pleasure. I’m#117899 by 1drees 1drees, And then, there’s the internet. Which exposes us all, to people that we wouldn’t necessarily have been previously exposed, and because things are so bad, people get pissed when they hear stuff they don’t really wanna hear. So they either paranoid, (which is semi understandable, since there’s been nothing but lies, lies, and more lies for so long now, and they aren’t exactly ‘little ones’) or they blame the messenger. I’ve gotten used to it now. But, I’m like you, in that I’ll remember stuff from reading long ago, (since I’ve always done that) but I certainly don’t have anything close to ‘total recall’. So, the ONLY reason that I know at least some of this stuff now, is only because of returning to academia after a long career in something entirely different. (and now, I probably wouldn’t remember half of THAT stuff). Still, since returning, I’ve been studying all of this stuff again, so I have a more ‘refreshed’ knowledge of it. And, it helps that we can save the articles and journals and research work so easily now. I can’t imagine having to dig through the stacks the way I would have done in the old days, in order to verify something half-remembered. If that were the case, it would just have to stay ‘half-remembered’. Still, after a certain period of time on these posts, you get to figure out that most folks are reasonally pissed of in general, for the same reasons we all are. And others...well, what can I say? So, don’t sweat the small stuff. As long as YOU know what you’re talking about, that’s all that matters.
By 1drees, December 4, 2007 at 7:48 am # CYRENA : THANX, I know things through years of reading regularly BUT NEVER THOUGHT that i’d have to provide references from the daily newpapers and journals i read everyday for ages.
By 1drees, December 4, 2007 at 3:00 am # MARSHALL: And also NOTE , MANY Americans are talking of Convictions and such but I CAN GUARANTEE YOU that none of these “World Proven War Criminals “ will ever be prosecuted or convicted , as all of their crimes are very much “legitimised” through various channels. My sources of information are what I have been reading over the last atleast 20 years ( being an avid reader of World affairs since a very long time and used to read atleast 2 newspapers a day plus the weeklies and etc) So Comming to what I was trying to say was that the Reagan Administration ( who also introduced the concept of the NEW-WORLD-ORDER, if you might recollect) was, like I said before, DYING to damage IRAN at all costs and in that project which was being followed with MADDENING DEDICATION ( you might even find photos of Rumsfeld with Saddam during many of his special visits to IRAQ as another indicator, if you can accept indicators and understand the then mad rush to destroy IRAN then), they simply bent a lot of rules LEGALLY , like i said, known and proven weapons utilities were given false certifications to get the stuff past the DOPES/STOOGES in congress and other relative offices. IRAQ was provided the DEADLIEST TECHNOLOGY available and then the best chemical weapons were US and they were supplied other wise how did your govt in 2003 know the exact quantities to look for? nope it was not the UN weapons inspectors that were sources. (Although most of the UN weapons Inspectors were actually covertly on the US payroll. OK maybe today you cant find any exact proof to satisfy your curiosity Mr Marshall BUT these are well known facts that USA used to sent EVERYTHING ASAP and in that era they were shipping everything and IRAQ was being helped to the MAXIMUM, anything it would ask for it would get really soon, no matter what papers had to be prepared and no matter how the papers had to be prepared. USA armed that soviet block country to the hilt in its madness to damage IRAN, I mean the SCUD carrying extra heavy duty trucks (which were known weapons capabililty and were not usually offered to many other allies) were papered as “agricultural equipment” and passed on. Ciao.
By 1drees, December 3, 2007 at 1:06 pm # MARSHALL: See http://www.counterpunch.org/boles1010.html and that might shed some light to clarify your concepts. BEST WISHES, HAPPY HUNTING FOR THE TRUTH. #117700 by Marshall on 12/03 at 10:35 am #117670 by 1drees on 12/03 at 8:40 am “IRAQ used American supplied chemical weapons quiet frequently as per American provided directions.” The US did not supply chemical weapons to Iraq. Early on, the US did supply materials, called “precursors”, which could be used in the production of chemical weapons as well as non-military applications.
By sophrosyne, December 3, 2007 at 1:02 pm # Good article. It is so difficult to be an intelligent voter in America when so much is hidden from us by our own government. One has to assume Bush lies at every opportunity and the lack of trust is erroding our democracy. USA slavery to israel’s interests is extemely damaging to us and we continue to let it happen.
By dsmith, December 3, 2007 at 10:38 am # If Israel is pushing for the bombing of Iran, let them do it! Let Israeli mothers and fathers do the weeping for a while as the dead bodies of their sons come home in body bags. Let their hospitals become loaded with men whose facial features have been burned off. Let them become the hated war mongers around the world. (Neocon Norman Podhoretz, adviser to Rudy, says he is praying, that’s right praying for the US to attack Iran so that the US will be hated as much as Israel.) What an ally these Israeli/Americans are. But of course, Zionist fanatics like Kissinger, Podhoretz, Goldberg, Krauthammer, Kristol would rather fight against defenseless people like the Palestinians. In the case of Iran they definately want the goys to do it. You see...Jews are the chosen poeple. What a crock!
By 1drees, December 3, 2007 at 8:40 am # It might a few people if they knew a couple of International facts that the US MSM press maybe “forgets” to mention and that is When the Iranian revolutions was still red hot and the grand Ayatollah ( who I am sure has always been labelled as the raving madman by the MSM )was leading the REVOLUTION, he had decided & DECLARED ( yes he was the decider) that IRAN or any shiite will never use NUCLEAR weapons as that weapon kept on killing long after it was discharged. and hence similarly chemical weapons were also despised nd it ws sworn tht they will be enver used and then during the IRAN-IRAQ war IRAN never used the weapons even when IRAQ used American supplied chemical weapons quiet frequently as per American provided directions.
By aman, December 3, 2007 at 8:31 am # “Today when Iran demands that it be able to enrich uranium for nuclear power purposes, under strict international supervision, the United States says that’s proof Iran wants to develop nuclear weapons.” - What about when Iran declares to upcoming anihilation of Israel? Should we take that litteraly as well? Add Your Comment |
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