During the campaign debates between the major party presidential candidates, the two candidates essentially agreed on almost every subject. Romney claimed that Obama’s policies had failed and then announced that he would follow the same failed policies. On Iran the only disagreement was who would be the tougher president. Under Obama, the U.S. has engaged in economic warfare by imposing a unilateral sanctions regime and has strong armed other countries into abiding by the sanctions. The resulting economic dislocation, aggravated by mismanagement by the Iranian government, has had a significant impact on the economy. Oil exports have plummeted, contributing to a precipitous decline in the value of the rial. This decline, along with financial restrictions on marine insurance and funds transfer , have contributed to rising inflation and have made it difficult to import even essential goods such as medical equipment and drugs.
Despite all of the political noise, there has been almost no discussion about whether or not the sanctions policy is being effective in achieving its objectives and no discussion about the morality of economic warfare on the Iranian people.
Following the First Gulf War, the U.S. and its allies imposed draconian sanctions on Iraq designed to “punish the Iraqi people”. These sanctions destroyed the Iraqi healthcare and educational systems and resulted in hundreds of thousands of unnecessary Iraqi deaths. (See here) Madeleine Albright (then US UN ambassador) declared on 60 Minutes that “the price is worth it”. In 1998 Denis Halliday, the UN administrator of the oil-for-food program, resigned to protest the sanctions saying, “We are in the process of destroying an entire country” and calling them “nothing less than genocide’. His replacement, Hans von Sponeck, resigned in 2000 denouncing the sanctions as “criminal policy”. (See here) As we head down the same path in Iran, the same descriptions apply.
The stated objectives behind the sanctions on Iran have been variously stated to be: to force Iran to abandon or change its nuclear program or to provoke civil unrest resulting in the overthrow of the Iranian government. The decade long enhanced sanctions regime has accomplished neither of these objectives. In the past decade, Iran has gone from a small number of centrifuges creating a small amount of low enriched uranium to thousands of centrifuges creating a large amount of 20% enriched uranium. The regime has withstood the large demonstrations surrounding the 2009 elections.
While accurate polling in Iran by western pollsters is difficult, it is not impossible. Recent polls show that there is little appetite for regime change. 85% of Iranians say it is important for Iran to have a civilian nuclear program. 65% blamed the worsening economy on western sanctions and only 11% on government mismanagement. 76% have an unfavorable view of the US. These and other results (See here) show that the theory that, if pressured enough, Iranians will rise against their government is wrong. Secondly, the more Iranians suffer, the more they blame those imposing the sanctions and not their own government.
It is time for our political leaders, whoever they may be, to rethink the Iran policy on which they so much agree.
1 comment:
This kind of reflects my assessment.
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