IRAN´S BARGAINING TIGHTROPE IN VIENNA / GEOPOLITICAL FUTURES

Iran’s Bargaining Tightrope in Vienna

Tehran may be setting its sights too high in the nuclear negotiations.

By: Hilal Khashan

Last February, the U.S. expressed its willingness to return to negotiations to revive the 2015 Iran nuclear deal known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action. 

Former Iranian President Hassan Rouhani lauded Tehran’s humiliation of “the Great Satan” and predicted the immediate removal of sanctions. 

His remark was a testament to the Iranian regime’s failure to understand how the U.S. formulates its foreign policy on matters of national interest. 

Iran’s principal objective in participating in talks with the U.S. in Vienna was to gradually remove all the sanctions imposed by Washington. 

Iranian negotiators insist that they are fully committed to abiding by the terms of a nuclear agreement, and are even willing to go beyond the sunset provisions for resuming their atomic activities and to keep extensive monitoring in place for additional years. 

But they say the U.S. is reluctant to lift all sanctions – and is now even demanding the release of four American prisoners in Iran – which, in their opinion, creates a significant hurdle in the two countries’ search for a balanced agreement.

Lifting of All Sanctions Unlikely

Since the beginning of the negotiations last April, Iran has made it clear that its regional activities and missile program are off the table. 

Contrary to the solemn mood in Tehran, Iranian negotiators have regularly touted the progress being made in Vienna, even as they returned last December for the eighth round of talks. 

Iran’s lead negotiator alluded to the U.S.’ firm position on Iran’s non-nuclear activities, saying a win-win outcome is possible when good intentions supersede suspicion and intransigence. 

U.S. officials have opposed wholesale termination of the sanctions regime on Iran because not all of them are related to its nuclear program.

U.S. officials, including President Joe Biden, frequently refer to Iran’s destabilizing activities, including its use of regional proxies in Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and Yemen, as compelling justifications for maintaining some sanctions. 

Last year, Secretary of State Antony Blinken expressed the U.S.’ unwavering resolve to impose “the toughest possible sanctions to deal with Iranian support for terrorism.” 

Blinken’s deputy, Wendy Sherman, echoed his statement when she emphasized the U.S.’ determination “to keep sanctions that deal with human rights abuses, [and] state sponsorship of terrorism.”

For the U.S., eliminating all sanctions would require more than Tehran’s compliance with the terms of an agreed-upon nuclear deal; it would necessitate a change in its regional behavior. 

And Biden has made some concessions to push Iran in this direction. 

Shortly after taking office, he removed the Iranian-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen from the foreign terrorist organization list to encourage a negotiated settlement to the conflict there. 

Iran, however, did not persuade its Houthi allies to scale down their offensive to grab more territory. 

Biden also ignored Iran’s oil sales to China that violated the sanctions. But his goodwill gestures had little impact on how Iran conducted its regional policy.

Iranian negotiators went to Vienna, assuming the U.S. wanted to close the nuclear issue at any cost before withdrawing from the Middle East to focus on the Pacific. 

The Iranian public viewed with suspicion the diplomatic skills of President Ebrahim Raisi’s negotiating team in Vienna, perceiving them as less adept than Rouhani’s experienced diplomats. 

Raisi, a hardliner who previously opposed the negotiations, instructed his Vienna team to make maximalist demands such as assurances of the immediate lifting of the sanctions and guarantees that there would be no snap back to U.S. and U.N. sanctions.

Why Must Iran Settle for Less?

Success in the Vienna talks hinges not on removing all sanctions but on making sanctions relief resilient. 

Iran has no delusions that some sanctions will remain in place. 

It badly needs a truce with the U.S., a cease-fire to reclaim some of its $100 billion in frozen foreign assets, to finance its foreign policy goals and urgent domestic needs. 

Iran cannot afford a failure in the Vienna talks because it would mean tightening the stranglehold on its struggling economy at best, coupled with possible military action against its nuclear facilities should the diplomatic route break down.

Before reaching the JCPOA, Iran’s economy registered a growth rate of -1.3 percent. In 2016, it grew by 13.4 percent. 

After President Donald Trump withdrew the U.S. from the nuclear deal and reimposed austere sanctions, Iran’s economy dipped back into recession with -6.8 percent growth. 

Iran cannot afford the consequences of additional sanctions and the repercussions of war amid growing public discontent.

Biden has given Raisi’s administration ample time to moderate its policies and lower its expectations about dropping the sanctions without fundamentally transforming Tehran’s aggressive policies. 

Time is running out, and failure to reach an agreement, even if provisional, will be at Iran’s expense. 

Raisi remains adamant, however. 

In a defiant speech on the Islamic Revolution’s 43rd anniversary, he shouted angrily that the Iranian leadership put its hope “in the east, west, north, south … and never had hope in Vienna and New York.” 

His speech rang hollow because Iran wouldn’t have gone to Vienna had it not hoped to achieve a diplomatic breakthrough without compromising its regional ambitions. 

Iran’s relations with Arab nations are in turmoil because of its relentless campaign to coerce them to recognize its regional preeminence. 

Russia and China have no interest in Iran’s rise as a dominant regional power, and they only support Tehran to undermine Western interests in the Gulf.

We do not entirely know what’s going on in Vienna, especially since Blinken said the U.S. has concerns beyond Iran’s controversial nuclear program. 

It would not have been that difficult to return to the JCPOA if there were no other issues. 

Several other countries, such as Argentina and South Africa, had nuclear programs that caused alarm, but these fears were resolved with the International Atomic Energy Agency. 

Iran’s issues with the West and Middle Eastern countries exceed its nuclear program, threatening as it is, extending to its destabilizing regional policies.

Considering Iran’s restive population, Raisi does not have the luxury of allowing his negotiators in Vienna to maintain their adamant posture. 

While Raisi was celebrating the revolution’s anniversary, angry Iranians in Tehran posted signs on the streets reading “death to the dictator and the Islamic Republic.” 

In Fardis city, posters about the expiry of the supreme leader’s sanctity tainted his once irreproachable image.

Iran’s Unachievable Ambitions

Iran is playing a risky game that it cannot win. 

It presents itself as a model for humanity but is unwilling to behave as a normal country and eschew meddling in its neighbors’ internal affairs because the ruling conservatives believe they are on a mission to export the revolution and achieve a preeminent status in world affairs. 

A former foreign affairs minister made the ideological choice very clear, saying: “We have chosen to live in a different way [and] we do not want someone telling us how to live.”

Tehran is unwilling to abandon its regional ambitions and proxies whose operations made Iran a regional power, overshadowing Saudi Arabia, Egypt and the United Arab Emirates and competing only with Israel. 

It prefers to live with some sanctions to save its four decades of achievements rather than being forced to retreat and focus solely on domestic politics, which would imply that the Islamic Revolution has failed.

Iran took its subversion to Turkey, its economic lifeline to the outside world. 

Turkish authorities recently arrested 14 members of a espionage group responsible for kidnapping Iranian opposition activists, illegally repatriating them to Iran, and planning to assassinate an Israeli businessman to avenge the killing of nuclear scientist Mohsen Fakhrizadeh in November 2020. 

In addition, a shadowy, pro-Iranian group in Iraq named True Promise Brigades warned the UAE that its attacks are not limited to drone and ballistic missiles. 

It urged Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Mohammad bin Zayed to seize the opportunity and extricate the UAE from Yemen’s war before destroying the progress it has made since its formation in 1971. 

The warning coincided with advice from Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah, who told UAE leaders that the best defense for their country was to withdraw from the war in Yemen. 

The U.S and Israel responded to the hostility of Iran’s Yemeni and Iraqi proxies by pledging to defend Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates against their aggression.

In recent weeks, the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen has achieved significant territorial advances against the Houthis, pushing them back from oil-rich Shabwa and most of Marib, in addition to a critical stronghold in the Houthi heartland in Saada. 

Territorial acquisition in Yemen will determine the shape of any negotiated settlement to end the war. 

In Syria, Israel has launched more than 1,000 air raids against Iranian-linked groups like al-Quds Brigade, Iraqi Shiite militias and Hezbollah. 

The Israeli command was reluctant to launch the first air raid in 2013 for fear of reprisal. 

To its surprise, neither the Syrian regime nor Iran and its proxies retaliated. 

Israel conducted subsequent air raids, including recent commando operations, with impunity. 

Evicting Iran from Syria is a critical Israeli objective that the Russians do not oppose despite their public opposition. 

Iran remains unwilling to live in harmony with its neighbors. 

Its ruling mullahs subscribe to medieval divine right thinking. 

Their domestic policies, let alone foreign adventures, do not align with Iran’s secular-minded people. 

The Iranians staged two revolutions in the 20th century, in 1905 and 1979. 

Anglo-Russian meddling sabotaged the first, and Khomeini hijacked the second. 

It is always the third that works.