Posted By Lara Friedman Sunday, March 14, 2010 - 10:34 PM Share
Recently
I was talking with a friend from the military-intelligence world about the
mounting pressure on Congress to pass the Iran Refined Petroleum Sanctions Act
- legislation aimed at "crippling" Iran's civilian economy. Reportedly a
House-Senate conference is already informally underway trying to craft a
consensus version of the bill, and last week AIPAC sent a message to every
Member of Congress urging that IRPSA be enacted "without delay."
I explained that in my view sanctions aimed at civilians were a bad idea, and
that sanctions in general, while a potentially powerful tool, do not, on their
own constitute a policy. My friend's response? "Sanctions are the
sign of a failed policy, period."
He
makes a good point. Fundamentally, sanctions
are how the US tells a foreign government:
we don't like you, we can't convince you to see things our way, and we
can't (or aren't ready to) overthrow you - so get ready to feel some pain.
But
many people today are operating under the delusion that sanctions are about
more than inflicting pain. They seem to
believe that the message of sanctions is: you will see things our way or we
will sanction you into submission.
Where
does this delusion come from? Maybe back
in 1960, when the US first imposed sanctions on Cuba, someone could have
believed this. But today? Sanctions
still haven't worked in Cuba (unless you define "working" as impoverishing the
population). They didn't work in Haiti
or Iraq. They aren't working today in North Korea, Syria, or Gaza (or even
Iran, where far-reaching sanctions have been in place for three decades).
The
record is clear: sanctions may make angry Americans and frustrated policymakers
feel less impotent, but they don't force regimes to fold or change their
behavior, and they don't motivate populations to overthrow their leaders. In fact, they usually have the opposite
effect.
Here
is where supporters of sanctions will raise, triumphantly, the case of South Africa. But South Africa is the exception that proves
the rule. Because South Africa is the
one case where sanctions were about supporting the self-identified interests of
a large portion of that country's population.
In every other case, sanctions have been about promoting US interests,
not the interests of the people bearing their brunt. We sanctioned the Castro regime because we refused
to tolerate Communism so close to home. We
sanctioned Gaza because we rejected any dealings with Hamas. We sanctioned Iraq because we decided that
Saddam Hussein had become an irredeemable enemy of the US. We started sanctioning Iran because we decided
that the Iranian regime was beyond the pale. And - no surprise - in every case except South
Africa, the populations that were expected to rise up and act as tools of US
foreign policy obstinately refused to cooperate.
And
so we return to Iran.
Historically
speaking my friend is right: the US-led Iran sanctions regime - which dates to
the bad-old-days of the embassy takeover - signaled the failure of America's Iran
policy. We don't need to re-hash the
ugly history that led to this failure.
It is enough to recognize that thirty years ago the US decided: until something significant changes, we are
abandoning policy in favor of sanctions and saber-rattling.
That
was then. This is now.
And
now Iran represents an acute foreign policy challenge to the US and the world.
The kind of challenge that demands sober, rational policy reflecting
clearly-defined, well-understood, prioritized objectives. Objectives like getting Iran to abandon any
pursuit of nuclear weapons and accept stringent international oversight of its
nuclear energy program; to stop supporting terrorist groups; to end activities
that undermine US efforts to stabilize Iraq and Afghanistan; to cease
belligerent anti-Israel rhetoric; and to respect international norms of human
rights and civil liberties inside Iran.
Is
this a call to end sanctions against Iran?
Not at all. I still believe that
smart, targeted sanctions can be a powerful tool for putting pressure on Iran,
as part of a broader strategy that uses engagement and pressure - bilateral and
multilateral. And even if existing
sanctions have failed to achieve US foreign policy goals, they unquestionably represent
leverage that the US can use as part of a smart, resolute diplomatic strategy
today. Can such a strategy work? Maybe.
The truth is, nobody knows, because it's never been tried.
But
let's not kid ourselves about what adding new sanctions will achieve. New Iran sanctions may represent valuable domestic
political currency in the US, and new targeted, multilateral sanctions could
have some impact on the margins and send an important message to Iran that the
international community is united. But
in terms of achieving US foreign policy objectives, new sanctions on their own
won't do the job - and unilateral US sanctions targeting civilians will likely
backfire.
And
more broadly speaking, persisting in making sanctions the primary focus of the
US approach to Iran will be a signal of the continuing failure of US policy,
not of a new US seriousness to confront this major foreign policy challenge.
How do you suggest stoping Iran from aquiring nuclear weapons, the Iranian people are angry at their gov't and if we will slap harsh senctions they won't we like north Korea, they will know where to point the finger. They are a vonurable huge country which imports lots of oil.
If you think that sanctions won't help or only putting soft sanctions those won't have much effect, than I don't understand what you want to do, the only options left are a military strike, the obama administration has wasted lots of time this year, they are not taken seriously in the world anymore, they set up deadlines for talks and they were decieved again by the Iranian masters of manipulations, the arabs are more scared of Iran than anyone else even Israel and they are losing their trust in the white house .
I don't think that many in the U.S understand the implicatios of a Nuclear Iran, it will definitly do what it likes and achieve hagemonial power. and the U.S will just pay more in the long run. It is almost like world war 2 when the leadres of the free world could have chosen to act and save the world before they had to drag themselves war into a chaotic war because they didn't act on time Obama can choos eto either save the world now or make it pay an unknown huge price later.
How do you suggest stoping Iran from aquiring nuclear weapons, the Iranian people are angry at their gov't and if we will slap harsh senctions they won't we like north Korea, they will know where to point the finger. They are a vonurable huge country which imports lots of oil.
If you think that sanctions won't help or only putting soft sanctions those won't have much effect, than I don't understand what you want to do, the only options left are a military strike, the obama administration has wasted lots of time this year, they are not taken seriously in the world anymore, they set up deadlines for talks and they were decieved again by the Iranian masters of manipulations, the arabs are more scared of Iran than anyone else even Israel and they are losing their trust in the white house .
I don't think that many in the U.S understand the implicatios of a Nuclear Iran, it will definitly do what it likes and achieve hagemonial power. and the U.S will just pay more in the long run. It is almost like world war 2 when the leadres of the free world could have chosen to act and save the world before they had to drag themselves war into a chaotic war because they didn't act on time Obama can choos eto either save the world now or make it pay an unknown huge price later.
Several think tank studies have been publicized in the previous few months, including from Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, and the Brookings Institute.
The exercizes point to problems with military strikes and now sanctions.
What's left, is "diplomacy", which was initiated last year, and then stopped, and now "containment". The latest is the resurfacing of the containment document originally written by "X" back in the early part of the Cold War, as a plan to respond to the Soviet's attempt to obtain nuclear weapons.
Several thoughts come to mind though over the pursuit of "containment". First, in included several regional wars, including Korea, Viet Nam, and in the Middle East.
Second, Diplomacy, dealt with direct contact between the principals. In the case of Iran, It has outright rejected direct contact with the United States, and its principal realm of conflict includes Israel, which Iran's leaders, since the days of Ayatollah Khomenei, rests on a platform of outright rejection and scheduled destruction.
Iran is backing up its policies with two proxy armies on Israel's borders, HAMAS and Hizballah.
So the question becomes, what does "containment" entail, and what sort of diplomacy, will bring Iran to the table to actually walk away from its quest for nuclear weapons much less its policy of military adventurism.
What's disconcerting about the diplomacy only as the planned policy, is that it comes even as both the NIE and IAEA are hinting that new conclusions regarding Iran's nuclear intentions will be published in the near future, and that both groups are emphasizing a more hostile and active picture of Iran's nuclear activities.
Of course the alternative policy that the Obama administration could take is abdication of its allies in the Middle East, and given the hostility towards Israel and genuflection towards states such as Syria and Libya, wouldn't be an entire shock.
what would forsaking Israel (an ally in the region) actually gain us? Would it really endear the US to Syria, Libya, and the like? Some how I doubt that it would. If anything it would send a very bad message to our other allies around the world.
Not to mention that the US has a legal obligation to support Israel.
There are two levers that the US could push. Unfortunately, we don't see either happening soon.
The first is Iraq. More focused is the push to expand Iraq's oil exports. While there have been some stirrings by both the Iraqi government, OPEC, and the US, to expand the production capacity of Iraqi fields, such increases take time and investment. But to date, I have seen little in the way of advancement of Iraqi production and capacity.
Second, is the push towards alternative fuels. This week's Economist highlights the potential reserves and lower price of liquid natural gas (LNG), and how there are large quantities of the energy in North America.
Given the environmental benefit of this resource, especially over coal and oil, and the expected price decline of that market, so too, could you find a large rise in demand, depending on its use.
The increase in these two sources, could have a significant impact on the price of oil, which is what Iran relies on to fund its regime.
The old figure thrown out is that Iran needs oil prices around the $90/ barrel mark to fund its operations, including domestic subsidies and foreign armies.
But if that's the plan, then no one in Washington has been promoting such a diplomatic push.
The closest hint of this is that Dutch Royal Shell announced that it will stop selling gasoline to Iran.
Baby steps or just random actions? Either way, I haven't seen any public coordinated efforts since last fall, after Iran rejected the US ovature to Iran to enrich its uranium overseas, in return for nuclear raw material that could not be enriched to weapons grade levels.
Overall, I agree that sanctions are not an end in itself. History is indicative of so many sanctions packages failing in their main objective, which is to weaken an adversary or at least change regime behavior. Despite three decades of strong economic sanctions on the Iranian economy, nothing beneficial has resulted for the United States. In fact, these same punishments have only emboldened the Iranian regime to act in a more provocative fashion. Iran's support for terrorist groups in the Middle East continues unabated, and of course, Tehran's nuclear program is still pressing on without any difficulty (and no, technical problems don't count).
And you can't forget about other examples, like Iraq, where an unsuccessful sanctions regiment was used as an excuse to start thinking about that infamous 2003 invasion.
But sanctions aren't all bad? What about the Libyan example, where economic pressure essentially forced Muammar Gaddafi to abandon his WMD program? Sure, it took close to thirty years of U.S. saber-rattling to finally get Gaddafi to clean up his act, but the campaign did eventually work.
Now obviously a couple of factors were at work. The Libyan Government was already feeling the heat from decades of international neglect, partly due to Gaddafi's support for terrorism and partly due to Libya's crumbling domestic infrastructure. But sanctions put his whole predicament over the edge. And the result was nothing but transformative...an end of nuclear proliferation in North Africa.
None of this is to say that unilateral sanctions on Iran will work. In fact, I don't think they will; the Iranians are intent on building a nuclear capability, and it appears that nothing will deter them from taking the next step. But before we totally diss economic sanctions as a national security policy, we should take an in-depth look into history.
Incorrect assertion about ineffectiveness of sanctions and wrong comparison between countries mentioned in the article.
Cuba is sanctioned only by USA not intentionally, check Cuba's data and visit Cuba .
Iraq's sanction did not work as such because of Russia, and "Arab brother" countries helped Saddam all the way through, needless to mention the corrupt regime of Saddam where his inner circle and only Baath Party, the minority Sunnis were sole recipient of smuggled oil revenue and most of oil income spent for purchasing arms.
North Korea's sanction is not working because big brother China making sure sanction doesn't work and clandestine arm sales to countries like Iran, Syria will help the regime but not the people.
Gaza is not working because there is no international sanction against them, but they receive their money from Arab and Iranian regimes on a regular basis and Palestinian life is the same as it was since last 50 years; simply miserable .
In reality there was not any meaningful sanction against Iran; because: All counties including USA are trading with Iran, USA direct trade is less than the others but subsidiaries of USA companies are quite active in Iran, also Russia , Europe and of course China, are not complying with so called partial sanction imposed so far, check export/trade by each of these countries to/from Iran, you will be surprised.
A tight, comprehensive all out sanction, a meaningful, truthfully sanction including embargo of oil and gas definitely will work, provided there is no cheating. This must include the water ways in Persian Gulf, and air space. Do not forget 80% of Iranian income comes from selling oil and other oil products, and most of these income is not reaching Iranian people.
Granted, the US is successfully pursuing tighter trade sanctions on Iran, but at the end of the day, you're going to go face to face with a smuggling operation through the Gulf or through Afghanistan, which has a border pourous enough that the Iranian border guards can't stop smuggling of drugs into their country.
And then there is Iraq. An awful lot of oil can get smuggled through the border and into Syria.
Of course on the flip side, there is the blockade of refined gasoline into Iran which could really put the thumbscrews to the regime.
But in both cases, you need to get China to play along, and at present, they show Zero inclination in following this path.
In truth, market sanctions would provide the most complete and effective form of blocking Iranian trade.
This means helping Iraq buildup its drilling and transportation resources, and pushing the distribution and use of LNG (Liquid Natural Gas).
Here is the link to the Economist article I mentioned above.
But again, the caveat to both paths is time, or the lack thereof before Iran completes its objective of obtaining a nuclear device and delivery system. Big system projects take more time to filter through the economy than internet breakthroughs.
Of course that said, when they do work, they have significant impacts. Remember it was 1991 when oil hit relative highs, and only eight years later, 1999, when it was sold for under $1.00 per gallon... including taxes.
Iranian political ambitions facing oil of $10 a barrel get crushed.
Incorrectness of the author ( in my opinion) motivated me to write what I wrote, however you are asking different venue where I think need more time and patience for me to reply and I leave it to some other time. Meanwhile I thought you may like to see other thought/ideas in this attached link.
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