Detente or Appeasement?e

The regime in Tehran is not prone to moderate least of all because it is weak and internally fragile. The regime cannot concede on what matters most to the rest of the world; i.e. stop its support of sectarianism and terrorism in Iraq, Lebanon, the Gulf States, and Palestine; desist from pursuing an 18 year clandestine nuclear weapons program; and stop the gross and systematic violation of human rights in its own country. The reason is very simply that it was founded on the export of revolution (read Islamic fundamentalism) as a balance to its domestic problems and deep unpopularity. A close study of the modus operandi of the Iranian domestic and foreign policy, its state structure and internal conflicts, its close knit relationship to radical and regressive Islamist forces in the region, will reveal that the regime lacks a capacity for real change and thus for moderation and the sort of détente that Takeyh proposes.

Détente is based on the interaction of two rational state parties with a mutual interest in deescalating an existing state of animosity and conflict. The Iranian regime thrives on such animosity and will melt in its absence. So either the US must succumb to our Iran pundits unfounded policy suggestions and unilaterally deescalate by giving much and receiving little in substance, or pressure must be maintained and mounted on the regime to a point where the process of internal regime change will yield an Iran that is a responsible state actor and member of the international community of nations.

Indeed, a historical convergence of interests might be occurring to the benefit of the Iranian people’s long struggle for liberty and democracy in their homeland, for world security and peace, for regional stability and progress, and for the uprooting of the terrorist and Islamic fundamentalist scourge.

The US Administration and indeed the EU would be well advised to steer clear of snake oil salesmen and to pursue a determined policy of isolating the Iranian regime and supporting dissident opposition movements for democratic change in Iran. A key step would be to delist the main Iranian opposition movement of the PMOI (MEK) and the NCRI who were put on the list initially during the Clinton Administration as part of the ill-conceived appeasement of then Iranian president Khatami.

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