Published in Tehran-based English daily Iran News – January 8, 1998, p. 1
By Dariush Sajjadi
TEHRAN – In a famous speech delivered in New York more than four decades ago, then Iranian Prime Minister Dr. Mohammad Mosaddeq defended Iran’s nationalization of its oil industry. He referred to the 1773 Boston Tea Party (uprising against British colonialism), calling it a legitimate act by the American people in the defense of their rights.
NEWS ANALYSIS
Forty-six years later and after 18 years of frosty Tehran-Washington relations, Iranian President Mohammad Khatami, in his address to the American people, analyzed the nature of ties between the two countries in the same vein as Mosaddeq. He surveyed the history of the civilization of freedom-loving and religious Americans and called the present state of Tehran-Washington ties a result of the flawed policies adopted by some US statesmen.
Like Mosaddeq, Khatami proved knowledgeable about the history of American civilization. He also demonstrated that he is a shrewd politician with the courage to initiate a logical dialogue with the outside world.
Talking of how the American civilization took shape, Khatami whose knowledge of US history is decidedly influenced by the renowned French sociologist Alexis de Tocqueville, said this civilization is the product of efforts by a religious and freedom-seeking nation.
The President praised the American nation’s toleration of different views. He also reserved the right of the Iranian nation to rely on the most progressive vision of Islam in its quest for freedom to determine its political fate as is done by the American nation.
Subtly presenting reasons for the strong reactions of Iranians to the US government and its policies after the Islamic Revolution, Khatami said the American people did not blame Ho Chi Minh’s soldiers for killing American GIs during the Vietnam War. This, he said, is indicative of the American peoples’ understanding of the legitimate right of the Vietnamese to defend themselves in the face of foreign aggression.
He also said the Americans humiliated the Iranians over the past half century, and called it the reason for the negative attitude of Iranians toward America in the early years of the Revolution. By the same token, he said, the US should not blame Iran either.
In his interview with CNN, Khatami welcomed cultural ties between the Iranian and American nations and said American politicians are not keeping pace with the times and are unable to get rid of their Cold War mentality of dictating their policies by recourse to military muscle.
In fact, Washington has so far not been able – or willing – to forget its dream of world supremacy, a dream it nurtured during the Cold War era.
Given the rigidity of the American political paradigm and structure, the US is still naively striving to use the same political means it gained during its Cold War supremacy.
The stagnated American diplomacy, in the course of the years, prompted its European allies to seize a historical opportunity to decide their own policies independent of the United States and to strengthen their ties with Iran.
The European non-compliance with the d’Amato Law and the return of European Union (EU) envoys to Tehran after the Mykonos trial indicate that the Europeans are politically more up-to-date than the Americans.
The age-old American diplomacy has made the US statesmen similar to the inflexible Inspector Javer*, as they fail to understand the New World Order and, with bias, insist on the fossilized principles of the Cold War. Handicapped by this obstinacy, the US statesmen cannot understand the Iranian government.
While referring to this rigidity, Khatami, in his interview with CNN, did not regard such diplomacy compatible with the freedom-loving American civilization and questioned the legitimacy of the US Administration’s performance.
Western media launched an extensive publicity campaign about Khatami’s message to the American people, which they said was a sign of Iran’s willingness to establish ties with the US. On the whole, Khatami proved he had nothing new to say on the issue of establishing relations with the US.
He put the entire responsibility on the US, saying Washington should abstain from adopting hostile policies toward Iran. While using a commending tone in his address to the American people, Khatami aimed at creating a new front inside the US for public pressure against the US Administration.
The novel point about the address was the tone used by Khatami. Contrary to other officials of the Islamic Republic who always used a humiliating tone when discussing the US and scorned their culture, Khatami praised the American civilization.
CNN correspondent, Christiane Amanpour, persistently and enthusiastically tried to obtain a verbal guarantee from Khatami to the effect that Iran would not support terrorism.
In a retrospective response, Khatami defined terrorism and differentiated it from a nation’s legitimate defense vis-à-vis usurpers. He said Iran does not support terrorism and stressed that this has been a principle of the Iranian government ever since the victory of the Islamic Revolution.
In case Khatami had furnished a forward-looking response, Washington could have interpreted it as Iran’s confession of past support for terrorism and a sign of Iran’s retreat from its stances, as well as a signal of willingness to improve ties with the US.
This indicates that the US, on the one hand, is trying to find an opening to start moving toward Iran, and on the other hand, in order to retain its international prestige, does not want to take the first step for establishment of relations with Iran without obtaining any concessions from Tehran.
Moreover, even if Khatami has any penchant for establishment of relations with the US Administration, he will not, logically, accept such a high risk without obtaining any political concessions from the US in advance.
At present, anyone who takes the first step to establish ties with the US without obtaining concessions from Washington to justify the move and to appease the domestic pressure groups, would be committing political suicide, regardless of his official position.
Notwithstanding limitations and restrictions faced by Tehran and Washington regarding establishment of ties, the two countries have grown so far apart that they must first bridge the gap in their political paradigms before they can initiate any diplomatic dialogues.
Currently both Iran and the US use their lack of relations as an indication of prestige. Iran refers to US imperialism, glorifies the absence of relations with the US, and legitimizes its own revolutionary image in the Third World, while the US accuses Iran of supporting terrorism and advancing anarchy in the international system. This US move is aimed at portraying itself as the defender of democracy in the eyes of the world public opinion.
Against this backdrop of mistrust, the prospect of the two countries’ relations is hazy, and there seems to be no hope of Tehran-Washington reconciliation in the near future.
* Inspector Javer is a character in Victor Hugo’s Le Miserables.
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