Sunday, June 16, 2013

Iran: Pretend Move to Moderation Shakes Up Everything‏

Barry Rubin

Hasan Rowhani, the only reformist candidate allowed in Iran’s presidential election, has won a landslide victory. There won’t even need to be a second, run-off round since he won over 50 percent of the vote.

It would be easy to subject this to instant analysis, for example saying that it is so that the Tehran regime could claim moderation and thus stall for time to build nuclear weapons, or that the masses simply overwhelmed the regime so that his victory was undeniable. Perhaps the regime figured that a second straight election stolen by the regime from the reformists--the previous one was in 2009--would set off a revolt.

The scoops largely belong to the New York Times Thomas Erdbrink who reported that Tehran has turned into a massive street celebration. The police and militia vigilantes stayed off the streets where pop songs ruled instead of regime dress standards. People chanted, Erdbrink tweeted, “We are celebrating that we are free after 8 years of Ahmadinejad."

Since supreme guide Ali Khamenei congratulated Rowhani it appears that the rulers have accepted his victory and he will not be denied office.

No matter what the regime's intentions or acceptance, the outcome will be this:

1. Rowhani will have little power. Remember that a moderate already served eight years as president and accomplished nothing.

2. A lot of Iranians will be very happy.

3. There will be many analysts and politicians and government officials saying that since Iran has now turned in a moderate direction, it must be given a chance to show whether this is true.

4. Therefore, the Obama Administration will spend the rest of 2013 in exploratory negotiations as Iran moves forward toward nuclear weapons. People will talk about gestures toward Iran like reducing sanctions and certainly not increasing them. Russia, Turkey, and China will continue to get waivers on sanctions.

5.  This will have no effect on U.S. policy in Syria, giving weapons to rebels.

Many analysts--including myself--cynically suggested that the election would be once again fixed so a regime candidate would win. In retrospect, of course, this was wrong. In hindsight, perhaps it was a tip-off (if the regime wanted Rowhani to win--that it let in several regime supporters who took votes from each other. In the end, though, it didn't matter. The key decision was to allow an honest tally of votes.

At any rate, while the Iran regime has not changed policy really, many will think it has done so. If the regime really wanted to change its aggressive and nuclear-oriented policy, it would have put into power a regime supporter who would announce a new set of positions. At any rate, all of these questions about Iranian politics and foreign policy will have to be seriously evaluated now.  


 
Professor Barry Rubin, Director, Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center http://www.gloria-center.org
Forthcoming Book: Nazis, Islamists, and the Making of the Modern Middle East (Yale University Press)
The Rubin Report blog http://rubinreports.blogspot.com/
He is a featured columnist at PJM http://pajamasmedia.com/barryrubin/. 
Editor, Middle East Review of International Affairs (MERIA) Journal http://www.gloria-center.org

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