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Defense Professional
Join Date: 12-10-04
Location: Seattle, WA
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This is a pretty good article on the Russian angle:
Quote:
Russia’s Position on Iran: Motives and Constraints
Ivan Safranchuk
Economic aspects of Russia’s position
It is widely held that Russia is interested in economic cooperation with Iran, on projects ranging from the civilian nuclear industry to a future “gas OPEC.” One could imagine a breath-taking future for the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, in which Russia and China are co-leaders and Iran, currently an associate member, is seeking full membership. The SCO dominates in Central Asia, and Iran as full member could provide access to Persian Gulf. This would make the SCO unique in its influence on oil and gas markets since its members would have dominant or important positions on three reserves of conventional oil: the Persian Gulf, Russia and Central Asia. Such geographical scope would also make the SCO unique in its transit capabilities and access to world markets. Still, such considerations are for the long term, and there is no ground to believe that Russia’s position on Iran is formed by such long-term considerations, in particular, because the future development of the SCO could turn out entirely differently. China could take dominant positions in economic projects within the SCO. Russia would have to counterbalance Chinese influence in Central Asia, and would not be in a position to interfere in the growing Chinese-Iranian cooperation. So Iran would provide Gulf access to China rather than to Russia. On the one hand, this would raise US-Chinese tensions and competition over the oil market considerably. Russia could benefit from this, since as China enters the American oil backyard, the US will be more interested in Russia. On the other hand, Chinese influence in Central Asia could easily go beyond a level acceptable to Russia, undermining Russia’s own interest in contracting and transiting Central Asian reserves. In short, the long-term considerations are complicated and have multiple probabilities. They provide no firm basis for determining the current Russian position on Iran.
Regional considerations of Russia’s position on Iran
The global context on Iran is obvious. If Iran goes nuclear, the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty becomes meaningless.
The regional context is usually discussed in connection with the Persian Gulf. But Iran has access and interests not only in the Gulf, but also in the Caspian basin. It is commonly overlooked that for Russia, this regional perspective is very important and has direct consequences for shaping its position on Iran. Russia is struggling for influence and economic benefits in Central Asia. The Caucasus is the key region for the transit of Central Asian resources. Russia is losing the influence game in the Caucasus as the US develops relations with Georgia and Azerbaijan, and with both countries thinking about NATO membership. Georgia, or more precisely, its current leadership, is already seen as a hopeless case. This leaves regime change in Georgia the only option for Russia.
Azerbaijan, on the other hand, is not rushing to spoil its relations with Russia. But growing cooperation between Baku and Washington has Russia worried. Russia may not realistically expect to reverse Azerbaijani interest in further cooperation with the West. Still, Russia is interested in Azerbaijan not inviting US/NATO military presence in Caucasus and Caspian Sea. Azerbaijan has an incentive to invite an outside military presence in the region. This has a direct connection to Iran.
Azerbaijan and Iran portray their relations as normal. There is some economic cooperation and dialogue on the political level. But in reality, both countries look at each other with a lot of suspicion.
In Iran, the Azerbaijani population is regarded as potentially non-loyal. Turkish secular influence has the potential to develop amid Azerbaijani nationals. Iranian authorities have every reason to worry about this, since Azerbaijanis constitute a 20 mln strong minority among Iran’s population of 70 mln.
Through Azerbaijani eyes the Shia Iranian leadership, with control over a 20 mln Azerbaijani population, constitutes a challenge and even a direct threat to Azerbaijan, with its relatively small population of 8 mln. Who can guarantee that Iran will not attempt to take Azerbaijan under control?
Azerbaijan is not interested in escalating problems in its relations with Iran. This allows the two countries to portray relations as normal while huge tensions exist. But this apparent normality does not prevent Azerbaijan from looking for a security provider. The US/NATO are natural choices.
Russia does not want to see an outside military presence in the Caspian region, and will attempt to dissuade Azerbaijan from inviting such a presence into the region. Azerbaijan had every reason to be worried by improving Russian-Iranian relations. But since 2002, Russia has come to share Azerbaijani concerns regarding Iran. In the regional context, Russia has shown an interest in counterbalancing Iran. This signals to Azerbaijan that Russia is not Iran’s friend, that Russia is interested in keeping Iran constrained. Russia tries to send the signal that it counterbalances Iran and that Azerbaijan does not have to worry. For the sake of dissuading Azerbaijan from inviting outside military presence in the Caspian Sea, Russia is willing to be tough on Iran in the regional context.
Will a nuclear Iran be an incentive for US/NATO military presence in the Caspian Sea? Growing Iranian nuclear power would probably reinforce the Azerbaijani perception of the Iranian threat. Under a nuclear umbrella, Iran may feel free to extend pressure on Azerbaijan and threaten its oil reserves and Baku-Ceyhan transit. Consequently, Azerbaijani interest in an outside military presence would be reinforced. All this stimulates Russian interest in preventing Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons.
The limits of US-Russian understanding on Iran
The US got Russia’s agreement to exert more pressure on Iran. However, US diplomacy would like to see far more resolution from Moscow to press Iran for concessions. But this is problematic.
To raise international support for more pressure on Iran, the US must first tackle the Iranian crisis in a global non-proliferation context. But within the global context, Russia is very unlikely to take a tough position on Iran.
Russia does not want Iran to go nuclear. At the same time, Russia is concerned about international law. Russia hesitates to accept the logic that the Iranian nuclear crisis should be solved by any means. At a minimum, Russia will struggle to make this solution conform to international law. This seriously limits the level of toughness that Russia can afford to show in its position on Iran. The history of diplomacy in 2002 before the Iraq crisis is having a big impact on the Iranian crisis. The US diplomacy of 2002 is seen not as diplomacy meant to solve the Iraq crisis by peaceful means, but as the building of a case to justify military action against Iraq. Now, when Russia is being asked to take a tough position on Iran, the explanation goes that Iran will make concessions only if it faces a united international community with a common tough position. The problem for Russia in this is the following: what if even in these circumstances Iran does not become cooperative? The answer should be obvious: Iran will be punished with sanctions and the military option is likely to get more attention. But Russia does not want to sign up to this. So Russia is ready to join the expression of a threat to Iran, but does not want automatically to sign on to the realization of this threat. This is so because Russia cannot be sure that tough diplomacy on Iran is not actually pursued with the idea of building a case of Iranian non-cooperation simply in order to hasten to the realization of the threat against Iran. These considerations make Russia extremely careful in taking a tough stance on Iran.
The only framework in which Russia is tough on Iran is Caspian region. Theoretically, Russia might consider the following: Russia joins hard pressure on Iran in exchange for US commitment not to have a military presence in Azerbaijan. But such a deal does not fit into the global context, within which Iran is described as challenger to the non-proliferation regime, international peace and security.
Tactical dynamics of Russia’s position on Iran
Tactically, through the entire Iranian crisis, Russia has been avoiding making a choice – the ultimate choice between the West and Iran. Russia does not want to sacrifice relations with the West for the sake of Iran. And Russia is not interested in paying the price of abandoning ties with Iran for the sake of relations with the West.
US diplomacy demonstrated some respect for this Russian dilemma. On the contrary, it was Iran that raised the stakes, destroying any ground for compromise with the international community. Iran demonstrated an interest in the Russian proposal for a joint venture on uranium enrichment, but forgot about it as soon as it served the purpose of delaying the referal of the Iranian dossier to the UN Security Council. It is hard to avoid the impression that Iran was chewing on Russian proposal just to win time, which is very close to cynical manipulation. At the same time Iranian authorities and experts, off the record, express confidence that Russia would not vote for a UN resolution with sanctions. Iran demonstrated high levels of confidence that, if forced to make the ultimate choice, Russia would not betray Iran. Russia does not like this.
The overall impression is that in recent months Iran was pushing Russia to make the ultimate choice between Iran and the West. It is hard to judge whether Iran did not understand Russia’s wish to avoid such a choice or whether it was just playing a trick to influence the Russian position. In any case, this push for the ultimate choice was beginning to irritate Russia. Russia wanted to downplay the crisis, to de-escalate tensions and find compromise at the lowest possible level. But Iran was doing absolutely the opposite, probably with the assumption (incidentally not groundless) that the higher the level of tension on which compromise is found, the smaller the scope of the compromise to be made.
If forced to make the ultimate choice, Russia is likely to make its choice against the one who pushed for this choice. Irritated by Iran’s escalation of this crisis, Russia may well surprise Iran.
http://mdb.cast.ru/mdb/2-2006/item1/item1/
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