Since the Iranian people overthrew the US-backed despotism of the Shah in 1979, Washington’s 4½-decade campaign of maximum pressure has been couched in terms of countering the Islamic Republic’s “destabilisation” of the region.
Throughout most of this period, overarching narrative justifying the West’s fixation on Iran, rather than admitting it to be a critically important country that escaped its dependent semi-colonial status to pursue its own interests, is that it is harbouring a clandestine nuclear weapons program. Since at least 1992, [paywalled] we have been told by no less an individual than the current Israeli Prime Minister and international fugitive, Benjamin Netanyahu, that Tehran is mere years or months away from having enough enriched uranium to produce an atomic bomb.
After 33 years, this accusation could be legitimately dismissed on its face. Those in need of more concrete clarification might refer to the collective assessment of the US intelligence community that, at least since 2003, Tehran has not been developing a nuclear weapon, nor has it made the decision to do so. As of now, this remains the position of the intelligence community. Beneath the grand-standing and rhetorical handwringing, the underlying substance of Washington’s argument is that Iran could develop a nuclear weapon, not that it is.
This was all before October 7 2023, when president Biden gave carte blanche to Israel to level the Gaza Strip and expand the war to no fewer than seven separate fronts as Prime Minister Netanyahu answered every opportunity for diplomacy with further escalation, up to and including direct exchanges of missile fire with Iran.
Now, after a briefly imposed ceasefire in Gaza where Palestinian factions ceased, but Israel kept firing, Netanyahu has decided to resume the genocide at full intensity.
Who needs war when you have US-backed “stability?”
The nuclear crisis escalated into truly dangerous territory on 1 April 2024 with the Israeli bombing of the Iranian consulate in the Syrian capital Damascus.
Nevertheless, when Tehran fired several hundred drones and ballistic missiles at Israel some weeks later, it loudly announced the action and broadcast that it considered this to be the end of the matter, providing a desperately needed off-ramp. When it fired an even larger volley of missiles on 1 October, it again took strenuous care to only attack military targets and caused no fatalities. Rather than climb down the ladder offered to it, the Israeli Government did what it always does and declared itself the victim of unprovoked aggression to which it needed to retaliate.
All of this rising tension comes amidst the looming deadline of October when the already deceased JCPOA expires. When that happens, the European signatories will likely cave to US pressure and enable the “snap-back” of the full sanctions regime as it existed prior to 2015. Tehran has made clear if this happens, it will withdraw from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, terminating its compliance with the global non-proliferation regime, for all the good it brought them.
Far from being the doomsday scenario of Washington’s nightmares, the consistent actions of successive American presidents seem very deliberately calibrated to drive the Islamic Republic towards weaponisation of its program. During the last calamitous year-and-a-half, it may well be on the verge of achieving this.
Being the second-most affected country by weapons of mass destruction, after Japan, the Islamic Republic has consistently, through its own political-religious institutions, banned the production or use of such weaponry.
In the time since 7 October 2023, studies of public opinion in Iran have registered a sharp change. For the first time since polling on the issue began, clear majorities have expressed agreement with the idea of their government developing a nuclear weapon.
The discourse among the political class has also notably shifted. In a departure from the previously universal reference to the Supreme Leader’s “fatwa” against weapons of mass destruction, some have vocally suggested a nuclear deterrent may be desirable, or even necessary.
The bigger question is, if it came to pass that Tehran tested a nuclear device and demonstrated the means to deliver it, would that be worse than the current situation?
Assuming we get to the stage of it being clear that such a weapon exists and is deliverable, perhaps the least likely response of the US-Israeli axis would be to attack Iran. In fact, they would be far less likely to do so than they are currently, with there not being a nuclear deterrent. In considering all the recent states to have been invaded, occupied or attacked — Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Libya — the common denominator was the conspicuous absence of weapons of mass destruction. While the sample size isn’t ideal, the answer as to why North Korea, Russia or Pakistan don’t rank beside these countries is that they do have nukes.
If Iran did this in the interests of self-preservation, would they use it? Judging by the near-five decades of its existence, the Islamic Republic’s foreign policy speaks to a posture of self-defence. Cases of its “interference” in its near-abroad has been to raise the potential costs to the countries most likely to attack them directly.
It should be said that any further proliferation of these weapons is not to be celebrated. The silver lining to such a dangerous outcome would be that it would at least force the Pentagon and its subsidiary in Tel Aviv to engage in some deep contemplation of the consequences of their actions. A nuclear deterrent would finally remove the pipedream of regime change through invasion and occupation of Iran from Washington’s extensive list of catastrophic foreign policy objectives.
Tehran’s nuclear program has always been valued as a source of negotiating leverage that it would limit in exchange for the right concessions, hence the JCPOA. The added leverage of a nuclear bomb would give it grounds to demand regional de-nuclearisation, of Israel in particular. There is still a distance to go before we arrive at that destination, but this far up the escalation ladder, it’s doubtful the West is about to climb down.