- 7 September 2011
- 1 Comments
- Election 2012, Nuclear file, Presidential Election, Sanctions, UN, US-Iran War
For the first time since the May 2010 “Tehran Declaration,” Iran has offered a proposal that could break the deadlock over its nuclear program. While there are many unanswered questions about the contours of the proposal and about Iran’s motivations for offering it, there is only one way to answer those questions: renewed diplomacy.
According to Iran’s atomic energy chief, Iran is proposing that the IAEA would be granted “full supervision” of Iran’s nuclear program for five years in exchange for the removal of sanctions.
This proposal may be the first glimmer of opportunity towards a solution to the Iranian nuclear issue. It could present a rare chance for the U.S. and Iran to get negotiations on track after the false start of October 2009 and the diplomatic purgatory that set in with the implementation new UN and U.S. sanctions.
But while the details of any such proposal have yet to be laid out and would obviously have to be settled at the negotiating table, some—notably the Washington Post in a September 6th editorial—have already dismissed the proposal it out of hand. In the past, the limited process of diplomacy between the U.S. and Iran has been undermined by each side dismissing the other’s proposals out of hand; and each time, the conflict has become more dangerous and more entrenched.
While sanctions and sabotage efforts have reportedly slowed Iran’s nuclear progress, and as recent reports show that U.S. diplomatic efforts have convinced China to “put the brakes on oil and gas investments in Iran,” the Iranian nuclear program is advancing, albeit at a slower pace. It is widely acknowledged that sanctions have not changed Iran’s strategic calculus regarding its nuclear program.
The fact is, sanctions were never supposed to do that by themselves. Even those who supported the sanctions touted them as a means to bring Iran back to the table for a deal. But now that Iran has signaled a potential willingness to come to the table, we have to ask ourselves whether we value the idea of sanctions more than a potential diplomatic solution.
The idea that sanctions would be lifted in exchange for full supervision is a test for those who said the goal of sanctions was to serve as leverage. By definition, a lever must be able to move. Our sanctions regime, we may come to find out, is a lever that is stuck in place—a monument to “toughness” that places form over function.