07 02 07 A Fluid Situation In And Around Iran
The pace of events related to Iran, both domestically and internationally, has picked up in the past few days on a number of fronts. While Ahmadinejad speaks of a 'celebration' next week for their nuclear program, he is under heavy domestic pressure in large part due to the Iranian economy. At the same time the Iranian Revolutionary Guards are holding defensive exercises, they have new tensions to deal with in Iraq. The West, US in particular, has the difficult task of walking a very fine line in its dealings with Iran as even small words or deeds could send the situation careening down a cliff or lead to a reduction in tensions and a moderation in Iranian actions.On the military front, the IRG are conducting a two day defensive war game in the Sea of Oman and Persian Gulf using air and naval assets to test Iran's missile defenses. On the first day, the IRG made sure to test their new toy - the Russian made Tor-M1 system whose delivery is now complete. A more detailed description of the Russian deal and the Tor-M1 can be found in our comments of May, 2005. In short, the Tor-M1 is a system with short range capabilities against air craft and cruise missiles and the ability to counter electronic warfare. Perfect for defending valuable state assets such as Natanz and Arak. The IRG have been planning and training for a US attack for quite some time, and unlike Iraq, Iran does have a reasonably capable defense - perhaps not sufficient to survive a prolonged onslaught by the US, but one when combined with some difficult geography assures a degree of damage being inflicted on any attacker. And while Iraq fell back on asymmetric warfare post US occupation, Iran appears to have plans for both asymmetric and symmetric defense.
In Iraq, the situation for Iran has destabilized since the turn of the year. First there was the US led operation against an Iranian 'diplomatic' outpost and now yesterday the abduction of the Iranian second secretary of its principal Baghdad embassy. Iran has accused the US of orchestrating his seizure, either directly or by Sunni proxies. And they are quite possibly correct in their allegations. The US is determined to stir the pot for Iran inside of Iraq in the hope of making them second guess their assessment of the weakness of the US position. Capturing a probable intelligence operative on the sly for interrogation should definitely turn heads in Tehran as the normal procedure is to declare such a 'diplomat' non-gratis and expelled from the country. That the US would first try to break the intelligence officer to gain insight into Iranian operations and strategic plans shows Tehran the US does not consider any Iranian out of their reach in Iraq. The US will be careful not to actually kill a diplomat but instead show them a short vacation in hell. And even if the US had nothing to do with the abduction (al Qaeda after all also views the Iranian's as targets) - they think that the US did which is just as valuable.
On the domestic front it becomes clearer every day there is a campaign to cut President Ahmadinejad down to size - and that can only happen with the acquiescence of the Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. Ahmadinejad was first rebuked late last year when his slate of candidates to the Assembly of Experts fared very poorly and reformist Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani re-emerged as a political force with 75% of the new assembly being his close associates. And while there had been rumblings in the population over economic conditions, these have now spilled over to the Iranian Parliament. Many blame Ahmadinejad's domestic largess and redistribution of oil sector income for the now 16% rate of inflation while at the same time they see his hard-line rhetoric internationally on the nuclear (and other) issues squeezing imports and generally crimping economic growth and flexibility. But now they have gone so far as to accuse him of dishonesty in presenting the budget. Among other irregularities, MP's say Ahmadinejad has used one low price of oil ($37) for budgeting while in reality the expenses proposed require a higher minimum of $45, not far below Iran's blended rate of $54 seen this past October (side note: much of Iran's oil exports are of sour crude which sells for a lower price than that often quoted in newspapers).
Finally, Ahmadinejad has promised that Iran will celebrate "the stabilization and the establishment of its full right" to enrich uranium. Mohamed ElBaradei, head of the IAEA, said "I understand that they are going to announce that they are going to build up their 3,000 centrifuge facility ... sometime next month." As Ahmadinejad spoke on Feb. 1, the start of a 10 day 'celebration' of the 1979 revolution, look for this announcement on Feb. 10. We look forward to see if his prediction of Iranians dancing in the streets proves true. One thing we can be certain of is he will not be announcing a working 3,000 unit cascade. In fact, we doubt there will be very much 'new' at this announcement. The Iranians have been working on two chains of 164 centrifuges above ground at Natanz while mucking about with a much smaller number in the underground facility. What is most likely is they have moved the two 164 unit cascades underground. Yawn. Of course the Iranians will tout this as a great achievement and that they will shortly have all 3,000 installed on the way to 54,000. What they won't tell you is they don't have the parts to make 3,000 units. Well, that's not fully true. As Arms Control Wonk.com wrote in April, 2006:
First, I am not sure Iran can assemble that many centrifuges that quickly. The IAEA reported that Iran assembled 70 centrifuges during a one month resumption of production in June-August 2004. Assuming Iran has been assembling 100 centrifuges a month since the beginning of January (and had 700 on hand) and continues to do so, Iran won’t have 3,000 centrifuges until November 2007.However, the most significant announcement may be, according to Arms Control Wonk, "the Iran Atomic Energy Organization will declare that Iran has mastered cascade operations, has enough enriched uranium for current purposes and that it will place it’s cascades in warm standby," prior to the deadline (2/24) of UN SCR 1737 which requires Iran to cease all enrichment related activities. Why does this idea make sense? Because it is exactly the out that the clerical leadership in Iran is looking for with the West. They realize they really don't have the parts or capability at this time to live up to even their 3,000 unit claims. At the same time, Ahmadinejad's rhetoric and ill played hand has managed to bring the wrath of the UN Security Council down on Iran and its economy. So the clerics see this as their point of maximum leverage in negotiations with the West. If they can establish they have installed a working 164 unit cascade in the underground facility, that will be enough to demonstrate nuclear fuel cycle capability. Iran is thus able to save face in the eyes of their population and the larger Muslim world while also moving away from the brink with the West. After that, all will depend on negotiations. Iranian scientists and engineers will certainly continue to work to determine where they have gone wrong, and should the day come months (if not years) from now that negotiations ultimately fail, Iran will be in position to rapidly move ahead with a larger cascade.
Second, Iran probably doesn’t have enough components or the ability to manufacture them. Albright and Hinderstein cite “senior diplomats in Vienna” as claiming that Iran has “components for up to 5,000 centrifuges” and “other senior diplomats” suggesting that some components are of poor quality and that Iran has components for an additional 1,000 to 2,000 centrifuges.
Hard to know which components are scarce, although Mark Hibbs has been all over this story about the export of ball bearing preforms to Pakistan and the question of whether Iran can indigenously manufacture it’s P-1 centrifuge.
It isn’t at all clear, Hibbs writes, that Iran’s tiny balls are good enough to get the job done
And why does this 'warm standby' idea sound likely? "On the sidelines of the Munich Conference [on Security Policy], we will hold negotiations with Western parties," said Ali Larijani as quoted by Iran's official IRNA news agency. The Munich conference is the 43rd in a series of meetings primarily of western security officials and Larijani is the secretary of the Supreme National Security Council and Iran's chief international negotiator on the nuclear program. We doubt he is going there just to whisper in their ears 'We did it!'
So we have reached a tipping point between Iran and the US. Should either side push too hard they risk increasing the favorability of domestically unpopular leaders. A move by the US against Iran - either by a direct attack or by going to far in the anti-Iran operations within Iraq - would give Ahmadinejad a new round of credit with hardliners and could lead to renewed nationalistic support from the broader population. Conversely, Iran has worked too hard until now on both the nuclear program and establishing their beach head in Iraq to provide a distraction for the US Congress from their current role of knifing Bush over Iraq. Can Bush, Cheney and Ahmadinejad contain themselves long enough for cooler heads to prevail?
Lastly, we leave you with a great photoshoping by the Robot Economist at The Arms Control Otaku:
"MC Ahmadinejad seyz the rims keep spinnin' even after the centrifuges stop."
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President Ahmadinejad’s real views are summarized on this website: ahmadinejadquotes.blogspot.com
Al () - 09 02 07 - 22:43