A Victory For the Ruling Clerics

Irans-supreme-leader-Ayat-007While the Obama administration formerly stated that extending the nuclear talks is out of equation, nevertheless, President Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry raised the option of an extension a day before the November 24th deadline. Iran’s foreign minister, Javad Zarif, definitely welcomed the idea.

After over a year of negotiations, which have traveled across the globe from Vienna, to Oman, and to New York, the negotiators (the Islamic Republic and the P5+1: China, France, Germany, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States) planned to extend the nuclear talks for another seven months in order to finalize the preliminary deal reached last year in Geneva. Accordingly, the nuclear negotiations will continue through the end of June.

The obscure objectives are to achieve a “headline” agreement by March 1st and seal the complete technical details of the headline agreement by July 1st. Details and nuances of the nuclear talks, with regards to agreements and gaps, have yet to be released, but some diplomats stated the repeatedly-heard phrase that “progress has been made.”

The nuclear extension definitely lacks any clear key terms upon which prospective nuclear talks would be anchored or that give any idea how a final nuclear deal could be reached.

But what is clear is that the Islamic Republic, particularly the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and senior cadre of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), have gained considerable amount of geopolitical, geostrategic and economic advantages from this offer by the Obama administration. The Supreme Leader’s strategies to buy time, regain full recovery in the economy, pursue his regional hegemonic and ideological ambitions,  and reinitiate his government’s nuclear program have been fulfilled.

Based on the extension offered by the Obama administration, the Islamic Republic will continue receiving $700 million per month in frozen assets during the extended seven month period. Secondly, Iran will further consolidate its economy through increased sales in oil, particularly to Asian countries, heighten business deals with some Western companies, regain the value of its currency, and enjoy the removed sanctions on some of its industries. As a result, Iran will attempt to address the economic challenges which were threatening the hold on power of the ruling politicians.

From the economic perspective, the $700 million in sanctions relief will boost Iran’s economy as it is an equivalence of approximately 350,000 more oil barrels a day, based on the current market price.

The Islamic Republic exports roughly one million barrels of crude oil in a day. The sanctions relief would be equivalent to a 30 percent increase in oil sale.  In the next few months, Tehran will attempt to push for additional sanctions relief as well as ratchet up its economic deals, such export of gas and other goods, to some European and Eastern countries including France, Germany, Russia, Japan, and China.

Some European countries’ exports to Iran have already ratcheted up due to the prospects of the nuclear negotiations. Tehran Times, the Islamic Republic’s state newspaper, stated that Germany was Iran’s leading trade partner “The European country (Germany) exported €207 million of goods to Iran in June 2014, an 88 percent rise compared to June 2013.” Nevertheless, Tehran needs the complete lifting of economic sanctions in order to gain the optimal potentials of its economy and gain full recovery.

Third, the extension of the nuclear negotiations will ensure to the Iranian leaders that the international community, specifically the West, will not make efforts in further isolating Iran and pressuring it economically or politically.

In addition, the extension of nuclear talks offered to the Islamic Republic is not going to alter Iran’s stand on its nuclear program. Iran will continue holding the position that their demands for the following issues to be met: maintaining a specific number (tens of thousands of) fast-spinning centrifuge machines, Tehran should have the capacity to produce nuclear fuel in the future, and maintain specific level of enriching uranium. In the next few months, the Islamic Republic is not going to give up its capacity to produce plutonium which can be utilized for weapons at its heavy water reactor in the city of Arak. Iran is less likely to provide more evidence proving that it did not carry out secret tests on the development of atomic weapons in Parchin or other military complexes. The head of the International Atomic Energy Agency recently pointed out that the Islamic Republic continues to deny the IAEA access to sensitive military site which are suspected to be used for nuclear activities.

Finally, the Islamic Republic’s antagonistic stance towards the United States and the West will remain the same as well. This week, while Khamenei officially granted his blessing to Rouhani to continue with the game of nuclear negotiations, he also called the West “arrogant.” Earlier, he published a “9-step plan” to eliminate Israel. After the extension of the nuclear talks, President Rouhani pointed out on state television that “I promise the Iranian nation that those centrifuges will never stop working.” The extension not only will not alter the Islamic Republic’s position on its nuclear program, but will give the ruling clerics the opportunity to be further empowered, making them more determined to pursue their regional hegemonic ambitions.

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  • objectivefactsmatter

    This is just beyond belief.

  • muchiboy

    Is Fundamentalist Iran any more likely than Zionist Israel to actually use a nuclear device in the region? Is there any truth to the rumor that Israel took first steps to assemble a nuclear weapon in the early days of Yom Kippur,if only to nudge America into resupplying her depleted armaments?

    • objectivefactsmatter

      Oh yeah. You can see how much pressure Iran is under with people attacking from all quarters.

      • muchiboy

        Maybe,but look how long North Korea,Israel,India and Pakistan,much less the rest of the world,have had nukes,and not used them.Ironically,America was the only country to use them in war.

        • Exsaint

          Please do some reading and find out why the US used nukes. You do realize that the US was attacked by Japan, or did your favorite Marxist professor leave out that inconvenient fact?

          • muchiboy

            I’m just sayin”.

          • Exsaint

            Just saying a load of ignorant, low-IQ leftist nonsense, you mean.

        • objectivefactsmatter

          It’s a little ironic when the subject is treated superficially.

          • muchiboy

            Superficially?

    • JayWye

      Iran’s first use of a nuclear bomb may not be over Israel,but the US,a HEMP attack. A HEMP attack on the US would set us back to 19th century living conditions we are NOT prepared for,and many millions would die from starvation and disease in the first year. It could mean the end of the US. Iran has been testing SCUD launches from containerships,with HIGH altitude detonations characteristic of an EMP attack,and not usable for attacks with conventional warheads . This type of attack is not needed for Israel,Iran’s IRBMs already can reach Israel. But with the US crippled or destroyed,Iran is free to do as they please,without any other Western nation able or willing to interfere with them.

      Then there’s the other major nuke option;the “Test Baker” scenario.
      But that would only affect NYC or the DC area,not the entire nation as would an EMP attack.

      • Vincent Vega

        i agree with your analysis except the US Navy is very mobile and too big and spread out to be disabled by Iran and they carry nukes on subs and aircraft carriers. If needed the US Navy could take out the rest of the world quite quickly

        • JayWye

          there’s a lot you overlook there.
          First,MAD only works with rational players,and Iran’s mullahs are not rational by our standards.
          Second,the EMP launch is from container ship,and they’re just ordinary commercial ships,they go all around the world,largely unnoticed,and unmonitored. Iran sails it’s ordinary ship just off the US coast,or into Hudson Bay,and launches,then SCUTTLES their ship,and there’s no way to trace where the nuke originated. That means you don’t have any solid clue as to who to retaliate against. No valid target,no retaliation.
          Third,whith most of the US in critical condition,those Navy ships are all going to be called back to the US,for defense and for using their nuke plants to provide electricity for the cities that no longer have it.

          Lastly,you need to read One Second After by William Forstchen. it describes the aftermath of an EMP attack on the US. it’s not pretty. in the1st year,around 90% of the US dies from disease,starvation and civil war. An EMP attack might mean the end of the US. Iran wants that.
          The US Commission on EMP report is where this book got it’s info.

          • Vincent Vega

            I can’t even imagine NY without power for a week. Total chaos. The biggest cause of death would probably be violence.
            If the US was in such dire straits the military would probably have to do drastic things to prevent an invasion.

  • Gradus Quia

    Kerry’s secret strategy is to keeps the talks going until all the U-235 in the world has decayed to lead.

  • Mohammad

    USA is the only country which used nuclear weapons against innocent people. Israel will use it too. So these countries should be disarmed.

    • JayWye

      Sorry,but Japan wasn’t “innocent people” during WW2. Those folks at Hiroshima and /Nagasaki were building weapons for the Japanese military,and would have been fighting if the US had to invade the Japanese homeland,as their civilians did on their islands we captured with heavy US losses. We actualy SAVED millions of Japanese by nuking them.
      We would have had to do FAR more destruction and killing through conventional bombing and a ground invasion of the Japanese islands.

    • Exsaint

      LOL! Another “evil US” comment!

      My country did the right thing by using nuclear weapons to end WW2. No amount of leftist whining or taqiyya can change the truth.