Iran Analysis: What's Most Important Today? (Hint: Not Sanctions)

We begin today with a special analysis from Mr Verde of last Friday's events, which become more rather than less significant with the passage of time: "4 June: The Day the Regime Will Regret".

Keep that, and the internal developments in Iran, in mind today as the international politicians and press run amok with the story of Iran's nuclear programme and the world's sanctions. After months of spin and manoeuvre, the UN Security Council will convene this morning in New York to adopt a US-led resolution for stricter financial measures. The Americans are now confident they will get passage, with Russia and China giving assent --- Washington is putting out the line that it will be a 12-3 vote with no vetoes.

Iran Analysis: 4 June “The Day the Regime Will Regret” (Verde)

The economic reality is that, to get Moscow and Beijing on board, the sanctions package has been diluted so much that the measures are marginal. (As EA has noted regularly, the behind-the-scenes effort to get foreign companies to disinvest from Iran is far more significant.) Politically, however, this will be the platform for tough-guy --- and tough-woman --- posturing with claims, "We have been vindicated."



The US and its allies will intone that this shows the world now realises the seriousness of Iran's threat. Russia and China will say very little, and what they say will be very guarded: we have supported the sanctions but the primary path to resolution should be diplomatic discussions. Turkey, which will probably vote No, will use that move to bolster its emerging claim as a defender of negotiation rather than punishment and, thus, as a country able to work both with the big boys like Washington and the smaller nations seeking recognition and respect.

And Iran's leaders will use the UN measure to their own advantage. Three days before the anniversary of the 2009 election, they will tell their people that this proves the hostility of foreign powers --- the same foreign powers who tried to undermine Iranian democracy by supporting the opposition movement and "regime change". They will insist that the vote in New York reminds those in Tehran, Shiraz, Tabriz, and Ahwaz that they cannot let up in their defense of "Iran" (i.e., the Supreme Leader, the President, and the Government).

In other words, they will use the nuclear-sanctions fuss as their saving distraction. It will be upheld over the arrests, sentences, and executions that continue and, in recent days, escalate. It will be given priority over the political disputes --- on the economy, on President Ahmadinejad's battle with Parliament over legislation, on the treatment of Ayatollah Khomeini's grandson --- within the ruling establishment. It will be the shiny object held high so Iran's people can look away.

So, as the ink is spilt and trees die today for the rhetoric over the UN sanctions decision, the important spin-off will not be on any claimed effect on Iran's centrifuges and uranium. It will be this: will the political theatre 6121 miles away take over the stage in Tehran? Or will it be set aside --- not by Iran's leaders but by others --- for other, more significant shows?