What to expect from the second Bush administration, and why

Professor Robert Reich:
What to expect from the second Bush administration, and why

LSE Miliband Public Lecture, 22nd March 2005

Such is the depth of hostility harboured towards George Bush in Britain that any lecture by a prominent Democrat about the failings of his administration was bound to be popular. And so it proved. A packed audience at the London School of Economics’ Old Theatre enjoyed an absorbing and entertaining lecture by the Clinton administration’s former Labour Secretary, Professor Robert Reich, on what he sees as the challenges of President Bush’s second term. Short in stature yet charming and witty in his manner, Professor Reich dispensed with cue cards and strode confidently about the stage, keeping his audience rapt for an hour of American political intrigue.

As a policy advisor on the ill-fated John Kerry campaign, Reich clearly has no small amount of disdain for the current state of American political discourse. However, the tone of his speech remained hopeful: he believes that the Democrats, if they apply themselves correctly, could seize the initiative and re-draw the political boundaries over the next four years.

Reich began by examining the minutiae of the White House’s attempted reform of Social Security, America’s long-standing welfare payment scheme for the elderly. He explained this in fairly simple terms: the administration claims that due to the demographic bubble of the baby-boomer generation, the current system will be ‘flat broke’ by the mid- 21st century. The Republican’s solution is to replace the scheme with privately owned accounts, subjected to the vagaries of the financial markets. However, Reich argued, the simplest approach to fixing the system would be to make one or two minor tweaks if and when problems occurred, rather than to scrap the system entirely. Reich apologised several times, perhaps mindful of numbing his audience with the nuances of US domestic policy, yet he needn’t have done so: he delivered a lucid and concise explanation of the American welfare system, and had John Kerry been so eloquent last year we could have seen a very different election result. Reich summarised by stating that he didn’t believe Social Security would change one bit, due largely to the system’s overwhelming popularity in its present incarnation.

Moving on to the federal budget deficit, Reich attacked what he termed ‘corporate welfare’, highlighting the fact that government revenues are the lowest they have been for fifty years due to the income and corporate tax cuts of 2001 and 2003. This shortfall is to be rectified by spending cuts which will target the poor – for example in public housing, Medicaid and job retraining. Reich made a well-received wisecrack at the expense of Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan, and warned of the potential for a global financial crisis if the US were to go into a severe recession. Professor Reich did, however, offer a silver lining to this darkening cloud: a conviction that the current economic predicament virtually guaranteed that further military engagements are unlikely – Damascus and Tehran are safe for now.

Reich then moved on to his main topic: that the central dilemma facing America is the attempted erosion of the boundary between church and state. He highlighted the case of brain-damaged woman Terri Schiavo, saying that what had hitherto been a state issue had effectively been hijacked by the federal government. He described it as the “usurpation of judicial rule by the legislature”, and made clear that the ‘special law’ that Congress approved in this case was a very dangerous precedent. Furthermore, the fact that the President is likely to appoint right-wing, pro-life judges to the Supreme Court over the next few years means that America is set on an irreversible course towards becoming a politically religious state. The dominance of religion in American political and cultural life is immense. To illustrate, Reich invoked a chilling statistic: while only 17% of Americans would describe themselves as ‘liberal’, 18% of the population firmly believe that they will see the end of the world within their lifetime.

Given this warning, however, Reich ended the lecture on an optimistic note, with his prescription for what he believes the Democrats need to do to in order to break down this hegemony. He identified the importance of ‘narrative’ in American politics, and described four: the ‘rags to riches’ story, the idea of the ‘benevolent community’, and, on the negative side, the idea of the ‘mob at the gates’ and the ‘rot at the top’. The reason that the Republicans have been so successful, Reich believes, is that they have firmly entrenched the latter two narratives in the public consciousness. The ‘mob at the gates’ is embodied by fears of terrorism, and the ‘rot at the top’ is embodied by the liberal elites and Hollywood, and their surrogates in the Democratic Party who advocate such ungodly things as gay marriage and abortion. For the Democrats to win, they need to find their own narratives, reflecting their own values. John Kerry’s mistake, argued Reich, was to run a political campaign based on policy rather than conviction.

This was all very interesting, yet I felt that Reich didn’t really address exactly what ‘narratives’ the Democrats could use. Furthermore, the suggestion that narrative takes precedence over political nuance may be a truism, yet if so it is a deeply depressing one. I wasn’t the only one in the audience somewhat unconvinced by our speaker’s optimism.

Reich ended by making a bold prediction for the two presidential nominees in 2008: Jeb Bush for the Republicans, and Hilary Rodham Clinton for the Democrats. There was a ripple through the audience at the mention of Clinton’s name, although I couldn’t tell whether this was from those in support of her or those, like me, who fear the idea of another northeastern ‘liberal’ Senator being destroyed by attack dogs such as Bill O’Reilly on Fox News.

In the session that followed, Professor Reich confidently answered questions from the audience, demonstrating his warmth and humour by engaging in banter with audience members before responding. One particular criticism from a woman from Florida, who compared the fight to keep Terri Schiavo alive to the civil rights movement of the 1950s, brought a sharp rebuke and an eloquently argued response.

One curious omission from the evening was the name of Howard Dean, the recently elected chairman of the Democratic National Committee and the man who galvanised his party with an abortive presidential campaign in 2003. I was interested to know Reich’s opinion of the man who is likely to shape Democratic policy guidelines running up to the election of 2008, yet the subject was never brought up and unfortunately there was insufficient time in the Q & A session. My suspicion is that Reich and Dean would not necessarily agree on certain issues: notably, Reich favours the pro-Iraq war Hilary Clinton as a potential candidate, while Dean’s campaign was based squarely on an anti-war platform.

Overall the lecture was an entertaining one, and despite the focus on American domestic policy, the audience was engaged throughout by an excellent public speaker. However, I for one do not share the optimism that Professor Reich evidently feels for the immediate future of American politics, and I believe that if his backing for Hilary Clinton as the challenger in 2008 bears out, the Democrats are likely to face another four years in the political wilderness.

A One-Nation Conversation

At her Senate confirmation hearing, Condoleeza Rice did her very best to assuage the minds of all those who see the current American administration as being dismissive of world opinion. She insisted that relations with the rest of the world need to be a “conversation, not a monologue”, nearly a tacit admission that the government had hitherto been far more comfortable in laying down the law amongst friends and enemies alike, paying little heed to any discomfiture it caused. What Donald Rumsfeld made of these comments, widely interpreted as being an olive branch to what he famously termed ‘old Europe’, has not thus far been divulged. Yet two political appointments by the White House during the last month suggests that the Secretary of Defence is unlikely to have trouble sleeping any time soon.

On February 16th, George Bush announced the new United States ambassador for the United Nations: a striking individual by the name of John Bolton. Mr. Bolton is certainly familiar with the UN; moreover, he has distinguished himself in recent years by frequently displaying his contempt for that organisation. A sample comment from this acerbic individual swiftly demonstrates his attitude: “There is no such thing as the United Nations”. He also doesn’t have much time for America’s erstwhile partners, saying of Europeans that some “have never lost faith in appeasement as a way of life”.

Now, Paul Wolfowitz, has been nominated for the presidency of the World Bank. Despite having little experience with international development, and seemingly little concern for the plight of the world’s impoverished people, the White House has decided that Mr. Wolfowitz is the best man for the job. A much better candidate, many analysts agreed, would have been former Mexican president – and Yale PhD – Ernesto Zedillo. Yet Mr. Zedillo was effectively ruled out by his nationality; by decree of a sixty-year old convention, the job will always go to an American citizen, while the leader of the International Monetary Fund is selected from Europe. Thus, we have the nomination of Mr. Wolfowitz, who was most recently one of the chief architects in Washington of the Iraq war, and who is now seen as something of an idealist for suggesting that the cost of that war could be recouped through Iraq’s oil revenues.

It is almost tempting to say that the question of whether Wolfowitz will be a success in his new role is a moot point. What is more revealing is what his appointment, like that of John Bolton, reveals about the US attitude to such institutions as the World Bank and the UN. By seeking to install such trenchant neo-conservatives into these multilateral institutions, In the case of Wolfowitz, it will be interesting to see whether or not he can reorder the Bank around his commitment to neoliberal economic policies, as opposed to vast amounts of financial aid. As for Mr. Bolton: this is a man who once said that, if he were to remould the United Nations, it would have just one permanent member. I think we can guess to whom he is referring. All of these factors add up to suggest that the commitment to “conversation” with the world that Condoleeza Rice promised is so far turning out to be nothing more than a disdainful sneer.

Trouble in the Andes

Perched high amongst the Andean peaks, nestled between the mountains of Illimani and Huayna Potosi, La Paz is one of the most arrestingly beautiful capital cities in the world. Yet right now it serves as the focus of a country in the grip of an extraordinary struggle that encapsulates its gargantuan differences in wealth, class and political ideology.

During the last eighteen months, Bolivia has been wracked by immense political upheaval. The October 2003 ousting of former President Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada, known as ‘Goni’, and his replacement by Carlos Mesa, promised to usher in a period of relative calm. However, after a year and a half of often severe civic disruption - and what Mesa describes as a total of 824 public demonstrations - the reality is that this landlocked country, South America’s most impoverished, remains balanced on a knife-edge.

Things boiled to a dramatic head on March 7th when President Mesa submitted his resignation to Congress, claiming that he could no longer function under such competing interests. Those who saw this as a political stunt aimed at consolidating his support were justified as the resignation was swiftly rejected. However, Mesa’s subsequent calls for unity – directed in particular to Evo Morales, opposition leader of the indigenous coca-growers party MAS (Movement Towards Socialism) – have fallen on deaf ears. Road blocks have continued, the city of Cochabamba is virtually cut off from the rest of the country, and in the more affluent department of Santa Cruz a referendum is planned on the question of autonomy. Far from bringing the country together, Carlos Mesa’s presidency seems only to have pushed things further apart.

The particular demands of the various groups in the country have matured considerably in a fairly short space of time. When I was last in the country, President Sanchez de Lozada had only recently been re-elected, having served from 1993 to 1997. His bete noir in the election, Evo Morales, had come very close to winning, and the two represented the schizophrenic nature of contemporary Bolivian society – on the one hand the Spanish-descended, US-educated former finance minister, on the other, the indigenous and inveterate anti-colonialist farmer’s union representative. Some 80% of Bolivia’s population claim indigenous heritage, and the languages of Quechua and Aymara dominate many areas. The schism between the indigenous peoples and those of Spanish descent stretches back to the early days of colonialism, when the silver mines of Potosi were emptied, filling the coffers of the King in Madrid. Since then, many Bolivians in the altiplano have – with some justification – seen the history of their nation as one unbroken line of usurpation and exploitation by foreign agents.

During my time there I witnessed first-hand the beginnings of the civil unrest that has now become commonplace. At that time, in early 2003, the central dispute was sparked by President Sanchez de Lozada’s desire to allow foreign companies to exploit Bolivia’s vast reserves of natural gas.

The president fatally misread the mood of the nation. Bolivians have a huge amount of animosity towards neighbouring Chile, going back to the War of the Pacific in the 19th century, during which Bolivia lost its entire coastline. Thus, the plan to allow the export of gas by a Californian company, via a Chilean port, provoked massive unrest. Strikes and road blocks, organised with a deft efficacy by MAS, swept across the country, and Sanchez de Lozada called the army in. Eighty dead protestors later, the president was forced to flee to the United States. People power had struck a decisive blow, and also set a chilling precedent.

Since then, the demands of groups such as Morales’ MAS have grown exponentially. The current crisis stems from a row over higher taxes on foreign energy companies seeking to exploit the aforementioned gas reserves. Morales’ group seeks an increase in tax from the current level of 18% to 50%, which President Mesa claims will simply make foreign companies abandon the country altogether. Furthermore, Mesa has in recent weeks buckled under pressure to cancel the contract of a French water company in El Alto, echoing the successful ‘water wars’ of 2000 which forced the US company Bechtel to abandon plans to privatise the water in Cochabamba. It is clear that the traditionally maligned indigenous majority in Bolivia now wield considerable political power.

What will happen next in this troubled country remains to be seen. On March 16th, Morales called off the nationwide roadblocks following Congress’ decision to raise tax on foreign companies to 32%. However, given the effectiveness so far of civil action, it is by no means certain that Morales will be content with this small victory. Despite the country’s ongoing paralysis, President Mesa’s approval ratings remain above 50%, indicating that a large section of the population still trust his working methods. Mesa must also be congratulated for thus far avoiding further bloodshed, refusing – despite pressure from certain sectors – to summon the police and army to confront protestors. The pro-Mesa sections of the country – not to mention Washington – would react negatively to a Morales presidency, yet having called an early election Mesa is constitutionally barred from running again. High on the Andean plains, this fractured country looks set to fall further into the trap of poverty and internecine rivalry. With a relentless and powerful opposition, a divided Congress and a lame-duck president overseeing matters, it is becoming hard to see how the historic problems of this fractured country can be resolved.

Teresa Kerry: Ohio conspiracy?

Teresa Heinz Kerry’s recent outburst has set me to reminiscing a little about the heady and often hysterical election campaign that gripped America – and in truth, most of the world – last autumn.

At a Democratic fundraiser in Seattle, the Mozambique-born heiress denounced the results of the Ohio polls, pointing out that the optical scanning machines used to tabulate votes were manufactured by companies owned by “hard right Republicans”. In lieu of the fact that a mere 60,000-vote swing in that state could have secured the presidency for her husband, Mrs Kerry suggests that fraudulent and criminal behaviour could well have determined the outcome.

She may well have a point. As well documented by the investigative journalist Greg Palast, amongst others, in the 2000 election Republican operatives used a number of underhand, illegal, and often ingenious ruses to secure the necessary votes. Most notoriously was the wrongful disenfranchisement of tens of thousands of Black and Hispanic voters in traditionally Democrat-voting districts in Florida, at the behest of Governor Jeb Bush and Secretary of State Katherine Harris. With this precedent, and in an election that was contested in a spirit of degenerative brutality and viciousness, it is easy to surmise that dirty tricks were again at play.

However, with the benefit of a few months hindsight, we have to ask ourselves: under the circumstances, would we have wanted a John Kerry presidency? The 60,000 division in Ohio masks the broader, nationwide picture. Thanks to the quirks of the U.S. electoral college system, although a relative handful of votes could have given Kerry the crucial win, in the popular vote he trailed George Bush by some 3.5 million votes. Had he become President in such fashion he would have lacked anything approaching legitimacy or a workable mandate. Add to that a Republican-dominated Congress and the hostility of media attack dogs such as Rush Limbaugh and Bill O’Reilly; it is hard to envisage that Kerry would have been able to impose much, if any, of his plans for the country.

Speaking of which, what exactly were his plans? Little over four months after the election, and I can barely remember what Kerry stood for, even if I ever understood in the first place. Now, John Kerry is a man of principle and intelligence: his spirited stand against the Vietnam War following his tour of duty, and his probing investigations into the Iran-contra affair in the mid-80s, clearly demonstrate this. He is also an excellent debater, as he showed in his mis-matched tussles with George Bush. But all of his good qualities were muddied and confused when it came to fighting for the presidency. Fear dominated his campaign from start to finish: the fear of being seen as weak on terrorism; the fear of being out of touch with the people; the fear of that most potent of slurs, ‘liberal’. Thus, instead of setting his stall against the war on Iraq, Kerry prevaricated and pontificated until, eventually, his policy was drowned in a sea of contradictory euphemisms. Kerry then ludicrously had himself photographed going hunting, yet this clashed with the images of him kite-surfing on his summer vacation. In press conferences and campaign rallies, he and his running mate John Edwards vouched to ‘hunt and kill’ those who sought to harm America. Did they seriously think this empty macho posturing was going to convince anybody? None of these stunts reflected honestly upon Kerry as a person, and their vapid emptiness looks all the more cynically obvious in hindsight. They demonstrated how successfully the Republicans have dictated the margins within which mainstream politics operates: the concern within Kerry’s camp was that to stray too far risked political annihilation.

When it came to the crunch, Kerry turned out to be the wrong candidate for the wrong time. What the Democrats needed – as evinced by Howard Dean’s brief but fiery presidential campaign – was a clear message, distinct from the brand of fundamental conservatism proffered by the Republicans: instead of being drawn further to the right, thus losing many of the unique progressive values that galvanise people to vote Democrat in the first place, they needed a candidate who would stand his own ground and carve out a vision bolstered by traditional Democratic values.

Fortunately, with Kerry’s defeat and the serious congressional losses sustained last November, it seems that a corner has been turned. The guidance of the Democratic Leadership Council – the body that fuelled the rise of Bill Clinton, and advocated a pragmatic third-way triangulation as an electoral strategy – looks to have run its course. Howard Dean’s campaign to be president may have faltered, but he is now installed as chair of the Democratic National Committee. Hopefully he will manage to instil within the party his values and beliefs, which as his presidential campaign showed have a potentially huge base of grassroots public support, and set about the mammoth task of unseating the current Republican hegemony.

Melanie Phillips: having her cake and eating it

It seems that Daily Mail columnist and broadcaster Melanie Phillips is back on the special sauce again. She seems to be having a little trouble deciding whether all this democracy that is supposedly gushing forth across the Middle East is actually, well, worth the trouble after all.

In a recent article in the Mail, “A glimmer of hope” (March 7th) she decided to prematurely jump on the 'Arab Spring' bandwagon, hailing the anti-Syrian riots in Beirut – combined with the promised electoral reforms in Saudi Arabia and Egypt – as the consequences of the war in Iraq.

Numerous, less melodrama-inclined commentators, have debunked this idea, and I criticised such sentiments in an earlier posting. However, what is curious about Phillips’ rant is that in her online diary for March 8th she subsequently abandons her optimistic outlook for a more negative critique of the potential of Middle Eastern democracy.

She quotes liberally from an article by Daniel Pipes, in which he offers a stern warning of the very real “danger” that anti-Western governments could come to power, given the widespread resentment of the U.S. across the region. It seems he’s worried about the threat of “Islamist ideologues”, and our Melanie heartily concurs.

It’s a question that many commentators in Phillips’ position – not to mention the politicians proclaiming the “march” of democracy – have carefully eschewed: what happens if the ‘wrong’ kind of government comes to power? What if, as has happened in Iraq, the Western-anointed candidate comes a distant third?

Melanie, its time to make up your mind. Are you really interested in Arab democracy? Or are you more interested in pro-Western, Israel-friendly governments across the region, regardless of what the populace wants? My guess is that when it comes to the crunch, the answer is the latter.

Arabian Springtime?

Historical revisionism over Iraq has begun in earnest

“"I was cynical about Iraq. But when I saw the Iraqi people voting three weeks ago, eight million of them, it was the start of a new Arab world. The Syrian people, the Egyptian people, all say that something is changing. The Berlin Wall has fallen. We can see it."

These were the comments of Walid Jumblatt, the Druze leader in Lebanon, after thousands of anti-Syrian demonstrators swarmed onto the streets of Beirut on March 7th, demanding the end of Syrian interference in their country and the resignation of pro-Damascus Prime Minster Omar Karami – a resignation which was swiftly delivered.

Jumblatt isn’t the only one to proclaim a New Dawn across the Middle East. Commentators and politicians from across the spectrum have hailed recent events as the beginnings of a much wider democratisation, linked intrinsically as a direct result of the US-engineered invasion of Iraq. In a speech to military scholars at the National Defence University on March 8th, George Bush proclaimed that “the trumpet of freedom has been sounded, and that trumpet never calls retreat”. Meanwhile, his erstwhile companion Tony Blair described a “ripple of change” running through the region. Whilst it is not difficult to imagine the chief architects of the Iraq war seeking some justification actions, even some who opposed the invasion are re-examining their earlier positions. Jonathan Freedland writes of a “silver lining” to the Iraq war, and urges other similarly opposed people to recognise that what is flowering across the region is in fact the first steps towards a nascent democracy.

There are two responses to this proposition, which is rapidly gaining credence. The first one hardly needs to be looked into, as it has been picked through in some detail in the aftermath of the war. Throughout 2002, we were warned of the precarious danger posed by Saddam’s regime: the “clear and present threat” in President Bush’s language, the “45 minutes to destruction” claims propagated (and then spuriously denied) by Downing Street. The introduction of democracy, and its spawning across the wider Middle East, were simply never put on the table. Whilst it may have occupied the thoughts and dreams of some of the war’s neo-conservative architects, it was never presented to the public as a viable justification for military intervention, and has only now – in the grim realisation of the paucity of Saddam Hussein’s fractured regime – become a convenient fig-leaf of moral duty.

The second response is that, quite simply, those who are suggesting that the Middle East is on the verge of a monumental democratic revolution are wilfully reading too much into events that are (outside the minds of serial conspiracy-theorists) largely coincidental. The death in November of Yasser Arafat has resolved a previously insurmountable problem – the refusal by the United States and Israel to negotiate with a man they both considered an obstacle to peace. The election in January of Mahmoud Abbas has certainly brought renewed hopes for peace, but it is stretching the realms of the imagination to suggest that a resolution is near. During the supposed ceasefire, some 31 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli soldiers; meanwhile a suicide bomber struck at the heart of Tel Aviv, killing four young Israelis. To the credit of both sides there has since then been a relative lull, but there is little point in assuming that the successful election of a new leader means that the so-called ‘road map’ is back on schedule.

Meanwhile in Lebanon, the assassination of Rafik Hariri – and the subsequent anti-Syrian protests in Beirut – have swiftly been followed by a 500,000-strong Hizbullah-organised rally and, on March 10th, the re-instatement of Omar Karami as Prime Minister. If this was a revolution then it was a rapid one, and in keeping with the true meaning of the word. Reporting from the scene, Robert Fisk describes amongst the sea of bodies a poster proclaiming that “America is the source of terrorism”. Perhaps Bush is right in saying that the Lebanese people want to be free of foreign interference; however he surely must include the US and Israel in that list. More anti-Syrian demonstrations on March 14th further show how precariously balanced Lebanon remains.

Elsewhere in the Middle East, the announcement of cosmetic changes to the upcoming Egyptian elections by Hosni Mubarak has been seized on as further proof of the irrevocable slide towards democracy. Having been the victor in four consecutive single-candidate referendums, many are hoping that Mubarak will be good to his word and allow multi-candidate elections. The reality is that Mubarak, at the age of 76, will simply be fostering the illusion of free elections in order to hand over power over to his son, Jamal. Saudi Arabia, too, has promised democratic reforms – including the enfranchisement of women – although this will have to be seen to be believed.

Meanwhile, Iraq remains largely ungovernable. The election of late January already seems a distant memory, a single moment of sanity in an otherwise chaotic and fear-ravaged country. President Bush has suggested that this deeply troubled nation is the “example” for other nations in the region; yet I cannot imagine too many individuals looking towards the carnage in Baghdad and Fallujah – the daily ordeals of kidnappings by the insurgents, or shoot-first tactics of the US marines – and wishing it on their own country.

There is, of course, the chance that this Arab spring will manifest itself in the way that some have described; and five years down the line, confronted with a harmonious Middle East, a sovereign Palestine, a stable Iraq and a newly-enfranchised Egyptian population, many could regret sounding their earlier caution. However, those who engage in this wilful re-writing of history before it even happens are guilty of trying to see conjure a euphoric revolution that simply isn’t there.

Iran and the West

WHY SHOULD THEY TRUST US?

The Iranian desire for nuclear armament reflects a century of manipulation by the West

One of the most interesting moments of diplomatic nomenclature during Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice’s recent trip to Europe was her cryptic response to the question of possible military action against Iran. Apparently such an event is “simply not on the agenda at this point in time”. Obtuse declarations are typical of the George Bush’s administration, and one should not be surprised if the “agenda” shifts at any point in the near future. Although Secretary Rice professed that “diplomacy can work”, it is clear that behind the scenes there is a strong desire for regime change in Tehran, by force if necessary. Seymour Hersh’s report in a recent edition of the New Yorker about US reconnaissance of potential military targets has only added to the air of inevitability.

However, it is worth at this point to examine what exactly the motivations are behind Tehran’s apparent desire for nuclear armament. Clearly the events of the past two years in neighbouring Iraq have underlined the importance of seeking an effective deterrent. Secretary Rice has, on occasion, demonstrated her continuing fixation on the Cold War by labelling the regime ‘totalitarian’, as if this is a one-size-fits-all explanation for the drive to the bomb. Certainly, the hard-line Islamic theocracy that dominates Iranian politics is repressive, and indeed reviled by most of the population, who have seen moves towards reform stymied in the last eighteen months. However, there is little doubt that anti-US sentiment runs high in the streets of Tehran, and any potential invasion would be bitterly resented and resisted. To understand precisely why Iran seems to be so hell-bent on acquiring a nuclear arsenal, we need to look at the history of relations between the country and the West, in particular the United States and Britain.

For many Americans, Iran first came to their attention with the 1979 seizure of the US embassy in Tehran, and the subsequent holding of American diplomats for fourteen months. This event, which was seized upon by presidential challenger Ronald Reagan to undermine the incumbent Jimmy Carter, terminated diplomatic relations between the two countries. However, in many ways the 1979 hostage crisis was the culmination of a 26-year old event that was for many years kept clandestine but which goes some way to explaining the current relationship between Iran and the West.

Turn back a half century. Post-World War II, Iran lay between the interests of two global powers: the British, who had been a major player in the country since the discovery of oil at the century’s turn by the prospector William Knox D’Arcy, and the Soviet Union, which had long seen Iran as a target for assimilation. In 1950, Mohammad Mossadegh was elected by the Iranian Majlis, or parliament, to the office of prime minister. Mossadegh, a long-term campaigner for Iranian national sovereignty, succeeded the following year in nationalising the British-controlled Anglo-Iranian Oil Company, demanding recognition that the oil – hitherto expropriated by the British with scant recompense to Iran - was his countrymen’s birthright. With the outraged British attempting to undermine him by any means, Mossadegh turned to the United States as a potential ally. At an extraordinary United Nations meeting in October of 1951, a tearful Mossadegh evocatively depicted the harsh conditions under which Iranian workers served their British rulers at the oil refinery of Abadan. A skilful performer on the world stage, Mossadegh represented for many the face of the ‘new’ third world, eager to cast off the shackles of imperialism.

Under the administration of President Harry S. Truman, the US government came to mediate between the two sides. Mossadegh himself called Truman a ‘great friend’ to Iran, and believed that he would act as a counterbalance to the British. However, by early 1953 Truman was out of office, replaced by President Eisenhower, who had run a fervent anti-communist campaign was surrounded by a firm group of Cold Warriors, convinced that Iran was the focal point of the battle between East and West. This, combined with the re-election in Britain of the trenchantly imperialist Winston Churchill, set in motion a sea change of Western attitude towards Iran. In August of 1953, the CIA – and the British Secret Intelligence Service (nowadays known as MI6) – planned and executed Operation Ajax, which deposed the populist Mossadegh and returned Shah Reza Pahlavi to the throne.

While much of this at the time was unknown in the West, the people of Iran were fully aware that – once again – the history of their country was being usurped and determined by foreign rule. Things became worse when the Shah, given huge sums of money by the U.S. and Britain in order to achieve national stability, implemented a repressive and hard-line regime, using his SAVAK secret police to crack down on dissident groups and siphoning much of the profits from oil away for his own personal use. While the Shah’s profligacy and corruption angered the masses, his secular disdain for Islamic traditions enraged the clergy, particularly the Ayatollah Khomeini, who returned from his exile in Paris to lead the country after the 1979 revolution.

Thus Iranians in general have a strong justification in resenting the West, in particular the United States and the British. While relations between Tehran and London have improved in recent years, particularly since the election of the reformist-minded President Khatami in 1997, the US and Iran continue to lack diplomatic representation. The hostage crisis, US support for Iraq during the horrifying war of the 1980s, and the absurd monikers given by each side to the other - “axis of evil”, “Great Satan” – indicate that this is likely to continue. Can it be any wonder that Iran appears to wish to arm itself, when two of their toothless neighbours have fallen in the past three years? Whatever sabre-rattling the US government may pride itself on, it is through diplomacy, and diplomacy alone, that we should engage with Tehran.