Dr. Ahmadinajad, Just Don’t Go There
By Dr Ahmad Faruqui
Dansville, CA

I am talking about the point of no return with the US. Your former enemy, Saddam Hussain, crossed it in August 1990 when he invaded Kuwait. Earlier, in a typical blustery moment, he had threatened to gas half of Israel. Maybe the petulant Saddam felt this would be his revenge for Israel’s taking out his nuclear reactor in 1981. But his brash decision to invade Kuwait brought on an attack by a coalition of forces led by the US in 1991 that reduced Iraq to rubble. The few errant Scuds that he lobbed into Israel carried no military value.
Of course, Saddam lived to cross the point of no return again in 12 years, when he refused to comply with American demands to yield his (non-existent) weapons of mass destruction or leave the country. He gambled that the Americans would blink and this time he lost the entire country. He did not realize that one day Americans would flush him out of a spider hole at gunpoint and put him on trial for mass murder.
Of course, your viewpoint is that Iran is not Iraq. It has a population of 68 million, almost three times bigger than Iraq’s. You are blessed with 10 percent of the world’s oil reserves and 16 percent of the world’s natural gas reserves. Your influence on world oil prices is much stronger than was Iraq’s, since you provide five percent of the world’s oil supply (4.2 million barrels a day) and export about half of that.
In the event of hostilities either with Israel or the US, you would be in a position to inflict substantial economic harm by turning off your production, shutting down tanker traffic through the Gulf and attacking an important oil-processing hub such as Ras Tanura. Oil prices would rise over $100 a barrel, unleashing an economic tsunami through the globe.
In addition, being the second largest country in the Middle East, you have the ability to inflict substantial harm on US military personnel in the region. Recently, you hosted the head of the Mahdi army in Tehran. During his high profile visit, Moqtada al Sadr pledged that his militia in Iraq would retaliate for any American attack on Iran.
You have also argued that Iran is the heir to a great civilization that is governed by a democratically elected leadership, not by a military dictatorship. While there are human rights issues in Iran, a corrupt and oppressive Baath Party is not in power. Yet, was it not your nation that got embroiled into an avoidable eight-year war with Saddam’s Iraq, a war that left more than a million dead on both sides and that devastated the economies of both countries?
Recall that in the Gulf War, Saddam had coined that most unfortunate of all expressions, “Mother of all Battles,” to glorify war. However, his million-man army, the fourth largest in the world, capitulated in two months under unrelenting American bombardment. The images of crying Iraqi soldiers emerging from burning trenches with their hands up are indelibly etched in our memory. Just before the Iraq War began in March 2003, Saddam had boasted that Iraq was no Afghanistan. But while the Taliban regime lasted for two months, his regime lasted only three weeks.
Mohteram Ahmedinajad, remember that should you get into a fight with the Americans, no one will come to your assistance, except for those fanatics who may carry out a few (or even several) suicide bombings on your behalf. These days, almost everyone needs the US as a trading partner and everyone fears it, even China. It will not irritate the US by adamantly supporting Iran. Neither will you find Russia coming to your help. And the Arab street, which did not even rise in revolt for Saddam, won’t do much for you.
Your military may be lulled into complacency by war games coming out of some American think tanks, which show that the US has no good military options against Iran. But remember that some had said similar things before the Gulf and Iraq wars broke out. The US may be overextended globally but it can still deliver one hell of a punch from the air. B-2 Stealth bombers and F-17’s would lead the attack and take out your air defenses. They would be followed by air and missile strikes from a variety of US air bases in neighboring countries, aircraft carriers, surface warships and submarines in the Indian Ocean. An American attack is not just a theoretical possibility. Canadian war correspondent Eric Margolis reports that the CIA has already briefed Jordan, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Turkey on its plans to hit Iran if you don’t comply.
The best place for hot air is in a balloon, not in the mind of a statesman. Think about the future of your young country. You did a great job as mayor of Tehran and need to do something equally great for Iran. Almost 40 percent of your population lives below the poverty line, in spite of your country’s large oil and gas resources. Your state’s involvement in the economy is large and inefficient. That is why you have a low per capita income of some $2,700 and an anemic GDP growth rate in the 4-5 percent range.
Your priorities should be on economic reform and on human and infrastructure development, not on its destruction. A war with the US will destroy economic deals that have taken years to develop, such as the October 2004 long-term sale of liquefied natural gas to China that could eventually be worth $100-200 billion.
Don’t take on the United States of America. The beleaguered Bush administration is looking for an excuse to divert the public attention from the failed and unending war in Iraq. Don’t give it one. Bush spoke directly to your people in his State of the Union speech. That is an ominous sign. Remember the words of the Admiral Yamamoto who said after the Japanese had attacked Pearl Harbor, “We have awakened a sleeping giant.” This time the giant is already awake and waiting to come your way with the authority of the UN Security Council.
Once force is used, Tehran may become a place where, to recall a Persian couplet,
The spider weaves the curtains in the palace of the Caesars
The owl calls the watches in the towers of Afrasiab
You have it in your hands to prevent such a day from coming. Please start de-escalating tensions with the West by complying with the latest IAEA Resolution.


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Editor: Akhtar M. Faruqui
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