IRAN: There appears to be a dreadful inevitability about the collision course on which both Iran and the US are impelled, argues Lara Marlowe in Tehran
Iran is playing a dangerous game of "chicken" with the US. The ruling conservatives seem confident that the US cannot attack them, for three reasons: US forces are bogged down in Iraq; already high oil prices would skyrocket in the event of action against Iran and there is no "smoking gun", no absolute proof that the Islamic Republic is building nuclear weapons.
In a saner world, these arguments might persuade President George W Bush to hold fire. But according to US press reports, Mr Bush privately compares President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to Adolf Hitler and says he must "save" Iran before leaving office.
One is reminded of the old joke about the man-eating crocodile who explains himself with the words: "It is in my nature to do so."
The debate on Iran in the US today boils down to "should we bomb Iran or give diplomacy a chance?" Mr Ahmadinejad gave Washington a shove in the direction of bombing by announcing with great fanfare last week that his country has enriched uranium to the low level required for nuclear power plants.
On both sides, things could have been done to ease the crisis, but the will hasn't been there.
Iran could have ratified the additional protocol of the Non-Proliferation Treaty, which allows for snap inspections. To reassure the West, it could have offered the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) a permanent office in Tehran and said it would pursue research but hold off on industrial production of nuclear fuel.
Instead, in recent months Iran stopped snap inspections and put scientists to work around the clock, with the resulting April 11th announcement.
Lest there be any doubt about Mr Ahmadinejad's defiance of the US, the government lathered on further declarations: Iran will go from 164 centrifuges to 3,000 within a year; Iran is building superior P2 centrifuges to replace the old P1s; Iran is funding the Palestinian group Hamas.
Some sources here think these actions will enable Iran to negotiate from a position of strength. They don't seem to realise that by ignoring a United Nations Security Council statement and several IAEA resolutions, Iran has crossed a "red line" as far as the US and EU are concerned.
In preparation for war, the former president Hashemi Rafsanjani, still a high-ranking official, is visiting Syria and the Gulf states. Iran's nuclear programme is peaceful and would never hurt its neighbours, Rafsanjani tells them. In an Iranian-style veiled threat, he says he knows none of them would ever help the US by providing bases for an attack on Iran.
Under the NPT, Iran has the right to enrich fuel for nuclear power plants. If it were a US ally, no one would bat an eyelid, but if uranium is enriched to 90 per cent, it becomes weapons-grade material. And the regime's rhetoric about both Israel as a "cancerous tumour" and the vulnerability of US troops in Iraq sits uneasily with claims of an entirely peaceful programme.
The late Ayatollah Khomeini often called for the destruction of Israel but under the previous, reformist president Mohammad Khatami, Iran reached an understanding with the EU to stop such statements.
Unfortunately, a war now seems likely because neither side is willing to take the steps that could avert it. The US and Europe are unwilling to allow Iran to continue enrichment under IAEA supervision and Iran is unwilling to refrain from industrial production.
The US could invite the leader of the revolution, Ayatollah Khamenei, and Ahmadinejad to Geneva for direct talks, but it won't because it wants regime change more than it wants peace. For the US, it is, it appears, easier to bomb Iran than talk to its leaders.
Washington says Iran must first suspend enrichment and then it will see. Nor is the Bush administration willing to consider incentives that might change Iran's course: releasing $8 billion (€6.5 billion) in Iranian money frozen when the shah fell; ending the Iran-Libya sanctions act; letting Iran join the World Trade Organisation or providing guarantees that Iran will not be attacked.
Washington will not accept the possibility of the Islamic republic obtaining nuclear weapons and Iran will not accept an imposed solution, so a military confrontation appears inevitable.
The most charitable interpretation of the Iranian programme is that Tehran wants to keep open the option of building the bomb. The previous reformist government used that option as a bargaining chip; the present hardline government doesn't seem to want a deal.
The people of Iran are the great unknown in this equation. "The Bush administration thinks a bombing campaign would encourage them to rise up to overthrow the mullahs," says a long-time European resident of Tehran. "Will they? Probably not. Will they side with the leadership? Possibly. Nobody knows."
The IAEA will report on the enriched uranium samples which Iran turned over last week by April 28th. Western intelligence agencies will use the report to reassess their estimates of the lead-time to an Iranian bomb. The two main criteria will be the purity of the enriched uranium and the efficiency of the centrifuges.
The latter turn at supersonic speeds and can explode, destroying the whole cascade, if not properly machined.
Iran says it now has 110 tonnes of uranium hexafluoride, which is fed into the centrifuges to make enriched uranium. When Iran had 40 tonnes of UF6, experts said it was enough to make three bombs. The UF6 storage site at Isphahan would almost certainly be the first US target.
Depending on the IAEA's upcoming report, pressure to take diplomatic or military action against Iran could culminate at the G8 summit in Russia in June. The US may then resuscitate the argument it used before the invasion of Iraq: that the UN must prove itself as an organisation by moving against Iran. If it doesn't, the Bush administration may again be tempted to act unilaterally. It is in its nature to do so.
Iran and the US are, of course, not the only players on the stage. Negotiations between the E3 (France, Britain and Germany) and Iran resulted in a suspension of enrichment from October 2004 to January this year.
The US was at the time happy to let the Europeans have a try, but are convinced now that track has failed.
And while Russia and China share US and European fears at the prospects of an Iranian bomb, they have extensive trade interests in Tehran and have both made clear their opposition to military action against Iran.
Both, like the EU, would be keen to see a compromise on the part of the Iranians, but in its absence their opposition would not necessarily be sufficient to inhibit US action.