A Grateful (Ingrate) Iran

When sanctions were imposed on Iraq after Operation Desert Storm in an effort to turn Saddam Hussein away from fears by the international community that he was developing nuclear weapons it was well known that he wasn't suffering, nor were any members of his Baathist government or the elite of Iraqi society. It was the general population that was suffering privation through lack of adequate food, potable water, electricity.

Through the oil-for-foods program administered by the United Nations (whose son of the then-Secretary-General Kofi Annan was involved in the corruption), Iraqi children were dying from massive malnutrition, and hospitals had a lack of basic supplies to save lives. The oil-for-food earnings were meant to be channelled toward civil relief; it was channelled into corrupt bank accounts into building more sumptuous palaces for Saddam Hussein.

Under the current multiple-years-long sanctions program imposed on intransigent Iran by the United Nations and enforced by the United States, Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei saw fit to use straitened state funds to continue furthering his beloved nuclear program. It was the nuclear program and its clear defiance of the universal non-proliferation agreement and Tehran's refusal to open all its sites for inspection by the International Atomic Energy Agency, along with its secretive building of new installations that brought the sanctions into action to begin with.

The Iranian public was becoming increasingly affected by the sanctions, and although they generally accepted what the leading ayatollahs claimed, that their country had a sovereign entitlement to nuclear development, they were restive as a result of their worsening economic and employment circumstances. The lack of financial investment and cash flow hardly mattered to the regime. It didn't stop them from financing Bashar al-Assad's vicious war against his own civilian population, nor did it stop them from funding Hezbollah, their proxy jihad militia in Lebanon.

And nor did it put much of a damper on financing the construction of new nuclear sites like the heavy-water nuclear installation at Arak. It had all the finances it needed to take possession of new and more advanced centrifuges to spin more efficiently in the production of enriched uranium. But it is a relief to the regime that negotiations with the hated West paid off in a relaxation of sanctions, however briefly.

Six months' enablement for the Islamic Republic of Iran can produce wonders for a country feverishly working against time to achieve its clandestine goal of nuclear warhead production.

It represents a tactic and a successful technique that Iran has used many times previously; to disarm suspicions of those nervous about its intentions by pledging cooperation, only to move forward on its initiative toward its goal. And despite how many times in the past the international community has been lulled into complacency, it never fails but to accept the new and 'reasonable' assurances emanating from Tehran. All the more so now, that there is a new, moderate and reasonable president whose engaging smiles are a welcome relief from the truculence of his predecessor.

But, in fact, statements out of Tehran belie the assurances given in Geneva. Tehran states again and again it has the inalienable right to produce enriched uranium. While it denies it plans to ultimately produce nuclear warheads, it continues to speak threateningly and convincingly of its plans to destroy the State of Israel; by sheer will power of malign thought-transference perhaps? Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States have no illusions; they feel no fear of Israel's weapons stock but they do for Iran's potential.

So, will relief come to the people of Iran, celebrating the 'win' by their nuclear negotiators at Geneva, whose clear conscience and common sense assurances won the day? That remains to be seen, but the beneficiaries will most certainly be the Iranian Revolutionary Guards' Corps and the Supreme Leader, in both of whom not only rests the authority of the fundamentalist Islamist state to continue their repression, their barbaric take on justice, their support for terrorism and threats and violence on the international stage, but their investments as well.

The freeing up of the oil flow and automotive sector benefits the military-industrial complex in the Islamic Republic of Iran, reflected by the IRGC and the Supreme Leader. There is a whole lot of dual-use technology of benefit to the state in many ways through their oil and gas holdings, investment companies, petrochemical industries and manufacturing groups, along with investment foundations worth billions whose profit directly enriches the ayatollahs and the the Revolutionary Guard elite.

The recent report by Saeed Ghasseminejad in the Times of Israel relating to Rey Investment, directly controlled by the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei owns spare car parts companies and has the exclusive dealership for BMW in Iran; Germany is pleased no end it can now legitimately authorize re-entry into that market.