The Indecent Haste of Profitability

Credit: ABEDIN TAHERKENAREH/EPA

"[The agreement is] a big deal [for Iran and] will open the door for more companies to sign contracts [with the country]."
"[It] also gains the Iranians some diplomatic cover from both France and China in the event of attempts to impose further sanctions."
"The initial commitment of [US]$1-billion is relatively limited, giving it the flexibility to invest more if the situation is favourable."
Robin Mills, head, Qamar Energy, Dubai (Bloomberg News, July 2017)

"...The rewards of Iran’s nuclear concessions are actually widely evident—in the volume of new trade and investment that is already underway; in the scope and velocity of diplomatic and commercial reengagement with Iran; in the swifter than anticipated revival of oil exports. Heads of state from Italy and India, from South Korea to South Africa are beating a path to Tehran, accompanied by contingents of eager investors. Meanwhile, Iranian officials including the chief of the same Central Bank that was formerly barred by sanctions headline conferences aimed at wooing European business partners. The great Iranian gold rush is on."
Susan Maloney, Brookings Institute, May 2016 

"The flurry of investor excitement and the sheer size of Iran’s economy had some analysts comparing it to the reopening of Eastern bloc markets after the fall of communism. In a measure of the billions of dollars that are at stake, Tehran announced that it planned to buy 114 Airbus jets, while the head of the state-owned National Iranian Oil Co. said Sunday that the country planned to boost production by 1 million barrels a day, about a 33 percent increase in output."
"European leaders, seeking a rare piece of economic good news amid sagging markets, encouraged their nations’ businesses to take advantage of the opportunity. American companies are still barred by a range of U.S. sanctions that remain in place despite the lifting of those that were related to the nuclear program. For now, few U.S. companies are openly exploring business with Iran, even as European energy giants, carmakers and banks angle for a piece of the reopened market."
Michael Birnbaum, The Washington Post, January 2016 

Credit: RAHEB HOMAVANDI/Reuters

"Iran sold its first cargoes of natural gas condensate and crude oil to British in October last year. National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) said the state-backed oil giant sold a cargo of one million barrels of natural gas condensate to BP as well as a second cargo to an unnamed British company."
"Iran has been seeking new customers for its crude oil and condensate production as it works to boost its output and export levels. The oil state is hoping to further increase its daily output to approximately 6 million barrels a day within the next 5 years, but this is highly dependent on whether Iran will be successful in attracting investment from oil majors."
The Telegraph

So much for the morality of investing in and trading with a country whose raw and naked ambition is the political, social, religious conquest of the Middle East is unstoppable. In its quest it leaves no stone unturned nor opportunity to ply its Persian Shiite theocracy into a position of unrestrained power over the limpid reactions of the Arab Sunni majority in the region. Boasting of its intentions to release Hezbollah, its proxy militia, toward another war with Israel as soon as its Republican Guard Corps al Quds branch, Hezbollah and Shia militias complete their conflict engagements in Syria and Yemen, the Arab states are restively nervous.

Nervous of the Islamic Republic of Iran's determination to acquire and stockpile nuclear arms as made abundantly clear through its recent past where its nuclear scientists have initiated furtive preliminary nuclear explosives and its stride toward nuclear enrichment and the building of secret, underground plants alongside its growing technologically advanced ballistic missiles program emphasized its intent. Time and experience has shown that Israel's nuclear arsenal is in place for purely defensive purposes; there will be no such assurances with the Iranian Republic's acquisitions.

As North Korea continues to surprise and confound with its dual ICBM/nuclear advances, so too will Iran recommence its nuclear aspirations. Which it has temporarily shelved, while continuing to operate stealthily. Its attention for the time being focused on building its trade and investment with European corporations anxious for a profit cut from the vast oil and gas reserves located in Iran, the carrot that the Iranians use to their advantage toward profit-oriented companies and nations eager to overlook its Islamofascist terrorism links, much less its commitment to consolidating the Shiite crescent to challenge Sunni Arab majority status and power.

To Total SA went the crown for representing the first investment in Iran by an international energy company since the easing of sanctions last yer. The resulting 20-year agreement with National Iranian Oil Co. and China National Petroleum Corp for the development of phase II of the South Pars offshore gas field is considered the "first of many" such projects for these exuberant partners. With that kind of investment and the long-range profitability how likely is it that France would exert its moral authority should it be required to once again constrain Iran's ambitions?

Little wonder that Qatar, which shares the world's biggest gas deposit with Iran has chosen to champion the Republic against the pressure exerted by Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States to isolate both countries for their complicity in opening ever wider the sectarian chasm between Shiites and Sunnis. Iran's vital importance to the Syrian regime of Bashar al-Assad in destroying the futures of the majority Syrian Sunnis in his Alawite-led conquest of his own people, slaughtering civilians and creating millions of refugees let alone its incitement of the Houthis in Yemen in another Shiite civil war, describe in part the barbaric butchery Iran upholds.