Washington's fuss over Iran has more to do with its natural
gas and oil reserves than anything else.
Like the United States
and most other world powers, Iran foolishly wants to be in the nuclear power
business. Atoms offer energy diversity and national prestige, plus a lot of
bucks for somebody.
There are plenty of
environmental and safety reasons to oppose the construction and operation of
nuclear reactors. Key among them is the fact that there’s no proven safe system
to dispose of or store the highly radioactive waste they generate.
This skepticism isn’t
unreasonable. After all, Iran ranks as the
world’s second-largest natural gas reservoir and it’s got the planet’s fourth-largest proven oil
reserves, according to U.S. government estimates.
Israel claims that if
Iran were to acquire nuclear weapons, they would be directed its way, and
therefore, there’s no choice but to mull the bombing of Iran’s nuclear
operations. An attack by Israel, which itself possesses nuclear weapons, on
Iran could unleash regional mayhem.
While probably less
devastating than a military strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities, the U.S.-led
UN sanctions against Iran for its nuclear efforts are proving brutal, depriving
average Iranians of prescription
and over-the-counter drugs. Inflation
is raging and the quality of life in Iran is declining across the board.
Meanwhile, some
scholars are debating whether the sanctions actually constitute an act of war,
and it’s starting to look like efforts
to enforce the sanctions in Europe are hitting legal roadblocks.
There’s a chance that
things will soon appear less intractable. Iranians recently elected a new
president, Hassan Rouhani, who experts deemed to be the most “moderate”
candidate. He takes office in August.
So there could be some
reason to stop considering the potential for that kind of carnage. But there’s
no way to end Iran’s status as a U.S. foreign policy priority.
What exactly is at
stake?
The answer is the same
as with Iraq, Libya, and Venezuela. They’ve all got oil and gas, and the United
States wants as much access to their fossil fuels as possible.
Our leaders don’t
relish occupation. They just want to ensure that our consumers and companies
can obtain all the oil they wish to consume, and that American oil companies
can suck up all the profits they can guzzle.
Iran, after all, is
the land where oil and foreign policy first pooled together. After seven years
of searching for oil in what used to be called Persia, William Knox D’Arcy, a
British entrepreneur, found black gold there in 1908. His discovery officially
turned the Middle East into an oil hotspot, a fate from which the region has
yet to recover.
In the early 1950s,
Iran elected Mohamed
Mossedegh president. He
was a progressive and popular politician who wanted Iran to take control of its
own oil and become a great nation.
Washington had other
plans. In 1953 the CIA engineered a coup that ousted Mossadegh and installed the
Shah, who ensured that U.S. and British oil companies could resume their
siphoning away of the Iranian oil industry’s profits. Iranians have hated our
government ever since. In 1979, they chucked
the Shah and eradicated
the last traces of foreign influence over their oil fields.
For perspective, just
remember Watergate and its theme, “Follow the Money.” In the Middle East, our
national modus operandi is simply “Follow the Oil.”
Emily Schwartz Greco is the managing editor of OtherWords,
a non-profit national editorial service run by the Institute for Policy
Studies. OtherWords columnist
William A. Collins is a former state representative and a former mayor of
Norwalk, Connecticut. OtherWords.org