Tensions with Iran are now “extreme”, French Prime Minister Francois Fillon said on Monday, heightening a diplomatic storm caused by French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner's warning on Sunday that the world should prepare for a possible war with Iran over its nuclear program.
The warnings came as France, which always said it wants to resolve the Iranian nuclear dispute through negotiations, launched a proposal to impose European sanctions against Tehran, outside of those already implemented by the United Nations. "These would be European sanctions that each country, individually, must put in place with its own banking, commercial and industrial system. The English and the Germans are interested in talking about this. We will try to find a common European position," Kouchner said after meeting his Dutch counterpart Maxime Verhagen in Paris.
Verhagen said that if the Security Council didn’t agree more sanctions, the Dutch government would be willing "to apply European Union sanctions in common with the United States sanctions."
In his first response to the French warnings, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said: “We do not take these declarations seriously. Comments to the media are different to the real positions.”
Ahmadinejad’s response stressed a firm belief in Tehran that the current warnings, either from Washington and Paris, are just psychological warfare.
"I don't think anyone in Iran has taken these threats seriously. They think that it's more rhetoric and for putting extra psychological pressure on Iran," says Sadegh Zibakalam of Tehran University.
"As far as the president is concerned, as far as the supreme leader is concerned, the United States is simply trying to wage a psychological war against Iran and we must be strong enough, we must be resolute enough," he added. "We must not show them that we have been frightened and we are going to back down."
There is also a strong belief in Iran that the U.S. is not in a position to attack it. As the newspaper Jomhuri-ye Islami put it: “Iranians are deeply aware of the fact that America is so busy in Iraq and Afghanistan that it cannot do anything against Iran."
In response to the French warnings, Iran's military elite has also warned of the consequences of any attack against the Islamic Republic, saying U.S. bases in neighbouring Afghanistan and Iraq are well within the range of its missiles. "We are ready for a hard battle of defence," said Iranian air force chief Ahmad Meighani. "We are ready to face any menace."
Some in Iran are also convinced that Washington can somehow be overwhelmed by international opinion. An anti-war rally in Washington last weekend was given major coverage in the Iranian press - all evidence for Tehran that the U.S. public opinion simply will not allow an attack on Iran.
According to the BBC, such beliefs are even stronger among those close to President Ahmadinejad and the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. In fact, President Ahmadinejad is increasingly confident there will not even be fresh UN sanctions over Iran's nuclear program due to Tehran‘s increased transparency in answering questions from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). As he has put it several times recently: "The nuclear issue as a political issue is closed... the Iranian file is finished with."
By agreeing to talks with the International Atomic Energy Agency, Iran has won back the support of Russia and China, at least for the moment. Tehran says President Vladimir Putin of Russia is even going to visit Iran next month.
But the French warnings stoked tensions, particularly because they came as the U.S. Defence Secretary Robert Gates said that "all options are on the table” in relation to punishing Iran for its refusal to give up its nuclear program.
The French threats also showed the increasing influence that the United States has over policy in France, whose line on the Iranian nuclear standoff has hardened considerably since the election in May of President Nicolas Sarkozy.
Iran’s Foreign ministry spokesman Mohammad Ali Hosseini said Kouchner’s comments showed "the influence of unreal suggestions and erroneous information from others" and would damage France's credibility in the region. "It seems that the French foreign minister has forgotten the policy of the European Union" with his war warning. "The use of such words creates tensions and is contrary to the cultural history and civilisation of France," he added.
The state news agency IRNA also launched a withering attack on the French government, accusing it of "copying the White House" and saying Sarkozy has "taken on an American skin."
"The French people will never forget the era when a non-European moved into the Elysee," it said.
There was criticism in France too. "Kouchner's war-mongering statements overshadow nuclear talks," said the centrist daily Kargozaran, while the reformist daily Etemad-e Melli said: “A new lining up against Iran.”
Some of France's own European neighbours also reacted nervously to Kouchner's strident tones, with Italy's Foreign Minister Massimo D'Alema saying: "I think new wars are not the solution to the problem and that they could create new tragedies and new dangers."
According to AFP, Austrian Foreign Minister Ursula Plassnik slammed Kouchner’s "martial rhetoric". "I am for continued work towards a negotiated solution," she said in Vienna where the French campaign has cast a shadow over the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) conference in Vienna where Iran is top of the agenda.
International Atomic Energy Agency chief Mohamed ElBaradei also called the war talk "hype". "We need always to remember that use of force could only be resorted to when ... every other option has been exhausted. I don't think we are at all there," he told reporters on the sidelines of the conference.
The outcomes of the Vienna conference are hard to guess. But it’s a well-known fact that the U.S. cannot easily win approval for new UN sanctions against Iran. So the next three months could allow more time for negotiations. But Washington won’t stop its campaign against Iran, which has been made a scapegoat for the U.S. failures in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Meanwhile, President Ahmadinejad is on a public relations campaign to convince the world that Iran’s nuclear program is peaceful, not aimed at making atomic arms as the U.S. and its allies claim. He would also visit the UN General Assembly in New York this month.
The results of such efforts are not clear, but the worrying thing is not just that Washington and Tehran disagree. More fundamentally, they completely misunderstand each others' intentions. And that is how wars start.
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