Iran has no intention of reaching a settlement over its illicit nuclear program, the Islamic Republic’s senior strategist revealed last week on his blog.
Instead, the regime has adopted a policy of “elongation” with the 5+1 nations in which it strings along the United States, France, Britain, Russia, China and Germany as it develops nuclear weapons, wrote Alireza Forghani.
Forghani is a senior analyst and strategy specialist in the supreme leader’s camp and closely aligned with Mehdi Taeb, who heads the regime’s Ammar Strategic Base, a radical think thank, and thus speaks with the blessing of the Islamic regime.
“Elongation” is Iran’s sole doctrine, Forghani wrote, in which the Geneva negotiations between the P5+1 and Iran were “never supposed to be brought to a successful conclusion … whether positive or negative.” Those talks began in 2006 and have been extended several times as one deadline after another failed to produce a comprehensive agreement. The two sides agreed on Nov. 24 to yet another deadline extension, this time to June 30, 2015.
Forghani warned that soon he will promote the slogan “Nuclear weapon is our definite right,” and that there will be people in the streets demanding a nuclear-armed Iran. He also promised the destruction of Israel, which he claimed “is exactly what Almighty God wants.”
The strategist claimed that soon the world will face “a nuclear Iran that not only has nuclear power, but also is equipped with nuclear weapons. Hence, Tehran will not negotiate with Washington anymore… I will promise it to [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu, [President] Obama, the U.S. Congress and [the Israeli] Knesset… Insha’Allah [God willing].”
The clerical establishment ruling Iran has already received billions of dollars and the loosening of some sanctions in the 2013 interim agreement, but with the Nov. 24 deadline extension, it will also receive $700 million per month to continue with the negotiations.
The Associated Press, quoting U.S. officials, reported on Dec. 5 that Iran has agreed verbally to limit its development of advanced centrifuges and allow greater access for inspection by the International Atomic Energy Agency, the United Nations’ nuclear watchdog. Shortly after the release of that report, the regime’s media outlet Fars News Agency quoted an Iranian official close to the talks that no such agreement took place and that Iran will continue with its research and development of centrifuges and enrichment.
The regime currently has about 10,000 centrifuges that are spinning nonstop and, according to the latest IAEA report, has even increased its stockpile of low-enriched uranium to over eight tons, enough for several nuclear warheads if further enriched.
That report also said that Iran continues to stonewall IAEA inspectors, who for years have requested the inspection of the regime’s Parchin Military Base, where the regime conducted high-explosive tests that could be used for nuclear weapon detonators. Satellite images have shown extensive activity by the regime to clean up the site.
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the supreme leader, along with Revolutionary Guard commanders, have continuously held the position that not only will Iran continue with its ballistic missile program despite U.N. and international sanctions, but that the country’s nuclear program will not only not be halted but expanded.
As reported in April 2012, an analysis by Mohammad Mohammadi, an Iranian international affairs and nuclear program analyst, concluded that the country no longer needs to compromise with the U.S.
“It is quite clear that when we watch the current arguments between America and Israel over Iran, the Obama administration is quite confused,” Mohammadi said in the Keyhan newspaper, an outlet under Khamenei’s direct supervision.
In his article, titled “The Lessons from the Past for the Negotiations in April,” Mohammadi wrote: “Looking back at the past decade, all the red lines by America and the West over Iran’s nuclear issue have now been transformed into acceptance. America has always adopted radical actions at first that have changed to symbolic measures later. Iran has always known that America and the West needed a way to solve the nuclear issue with some honor, and today it is quite visible that with the defeat of America’s policies toward Iran, the talk about a need to solve the Iranian nuclear issue diplomatically is a way to obtain that honor.”
Mohammadi concluded back then that, “Today, Iran is proving the point that in order to be a powerhouse, it does not need to compromise with America.”
Reza Kahlili is a pseudonym for a former CIA operative in Iran’s Revolutionary Guards and author of the award winning book “A Time to Betray” (Simon & Schuster, 2010). He serves on the Task Force on National and Homeland Security and the advisory board of the Foundation for Democracy in Iran (FDI)