INSTITUTE FOR NATIONAL 

STRATEGIC STUDIES 

IRAN'S STRATEGIC 

INTENTIONS AND 

CAPABILITIES 

Edited by 

PATRICK CLAWSON 

NATIONAL DEFENSE UNIVERSITY 

McNair Paper 29 
A popular Government, 

without popular information or the means of 

acquiring it, 

is but a Prologue to a Farce or a Tragedy; or 

perhaps both. 

Knowledge will forever govern ignorance; 

And a people who mean to be their own 

Governors, 

must arm themselves with the power which 

knowledge gives. 

JAMES MADISON to W. T. BARRY 

August 4, 1822 
IRAN'S STRATEGIC 

INTENTIONS AND 

CAPABILITIES 

Edited by 

PATRICK CLAWSON 

McNair Paper 29 

April 1994 

INSTITUTE FOR NATIONAL STRATEGIC STUDIES 

NATIONAL DEFENSE UNIVERSITY 

Washington, DC 
NATIONAL DEFENSE UNIVERSITY 

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[] Editor for this issue: Frederick T. Kiley 

[] Secretary: Laura Hall [] Circulation Manager: Myma Morgan 

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ISSN 1071-7552 
Contents 

Introduction ............................ 1 

Patrick Clawson 

DOMESTIC POLITICS AND 

STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

Iran's Foreign Policy and Internal Crisis ........ 5 

Laurent Lamote 

Alternative Foreign Policy Views Among 

the Iranian Policy Elite ................. 27 

Patrick C/awson 

All Politics Is Local ...................... 49 

Farhad Kazemi 

RUSSIA AND IRAN 

Evolving Russian Attitudes Towards Iran ...... 55 

John Hannah 

Russian Military Strategy on Iran's Border ..... 61 

Stuart E. Johnson 

IRAN'S MILITARY INTENTIONS 

AND CAPABILITIES 

Iran's Strategic Aims and Constraints ......... 65 

Shahram Chubin 

D~j& Vu All Over Again? An Assessment of Iran's 

Military Buildup ......................... 93 

Michae/ Eisenstadt 

Iran's Military Situation .................. 153 

Ahmed Hashim 

Abbreviations Used ..................... 221 

About the Authors ...................... 223 

o°° 

111 
IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

AND CAPABILITIES 

INTRODUCTION 

PATRICK CLAWSON 

Iran appears to be pursuing an assertive foreign policy that 

confronts the United States on a variety of points: the Middle 

East peace process, the stability of moderate Muslim states, 

terrorism (such as the death threat to Rushdie), security in the 

Persian Gulf, and nuclear proliferation. 

However, Iran's intentions and capabilities are by no means 

clear. 

• On the intentions side, some observors expect that a 

desire for good economic relations with the West and a 

waning of revolutionary fervor will lead to moderation in 

action if not in words; others, myself included, see a 

broad consensus inside Iran for assertiveness, uniting 

Persian nationalism with Islamic fundamentalism. 

• On the capabilities side, Iran is short on cash and faces 

growing internal political dissension, which some say 

means it will not be able to devote much to Ibreign 

adventures and the military build-up, while others say 

intemal problems give Iran reason to acquire a military 

with which to pressure its rich neighbors. 

To discuss these issues, the Institute for National Strategic 

Studies at the National Defense University convened a workshop 

on "Iran's Strategic Intentions." The workshop brought together 
2 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

leading experts on Iranian security policy: speakers with access 

to Iranian officials and with the language skills to follow Iranian 

developments. 

Some of the points that I took from the discussion, which by 

no means represent the views of all the authors or discussion 

participants, were: 

• Iran is absorbed with domestic problems. 

- Foreign affairs is a secondary concern for Iran's 

leaders and its people. Foreign policies are in large 

part a by-product of domestic politics. 

- The govemment lacks legitimacy. The postKhomeini leadership is not accepted by many 

believers as the voice of religious authority. 

Religious figures in the provinces, especially those 

with large Sunni or non-Persian populations, 

increasingly reject the representatives sent from 

Tehran. The hold of the central govemment over the 

provinces is weakening. 

- The economic situation is bad, and the popular mood 

is worse. Public and elite opinion both believe that 

the continued existence of the Islamic Republic is in 

doubt. 

• Iran's military strategy does not emphasize extemal 

defense. 

- Iran sees itself as friendless in a hostile world, but it 

does not see itself as facing a serious danger from its 

neighbors. Iraq is not seen as a credible threat for 

the foreseeable future, for political and military 

reasons. Turmoil in the southem parts of the former 

Soviet Union is not seen as posing a conventional 

military problem for Iran. 

- Iran's principal external aims for its military are to 

discourage U.S. involvement in the Gulf and to 

spread its influence in its neighborhood. 

The Revolutionary Guards and the security forces, 

which are increasingly coordinated with the military, 
INTRODUCTION 3 

may be called on regularly to suppress domestic 

unrest. 

Iran will pursue military capabilities at the low end and 

high end, not the middle. 

- Development of nuclear weapons makes excellent 

sense, to assert the revolution's success (diverting 

attention from domestic problems) and its claim of 

equality to the great powers. 

- Iran lacks the resources to engage in an extensive 

buildup of its conventional military. The leadership 

realizes that lfigh-teclmology weapons are essentiai 

for success on the modem battlefield; revolutionary 

fervor is not sufficient. 

- Support for subversion and terrorism fits Iran's 

budget, its ideology, and its predilections. Nor does 

Iran believe it will have to pay a high price for this 

sort of low-intensity conflict. 
DOMESTIC POLITICS AND 

STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

IRAN'S FOREIGN POLICY AND 

INTERNAL CRISES 

LAURENT LAMOTE 

For a long time, exporting the Islamic revolution was the Iranian 

govemment's ideological priority and, also, a political means of 

countering Iraq's allies. Nowadays, Iran lacks the political, 

economic and military means of achieving this ambition. The 

only fight the 15 year-old Islamic Republic of Iran can undertake 

is for its own survival. 

Iran is isolated on the intemational scene. It has been 

defeated, or is facing new problems, in the international conflicts 

which it has faced on almost all its borders, as an actor, victim 

or witness. It can no longer cope with a staggering debt at the 

very time when, belatedly, proposals for cultural, social and 

economic reforms are being carded out. In addition to the 

internal socio-economical crises, Iran faces the failure of its 

politico-religious legitimacy. For the first time since 1979, the 

political elite and the Iranian clergy is openly split between the 

supporters of the national religious Guide (now Ali Khamene'i) 

and the traditionnal religious leaders. 

The Islamic Republic is now concerned about the survival of 

the national government. With the regime's survival at stake, 

5 
6 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

Iran's foreign policy is now dependant on these intemal crises. 

Nationalism seems today the last way to keep Iran united and 

traditional Islam safe. Nationalism, as well as the current Islamic 

ideology, explains the Iranian military build up and Iran's 

reassertion of its position as a major regional power. 

THE POLITICAL DEADLOCK AND THE 

REVIVAL OF NATIONALISM 

Although the public administration, services and institutions work 

relatively well, the Islamic Republic is facing a domestic crisis 

so widespread and serious that it risks bringing down the regime. 

Popular discontent became evident for the first time in 1992, 

when spontaneous riots broke out in Meshed, Arak and Shiraz. 

During the June 1993 presidential elections, discontent led to a 

high rate of abstention and a strong vote for the opposition in big 

cities and non-Persian provinces, later in the begining of 1994 

terrorist actions were conducted in Tehran and popular riots 

broke out in Zahedan (Baiuchistan). 

Since the summer of 1993, lran can no longer keep up on 

payments for its short-term debt of $30 billion, despite 

renegotiations on a bilateral basis with Japanese, German and 

French banks. Following several years when its doors were 

relatively wide open and programs were launched for economic 

recovery, the country must now drastically curb imports. Per 

capita income was cut in half from 1979 to 1989; and President 

Rafsanjani's policies have not improved things. Basic 

commodities and spare parts are scarce once again, after five 

years of artificial abundance. Inflation is rising under the impact 

of the rial's enormous devaluation. Inadequacies in public 

housing, health and education are no longer bearable, given the 

high rate of population growth (1.7 million more people every 

year): half of Iranians have had no direct experience of Iran 

under the Shah. 

Paralyzed by ideological principles, which keep it from 
LAURENT LAMOTE 7 

taking out medium- or long-term loans, Rafsanjani did little more 

in his first term as President (1989-1993) than to lift restrictions 

on imports and begin construction on investment the projects that 

had been adopted but not yet financed. Just as settlements had 

been reached with Westem firms and nations regarding the 

economic disputes that had arisen out of the 1979 Islamic 

Revolution, Iran plunged into economic crisis. Tile Iranian 

govemment knows that there is no economic future if it does not 

accept becoming part of the intemational financial system via an 

agreement with the IMF which is a prerequisite for a 

comprehensive rescheduling of its loans, going beyond the partial 

reschedulings with banks. Such a change implies normalizing 

relations with the United States, but tampering with this founding 

dogma of the Islamic Republic spurs the opposition of both the 

Khomeinist clergy and Ali Khamene'i, the Guide of the 

Revolution. The bazaar which was supporting Rafsanjani's 

policies realizes that the govemment is at an economic dead end 

and is now becoming an active opponant. 

Grassroots support for the Islamic Republic is withering. The 

cultural and social crisis is now public since most of the 

population is still very receptive to Westem ideas, values and 

techniques. This is not something new. But it now takes on 

political importance, as evidence that the revolution has not 

succeeded in making Islam the motor for development. It is now 

obvious, even in remote areas, that Iran cannot possibly become 

a "leftist Saudi Arabia" by juxtaposing moral and cultural 

fundamentalism with economic and technological development. 

Thanks to foreign media in Persian (BBC, Voice of America, 

Radio Israel and television programs in border zones or from 

satellite) and, even more, to relations with Iranians living in exile 

(especially in the United States), the society is open toward the 

outside world. Intellectual debate inside the country is lively 

despite vain efforts at censorship. 

Wom down by 15 years of power, the Islamist ideology has 

had difficulty surviving the end of the Iraq-Iran war and 

Ayatollah Khomeini's death in 1989. Islam is no longer seen as 
8 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

a subversive force but as the official ideology; and the clergy, no 

longer as the savior of the people but as the state's agents. 

Populist ideals have been given up in favor of a free market 

economy. For this same reason, the state has abandoned its role 

of maintaining a social equilibrium. Members of revolutionary 

organizations have been incorporated in the civil service. Since 

political and economic chaalges seem indispensable, opponents 

have adopted the ideological stance of fighting against the 

"Western cultural invasion" and saving Islam's moral values. This 

quite active campaign, led by the Guide himself, is intended to 

reunite the clergy around unanimously approved principles (such 

as women's status) and to counter the effects of the govemment's 

tuming toward the West. 

The gap has widened between the Shiite clergy and the 

population, between the imposed Islamic culture and the evolving 

Iranian society. Having profited from the Islamic Republic, the 

clergy knows that its lot and especially its revenues are bound up 

with the regime's political prospects. In Shiite tradition however, 

the clergy formed a countervailing power and lived on offerings 

from believers. As domestic problems have worsened, more and 

more religious officials have realized that, were the government 

to fall, it would pull the clergy down with it. Islam would thus 

be endangered in Iran. The pragmatists in power are, therefore, 

trying to gradually laicize at least the administration, whereas 

traditionalist and Khomeinist opposition forces are trying (without 

much success) to make the clergy, once again, credible to public 

opinion. The Islamic regime is still strong enough to survive 

by using security forces. However, it is not able to change its 

policy and political culture. The people in charge of public 

affairs are the same as they were in 1982, after having killed or 

jailed all opponants. The political elite of Iran is united by 

common struggles and often by revolutionnary or terrorist 

activities. While the elite has had strong internal divisions during 

the last 12 years, they reject any stranger or anyone who has no 

link---especially familial--with the them and with the clergy. The 

technocrats who have been working for the regime for years were 
LAURENT LAMOTE 9 

expecting political positions but not offered any and now don't 

want them any more. After Khomeyni's death in 1989, Ali Akbar 

Hashemi Rafsanjani began to open Iran's policy, but he didn't 

succede4--and may not have tried--to open the political elite. 

During the campaign for presidential elections in 1993, 

nationalist leaders, well aware of changes in society, proposed 

forming a government of technocrats in order to implement the 

second Five Year Plan's (1994-1999) structural and political 

reforms. This proposal was obviously utopian. 

Rafsanjani's govemment is trying however to save the 

situation by encouraging various small political activities such as 

an ecological political party and feminist movements, or 

promoting technocrats to positions of medium responsibility. But 

it has run up against two refusals. On the one hand, lay 

technocrats do not want to take power in a system with such so 

uncertain a future. On the other hand, the religious caste in power 

will never accept giving real responsibilities to anyone not of the 

fold--who has no family bonds with the clergy or no established 

past as a revolutionary. Top civil service positions are still in the 

hands of a small, heterogeneous group of "relatives" and 

"activists" with close ties to Islamic power-holders. 

Dealing with this obvious failure of political Islam, but to 

save both the regime and the State, the govemement --President 

Rafsanjani and Guide Ali Khamenei--is both enforcing security 

measures and looking for possible political allies. The political 

debate is made more open to make possible the emergence of 

what we might call National Islamism (or Islamic Nationalism), 

which would rally patriots having respect for Islam. As a matter 

of fact, nationalism is the only remaining political viewpoint 

shared by most of the Iranian clergy and by the various semitolerated political movements, which come from the National 

Front of Dr. Mossadegh (mainly Mehdi's Bazargan Movement for 

Freedom). 

As in 1979, policy makers are actively debating a wide 

variety of options, especially in a number of cultural journals. 

Islamists and the opposition seem to agree on nationalism which 
10 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

could be a way to prevent a total failure. This National Islamism 

is not a new political theory but a matter of fact, an on-going 

attempt to harmonize the Islamic Revolution's cultural and 

political heritage with the state's strategic interests. This latest 

attempt seems to have come too late. 

The risks of a spontaneous social explosion are quite real. 

This could destabilize a corrupt, discredited regime and a 

government that has not laid the conditions for economic 

recovery. To ensure the regime's survival, the domestic 

intelligence services (SAVAMA) have been reinforced; the 

Revolutionary Guards have given up their positions on the Iraqi 

border to concentrate around big cities; and antiriot squads have 

been created. In addition, the Auxiliary Volunteer Forces (Basiji) 

were reorganized in October 1993 like an army with ranks, career 

opportunities, and a specific assignment in keeping law and 

order--there are about 150.000 of them in Tehran. In February 

1994 Minister of Interior Besharati was given wide powers to 

enforce security inside the country. The crises have never 

endangered the Islamic regime as they do now, because of the 

attrition of the clerical system, of the international situation 

involving transborder populations, the awakening of the important 

Sunni minority, and overall the widening of divisions inside of 

the Islamic elite and the clergy. Due to its intenal problems, the 

Islamic Republic of Iran no longer has the capacity for its 

international ambitions. 

THE NEW CRISIS INSIDE THE CLERGY 

AND THE POLICY MAKERS 

The clergy and Islamic organizations have adjusted poorly to the 

deep changes wrought in Iranian society. They have not managed 

to take root in the vast suburbs surrounding big cities, which now 

have a political and social clout than the countryside, bazaars or 

old urban centers, which took part in the 1979 revolution. 

The main political crisis which may lead to a new political 

system, is "religious". Two questions appear to provoke stronger 
LAURENT LAMOTE 11 

disputes : 

• The power of the national religious Guide and the 

relations between the Islamic gouvemement and the 

traditionnal religious leaders after the death in December 

1993 of Reza Golpayegani, the last of the traditional 

Grand Ayatollahs who comand widespread respect 

• The rights of the Sunni minority of 15 million people, 

whose religion has not been recognized like that of the 

small Jewish, Christian or Zoroastrian minorities. 

The Rupture Between the Government-appointed 

and Traditional Clergy 

Both political leaders and the traditional clergy from schools of 

theology in Qum and Mashhad increasingly, though still 

indirectly, criticize the religious office of Guide of the 

Revolution, on which the Constitution is grounded. Partisans of 

the Islamic Republic accepted or supported Imam Khomeini's 

absolute power because of his personality and as necessary to the 

revolution. But these reasons no longer hold. Major Shiite 

dignitaries have always thought that the office of a single Guide, 

as established by Khomeini, ran counter to the principles of 

Shiism--all the more so since the current Guide's whole career 

has been in politics, not in religion. 

Since Ayatollah Golpayegani died on December 9, 1993, 

there is no longer anyone who commands wide support to assume 

the theological duties as the Spiritual Guide (marjai taqlicO of 

Shiites throughout the world, a vital post in traditonal 

Shiism--unlike the political post of Guide of the Revolution 

introduced in 1979. The deep division, which has always existed, 

between the Islamic Republic and the traditional clergy is now 

fully public. While cleverly putting to use a show of strong unity 

among the clergy, the Republic has set up a religious hierarchy 

imposed from above--by the Guide of the Revolution. This 

political clergy is, in fact, a corps of civil servants. In each city, 

province, public administration or state institution, a 
12 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

"representative of the Guide" has been appointed, often taking in 

part or full the place of local religious dignitaries, who are closer 

to the population. 

There are two irreducible rationales: the one pursued by a 

clergy "under oath" appointed by the government and the other 

by an "unswom" clergy that has ties with schools of theology and 

is jealous of its independence. For years now, the show of unity 

between the clergy and major ayatollahs has been kept up thanks 

to: government grants to the clergy in general, the prestige of 

official duties and Imam Khomeini's undisputed authority (Even 

Grand Ayatollah Golpayegani had finally recognized Khomeini's 

power). But relations are no longer so cordial. There is fullblown conflict between Ali Khamane'i (the current Revolutionary 

Guide) and the traditional clergy from the Qum theology schools, 

which are no longer free to recognize their new ayatollahs. The 

paradox of an Islamic power that cannot attract good applicants 

for top religious offices tends to discredit the regime as a whole. 

It "endangers Islam", to borrow a phrase from Hojatoleslam 

Khatami, the former minister of Islamic Guidance. 

As a result, Islamic taxes (Khoms and Zakat) from the 

faithful to the clergy have decreased. The clergy's image has been 

deeply tamished, especially that of traditional religious leaders, 

who have accepted money from and compromises with the 

govemment, as well as of the political clergy in the govemment's 

service. This religious crisis is, above all, political. It is the first 

intemal crisis that divides the Islamic regime as well as the 

political elite. Differences are not over tactical questions of how 

to pursue the revolution: questionss like reformism vs. revolution, 

state vs. the private sector, or radical Islam vs. accomodation 

with the United States. The legitimacy of the Revolutionary 

Guide is at stake. This division runs through institutions, in 

particular the Revolutionary Guards and Basij. It also has an 

impact on grassroots support for the regime. 

The legitimacy of the present revolutinary Guide is disputed 

even by followers of Khomeini's ideas, such as Ayatollah 

Khoheiniha, publishers of the daily Salam. The centre of the 
LAURENT LAMOTE 13 

opposition is in Qom. An important figure is Abd ol Karim 

Sorush, a writer and philosopher of evident revolutionnary 

credentials, who is the leader of a think tank where are discussed 

new ideas about Islam and politics. A major figure in Tehran is 

Ayatollah Mahdavi Kani, formerly interim prime minister and a 

major figure during the Islamic Republic's early years, who now 

heads the powerful Tehran's Combatant Clergy Association. He 

has argued more than once for religious leaders to "return to 

schools and mosques" in order to maintain relations with the 

people and retain their power of criticism--instead of being civil 

servants in charge of repression. In fact, he is arguing for the end 

of the office of Guide, which, in 1979, was justified by the 

necessities of the revolution but could now be transferred, 

without its executive powers, to a council of Grand Ayatollahs. 

This would amount to going back to the Constitution of 1906- 

1979. 

Three outcomes can be imagined: 

• The Shiite community could be tom apart. This would 

amount to retuming to a situation like that in the 19th 

century: there would be many local ayatollahs and 

theology schools, each independent. Among Shiites in 

lraq, Lebanon and Pakistan, such a trend can be detected. 

Evidence of it in Iran comes from the revival of the 

Mashhad School of Theology and the comeback made by 

former religious dignitaries in several big cities. The 

Islamic Republic carmot easily accept this dismantling of 

Qum's authority in Iran, nor of Iran's among Shiites. This 

could set off a gradually uncontrollable process and 

ongoing conflicts between, on the one hand, local 

religious leaders, empowered by the people, and, on the 

other, the govemment-appointed "Friday Prayer 

Directors" and "Guide's representatives." 

• A council of ayatollahs could replace the one Guide. 

Alreay, a temporary council to issuefatwas wa set up in 

1992 after the death of Grand Ayatollahs Marashi-Najafi 

and Khoi. It could be made permanent and reformed so 
14 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

as to include a dozen ayatollahs from religious schools as 

well as politicians (including Revolutionary Guide Ali 

Khamene'i) with some Isl,'unic credentials. The Islamic 

Republic's constitution does provide for the possibility of 

filling the office of Guide with a religious council instead 

of just one man. But if Ali Khamane'i were to sit on the 

Fatwa Council, he would no longer be the Guide, since 

he cannot be both unus par inter and omnipotent Guide. 

This would signal the end of the Guide's magisterium 

(velayat-e faghi), a basic concept underlying the Islamic 

Republic. This would be fatal to the regime. 

• Open conflict could break out between Tehran and Qum. 

This would not be something new, as shown by the 

repression of all those who, over the past 2 years, have 

more or less covertly criticized the incoherence of a 

religious power (the revolutionary Guide's) interfering in 

everyday politics. This debate is widely open, but under 

a very low profile way, because it is still a crime to 

discuss openly on the legitimacy of the Guide. 

The second optiorv--a religious peace--is strongly opposed 

by Ayatollah Ali Montazeri. This energetic but controversial 

leader--who was designated to be Guide but now lives in "exile" 

in Qum--is above all, loyal to Khomeinism, including the 

combination of revolution and tradition. If, as an ultimate 

recourse, he made a comeback, this would mean that the current 

Guide has failed and should quit. A major crisis would break out. 

Under all these hypotheses, the regime will continue trying 

to separate religion from politics. This process could already be 

observed when Rafsanjani was elected president in June 1993 

with only 63% of the vote. The clergy's formal unity, on which 

the regime has been built, no longer exists even if on both 

sides--Qom and Teh~o one wants to open the "religious 

war", because each side knows that the issue is the end of the 

Islamic Republic and may be popular riots against the clergy as 

a whole. 

Previously, after the death of a Grand Ayatollah, several 
LAURENT LAMOTE 15 

years were sometimes necessary for a new clerics to be 

recognized as a Spiritual Guide, but the situation is now entirely 

different since the Islamic Republic didn't allow for 15 years the 

emergence of any new high ranking ayatollah outside of the state 

institutions, since numerous "young" rnojtaheds (high ranking 

cleric) are eager to get higher position, and because a big amount 

of money is at stake. Due to the current crises, the emerging 

issues are so important that serious violence will occur, and 

political instability. 

The Sunnis: An Unrecongnized Religious Minority 

Sunnls make up 15 percent of Iran's population and represent, by 

far, the largest religious minority in a country that, since 1979, 

has had a constitution based on Shiism. The Shiite govemment 

maintains that Islam is One and Indivisible, that distinctions 

cannot be made between Muslims. In contrast, non-Muslim 

religious minorities are "protected", i.e., they have a recognized 

legal status that, though marginal, is more advantageous than the 

position of Sunnis. Jews (fewer than 2,000 voters), like 

Zoroastrians (40,000 voters) have a deputy. Armenian (200,000 

voters) and Chaldean (5,000 voters) Christians have their own 

deputies, newspapers and associations. But Sunnis have been 

granted nothing for reasons that have to do with Islam itself and 

with the Islamic Republic's position in the Muslim world, but 

also because Sunnis are mostly Baluchis, Arabs, Turkmens and, 

above all, Kurds. 

Objections to this exclusion have been voiced more strongly 

since the areas with Sunni majorities are no longer just rural or 

tribal zones but also big cities. Before the Islamic revolution, 

Sunni areas, mainly rural, were controlled by tribal authorities. 

Then as now, the standard of living was the lowest in the 

country. Owing to their ethnic identity, these regions were 

"apart". They were not politically involved with the central 

government, except for occasional irredentist impulses that were 

quickly repressed. During the past years, wars in Iraq and 
16 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

Afghanistan as well as the Islamic govemment's centralism, its 

presence in remote villages and its aggressive interventionism, 

have set off revolts that have both finished the process of putting 

and end to the power of local leaders and set off vast migrations. 

Cities in these peripheral regions (Sanandaj, Mahabad, 

Kermanshah, Zahidan, Zabul, Iranshahr) have grown fast. 

Furthermore, many Sunnites have migrated toward big cities on 

the Iranian plateau, in particular Tehran. Given recent events and 

these migrations, Sunnis are no longer in the same 

sociogeographical position. Since cities exist that have more than 

300.000 inhabitants and are no longer dominated by the local 

bourgeoisie and tribal authorities, political relations with the 

central govenm~ent have changed too. Local officials, Sunni 

religious leaders, members of the Majlis and intellectuals have no 

qualms about intervening in politics at the level of the central 

govemment. They do so as Iranians with full fights, as Kurds but 

also as Sunnis. They are challenging the Shiite govemment on its 

own turf. Sunnis now form a political force that the Islamic 

Republic can no longer ignore as being peripheral, archaic or 

tribal. 

Iran's Sunni populations do not imagine forming political 

alliances with neighboring countries, for they have a strong sense 

of Iranian nationalism. However, they do not refuse outside help, 

notedly in Baluchistan, where most children attend private Sunni 

schools financed by Pakistan, i.e., with Saudi funds. At a time 

when the Shiite clergy's authority and hegemony is increasingly 

discredited, the emergence of Sunnis as a sociodemographic force 

could be a powerful factor of destabilization, all the more so 

since it is developing within the rationale of Islam. This question 

is all the more serious since the govemment is considering 

putting town-councils and mayor's offices up for election, and 

that several military conflicts are active on Iran's boundaries. 

Added to religious divisions among the Shiites, the Sunni 

problem, built up by the Islamic republic, seems to become most 

dangerous opposition. Several riots have already occured 

precisely on that matter in 1992 among Arabs of the Persian 
LAURENT LAMOTE 17 

Gulf, e.g., Bandar Lengeh) when Sunni school masters have been 

replaced by Shiite, and in Zahidan in February 1994. 

DIPLOMATIC ISOLATION AND THE 

DANGER OF BORDER CONFLICTS 

The Islamic Republic must handle three levels of conflict: 

embroiled relations with the West; the propagation of lslamism; 

and border relations. It sparked some of these conflicts, which are 

now tuming against it. Owing to them, the Republic has been 

forced to minimize (or abandon) its actions on the world scene 

to concentrate efforts on reinforcing its position with regard to 

next-door neighbors, and manage the emergency of the crises and 

wars along its borders. Transborder populations are new links 

between internal and foreign crises. 

For 15 years now, Iran has been threatened or 

threatening--along all its borders. No other nation in the world 

has had to face as many conflicts as the Islamic Republic: wars 

(Iraq, the Gulf, Kuwait, Afghanistan, Armenia, Azerbaijan, 

Kurdistan), drug traffic (Baluchistan), and the collapse of the 

USSR. To all these can be added the problems arising out of its 

anti-Americanism and ideological exportation of the Islamic 

Revolution, its terrorist actions as part of the war with Iraq, and 

the intervention of Iranian forces (the Pasdaran) directly in 

Lebanon or indirectly against Israel. Despite the success of the 

Hezbollah's base in Lebanon, Iranian islamic foreign policy 

policy, too much associated with shiism, has failed in spite of 

continuous but attempts to stick with political islam in various 

countries. This failure became obvious following Syria's 

discussions with the United States in January 1994. 

Iran is diplomatically isolated, American forces are present 

on its borders, and the Islamic Republic has little influence in 

non-Shiite Muslim lands. After the 1980 Iraqi invasion, the 

breakup of the USSR (which affects Iran more than any other 

country in the world) and the demonstration of American military 

might during the Iraq-Kuwait War, the Islamic Republic realizes 
18 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

that it reaps few benefits from its support for Islamist movements 

and the negative reputation acquired through terrorist actions. 

Feeling directly threatened, it has adopted the priority of 

reinforcing its regional position and its own security. The 

strengthening of lran as a state appears today as the only way to 

protect, and later spread, the ideals of revolutionnary islam. The 

followers of Khomeini's policy--the "hard liners"--are still 

thinking that political actions must be also conducted abroad, but 

do agree with the priority of securing the Iranian state. 

Iran's containment: Iran and the United States 

Because of, first, its clash with the United States in the context 

of the East-West conflict and, second, the Iran-Iraq war, Iran has 

been forced out on the fringes of intemational diplomacy. The 

American hostage affair and, then, terrorist actions in Lebanon 

have lastingly branded the Islamic Republic illegitimate. Most 

countries officially respect the embargo on, in particular, military 

supplies. The U.S. containment policy and the rejection of the 

"evil power" are far from being absolute principles: the United 

States was in 1993 Iran's fourth trading partner. Furthermore, 

Iranian exiles in the United States form a political, intellectual 

and scientific reservoir which the Islamic Republic taps. Despite 

the changing situation in Iran and the world, ideological hostility 

to American policy still legitimates Iranian diplomacy in 

countries that are nonaligned, belong to the Islamic Conference, 

or are estranged from or opposed to the United States (especially 

for reasons having to do with weapons). Despite its active 

diplomacy and the signing of agreements with several small 

countries, Iran has no true allies and is still isolated. The Iranian 

govemment realizes its survival depends on normalizing 

international relations. It knows it must soon overcome American 

obstinacy, even if that costs concessions and sparks violent 

political reactions among lslamist politicians. The American 

military presence a few miles from Iran's coastline weighs 

heavily on the government's attitude. 
LAURENT LAMOTE 19 

Iran used to support terrorist-type actions against Iraq's allies 

and Westem interests. But this has changed since the war with 

lraq ended in 1988. Such actions are now directed toward 

objectives having to do with domestic politics (eliminating 

opponents), operations against Israel, and ideological actions in 

the Muslim world. Despite the centralization of power, Iran's 

foreign policy, as well as intemal security forces, is not fully 

under the govemment's control. The failure of Hezbollah's 1993 

attacks against Israel has proven that the Iranian govemment no 

longer has the capacity for intervening effectively in Palestine. 

The network of men set up for intelligence and actions now 

operates with Iranian instead of Arab personnel, but lacking 

coordination with diplomatic actions, its reputation seems to 

exceed its effectiveness. Such an investment cannot, of course, be 

dismantled even if, owing to a lack of money, it has been put on 

hold and assigned new objectives. Iran continues these 

intemational activities, as seen in early 1994 in the activities of 

the Iranian "diplomats" expelled from Jordan, the support of 

Muslim in Bosnia and the active international campaign around 

the Rushdie affair. 

In spite of improvement of military, economical and political 

relations with some European countries like Germany, former (or 

still) Soviet countries, and numerous countries of the Third 

World, the relations with the United States remain the central 

political question in Iran. The possible renewal of official 

relations with the United States was, for several months in 

1993/93, the centre of private and official debates, but strong 

oppositions on both sides have shown that it was too early. In 

1993, Iran had to face a hard reality about its intematioal 

isolation: the United States introduced a containment policy 

around the military build-up, complaints about its human rights 

stance continued, and its access to intemational finance fell. 

Iran's relations with the West have become harder and more 

pragmanist at the same time: 

• The campaign against the cultural invasion is no longer 

confined to words. In response to U.N. and U.S. 
20 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

statements on human rights, some hard liners are 

launching attacks against Iranian Christians, e.g., the 

murder of Bishop Housepian in January 1994; 

• Trade between Iran and the USA has become easier and 

grown impressively, partly because Europe and Japan 

were constricted by Iran's huge debt. 

No rapid change can be expected from these intemational 

relations which are involved in a continuing cold war. 

The Danger From Outside: The Problem of 

Transborder Populations 

Since the revolution, Iran's role has grown both in the region, 

because of its eight years of war against Iraq, and in the world, 

because of the Islamic Republic's efforts to take its place among 

Muslim lands. Although the collapse of the Soviet Union has 

deprived Iran of its strategic importance as a front-line nation, it 

has also opened the long northem border. And the country now 

has to face ethnic and national conflicts among border 

populations: Azeris, Armenians, Arabs, Turkomans and Kurds. 

During the Shah's reign, foreign relations were much simpler. 

Under American control, they were centered on oil and the Gulf. 

Today, relations with Turkey and Pakistan have been tightened, 

whereas the efforts at alliance sponsored by the United States 

from the late 1950s through the early 1970s and 1960s never 

worked. Iran has opened toward the Caucasus ,and central Asia. 

This could have promising middle- and long-term effects insofar 

as Iran's political and cultural influence has, for centuries, been 

very strong there. 

For the time being, relations with the Arab word are still a 

priority for three reasons: oil, the Islamic centers there, and the 

American military presence. Although Iraq is still the immediate 

enemy, it could become an ally, given geographical similarities 

and the United States' dual containment policy. Iran is looking 

for a modus vivendi with the Gulf countries, in particular Oman 

and Kuwait. It would like to prove that there can be no security 
LAURENT LAMOTE 21 

in this region without its involvement, even if this means being 

a nuisance as it was in the 1992/93 affair about Abu Musa island, 

which is disputed with the UAE. 

Iran now fears that transborder populations will be used to 

destabilize it. The feelings of an Iranian national identity among 

these non-Persian peoples, who make up half the total population 

of 60 million, have been proven during recent domestic crises. 

The crises have also proven that these peoples are not separatists; 

instead, their assertion of an identity expresses political 

opposition to the Islamic govemment in Tehran. The 

independence of ethnic states in the former USSR has made the 

question of Iran's own ethnic minorities the Islamic Republic's 

principal intemational problem. 

Incapable of exercising much influence over these now 

independent countries, Iran fears that the latter are so many 

Trojan horses, all the more so since armed conflicts have broken 

out in nearly all bordering regions and Iran, already hosting many 

refugees, apprehends receiving even more. Since the summer of 

1993, Iran has started forcibly sending back the 2.5 million 

Afghan refugees. Furthermore, it is tightly controlling the Arabs 

of Southem Iraq. It has also built refugee camps in Azerbaijan, 

attacked the bases of Iranian Kurd political parties in Iraqi 

Kurdistan, and is trying to take back control of Baluchistan from 

drug-smugglers. These police measures are part of Iranian 

diplomatic policy. Iranian diplomacy is trying (often with little 

success) both to propose its good offices for settling the conflicts 

between Armenia and Azerbaijan and in Afghanistan, and to 

obtain recognition as a leading regional power. 

Owing to their intemational dimensions and the size of the 

concemed populations and territories, the conflicts in Kurdistan, 

Azerbaijan and Armenia bear the most danger for Iran. What is 

feared is not so much a direct military confrontation with a 

foreign (Turk, Azerbaijani, Armenian, Iraqi or even Russian) 

army as the political effects, inside Iran, of any tragic events that 

might set off new refugee waves. Plus the refugees, many of 

whom would be Sunnis, could complicate the politico-religious 
22 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

problems of the existing Sunni minority; the Shiite government 

and state could face a real problem. 

The Military and Iran as a Regional Power 

According to most of experts, the Iranian armed forces are no 

longer prepared. Weapons are outdated, or have been destroyed 

or worn out during the long war with Iraq. The army is split 

between the Guardians of the Revolution and the military. The 

ideological force that was the main Iranian weapon to hold off 

the Iraqi army has vanished since tile Revooutionary Guards, 

Revolutionary Committees and Bassidj Auxiliaries have been 

incorporated in the army and security forces. Lacking funds and 

suffering from the arms embargo, Iran has not been able to equip 

its forces with operational, homogenous weapons. Having 

adopted a policy of dissuasion, the Islamic Republic bought 

sophisticated technology (long-range missiles, submarines, 

nuclear plans). This has had an impact in the media, but most of 

these high tech weapons cannot yet be used. 

In the medium or long run, priority will have to go to 

creating a national weapons industry to produce missiles, 

munitions and vehicles for troop movements. This change of 

priorities is under way, but it necessitates economic and scientific 

development and, therefore, a change of policy so at to favor 

national defense over the advancement of Islam. As it now 

stands, Iran's policy of dissuasion is temporary. It helps the 

country ensure its security while gaining time to obtain the 

weapons fit for its ambitions as a top-rank regional power--in 

continuity with Iranian policy under the Shah but without 

American control. Since it does not have any territorial claims, 

Iran could in the future police not only the Gulf but the whole 

region from the Caucasus to the Arabian Sea, from Central Asia 

to the Arabia peninsula. Iran does have sufficient infantry and 

security forces to intervene in areas close to its borders. 

Moreover, these forces have proven effective during the war with 

lraq, and they were able to manage the flight of Kurd refugees 
LAURENT LAMOTE 23 

after the Gulf war. But Iran's military position would be much 

more precarious were a broader confrontation, or one with a 

neighboring state, to break out. Because of its internal 

difficulties--lack of money and of revolutiormary faith-- Islamic 

Iran is not a military threat at the present time. 

Although it can still be a nuisance, the Islamic Republic 

seems helpless ill the face of these many potential COlfflicts. It 

has not rebuilt its army since the war with Iraq. Nor can it any 

longer launch terrorist actions directly against foreign interests, 

since these would keep the country from establishing the 

economic and political relations indispensable for its survival as 

a strong state. By force if not by choice, nationalism has become 

again, and more than under the Shah's regime, the political base 

of Iran's foreign policy, and therefore of home policy. For the 

Islamic authorities, the safety of Iran as a state is now essential 

to protect Islam and they are compelled to discuss with 

nationalists and to find an utopian synthesis between Iranian and 

Islamic identities. As well as in the last years of the Shah's 

regime, Iran's intemational aims are mainly in its region between 

Russia, Turkey, India and the Arab world. Universal Islamic 

ambitions are still in mind, but no longer have priority due to 

border conflicts and internal crises but also to the opening of the 

northem border of the country. Central Asia is potentially the 

main field of Iranian influence, but at present time must be 

solved the immediate future of the Islamic regime and saved of 

the capacities of the Iranian state. During the Iraq-Iran War, the 

young pasdaran were fighting for Islam but have protected their 

country; today the youth living in big cities is no more eager to 

fight for anything, unless perhaps Iran, but Islamic Iran may not 

be rescued. 

The Islamic Republic Has Come to a Deadend 

The Iranian government is deeply distressed but unable to face up 

to its situation. For instance, in the second half of 1993, it 

requested a very broad survey about Islam's and Iran's image in 
24 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

foreign media. But owing to the intrinsic despotism of the 

regime, in particular among those close to the Guide, any critical 

analysis of the results of this survey was impossible. The obvious 

is known but denied, and the clergy's political role in the state 

apparatus are not to be put in doubt. 

Popular support for the Islamic Republic is being eroded, and 

the Republic's legitimacy undermined. There is no longer may 

field to which the regime can point as an example of success or 

source of hope. All available information indicates that the state 

apparatus is at a loss: it knows it is heading for crisis that could 

be fatal to it, but it is unable to make the necessary decisions. 

Given this context, three hypothesis can be formulated about 

Iran's political future: 

• President Rafsanjani's system might stay in place both by 

avoiding economic collapse as it negotiates, step by step, 

an open-door policy and by using force, if necessary, to 

quell social discontent and opponents from inside the 

regime. This solution would encounter opposition within 

the clergy. Though indispensable, the separation of 

religion and state seems impossible without, at the same 

time, causing the downfall of the Islamic regime. 

Furthermore, having failed in all fields, Rafsanjani's 

govemment is no longer credible. The touchstone will be 

whether or not the Second Five-Year Plan, slated for 

21 March 1994, which Rafsanjani's govemment presented 

two years ago as capable of working miracles, is 

implemented or postponed. 

• National Islamism could be reinforced to save the state 

before it is too late. Technocrats, liberal nationalists, 

religious pragmatists, and the like might manage to make 

enough mutual concessions to form a coalition 

govemment. Members of the 1950s-1960s fomler 

National Front might constitute, as they did in 1979, the 

frame of a provisiomml govemement. The prospects seem 

slight however. To the extent that there are the 

necessary political parties and organizations, they are not 
LAURENT LAMOTE 25 

eager to work with a regime which might fall down 

soon. Elections for town-councils in big cities could 

provide the setting for political reconstruction; but 

apparently, the govemment no longer has the force 

necessary to do this mainly if local religious leaders 

gather opposition forces as they did in 1978, but this 

time against the Islamic republic. 

• Given the accumulated crises and the differences among 

the political elite with regard to the office of Guide, even 

a minor incident in big cities, in border provinces or/and 

among Surmis, might destabilize the Islamic Republic. If 

an open clash takes place among religious leaders, 

Islamic troops--the Bassidji and Revolutionary Guards-- 

risk being dangerously divided. The current govemment 

may be unable to manage the confluence of a social/ 

religious movement and a military crisis, should one of 

the many conflicts along the borders flare up. As for the 

national army, it would try to remain neutral. One can 

expect, however, that the strong national feelings Iranians 

have would provide again the only force that could keep 

the country from breaking up and help it maintain or 

reinforce its power in the region. 

This present situation, central point of which is the conflict 

inside the clergy after the December 1993 death of Ayatollah 

Golpayegani, may grow up slowly but strongly and assume 

diverse, even incoherent, forms, as each faction in power pursues 

its own goals. The risks of violent clashes and purges cannot be 

discounted, even though conflict may take a form different from 

the 1981-1983 civil war. We cannot omit the possibility of 

"political gestures" (as factions verbally "outbid" each other), 

reversed alliances, and inconsiderate words and deeds, especially 

with regard to foreign lands. Given the country's disorganization, 

the Iranian govemment no longer has the capacity to draw up or 

pursue long-term policies that might upset political or regional 

equilibria. But a new Republic of Iran may emerge 

of this new crisis. 
ALTERNATIVE FOREIGN POLICY 

VIEWS AMONG THE 

IRANIAN POLICY ELITE 

PATRICK CLAWSON 

Westem policy towards the Islamic Republic of Ivan has long 

been based on the assumption that Iran could be persuaded to 

change major aspects of its foreign policy, such as its support for 

death threats against Salman Rushdie, its murder of Iranian 

oppositionists in the West, its cooperation with terrorists 

(Lebanon, Palestinians, and various North African countries), and 

its sponsorship of opposition the lsrael-PLO accord. In their 

declaratory policy, the G-7 industrial countries share a common 

assumption that the problem is with particular Iranian foreign 

policies, not the regime: "Concemed about aspects of Iran's 

behavior, we call upon its govemment to participate 

constructively in intemational efforts for peace and stability and 

to cease actions contrary to those objectives. ''1 That is also U.S. 

policy as set out in Martin Indyk's speech on the "dual contaimnent" 

policy, in which he was careful to hold the hope for normal relations 

with Islamic Iran: 2 

i Tokyo G7 Summit Political Declaration, July 8, 1993. 

2 Martin Indyk, "Clinton Administration Policy Toward the Middle 

East," a special report of The Washington Institute for Near East Policy, 

May 21, 1993. 

27 
28 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

I should emphasize that the Clinton administration is not 

opposed to Islamic government in Iran. Indeed, we have 

excellent relations with a number of Islamic governments. 

Rather, we are firmly opposed to these specific aspects of the 

Iranian regime's behavior, as well as its abuse of the human 

rights of the Iranian people. We do not seek a confrontation, 

but we will not normalize relations with Iran until and unless 

Iran's policies change, across the board. 

There are some contrary voices, who suggest that Iranian 

behavior is not likely to change. Their argument is made 

stronger by the frequent dashing of hopes that moderates would 

consolidate power and change policy--a hope first held out in 

December 1979 when the election of Bani Sadr as president was 

said to foreshadow release of the American embassy hostages, 

and then repeated regularly with each twist and tum of Iranian 

politics. Talk of Iranian moderates has been unpopular among 

U.S. politicians since the days of the Iran-Contra affair, in which 

President Reagan was so badly bumed (the release of some U.S. 

hostages being matched by the taking of new ones). Some 

Europeans also express in private their doubts about Iranian 

moderation. In a meeting with U.S. Secretary of State Warren 

Christopher, Foreign Minister Claes of Belgium (which then held 

the EC Presidency) was quoted by U.S. officials as saying, "It 

would be a historic mistake" for Europeans to believe they could 

continue the search for Iranian moderates. 3 

How realistic is the assumption that the Islamic Republic 

could be persuaded to change important aspects of its foreign 

policy? Surely the answer to that question depends not only 

upon what the West does, but also upon the factors inside Iran 

that shape foreign l~licy. The aim of this paper is to examine 

one of the most important such factors, namely, the attitudes 

3 New York Times, December 2, 1993. 

28 
PATRICK CLAWSON 29 

towards foreign policy. 

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF 

FOREIGN POLICY 

As in most countries, foreign policy is less important than 

domestic politics to Iranians and Iranian politicians. For 

example, the headline in the January 25, 1994 Keyhan (the 

country's leading paper) read "Joint Govemment, Majlis Meeting 

to Examine Country's Most Important Issues"--and foreign 

policy was not mentioned at all among the many issues. 

Whether ideologues or pragmatists, members of the Iranian elite 

have a whole host of domestic matters to occupy their time and 

attention. Foreign policy is subordinate to these pressing 

domestic issues--subordinate in the dual sense that foreign policy 

comes second and also that foreign policy is seen through the 

lens of how it affects domestic policy. 

The Iranian political classes have lots of domestic problems 

on their mind these days. Let me cite just two among the many 

domestic issues which preoccupy them but which have received 

relatively little coverage in the Westem media. First is the 

supreme religious leadership. The generation of pre-revolution 

Grand Ayatollahs has largely passed from the scene, with the 

1992 death of the widely respected Khoei of Iraq and the 1993 

death of the Iranian Golyepagani. The problem for the Islamic 

Republic is that its principal political-religious figures are not 

among those who can claim to have eamed the title of Grand 

Ayatollah since the revolution. The country's officially 

designated political religious guide, Khamenei, desperately sought 

acceptance as Khoei's successor in the role of "source of 

imitation" (supreme living religious guide), but his claim was met 

with resistance if not ridicule. 4 Nor are the prayer leaders in the 

main cities or other religious leaders closely identified with the 

4 Mideast Monitor, February 26, 1993, quoting from al-Majalla. 
30 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

regime regarded as plausible "sources of imitation. ''5 This is 

more than a source of embarrassment, it is a serious political 

problem. The regime is not seen by the people or by the 

religious establishment as being the embodiment of religious 

values, which challenges its entire self-conception. Plus there is 

the practical problem that no prominent leader appears to be 

interested in the job now held by Khamenei. Were he to die, the 

job would have to be filled by some second-ranker, which would 

further undermine the regime's claims to religious privilege. 

A second domestic issue that absorbs the political leadership 

is the self-perceived unpopularity of the present system. During 

the first decade after the 1979 revolution, Islamic Iran's leaders 

took great pride in the hundreds of thousands of people who 

would regularly turn out to demonstrate their commitment to the 

revolution's value. The leaders now feel that the population is 

not necessarily on their side. Listen to the leaders' words: 

Khamenei, speaking on "Revolutionary Guards Day" to a group 

of Guards, said, 6 

Don't think that the Islamic Republic is going to be destroyed 

by the utterances of a few simple-minded wishful thinkers who 

say it is going to end today or tomorrow .... [But] Iran is 

alone in the world today .... The element of loneliness in the 

contemporary movement has created a degree of similarity 

between us and the movement of Husayn Bin-Ali [who was 

slaughtered with all his followers in a battle he entered 

knowing the outcome would be certain death]. 

The regime has gone so far as to hold exercises with 122,000 

Bassidj-force reservists in 170 cities, practicing seizing public 

5 The regime is reduced to promoting the qualifications of a 

heretofore obscure centelmrian, Ayatolhth Araki; cf. Jomhuri Islami, 

December 21 ,and 22, 1993, as printed in Akhbaar. 

6 Radio Tehran, ,as transcribed in FBIS, January 18, 1994. 
PATRICK CLAWSON 31 

buildings and radio stations from rioters, including an exercise 

that closed a section of downtown Tehran while troops 

"recaptured" the Majlis. 7 The outbreak of riots in several major 

cities in spring and summer 1992 has left the regime nervous, 

partly because popular demonstrations of unrest continue 

regularly. For instance, in a January 1994 riot, "a large number 

[of] troublemakers" used cranes to haul concrete blocks onto a 

highway in southeast Tehran. 8 

Foreign policy is seen through the prism of domestic issues 

like these. So, for instance, the Islamic Republic is 

hypersensitive to the attitude of foreign governments to the 

members of the People's Mojahedeen, because Tehran is worried 

about popular unrest. However unreal may be there 

concerns--and I very much doubt that the Mojahedeen could 

organize unrest, much less seriously challenge the regime--Iran's 

leaders regard any toleration for activities of the Mojahedeen as 

evidence of foreign plotting against their govemment. 

The primacy of domestic politics, and the viewing of foreign 

policy through the lens of domestic issues, applies also to the 

famous split between radicals and moderates. Despite the 

repeated denials by the regime's voices in the West, Iranians view 

politics since 1981 as characterized by a split between radicals 

and moderates. The differences between the two are primarily 

about domestic policy, as was nicely stated July 28, 1993 by 

Salaam, a newspaper close to the radicals: 

Everybody knows that there have been two major trends 

of thought in our society since the revolution .... One 

tendency believed "social justice" to be the central theme of 

the economy and regarded the fundamental duty of the Islamic 

government ,as support for the deprived and the barefoot .... 

7 lran Times, December 3, 1993. The exercise, during Bassidj Week, 

was code-named KHANDAQ. 

8 Jomhuri lslami cited in lran Times, January 14, 1994. 
32 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

In the foreign policy arena, it believed in full resistance to the 

West and the US, support for Islamic and liberation 

movements, and close relations with the Third World countries. 

To sum up, this tendency regarded itself as follower of the 

Imam [Khomeini]'s thoughts and was known as the "Imam's 

line" tendency in the society. 

The other tendency emphasized giving a free hand to the 

private sector in the economic arena... It regarded any effort to 

support the deprived and the poor as an influence of Marxist 

and socialist beliefs. In the cultural arena, it believed in a 

certain dogmatism and backwardness which originated from its 

traditio~mlist approach to intellectual developments .... In the 

foreign policy arena, it had a cautious approach toward the 

West and the US, etc .... 

Since the emergence of the two tendencies, various titles 

were used for them: hardline ,and moderate, radical and 

conservative, left and right, etc. Both the domestic and foreign 

media used the various terms .... 

It is true that many people, who believe that "the one who 

wins is right," have change color and have co-ordinated 

themselves with the "tide current." The Majlis member for one 

town entered the Third [1988] Majlis on behalf of one wing 

(the so-called left wing) and entered the Fourth [1992] Majlis 

on behalf of the other wing (the so-called right wing). 

The radical and moderate labels each apply to tendencies, not to 

formal or tightly knit groups. On any issue, lines may blur, with 

some radicals taking a more moderate stance on that point and 

some moderates taking a more radical stance. To make a 

Westem analogy, the two trends are more like Democrats and 

Republican in the U.S. Congress than they are like Labor and 

Conservatives in the British Parliament: individual egos, not party 

discipline, rule supreme. To continue the analogy, much as the 

Democrats have "old Democrats" and "new Democrats," so the 

moderates are split between technocrats (the smaller group, with 

about 100 of the 270 seats in file Majlis but with domination of 

the ministries) and the traditionalists (with about 130 Majlis 

seats). The traditionalists were well described in the New York 
PATRICK CLAWSON 33 

Times as "economically liberal but culturally hard-line 

conservatives" connected to the bazaar. 9 

The thesis of this paper is that domestic political impulses 

lead a large majority of Iranian politicians to support two foreign 

policy stands. The first is an emphasis on economic 

development, which is the cement that holds together the 

moderate coalition of teclmocrats and traditionalists. The foreign 

policy component of this emphasis on economic development is 

economic ties to the West, which is seen as vital by technocrats 

and enjoys support from the traditionalists. The second issue is 

opposition to Western culture, on which the radicals and the 

traditionalists agree. The radicals argue that opposition to 

Westem culture entails a foreign policy based on suspicion about 

the West's political agenda and support for anti-Westem 

movements, though the traditionalists are not so sure if this 

foreign policy is necessary. The final section of this paper 

examines prospects for the future. 

MODERATES, ECONOMICS, 

AND THE WEST 

Iranian radicals have generally opposed any emphasis on 

economic growth or on material weUbeing. During the 1993 

election campaign, leading radical Mohtashemi complained, 

"When you set the economy as the principle, and sacrifice 

everything at its altar, there would remain nothing by which you 

could be powerful, free, and independent .... We can't have 

Islamic and revolutionary culture by slogans and rhetoric when 

our economy is a Western capitalist economy. "1° Ayatollah 

Khamenei has shown sympathy for this point of view, though he 

9 "ban's Chief Faces Merchant Class Challenge," New York Times, 

January 31, 1993. 

lo Salaam, May 17, 1993, as printed in Akhbaar. 
34 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

has not been active on the issue. ~1 To the extent they care 

about economics, the radicals prefer to emphasize social justice 

and state control, not economic growth. The economic policies 

they implemented when they ran the govemment were Indian 

socialism, with "economic self-sufficiency, a disdain for 

consumerisim, a stress on national planning, the tightening of the 

state's clutches on industries, restrictions on foreign trade, 

maintenance of an overvalued currency, and hostility to foreign 

investment. ''12 

By contrast, Iranian technocrats are very interested in 

economic growth---much more so than in foreign policy. For 

instance, President Rafsanjani's 1993 election address was 95 

percent about economics; foreign policy was barely mentioned. 13 

In choosing to stake his reputation on economics, Rafsanjani has 

made a dangerous gamble. His problem is that income cannot 

match popular expectations, no matter how good are the policies. 

Expectations formed during the oil boom under the Shah's rule 

are that Iran can have a standard of living similar to that in the 

West, which was the goal that the Shah held out. That goal was 

always ambitious for this generation, and it became completely 

unrealistic after the oil crash of 1985. Iran's per capita earnings 

from oil, in real terms, are no more than one-fourth of their 

1977/78 level. 

Rafsanjani recently pointed out that the standard of living has 

" In December 1993 he issued a letter to Rafsanjani that in effect 

gave him carte blanche to do what he wanted on economic policy. The 

letter, about the Second Five-Year Plan, was issued by the Islamic 

Republic News Agency on December 20, 1993 (two days before 

Rafsanjani presented the Plan to the Majlis); printed in FBIS, December 

21, 1993. 

t2 Jahangir Amuzegar, Iran's Economy under the Islamic Republic, 

London: I.B. Taurus, 1993, p 297 

13 Tehran TV, May 29, 1993, as transcribed in FBIS-NES. 
PATRICK CLAWSON 35 

improved in the last 5 years, during which non-oil GDP grew 7.5 

percent per annum. TM He could have added that in the previous 

l0 years, basic goods became more widely available, even though 

per capita GDP fell about 50 percentJ 5 Consider the following 

improvements: 

• Infant mortality fell to 35 per 100,000 in 1993/94 from 

45 in 1989/90 and 100 in 1976J 6 The number of doctors 

to 50 per 100,000 in 1993/94 from 34 in 189/90, which 

had also been the level in 1976. 

• The number of higher education students rose to 17 per 

thousand population in 1993/94 from 8.5 in 1989/90 and 

4.5 in 1976/77. 

• The average urban family diet improved in 1990/91 

compared to the pre-revolution level of 1978/79. In 

kilograms per annum, consumption of red meat was 148 

compared to 93 pre-revolution; of butter and shortening, 

92 compared to 46; of rice, 296 compared to 190; of 

bread, 736 compared to 538; of sugar, 170 compared to 

78.17 

,4 President Rafsanjani's presentation of the second Plan, Tehran 

television, December 22, 1993, as transcribed in FBIS-NES, December 

30, 1993. 

,s Depending upon the exact population estimates and the technical 

definition of GDP, the estimate reductions cited by Iranians are between 

50 and 60 percent (Keyhan, February 3, 1991; Keyhan English, 

February 16, 1991). Central Bank data suggest that 50 percent is a 

minimum figure. 

,6 1993/94 and 1989/90 data from President Rafsanjani's presentation 

of the second Plan, Tehran television, December 22, 1993, as 

transcribed in FBIS-NES, December 30, 1993. 1976 data from Bank 

Markazi Iran, Annual Report 1356 (1977/78), lor higher education 

students, and Iran Almanac 1976 (Tehran: Echo of Iran Press, 1976). 

1~ Keyhan, February 8, 1993, as printed in FBIS. 
36 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

• Electricity was found in 99 percent of households in 

1991; television, 90 percent; refrigerators, 92 percent; 

washing machines, 34 percent; and automobiles, 14 

percent--all multiples of the 1979 figures. TM Telephone 

lines rose from 22 per thousand in 1978 to 60 per 

thousand in 1993.19 

Despite the improvements in the standard of living, Iranians 

are profoundly pessimistic about their economic situation. The 

mood in Tehran about the economy is grim, fixated on the 

sharply declining value of the rial on the free market (from 1450 

per dollar in late October to 2100 by late December). 

Rafsanjani's reform program is widely blamed for the current 

economic difficulties. In the wake of criticism from Klmmenei 

among others, in November he had to reverse price and trade 

liberalization 2° while he spent much of December fighting off 

proposals for postpone the Second Five-Year Plan start from 

March 1994 to March 1995. Meanwhile, the foreign debt 

problems grow worse, forcing cancellation of major, highlyprofitable projects like the $1.7 billion deal to develop the South 

Pars gas and oil field. 2~ Plus the declining price of oil has led 

the Majlis Economic and Finance Committee to propose revising 

the forecast 1994/95 oil revenue to $9.4 billion, compared to 

18 Iran Statistical Center data printed in Hamshari, January 8, 1994, 

as translated in Akhbaar; the Central Bank data differ slightly. 

19 President Rafsanjani's presentation of the second Plan, Tehran 

television, December 22, 1993, as transcribed in FBIS-NES, December 

30, 1993, and Post and Telephone Minister Gharazi, Jomhuri lslami, 

May 31, 1993. 

20 Salaam, November 23 and 24, 1993, as printed in Akhbaar. The 

Commerce Minister's actions were ~dso described in Hamshari, 

November 18, 1993, also printed in Akhbaar. 

21 Resalaat, January 19, 1994, as printed in Akhbaar. 
PATRICK CLAWSON 37 

$18.0 billion in 1990/91. 52 The radical newspaper Salaam 

gloated in November, 23 

As long as the rival faction was in a majority in the Majlis, the 

officials and supporters of the adjustment policy blamed that 

faction for failure to achieve the plan targets .... Now that 

they have lost that pretext and the right wing controls 

everything, they blame one another .... The day they took 

over the government from the radicals, they said they had 

taken delivery of an empty treasury .... Now it is an honor to 

have a country with more than $30 billion debts, with foreign 

companies refusing to sign contracts to sell goods to Iran 

(owing to Iran's refusal to pay its debts of the past three or 

four years). 

It would seem that the emphasis on economic growth, the 

importance attributed to access to Western economies, and the 

gloom about economic prospects would all work to increase the 

West's leverage in using economics as a means to change Iranian 

foreign policy. But Iranian are convinced that access to Westem 

economies does not require changing political behavior. Iranians 

feel that Europe and Japan will continue trade and investment 

irrespective of Iranian actions because of the importance of Iran 

as market and oil supplier. This feeling has some basis in fact. 

Consider how German govemment spokesmen Dieter Vogel 

explained why the Iranian Intelligence Minister had been invited 

to Bonn on the eve of the trial of Iranian government agents for 

four murders in Berlin by referring to Iran's economic 

importance, "We will naturally hold the talks with Iran that are 

required by German interests; . . .Iran is a trading partner of 

22 Resalaat, January 19, 1994, as printed in Akhbaar,. 

23 Salaam, November 22, 1993, as printed in Akhbaar. 
38 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

significant size. ''24 Or consider that Iran has paid little price for 

its campaign of assassination of Iranians living in Europe. In a 

report on several murders in Germany, the German Federal 

Criminal Office concluded, "Behind all these crimes stands a 

sovereign state;... Iran does not shrink from committing serious 

crimes in pursuing its opponents .... The reaction in the West 

is most likely to be verbal" rather than any action. 25 

CULTURE, RADICALS, AND 

THE MUSLIM WORLD 

Radicals place highest priority on combatting Westemism. AntiWestemism is more than just hooligan squads enforcing proper 

dress by detaining or beating those women judged to be wearing 

"bad hejab" (visible hair, makeup, and form-fitting clothes). 

There is also an intellectual element, as seen in conferences like 

a three-day affair in January 1994. 26 The radical media campaign 

around the issue regularly, deploring the lack of action on 

"protecting our Islamic-lranian character and identity from the 

cultural conspiracy of those who fear and dislike our 

revolution. ''27 

The Westemism that the radicals confont has many facets. 

Sexual morality is a vital component: what for the West is 

freedom for women to participate fully in public life is to Iranian 

radicals a call for licentious behavior. The use of Westem words 

24 Vogel,"Allies Oppose Bonn's Iran Links," Washington Post, 

November 6, 1993. 

25 Quoted in Rick Atkinson, "Killing of Iranian Dissenters: 'Bloody 

Trail Back to Tehran'" (a quote from J,'unes O'Dea of Amnesty 

International), Washington Post, November 21, 1993. 

26 Keyhan International, January 13, 1994. 

27 Keyhan International, December 23, 1993. 
PATRICK CLAWSON 39 

and Latin letters, from technical literature to popular advertising, 

is seen as undermining Persian, the language of great poets and 

philosophers. Television soap operas and rock concerts 

undermine public plays on religious themes and family outings. 

Western food displaces a cuisine based on complex sauces 

prepared in the home for large family meals; the West even 

replaces traditional Iranian fast food at the chelokebab. 

The radical agenda is not simply medieval obscurantism or 

nostalgia for small-town and rural life. Much of what is 

presented to Iran as Westem culture is in fact decadence that 

many in the West also abhor. Iranian radicals reject the 

Madonna of MTV, not the Madonna of the New Testament. 

Much of the change in Iran's attitude towards the West from 

1964 to 1994 reflects changes in Westem society, not any wave 

of fundamentalism in Iran. After all, the Islamic revulsion 

against the West became became a mass movement about a 

decade after Westem popular culture changed profoundly in ways 

repulsive to many, West and East. Sex and violence are staples 

of television; story lines reject respect for authority and tradition; 

individuals are guided by what feels good rather than by moral 

values of good and evil. Who can be surprised if many Iranians 

find unattractive a society that presents Michael Jackson as one 

of its stars? 

Iran's cultural confrontation with the West is not just a moral 

issue: it is also a matter of foreign policy, concerning foreign 

govememnts. Leaders across the board agree that the West 

deliberately uses culture to undermine Iranian society. For 

instance, at the ceremony changing leadership of the Keyhan 

Institute (the largest media firm in Iran, owned ex-officio by the 

religious leader), the outgoing supervisor Sayed Mohammad 

Ashgari condemned "global arrogance's mischevious acts in order 

to create division among the Moslem Iranian people," asserting, 

"Our revolution is a cultural one based on Islam," while incoming 

superviosr Hossein Shariatmadari said, "Although the artillery has 

fallen silent, the engagement is not over. The only thing is that 

the field of engagement has changed .... [Now] the war is of 
40 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

ideas. ''28 Mohammad Javad Larijani, head of the Majlis 

Research Center, argued that the conflict between Western and 

Islamic culture is not resolvable because "the Westerners are 

dominating the Islamic world and want to expand and maintain 

that domination. 29 

While moderates like Larijani sympathize with the rejection 

of Westemism, on the whole they place less emphasis on the 

crusade against Western culture than on the need to develop 

economically. That causes conflict, because the anti-Westem 

crusade often clashes with economic liberalization, since the 

former emphasizes respect for tradition while the latter permits 

individuals freedom of choice, inlcuding the choice to reject 

tradition. To take an example that preoccupied Tehran in 

December 1993 and January 1994, the liberalization program has 

encouraged foreign investment and permitted advertising for 

foreign goods--specifically Coca Cola and Westem-style 

hamburgers. Revulsion against the United States extended so far 

as to force closure of a restaurant imitating the McDonalds style 

opened by some Iranian who had long lived in Spain, and a 

campaign has begun against Coca Cola. Mohsen Rafiqdoost, 

supervisor of the Janbazan and Mostazafan Foundation, explained 

campaign against Coca Cola: "We shall not permit the return of 

Western culture even in its weak form under the cover of 

economic prosperity." 30 Another example is the drive to set up 

government-sponsored video clubs that will rent only Iranian and 

select Westem videos (e.g., World Wrestling Federation shows). 

Yet another is the fulminations against satellite dishes which are 

now popping up across Iran (estimates range from 50,000 to 

2s Keyhan, December 29, 1993, as printed in Akhabaar, December 30, 

1993. 

29 Resalaat, December 14, 1993, as transcribed in FBIS-NES, January 

6, 1994. 

30 Jomhuri lslami, January 18, 1994, as printed in Akhbaar. 
PATRICK CLAWSON 41 

120,000) to pull in Star TV. 

As these examples show, many Iranians find themselves 

attracted to at least parts of Western culture. Sometimes the 

same individuals combine deep craving for parts of that culture 

with opposition to many of its aspects. Others generally accept 

Western culture. Amuzegar has a point when he argues that 

Westemization fits well with some Iranian attitudes: 31 

In a society where material well-being-----even conspicuous 

consumption--has had strong cultural roots not only among the 

well-to-do but also within the underclass, this austere and 

puritanical policy could attract precious few .... Similar 

attempts to fit Iranian society into an Islamic mold have also 

proved impossible. After more than a half century of 

Westernization, liberation from old taboos, global contacts, ,and 

an acceptance of new values and institutions, the state has been 

unable to reverse the irreversible. 

I have deliberately underemphasized the role of religion in 

the conflict over Westem culture. The Islamic religion is a vital 

element in traditional Iranian culture, but in addition, Islam is the 

embodiment of the altemative to Westem culture in every sphere 

of life. By focusing on Islam as the center of the conflict with 

Westemism, Iranians can see the conflict not as a matter of 

narrow national pride but as a clash of civlizations, each of which 

claims to be universal. Furthermore, emphasizing Islam allows 

Iranians to represent themselves as the center of human 

civilization through the claim that they uphold true Islam--a 

claim that marries Shiite prejudices, Iranian pride, and 

revolutionary conviction. This elevation of anti-Westemism into 

a clash of civilizations converts a domestic policy (promotion of 

traditional and communitarian values) into a foreign policy issue, 

because the domestic legitimacy of the anti-Westem campaign is 

greatly bolstered by the recognition on the part of others of Iran's 

31 Amuzegar, Iran's Economy under the Islamic Republic, p 301. 
42 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

leadership of global Islam. 

WHAT THE FUTURE HOLDS 

Iranian foreign policy will continue to be shaped by the belief 

that Iran has a central role in world affairs, a belief that has deep 

roots in Iranian culture and was a major tenet of the Shah's 

policies. Majlis Vice Speaker Hojatalislam Hassan Rowhani 

recently articulated the basic assumption of many Iranians: 

"Whether wanted or not, the Islamic Republic of Iran is 

shouldering the leadership of many communities of the world. 

But Iran's leadership is different from America's domineering 

leadership. ''32 This conception of Iran as a natural great power 

translates into an assumption that Iran's neighbors will certainly 

understand that they have to work with Iran, if not acknowledge 

Iranian leadership. Reporting at Friday prayers in Tehran about 

his trip through Central Asia, President Rafsanjani took as natural 

that, 33 

Even those people who are not Muslims--because there are 

also many non-Muslims living there---they, too, understand 

that, because of natural circumstances, their happiness and their 

interest lies in cooperation with Iran, because that is the way 

our region has operated. 

Because Iran expects to be the major power in the region, it 

will continue to have genuine difficulty perceiving why others in 

the area are touchy about Iranian assertion of what it sees as its 

natural rights. Iranians of many stripes are convinced that Iran 

has gone far to accommodate its neighbors. For example, on the 

Gulf islands, many Iranians think that the Shah was 

~ Keyhan Weekly (in English), January 13, 1994. 

33 Tehran Radio, November 5, 1993, as transcribed in FBIS-NES 

November 8, 1993. 
PATRICK CLAWSON 43 

magnanimous in taking only the small islands and not Bahrain, 34 

although few would endorse Jomhuri Islam i's view, "Sovereignty 

of Iran over Bahrain should be reestablshed on the basis of 

historical precedents [to which end Iran] should launch an effort 

to terminate the separation. ''35 When Iranian leaders speak to 

domestic audiences, they are absolutely inflexible on Iran's rights: 

the moderate Rafsanjani threatened "rivers of blood" if Iran's 

place on Abu Musa was interfered with. 36 

Within the general framework established by the principles 

that Iran is a great power and that domestic concerns matter 

most, foreign policy could go in a variety of directions. The 

uncertainty is great because of the perception that the current 

policy has not been successful. Radical spokesman Mohtashemi 

voiced a widely held view when he complained in 1993, "Foreign 

policy during Hahsemi-Rafsanjani's term [1989-1993] has been 

unsuccessful, and he has not even been able to maintain relations 

Ibrged with foreign centers in the past. ''37 The complaint is that 

Iran has not been able to develop better relations with the West 

or with Arab states, while simultaneously sacrificing some of the 

prestige it held as the ideological pure voice of radical Islam. 

Given the perception in Tehran that things are not going well 

and that past policy has not worked, policies could change 

sharply. There are mixed indications as to whether moderate 

policies could predominate: 

• Arab politics. Early reports that Iran would not act 

34 Shireen Hunter, lran and the World, Bloomington: Indiana 

University Press, 1990, p 101. 

3s Jomhuri lslami, January 7, 1993, ,as transcribed in FBIS-NES. 

36 Shahram Chubin and Charles Tripp, "Domestic Politics and 

Territorial Disputes in the Persian Gulf and the Arabian Peninsula," 

Survival, Winter 1993, p 10. 

37 Jahan-lslami, May 29, 1993, as printed in FBIS-NES, June 1, 1993. 
44 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

against the Israel-PLO accord were mistaken; a statement 

to that effect attributed to an official in an Austrian News 

Agency report caused a firestorm in Iran. 3s However, 

some suggest Iran, may confine itself to non-violent 

opposition. There are some signs of a cooling with the 

Palestinian radical Hamas organization, but Lebanese 

papers report Iranian aid continues, and the dispute may 

be about Hamas cooperation with secular leftists, which 

shocked Tehran. 39 A similar evolution has taken place 

with the Lebanese Hezbollah, where Iran's declining 

support may reflect moderation or atmoyance at 

Hezbollah's participation in democratic elections. 4° 

Furthennore, it may be that Iran is concentrating more 

attention and resources on what appears to be the 

prospect of a major payoff in Algeria, as well as building 

a movement in the Levant's strategic prize (Egypt) rather 

than in the Palestinian and Lebanese side-shows. In 

October 1993, Osama al Baz, the head of Egyptian 

President Mubarak's political affairs bureau, accused Iran 

of training terrorists active in Egypt, renewing charges 

not heard much for a year. 41 

Accommodation with Turkey. It would seem that Iran 

has tempered the support it extended in 1991-2 to the 

PKK terrorists in Turkey. Interior Minister 

38 Jomhuri lslami, September 23, 1993 and then nearly every day the 

subsequent two weeks (as printed in Akhbaar). 

39 1ran Times, January 7, 1994 and, on $10 million said to have been 

pledged for 1994, Al-Shiira (Beirut), December 13, 1993, as printed in 

FBIS-NES, December 15, 1993. 

40 Al Shira (Beirut), January 4, 1993, as printed in FBIS-NES, 

January 5, 1993. 

41 al-Wasat (Cairo), October 22, 1993, as printed in Mideast Monitor. 
PATRICK CLAWSON 45 

Director-General for Security Gholamhossein Bolandian, 

after the seventh meeting of the Iran-Turkish security 

committee in Ankara, reported that an understanding was 

reached on cooperation against terror. 42 Reportedly in 

earlier talks, Iranian Interior Minister Besharati gave 

Turkish Interior Minister Gazioglu a list of 138 Iranian 

dissidents, asking that they be expelled or their activities 

curtailed. 43 Also, Interior Minister Turkey Mehmet 

Gazioglu and Iran Mohammad Ali Besharati signed in 

Tehran a protocol and "hostile acts along their common 

borders." 

Russian relations. Consider the Iranian reaction to the 

bitter civil war in Tadzhikistan, in which 20,000 to 

50,000 people have died in the last 18 months. Iran has 

been "notable for its absence and impotence;" foreign aid 

to the rebels has come instead from Saudis and Pakistan, 

channelled via Afghanistan. 44 This is but one example of 

a general trend in which Tehran ignores Moscow's 

anti-Muslim policies, such as its stance on Bosnia or on 

Kashmir, while vigorously condemning the West for 

positions that are in fact less distant from Iran's stance. 45 

In tum, Russia provides Iran with access to technology 

it cannot acquire elsewhere. For instance, in December 

42 Abrar, December 8, 1993, as printed in Akhbaar. The survey in 

Mideast Monitor, December 22, 1993, of Turkish press reporting on 

Iranian Vice-President Hassan Habibi's visit in December 1993 was 

similarly upbeat. 

43 Mideast Monitor, October 19, 1993. 

44 Barnett Rubin, "The Fragmentation of Tajikistan," Survival, Winter 

1993-94, p 86. Rubin cites a range of 20,000 to 50,000 dead; Amnesty 

International cites only the higher figure. 

a5 lran Times, March 19, 1993. 
46 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

1993, Russian ambassador to Tehran Sergei Tretyakov 

reassured his Iranian interviewers at length that Russia 

would proceed with nuclear power plants. 46 

But it seems more likely that policies will change in the 

direction of being more radical. That has certainly been the 

direction in 1993 in policy towards the United States Consider 

the contrast between May and November 1993. In May, 

presidential candidate Rajab-Ali Taheri said on television, "direct 

talks with Washington to normalize relations" could help IranY 

and there was no reaction to speak of from the press or the 

clergy. In the same month, President Rafsanjani gave an 

interview to Time (itself a controversial act in times past) in 

which he said that the Unites States can sometimes do good: "If 

[U.S. military action in Bosnia] is not done with imperialist 

goals, why should one not encourage a good thing? ''48 In 

contrast, autumn 1993 saw a storm in response to the leaking of 

the 1992 letter to Khamenei, written by then representative to the 

U.N. Rajai Khorasani, in which he advised that Iran hold official 

talks with the United States 49 After a wave of press indignation 

that such a letter had even been written, Ayatollah Khamenei 

stated, "We don't want to have relations with the United 

States... Our condition [for relations] is their repenting of all 

the tragedies they have created in the world. ''5° The holding of 

46 Keyhan Havayi, December 22, 1993. 

47 Nw York Times, May 26, 1993. 

46 As printed in Keyhan English, May 20, 1993. 

49 By Mr. Khorasani's account, in Abrar, November 4, 1993, as 

printed in Akhbaar. 

50 Tehran Radio, November 3, 1993, as transcribed in Akhbaar. On 

the campaign about the Khoras,'mi letter, see Mideast Mirror, November 

1, 1993. 
PATRICK CLAWSON 47 

discussions with the United States was rejected ,as entailing a 

weakening of Iran's revolutionary credentials: 51 

In the existing unequal situation in which the U.S. has all the 

propaganda resources, accepting talks with the U.S. means 

losing our revolutionary and anti-arrogance prestige .... If 

we talk about talks ,and with relations with the U.S., it 

certainly me,ms backing off from our stands. Because there 

[will be] such an impression among the world's revolutionaries 

and Muslims. 

Looking out to the more medium term, there is also the 

possibility that the Islamic Republic, in its current form, will fall. 

The degree of discontent and the perception of failure are both 

strong. To be sure, there is no credible challenge from any 

opposition force, which makes the regime look solid. It is the 

solidity of glass: easily fractured. There is no important social 

group that would come to the defense of this regime were it 

threatened, nor does the regime have the support of a repressive 

apparatus that can keep it in power against popular discontent. 

The "senior official" who told the Washington Post in May 1993, 

"There is no serious prospect of [the Islamic Republic] being 

overthrown," would do well to hedge his bets. 52 

This paper has not answered the question of whether Iranian 

foreign policy could fundamentally change under the Islamic 

Republic, but it has provided some elements towards 

understanding the attitudes that shape Iranian policy. The 

s~ Sayed Morteza Nabavi, director of Resalaat, ill Keyhan 

International, November 11, 1993. 

s2 R. Jeffrey Smith and Daniel Williams, "White House to Step Up 

Plans to Isolate Iran, Iraq," Washington Post, May 22, 1993. 
48 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

opposition to Westem decadence, if not Westem culture, is deep 

and strong. It takes a true optimist to think that the perceived 

economic advantages from ties to the West will overcome the 

cultural barriers, especially if Iranian leaders think that they can 

have those economic advantages without changing their political 

behavior. On the other end of the spectrum, the true pessimist 

could argue that opposition to the West is deeply rooted 

culturally while cooperation with the West is based on a tactical 

reading of where economic advantage lies, and that tactics could 

change if there appears to be greater economic gain in 

confronting the West by, e.g., pressuring Iran's rich neighbors to 

co-finance its economic development. 
ALL POLITICS IS LOCAL 

FARHAD KAZEMI 

In the words of the late Tip O'Neill, "All politics is local." 

Although the House speaker's point of reference was the United 

States, the thrust of his observation is also applicable to the 

Iranian scene. As both Clawson and Lamote point out correctly, 

to understand Iranian foreign policy one must pay careful 

attention to the domestic sources of foreign policy behavior. In 

addition, one must also take into account that broadly speaking 

Iranian foreign policy has been more pro-active than reactive, at 

least in comparison with most Third World countries. 

Clawson and Lamote raise in various forms two broad 

themes, among others, in their analysis of Iranian domestic 

politics: (a) a worsening economy, and (b) a developing crisis of 

authority. Both points are basically valid but require further 

elaboration and some modification. In regard to the economy, it 

is clear that situation is currently highly problematic and is 

getting worse. All indicators consistently substantiate rising 

economic difficulties ranging from currency devaluation to debt 

non-payment to other areas. The key issue here is, of course, the 

falling price of oii. If oil prices improve, then there will be some 

clear, positive, and immediate impact. Since this possibility is in 

the short run unlikely, the expectation of oil as the panacea of the 

Iranian economic woes is unfounded. 

Two other observations on the economy are also relevant 

here. First, as tree as the assessment of the economy's 

performance maybe it is also important that it be placed in proper 

comparative perspective. The Iranian economy is in a difficult 

quandary but compare to what and where? When one compares 

49 
• . 50 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

the economic situation in Iran with some of the regional countries 

such an Iraq, Jordan, Afghanistan, Tajikistan or even Egypt and 

Russia, the picture does not look quite as bleak an it may appear 

initially. Second, although it is abundantly clear that the promise 

of the revolution---particularly in the areas of soci',d justice and 

economic self-sufficiency--has not been delivered, this has not 

in fact resulted in major and sustained political upheavals. In 

other words, Iran's economic problems have not so far had clear 

political consequences of major dimension such as general 

strikes, or strikes by govemment employees, large industrial 

establishments, the oil industry, and the like. These forms of 

protest have been limited and contained. 

Recent sporadic civil disturbances in Iran have occurred 

mostly in the urban poor areas of a few major cities in 1991-92, ~ 

and more recently, in the southeastern city of Zahedan involving 

what appears to be Sunni-Shi'i communal clashes. Although 

economic factors have played some role in these conflicts, their 

apparent causes are more complex. Nevertheless, it also appears 

that government's incipient economic problems are beginning to 

have some impact and may manifest themselves more fully in the 

political arena. 

The second theme of the Clawson and Lamote papers--the 

crisis of authority--is very serious and has been fueled by 

problems associated with the succession to Ayatollah Khomeini 

and the legitimacy of the new leader. Khomeini's undisputed 

legitimacy was based on at least three factors: (a) source of 

imitation for the Shi'i (rnarja' al-taqlid); (b) creator of the Islamic 

government and its supreme jurisprudent (faqih); mad (c) lYersonal 

charisma. During his lifetime Khomeini was able to at least 

temporarily routinize his charisma in the office of the faqih, the 

i On 1991-92 urban poor protests in Iran see Farhad Kazemi and 

Lisa Wolfe, "Urbanization, Migration, and Politics of Protest in Iran," 

in Michael Bonine (ed.), Population, Poverty And Politics: Middle 

Eastern Cities in Crisis (Gainesville: University Presses of Florida, 

1994 forthcoming). 
FARHAD KAZEMI 51 

supreme and all-powerful jurisconsult. Significant problems have 

now emerged with the office of the faqih since none of 

Khomeini's qualifications apply to his successor, Khamenehi. In 

this context it in interesting to note that Khamenehi is not 

referred to by the public as the faqih but simply as the rahbar 

(leader). 

This crisis of authority is evident in disputes over who is the 

supreme source of imitation for the Shi'is after the death of 

Ayatollah Khoi'i in Iraq and especially after the recent death of 

Ayatollah Golpayegani in Iran. This dispute has both political 

and economic dimensions. In the political realm, it concerns the 

designation of the country's premier religious/political leader, and 

more specifically, whether Khamenehi can qualify for the title on 

religious grounds. In the economic realm, the issue concerns, at 

least partially, control over funds that are based on a form of 

Shi'i religious taxation known as khurns, or the "share of the 

Imam." Khums is normally given to a high ranking ayatollah, 

most often the top Shi'i cleric. This form of taxation is not 

insubstantial especially now that elements from within the 

govemment are once again collecting (often forcibly) this tax 

from property owners. Whoever is the top maria' will have by 

definition some control over this fund and can use it for 

communal welfare, patronage disbursement, and other purposes. 

Therefore, Khamenehi's jockeying for top religious position, and 

his desire to be designated the supreme religious leader, will help 

his office both politically and economically. 

The crisis of authority is further exacerbated by what can be 

referred to as the ghost of Ayatollah Montazeri who continues to 

have support among some members of the parliament. 

Montazeri's non-acceptance of Khamenehi as the possible top 

marja' complicates the problem. In some ways, Montazeri is 

viewed by some groups as a possible focus for those from the 

parliament and other branches who are not satisfied with the 

regime's policies in religious and political arenas. 

Another issue to which Lamote refers is the possible creation 

of a permanent Fatwa Council (Shora-ye Fatwa'i) as a way to get 
52 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

around problems associated with Khamenei's religious position. 

The idea of a Fatwa Council goes back to the early 1960's where 

as part of a set of seminars organized by those learned in Shi'i 

religion, the idea of a collective entity composed of the most 

learned religious figures was proposed. 2 The ostensible purpose 

of such a council was to allow the most knowledgeable figures 

to act collectively and creatively with a host of problems and 

issues that emerge in modem society including any potential 

problems of succession to the top marja'. The idea of establishing 

permanently such a collective body has once again received some 

currency as a way to get around Khamenei's difficulties with his 

religious credentials. Whether he will be first among equals in the 

council or simply a member with no special privileges remains 

unresolved at this point. Lamote raises appropriate questions and 

is doubtful about the workability of this proposal as a solution to 

Khamenehi's problems. I tend to think, however, that such an 

arrangement may actually work assuming that enough of the top 

religious figures sign on and support it. 

Whether tiffs solution works or not, the key issue that looms 

large over the regime is the fact that a serious crisis of authority 

has emerged from within the inner circle. Profound questions 

about the form and manner of governance are being asked once 

again with no clear answer or resolution. The crisis has forced 

some of the regime's key figures to address the issue of survival 

of the Islamic Republic. Although there is no immediate danger 

that the government's survival is in jeopardy, a host of serious 

problems associated with the economy, governance, and the 

religious hierarchy have made the power holders jittery and 

fearful. They are aware that unless some of the key concerns are 

addressed and resolved, there may be serious problems for the 

theocratic state in the horizon. 

This fear and insecurity is further exacerbated because of 

2 For a full discussion of this, see Ann X.S. Lambton, "A 

Reconsideration of the Position of the Marja'al-Taglid and the Religious 

Institution," Studia lslamica, 20 (1964), pp. 115-135. 
FARHAD KAZEMI 53 

Iran's self-inflicted intemational isolation and its highly unstable 

regional environment. Some of this isolation can be resolved 

should Iran decide to play a different role in the Arab-Israeli 

peace process. So far Iran's formal position, which is not 

necessarily supported by a majority of the population, is one of 

opposition, obstruction, and intransigence. Even though there may 

be voices within the ruling hierarchy that clamor privately for a 

more moderate Iranian position on the peace process, no one 

appears to have the courage to express such views publicly. 

Internal disputes, rivalry, and fears of reprisal have basically 

eliminated this option. At this point there is no clear or hard 

evidence that would indicate a change in the Iranian position. 

Many have viewed, and continue to view, formal Iranian posture 

on the peace process as the litmus test of the Islamic Republic's 

true desire to play a more constructive role in regional and 

intemational politics. 

Another factor that plays some role in Iran foreign policy 

behavior, as raised by Clawson, is the extent of anti-Westem 

attitudes among the populace. Although there is no way to 

present systematic empirical evidence on this issue, it is 

nevertheless important to view this problem from different levels 

of analysis. In the first place, in the minds of top political 

leaders, the situation is probably more a case of anti-American 

posture than one of general anti-Western positions. Iran's 

relations with many Westem countries such as Germany, Austria, 

the Netherlands, and others are reasonably good. However, from 

a cultural point of view, and in the sense that the United States 

is the key Westem power, anti-American policies have negative 

implications for Iran's relations with the Western world. 

Second, it is important not to define all issues in purely 

cultural terms. For instance the recent action by the Foundation 

for the Oppressed to eliminate Coca Cola consumption in Iran 

can be most accurately described as a conflict over markets and 

economics rather than culture. The Foundation owns a soft drink 

company which was faring poorly in market competition with 

Coca Cola. What better way to got rid of Coca Cola than to 
54 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

denounce the company as an American outpost? 

Lastly, a distinction must be made between the acts of the 

government and the attitudes, views, and feelings of the people. 

The Iranian public is not, for the most part, anti-West or 

anti-American. In fact, the history of Iranian involvement with 

the West in general and the United States in particular has been 

rich and complex. General Iranian attitudes towards the West 

tend to be positive. The evidence for a clash of civilizations and 

culture is simply not there. 
RUSSIA AND IRAN 

EVOLVING RUSSIAN ATTITUDES 

TOWARD IRAN 

JOHN P. HANNAH 

Even before the December 1993 elections that brought 

ultranationalist Vladimir Zhirinovsky to world attention, Russia's 

policies in the former Soviet republics had grown increasingly 

assertive. This reflected an emerging consensus, shared by groups 

across the political spectrum, that Russian national interests 

required the re-establislunent of a "special and exclusive sphere 

of influence" throughout the newly independent states. Thus, by 

the fall of 1993, it had become commonplace to hear Russia's 

liberal, pro-American foreign minister, Andrei Kozyrev, demand 

intemational recognition of Moscow's fight to use its political, 

economic, and military power to maintain a "distinctive zone 

•.. of good neighborly relations" across "the entire geographic 

area of the former U.S.S.R. " 

Russian attitudes toward Iran have largely been a function of 

Iran's readiness to defer to these neo-imperial concerns, especially 

in the Caucasus and Central Asia. Immediately after the breakup 

of the Soviet Union, Russian policymakers expressed great 

skepticism about Tehran's intentions in these predominantly 

Muslim areas. They shared Western fears that Iran's mullahs 

would move aggressively to fill the vacuum left by the Soviet 

55 
56 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

collapse with their own brand of radical Islam. In conversations 

with foreign visitors, it was not uncommon for Russian officials, 

including Minister of Defense Pavel Grachev, to identify 

Iranian-inspired Islamic fundamentalism as Russia's greatest 

security threat in the post-Cold War era. 

Concerns about Iran went hand in hand with optimism about 

Turkey. Again paralleling Western views, Russian policymakers 

early on looked to Turkey as a potential stabilizing force in the 

region. With its secular, democratic government, and its 

historical, linguistic, and cultural ties to the area, Turkey seemed 

to provide the ideal model for ensuring the peaceful development 

of the newly independent Muslim states. 

In the past 2 years, these opposing perceptions have shifted 

dramatically. Today, Turkish policy is viewed with great 

suspicion in Moscow. The glee with which Turkey greeted the 

collapse of Soviet influence in the region, and the enthusiasm it 

expressed for asserting its own presence there aroused real 

resentment in the Kremlin. Careless talk in Ankara of a panTurkic revival resurrected historical animosities toward the 

"Ottomans." Most damaging, however, was what Russian 

officials saw as Turkey's brazen muscle flexing in the Caucasus 

conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan in apparent disregard 

of Moscow's traditional interests and sensitivities. On more than 

one occasion, Russia accused the Turkish army of conducting 

threatening maneuvers close to Armenia's borders in an attempt 

to intimidate the pro-Russian govemment in Yerevan. At the 

same time, Turkey had publicly offered to train and equip a new 

Azerbaijani army. According to Russian intelligence services, 

active duty and retired Turkish officers were already 

clandestinely directing Azerbaijan's military operations. 

In contrast to Turkey's alleged transgressions, Iranian policies 

in the former Soviet republics appeared almost benign. In the first 

place, Iran's response to the Soviet collapse was more muted than 

Turkey's. While the end of communism and the revival of 

Muslim identity in Central Asia were welcome developments, the 

disappearance of the USSR was viewed with some ambivalence 
JOHN HANNAH 57 

in Tehran's ruling circles. First, it left a hostile United States as 

the world's only superpower, better able to pursue its 

longstanding confrontation with the Islamic Republic. Second, 

Iran's leaders seemed more attuned to the potential dangers 

unleashed by the removal of Moscow's totalitarian grip on 

Eurasia. Rather than seeing it as an absolute good that created 

opportunities for dramatic geopolitical advances, many Iranians 

adopted a defensive outlook. In particular, they viewed the burst 

of new nationalisms on their northern border---especially in 

Azerbaijan---as a possible threat to the integrity of Iran's own 

multi-ethnic state. 

Most observers agree that Iran's policies to date have been 

surprisingly cautious and responsible. While Iran now has a 

significant presence in most of the new Muslim states, it has 

been careful, for the most part, to limit its political activities to 

govemment-to-govemment relations and to keep its 

religious/cultural activities non-threatening. In contrast to Turkey, 

which seemed to entertain fantasies of actually replacing Russia 

as Eurasia's predominant power, Iran has harbored no such 

illusions. For all their supposed revolutionary fervor, the mullahs 

have maintained a fairly realistic sense of their own limitations 

to affect events, both in terms of resources and ideological 

appeal. In their approach toward short-term developments in 

Central Asia, Iran's leaders do not seem to have posed the choice 

as one between Russian influence, on the one hand, and Iranian, 

or Turkish influence on the other. Rather. they have tended to see 

the situation as pitting Russian influence against violent chaos. 

Given those altematives, they have predictably opted for the 

former. 

As a result, Russian attitudes toward Iran have gradually 

shifted. While no less suspicious of Iran's theocratic internal 

structures, a growing school of thought in Moscow is now 

willing to consider Iran an occasional ally in the struggle to 

maintain order in parts of central Asia and the Caucasus. This 

approach received its most explicit endorsement during Kozyrev's 

March 1993 visit to Tehran when he called for a "strategic 
58 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

partnership" with the Islamic Republic. In addition to not 

opposing Moscow's efforts to reassert authority, this means using 

Iran's impeccable Islamic credentials to confer badly-needed 

legitimacy on postcommunist govemments in the region, rather 

than supporting and encouraging nascent Muslim opposition 

forces. 

Of course, Russian views of the Islamic Republic are not 

solely determined by Iran's policies toward the new independent 

states. A strong economic incentive reinforces Moscow's 

geostrategic inclination to establish a more cooperative 

relationship. In particular, Iran's appetite for sophisticated 

conventional weapons, its dependence on Russia as a supplier, 

and its long-term ability to actually pay for these arms, make Iran 

a very attractive partner for an economically strapped Russia. 

Especially in the wake of Moscow's dismal efforts in 1992-1993 

to penetrate traditional Westem markets, Iran's importance as a 

regular consumer of Russian military goods has shot up 

significantly. 

Finally, it should be said that there is increasingly a domestic 

political angle to Russian-Iranian relations. Quite simply, in an 

environment where nationalist sentiment with an anti-American 

bias is on the rise, developing closer relations with Washington's 

number one nemesis is good politics in today's Russia. It 

provides leaders with a relatively easy way to demonstrate their 

"independence" by standing up to the United States and 

defending distinctly Russian interests. 

Despite the overall upswing in Russian attitudes toward Dan, 

the process has not been entirely smooth. And given the 

enormous volatility in the region, there is no guarantee that the 

process will continue indefinitely. Situations could easily develop 

that draw Moscow and Tehran into serious conflict despite their 

best intentions. Two examples already exist. The first is the civil 

war in Tajikistan. Iran's involvement in 1992-1993 with the 

Islamic opposition to the Russian-backed govemment, while by 

no means overwhelming was enough to cause great concern in 

Moscow. The second case occurred in the fall of 1993 when Iran 
JOHN HANNAH 59 

reacted strongly to an Armenian military offensive in Azerbaijan, 

which sent tens of thousands of refugees streaming to the Iranian 

border. Not only did lran issue a verbal warning to Armenia and 

conduct army maneuvers near the border; it also sent Iranian 

nationals into Azerbaijan~at the request of the government--to 

erect refugee camps. 

In both cases, Russia responded with a mixture of public 

warnings and private diplomacy to let Iran know it was on the 

verge of going too far. And in both cases, Iran took note of the 

red lines Russia had set, backed off a more aggressive posture, 

and reiterated its commitment to working with Moscow to reduce 

tensions and restore peace and stability. This may offer modest 

encouragement for the two countries' ability to manage crises in 

the future. Nevertheless, given the likelihood of further instability 

in the region, and the possibilities this creates for miscalculation 

and escalation, the potential for trouble in Russian-iranian 

relations will remain just below the surface. 

These dangers will rise significantly should Zhirinovsky's 

influence on policy grow, given that his agenda is not simply 

pro-imperial, but also aggressively anti-Iranian. This reality has 

not been lost on Iran, arousing great concem. 
RUSSIAN MILITARY STRATEGY 

ON IRAN'S BORDER 

STUART E. JOHNSON 

While Russia has been steadily removing its remaining forces 

from Eastem Germany and, albeit haltingly, from the Baltic 

nations, its forces have increased sharply the pace of activity on 

the southem littoral. The largest deployments and most intense 

military activity has been in the Caucasus nations--all of whom 

are in a state of armed conflict. 

At times, this activity has brought Russian combat forces 

within 100 kilometers of Iran's northeastern border. While this 

activity has not led to contact with Iranian troops, Russian forces 

did occupy northeastem Iran after World War II. The activities 

of the Russian military in the region bear reviewing to discem 

Russia's strategy toward the region with a particular focus on the 

threat, if any, that strategy poses to Iran. 

The southern littoral, the area between the Caspian and Black 

Seas (the Don River Basin in particular), has throughout its 

history been a focus of concem for Russia. From the earliest 

centuries of Kievan Rus, the greatest threat to Russia came from 

this region. The grasslands north of the Caucasus provided 

support to Asiatic nomadic tribes such as the Kumens who 

occupied large parts of the Kievan state in the 12th century. It 

was against a kindred people, the Polovets, that Prince Igor 

mounted his ill-fated campaign in that century. 

A century later, the Tartars swept up from the southeast to 

overrun Kiev and destroy the Russian state. The most popular 

celebration of the reconquest is the lay of Dmitry Donskoy who 

61 
62 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

defeated the Tatar horde and drove them off the Don River basin. 

Although Peter the Great is best remembered for his apertura 

to the West, during the first eight years of his reign, he spent as 

much time securing all advantageous southem border as he did 

campaigning in the west. Having secured this border, a declining 

Ottoman dynasty lacked the vitality to threaten the status quo and 

Peter was free to turn his full attention to the west. 

In modem times, the incorporation of the three Caucasus 

Republics, Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan into the Soviet 

Union provided a buffer in the south. A buffer primarily against 

Turkey though "also against Iran. After World War II, Soviet 

troops occupied northeastern Iran and Stalin at least considered 

extending the "buffer" liJrther south of the Caucasus. 

Recent events confirm that the southern littoral remains a 

focus of Russian security concerns. The Russian military has 

been active in three operations. First has been support for the 

Abkazian separatists. It is not clear whether the suplx)rt for the 

Abkaz.ian separatists was a deliberate policy decision 

orchestrated from Moscow or the result of Russian commanders 

in the region taking the initiative on their own. In any event, the 

aid was substantial. Modem tanks, artillery and ammunition 

were supplied to the rebels and if this was not at the direction of 

Moscow, there is no indication that Moscow tried to prevent it. 

Second has been support for former President Gamsakhurdia 

in his challenge to the ShevarN~adze government and later active 

critical support of Shevardnadze. When the weakened 

Shevardnadze government was faced with a civil war led by 

former President Gamsakhurdia, Russi:m forces stood by until 

Shevardnadze agreed to Georgia's rejoining the Commonwealth 

of Independent Stales before coming to Tblisi's aid, and 

stabilizing the situation, eventually allowing forces loyal to 

Shevardnadze to get the upper hand. 

Third has been support to the Armenian forces fighting the 

Azeris in Nagomo-Karabakh. Despite a dire shortage of fuel for 

its domestic ix~wer needs, the Armeniml "volunteers" have 

appeared well supplied in their offensive against the Azeris in 
STUART E. JOHNSON 63 

Nagomo-Karabakh. The supplies appeared to have been supplied 

by (probably bought from) the RussiaJa Army units in the region. 

This, and the support by the regular Armenian anneal forces, has 

given Armenia the upper hand in the conllict. 

Russia is in the Caucasus for the long haul. Minister of 

Defense Pavel Grachev is negotiating arrangements by which the 

Russian military will maintain five permanent bases in the region: 

three in Georgia, and one each in Armenia and Azerbaijan. 

Moreover the Russian state security council has signed off on a 

new military strategy that includes intervention outside of Russia 

(under select circumstances) as an appropriate role for the 

military. 

Iran has not been (and will not be) unaffected by Russia's 

intervention in the Caucasus. Refugee flows from the Azerbaijan 

have already proved to be disruptive, though not yet destabilizing 

to Tehran's authority in its Azeri region. Iran did feel strongly 

enough about the plight of the Azerbaijan's forces to register a 

strong protest to Moscow and Yerevan about the seizure of Azeri 

territory. This had its intended effect as Russia appears to have 

eased up on its support for the Armenian forces. 

Does this activity represent a threat to Iran? Not to its 

territorial integrity at any rate. Russia shows no interest in 

crossing Iran's border to occupy the northeastern, predominantly 

Azeri region. It's interest appears to be confined to securing 

stability in the region and to prop up regimes that are friendly, or 

all least cooperative. This is a situation that Irma will 

understandably monitor closely but does not indicate Russian 

designs on Iranian territory nor does it merit military 

countermeasures targeted at the Russian military. 
IRAN'S MILITARY INTENTIONS 

AND CAPABILITIES 

IRAN'S STRATEGIC AIMS AND 

CONSTRAINTS 

Shahram Chubin 

The fluidity of the post-Cold War resembles more a multipolar 

than a bipolar world. It has not enhanced the security of all 

states; for some it has created new threats and it has eliminated 

one of the principal ordering devices that existed. This 

transitional system may be longlived. It seems unlikely that it 

will be dominated by any one power. Coercive measures to 

enforce principles such as non-proliferation will be difficult to 

apply.Increasingly attempts to create supplier regimes for denial 

of technology or categories of arms will prove difficult. There 

will be other suppliers,economic incentives, and the inexorable 

diffusion of science and technology will be harder to arrest. At 

best such regimes will buy time; what is done with that time then 

becomes important. 

As the North Korean case demonstrates; at some point, 

discussions are important. These should not be seen to yield 

dividends only to the disturbing power because of the wider 

example for other states which may then seek nuclear weapons's 

or WMD merely to achieve a grand bargain or recognition. Yet 

in the absence of a ready or effective military remedy, the 

65 
66 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

motivations and priorities of other states will have to be taken 

into account, though not necessarily accepted or conceded. Better 

comprehension of a state's perspective may or may not yield 

greater empathy, but it would at least improve understanding of 

its motivations, incentives and likely behavior. 

Counter-proliferation policies, the labelling of some as 

"rogue" or "backlash" states, the tendency to infer intentions fl-om 

capabilities, to exaggerate those capabilities, and to assume a 

similarity in states assigned to this category, often leads to an 

expectation of a unifomfity of behavior. This leads to 

stereotyping and is misleading. Hence ;m arms buildup does not 

necessarily indicate an imminent resource grab, and nuclear 

proliferators after Iraq are not necessarily more, likely to come 

from within the NPT. Oversimplification of problems thal are 

multidimensional will lead to poor policy. Iran's policies are a 

product of various factors including its recent experience, its 

world view, its capabilities, the global and regional opportunities 

and its other values.Its intentions are thus variable although its 

inclination is fairly steady. In this article 1 will focus on its 

perspectives, intentions and style of operations before dealing 

with the impact of resource constraints on these. 

IRAN'S NATIONAL SECURITY 

PERSPECTIVE' 

New security problems have replaced those of the cold war; an 

uncertain m~d unstable northern frontier zone, a new, weak but 

still assertive Russia like a weakened Iraq to the west, has 

created new concerns. Iran worries about the dismantling of 

"failed states", the encouragement of secessionist movements, 

For a much more detailed an~dysis, see this author's monograph 

Irwin ~ National Security Policy: Perspectives, Capabilities and Impact, 

Washington, D.C., Brookings Institution (for the C,'u-negic Endowment), 

1994. 
SHAHRAM CHUBIN 67 

the assertion of a "duty to intervene," and possible Western 

efforts to disinember Iran itself. 

Iran sees a loss of leverage in the new geopolitical setting, 

wilh file third world and nowaliglunent rendered irrelevanl and 

economic strength promoted in the indices of national power. 

In the Persian Gulf sectarian,cultural and national riffs have been 

exacerbated by the strains and crises of the 1980's. The Arab 

states are now more openly reliant on the United States, which 

is present in greater strength than ever bet:ore. It continues to sell 

arms on a scale which is--at best--undiminished. Even fife 

temporary eclipse of Iraq from Gulf politics, which has increased 

Iran's importance, is worrisome. The impact of Iraq's return to 

regional politics will be disruptive. In the oil area as a supplier 

it will be a competitor, hurting prices. Politically, its return 

either as a Shi'i dominated state or as a fledgling democratic 

coalition, which would see the relaxation of controls on it, would 

make it a competitor to Iran. Yet the alternative of Sadd~un's 

regime, with "all its uncertainties especially regarding national 

unity, is not much better. The chances of Iraq emerging as a 

competitor are much greater than transformation of Iraq as a 

vassal state. Iran sees itself as the object of a double 

containment policy by the United States, which seeks to exclude 

it from regional politics both in the north and in the Persian Gull 

to the south. More generally it is suspicious ~f the advent of a 

unipolar world dominated by the USA: in the selective use of the 

UN, in the Middle East negotiations, and in the forefront of 

efforts to cripple Iran economically by denying it access to 

technology. At the same time the Unites States is busy selling 

arms on a massive scale to Iran's Arab neighbors and cultivating 

secular Turkey, presumably with a view to a rerun of Desert 

Storm against lran. 

AMBITIONS AND GOALS 

As a revolutionary Islamic power Iran sees its message as having 

resonance and applicability throughout the Islamic world. 



SHAHRAM CHUBIN 71 

percent of its neighbor's--was deficient in the supply of parts. 

Iraq thus had control of the air and the process of esc',dalion in 

missile exchm~ges. 

The second war saw lraq deterred from the use of CWs 

against a foe that could retaliate in kind. At the szune time, it 

demonstrated the flexibility of missiles; their ability to penetrate, 

their mobility, survivability, and shock effect. This war also 

demonstrated the vast and growing gap between the military 

capabilities of the advanced states and the others. 

Given the costs anti difficulty of catching up conventionally 

(the less advanced states mi,,ht= reason), it migllt make sense to 

look at other means to deter these advanced states. As l~)r Iraq, 

it was clear that lran could not afford surprises in the l~ature; it 

would need CWs if only for deterrence; missiles to supplement 

an airforce that would be wobbly for some time to come, and to 

deter the use of an adversary's missiles. Missiles, furthennore, 

were easier to use than aircraft, and might be manufactured 

domestically. Above all they were available and becoming more 

so and could be made operational quickly, without a large backup 

infrastructure, lraq had had access t¢~ aircraft with long ranges 

(able to reach the southern Gull) mad high ceilings that flew 

above Iran's air defense, lran after the war would seek the best 

long range aircraft available and not stint on quality. 

ARMS POLICIES AND PROGRAMS 

The two wars have guided Iran's arms [x~licies: advanced arms, 

professional forces, diversified sources complemented where 

possible by domestic production, CW and missiles for deterrence, 

and above all no illusions about reliance on the international 

community to deter local aggressors. 

When Iran c~une to taking stock of its resources in mid-1988, 

it faced a mess. In addition to its losses over eight years of war 

(40 percent of its armor alone in 1988), it had had no real 

resupply or servicing of its equipment (avionics, missiles, and 

electronic components) Ibr a decade. Supplies, perforce, had 
72 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

been improvised, leaving Iran with equipment from some two 

dozen countries and a logistical nightmare. The war had seen 

two trends that were to continue: 

• Given the U.S. (and later Western) arms embargo, lran 

sought East bloc sources. From 1985-88 Europe 

accounted for 41 percent and China 34 percent, with 

North Korea also all important supplier. From 1988-92 

Russia accounted for 64 percent, China 16 percent and 

Europe only 8 percen0. 3 

• Given the difficulty of servicing and maintaining its 

aircraft operational, lran sought a quick remedy ; this 

meant the acquisition of missiles. 

Iran's arms programs since 1988 have been a combination of 

replacement due to attrition, modernization as a result of block 

obsolescence and a switching of sources of supply. The shift to 

non-Western sources is not necessarily optimal or voluntary. It 

entails moreover changes across-the-board that will take time (a 

decade) before they can be fully assimilated. In the interim the 

standardization of logistics will be difficult, especially if Iran 

retains its U.S. aircraft in parallel in its inventory. There is, 

furthermore, the question of the long-term reliability of these new 

suppliers, quite apart from questions about the quality of their 

product. Russia, China and North Korea are susceptible to U.S. 

pressure and could reverse themselves. A related question is 

whether Russia is able to provide the longterm after-sales service 

and support systems required in the sale of aircraft. Iran cannot 

have complete assurance on these counts. 

Domestic arms production is no longer seen as a panacea. It 

can replace imports of items that are much used (ammunition, 

some spare parts) and serve as a meditun for technology transfer, 

but it cannot economically substitute for imports of completed 

systems such as aircraft. 

3 Richard Grimmet, ConventionalArms Transfers to the Third World, 

1985-1992, Washington D.C.: Congressional Research Service, July 

1993, Chart 8 p.32. 
SHAHRAM CHUBIN 73 

Iran accelerated its military effort in 1988-91, allowing some 

two billion dollars a year for imports. But this has slowed since 

1992, which saw something around half that figure; 1993 

continues that trend. The figures and details of Iran's arms 

purchases are available and not generally disputed. Their 

significance though is hotly debated. 

It is worth noting that Iran during the war with Iraq 

consistently spent less on defense than its adversary or Saudi 

Arabia. Between 1984 and 1991, Iraq received two and Saudi 

Arabia three times (by value) the arms that Iran received: $34.9 

biUion, $63.6 billion versus $16.1 billion. By most criteria, 

whether starting from a 1979 baseline, or in comparison with its 

neighbors' military efforts, Iran's arms programs since 1988 have 

been reasonable, even modest. Compared to its inventory in 

1979 Iran today has fewer aircraft, ships, tanks, and helicopters. 

Its relative position in the region is weaker as Saudi Arabia has 

modernized and expanded its forces, while even Iraq after Desert 

Storm is still stronger than Iran, compared to its much weaker 

position numerically and qualitatively in 1979. 

What have been Iran's arms programs since 19887 

Essentially they have been to rebuild or replace forces and 

equipment lost in the war rather than expansion. The focus has 

been on air forces (Russian supplied Mig-29's and SU-24's) and 

armor and on mobility and quality over numbers. In naval forces 

Iran has not sought large ships but a coastal force. It has 

emphasized sea denial by the acquisition of submarines, missiles 

(Silkworm and others) mines and fast patrol boats. It has 

increased its capacity to monitor and track shipping. This reflects 

sensitivity to foreign interventions in 1987 and 1990-91 and to 

the loss of ships and oil-platforms and installations to US attacks. 

In terms of force structure, Iran has de-emphasized the Pasdaran 

(Revolutionary Guards) as the primary military force, 

concentrating them for internal missions ("defense of the 

revolution") eliminating their ministry and reducing their number 

to some 150,000. However, there is no doubt that they remain 

an influential interest group with specialised missions (20,000 
74 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

assigned to the maritime component) such as control of missile 

forces, coastal patrols, guarding importmlt installations and 

possibly also manning the Kilo-class submarines. 

There are inherent limits Io Irmfs buildup and its 

effectiveness. Apart from the questionable reliability of 

suppliers, problems of logistics, the difficulties attendant to 

switching sources of supplies, and the gap between orders and 

deliveries and adequate assimilation, there are other reasons to 

be skeptical about Iran's anns programs translating quickly into 

military effectiveness. These relate partly to the sustainability of 

the program and availability of resources (discussed below) and 

partly to domestic obstacles. Foremost among these is the 

mnbivalence of the IRI about creating a truly effective military 

with an esprit de corps capable of using advanced amls, and 

encouraging leadership, training and exercises with appropriate 

incentives. Suspicions about the reliability of the professional 

cadre will tend to block the development of such a force and see 

the continuation of a parallel structure of the Pasdaran (and the 

Bast j), which are considered more politically reliable. 

Coordination and integration remains problematic. As a result no 

clear military doctrine has been elaborated. In light of this and 

tile dramatic spectacle of Desert Storm (for which Iran had a 

ringside seat), how confident or enthusiastic will its anns 

program m'ake Iran to employ force? 

There are elements of the progranl that are worrisome: the 

coastal based antiship missiles, the Scud-B's and C's, and 

possibly soon the longer range Ro-Dong, the mines, the 

submarines--and even the longer range aircraft (for now the SU24's, but possibly others). These could complicate, delay and 

impede U.S. access to file region. They might "also be useful in 

intimidating the Gulf states. They could "also see deliberate or 

inadvertent conflict with an Israel which has geared its inilitary 

orders (the F-15E ) to this possibility. 

Such concerns are prudent. Seen from Irma, however, tile 

buildup looks more natural. The losses of the war, Iraq's 

aggression, foreign intervention, the military build up of the Gull 
SHAHRAM CHUBIN 75 

states by the USA, the U.S. presence--all call for some response. 

This does not reflect an increased willingness to employ force. 

lran has not sought an enhanced power projection capability; with 

its present amphibious capability, it can--at most--manage to put 

a few tanks and perhaps 1,000 men across the Gulf. 

In what scenarios would lran use force? To annex a disputed 

area for its resources? To intimidate the Arab states to loosen 

their ties with the United States, to be deferential to its interests, 

perhaps to increase its quota of production in OPEC? In its war 

with Iraq, Iran discovered how easy it was to polarize the region 

between Arab and Iranian; may dispute between lran and an.)' 

Arab state quickly becomes an Iran/Arab dispute. It "also learned 

that attempts to frighten the Gulf slates, e.g., Kuwait can quickly 

backfire, bringing in outside powers against it. Furthermore after 

Desert Storm these states are unlikely to be frightened easily. 

What of subversion, assistance in a coup attempt? This is always 

possible, but it does not require significant military power. 

Iran's military program does not denote an increased 

willingness to use force. It is aimed at remedying deficiencies 

in Iran's defense capability. It sees it greatest military threats as 

Iraq and the United States and its arms programs as designed to 

deter an attack from these sources. Iran must surely be deterred 

from provoking the United States if only because it can ill afford 

to replace expensive infrastructure and it does not have the 

means to defend it. Identifying Iran's negative interests is thus 

clear and straight forward. 

WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION 

What of weapons of mass destruction and long-range missiles, 

which might become their means of delivery'? There are 

consistent reports of a pattem of purchases and attempts to 

obtain teclmology relating to CW and BW. The CIA and other 

sources point to existing Iranian stocks of agents for CW and 

BW weapons disagreeing only on the size of the inventory. 

Iran denies any such intent. It no longer repeats its call made in 
76 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

1988, i.e., "We should equip ourselves both in the offensive and 

defensive use of chemical, bacteriological and radiological 

weapons." Iran has signed the CW convention, without linking 

it, as some Arab states have, to Israel's adherence to the NPT, but 

insists that technology restrictions going beyond that treaty would 

be discriminatory. The CW convention does not deal with CW 

precursors. The overlap between pharmaceutical and weapons 

applications of CW and BW make controls peculiarly unreliable 

probably even with intrusive inspections. The weaponizing of 

agents is possible, and several regional countries (Iraq, Syria, 

Egypt among others) have programs that could be designed to 

do this. Apparently the technology that Iran has in the BW 

domain is only applicable to weapons uses. Given that the 

effects of some BW are more destructive than that of equivalent 

size nuclear weapons, and that these capabilities are spreading, 

concern for their proliferation in a region of recent wars is 

understandable. 

The same applies to missile proliferation. Iran has acquired 

older, less accurate missiles. In time it may acquire longer range 

missiles like the 1000 km Ro-Dong from North Korea or the 

more accurate M-family from China. In the meantime it is 

seeking to develop and refine these and other missiles 

indigenously. The MTCR may arrest the spread of these missiles 

but cannot stop them. In time Iran may acquire access to cruise 

missiles whose technology may be commercially available 

generally within this decade. These missiles are more accurate 

and more militarily effective with conventional warheads than 

the Scud family. 

Is Iran's missile program intended as the delivery system for 

weapons of mass destruction? Or is it primarily a response to the 

cutoff of spare parts for its aircraft and the rapid scramble for an 

equivalent capability, which has taken on a life of its own? 

In both the areas of CW and missiles, Iran sees itself as the 

victim; surprised by Iraq's use of these weapons, Iranian leaders 

vowed never to be caught offguard again. Since the international 

community was unwilling to condemn Iraq's use of CW, or 
SHAHRAM CHUBIN 77 

restrain it, Iran now believes its best bet is to cultivate an 

equivalent retaliatory weapon as a deterrent. Reports of the scale 

and development of Iraq's CW, BW and nuclear programs since 

Desert Storm would strengthen Iranian arguments for continuing 

this effort. 

The need to maintain a CW and BW capability as a 

deterrent against its possible use by a regional adversary is 

plausible, but what of its acquisition as a shortcut--as a poor 

man's atomic weapon? This presumably might be intended to 

deter US intervention in the region. But this use appears 

doubtful. As the second gulf war showed, CW's do not deter 

conventional operations and may intensify them or bring down 

on the initiator in-kind retaliation or worse. The operational 

military utility of CWs are peculiar to very specific 

circumstances, chiefly if used with benefit of surprise against 

massed formations, against undefended troops or against 

undisciplined forces--all of which conditions obtained in the first 

Gulf War. Against a protected maneuvering force, CWs are not 

so effective. On balance apart from possible insurance against 

possible future Iraqi use, Iran's motives would appear to fall 

into Brad Roberts' category of "no immediate strategic purpose." 

Neither in the Gulf nor on its land borders is there an evident 

need for such weapons. 

THE CASE OF 

NUCLEAR WEAPONS 

There is, in lran, little if any discussion about nuclear weapons 

(or CWs or BWs). Intentions have to be inferred from 

analogous cases, extrapolation from style of behavior, 

interpretation of incentives and imputation of likely motives, all 

of which are so subjective as to drive the analyst to rely on any 

hard data available to make his case for him. 

The decision to go for nuclear weapons is driven by political 

will rather than technological capacity. As the diffusion of 

technology increases and such decisions become easier and 
78 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

cheaper to implement, this will become line even of the 

developing countries. The main bottlenecks--fissile materials 

and weapons designers--carmot be a permanent impediment. 

Rather the critical issue will be how states view their security and 

place in international relations and their assessment of the 

contribution nuclear weapons can make to them. 

Since 1988 Iran has revived the Sha.h's much maligned 

nuclear program, attempting to complete two half-finished 

reactors in Bushire. Stymied by U.S. pressure on Germany, 

France, India and Argentina, Iran has entered into agreements R~r 

reactors from Russia and China. Both of these agreements are 

tentative and are being delayed because of financial problems. 

Iran sees U.S. allempts to deny it access to nuclear energy for 

civil uses as discriminatory and contrary to the underta.kings of 

the NPT, specifically Article 4 and the package deal that it 

represented. It sees U.S. policy as arbitrary, picking on a 

signatory Iran, while ignoring Israel's non adherence and its 

stock of two hundred bombs. This selective targeting of states 

by the United States, unilaterally and outside of the treaty 

framework, only confirms its view that the USA is hostile, seeks 

to deny it technology and to damage its economic development. 

U.S. arms control iniliatives like the Bush May 1991 proposal to 

freeze produclion of fissile materi',d in the region, rather than 

deal with Israel's inventory, reinforces this view. Similarly 

Israers loose talk about precautionary targeting of Iran in future 

conflicts has caused anxiety about U.S.-lsraeli intentions. 

Iran emphasizes its right to nuclear technology for peaceful 

purposes insisting on its need to become acquainted with the 

current generation of technology if it is develop in the future. 

While its functioning program at present is limited to a research 

reactor and some small orders, tile scope of its declared aims and 

attempted orders suggest a much more ambitious program. It 

wants nuclear power to account lor 10-20 percent o1' its energy. 

In a country with some of the largest oil and gas reserves in the 

world, the economic logic of such a program is debatable. (The 

more so if one considers that reactors are vulnerable in conflict; 
SHAHRAM CHUBIN 79 

lr:m lies in ,an earlhquake zone; ~md the costs of nuclear reactor 

construction has gone up tremendously over the past fifteen years 

while their benefits are increasingly called into question.) The 

scope of Iran's declared ambitions, the pattem of its attempted 

purchases,the absence of credible energy motivation, together 

with size of the manpower-base and potentially also foreign 

exchange available, make Iran a case ol' concern for nuclear 

nonproliferation. Iran plans to train 500 to 2,000 specialists in 

the nuclear field domestically mad abroad and has invited lranimi 

nationals abroad to return and contribute to the program. 

Apart from the implausibility of its newfound interest in 

nuclear technology for energy and medicine, Iran appears to have 

given signs of seeking a nuclear weapons program. There are 

reports that it has sought "hot cells" mad other technology of little 

use for energy purposes. A CIA expert says that Iran has 

considered "whether to go the enrichment route or the plutonium 

route. ''4 Iran denies any such intention and has repudiated any 

statements made in the heat of the war with Iraq (e.g., the 1988 

statement quoted above). The denials do not ring true in part 

because they are mixed with insistence as a matter of right, on 

access to nuclear technology and because of official and semiofficial statements on Iran's right to obtain nuclear weapons as 

long as Israel has them. Iran's denials of intent are not reassuring 

because lran has the profile of a typical proliferalor. The world 

view underlying its comments suggest at best ambivalence, at 

worst, deception. Comments to the effect that states do not 

4 Dr. Gordon Oehler in the Hearings of the Subcommittee for 

International Security ,and International Organization ~md Hum~m Rights 

of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, July 28, 1993. In essence the 

CIA view is that Ir~m's CW progr~un is "extensive ~md improving" but 

also "relatively crude." It judges Iran to be working toward a BW 

capability and seeking to acquire nuclear weapons capability. The time 

frame for the acquisition of the latter is usu;dly given as 10 years. See 

inter allot Robert Gates' testimony to Congress, March 1992. See Mso 

Elaine Sciolino, New York Times, November 30, 1992. 
80 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

"obey intemational regulations" when their interests are 

threatened or that the control of nuclear weapons cannot take 

place unless all such weapons are controlled (Rafsanjani, 1990); 

or that the absence of rules and law intemationally and arbitrary 

double standards applied by the strong against the weak, drive 

the latter to national deterrents (Kayhan newspaper, 1993) are 

indicative. Statements that nuclear weapons are inunoral, and do 

not make a state strong, and are not practically usable, are 

interchanged with the assertion that if it had wanted them, Iran 

could have obtained nuclear weapons, and that even if it had a 

few weapons, the great powers would still have hundreds; none 

of this is reassuring. 

Above all the quest for nuclear weapons would be consistent 

with Iran's world view and the role it seeks to play. The sense 

of embattlement and siege,of hostility and discrimination on the 

part of the great powers, is palpable and animates Iran's 

intemational behavior. In this view there is a conspiracy to keep 

independent countries like Iran weak. Iran in tum seeks to 

achieve recognition as an equal power and to fulftU its own 

mission. Nuclear weapons would appear to meet many of these 

aims by: 

• Emphatically asserting Iran's self reliance 

• Demonstrating the progress and advance of its 

technology 

• Asserting the revolution's success and diverting attention 

from domestic inadequacies 

• Serving as a symbolically defiant claim of equality 

(they might reduce the need for conventional military 

expenditures ) 

• Providing Iran with a louder amplifier with which to play 

a broader international role. 

The sum of these motives is encapsulated by the word 

"status." Nuclear weapons would make Iran a contender, to be 

taken seriously. The "head table" argument, essentially the same 

as that made by France and England has its more recent 

adherents, China and India. None of these states cite particular 
SHAHRAM CHUBIN 81 

threats; all consider the issue primarily from a global standpoint. 

For Iran there are no pressing regional threats. Iraq despite 

its dangerous ambitions and clandestine progress, is not an 

immediate threat. But if Iraq had developed its nuclear weapons 

undetected, against which state(s) would it have been targeted? 

And if used or threatened could Iran have any assurance that the 

international community would respond any better than it did 

when CWs were used? Moreover how much faith should Iran 

put in Western intelligence which nearly missed (and abetted) 

Iraq's ambitious program? What guarantees can be made that 

continuing surveillance will inhibit a future program? And what 

reassurance are the nuclear powers prepared to give to Iran in 

terms of positive security guarantees given Israel's nonadherence 

to the NPT and the future risks of an Iraqi breakout? 

Seen from Iran the international community not only failed 

to stop Iraq's aggression or condemn its use of CWs, but it took 

sides in the war and intervened in such a fashion as to save 

Saddam Hussein so that he could launch another aggression. 

This intervention and the Desert Storm campaign underscored the 

tremendous disparity between the military capabilities of the USA 

and regional states. Iranian leaders surely consider Desert Storm 

as an implicit warning to them, if not a plot to legitimize future 

such actions. With the continuing U.S. military presence in the 

region, uncertainty about continuity of conventional arms supplies 

(or revenues to fund them) and the general sense of 

embattlement, Iran's leaders might reason that taking out an 

option on a nuclear weapons capability might be prudent for 

practical reasons. 

In short, Iran's recent experience, quest for self reliance, 

status and self-assertion, as well as its sense of siege, would 

argue for the development of CW, BW, and nuclear weapons as 

prudent hedges in intemational relations today. 

If Iran made such a decision, what sort of program would it 

pursue? It would avoid a crash program or policies that would 

entail confrontation like Iraq. It would instead seek to benefit 

from the cracks within the system. This could include the use of 
82 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

deception in inspections anti emphasis on the right to teclmology 

transfer. Dressing up the issue as one of principle for the third 

world, i.e. as a class dispute, might give il st,me mileage. 

Making U.S. demands for more rigorous inspections appear 

vindiclive grad the pursuit of a unilateral vendetta might generate 

sympathy for Iran and alleviate international pressures. Iran's 

experience with the black market for arms in the 1980's made it 

clear that anything can be bought at a price. Similarly Western 

countries are united on policies only until their pocket books are 

involved, then principles erode quickly and competition takes 

over. Regional states like Pakistan or others like China may lend 

a hand, although each denies doing so. Finally there is always 

a chance that Iran's progra,un could benefit from its proximity tO 

the former USSR. Scientists, weapons designers and fissile 

materials in quantities sufficient to make a few bombs could 

easily pass undetected into lran ~ld accelerate its still 

rudimentary pmgrani. The development of the means of delivery 

(missiles) in parallel might speed up the program. The basic 

limitation may not be financial as costs have declined and 

stretched over a number of years in the India model are well 

within even Iran's diminished means. The constraints are rather 

the (undetected) acquisition of sufficient amounts of fissile 

materials and their harnessing to an integrated nuclear weapons 

progrmn. 

IRAN'S DECISIONMAKING 

AND STYLE OF OPERATIONS 

Iran's view of the world as a hoslile place is matched by a 

detennination to play an important role in it. Reflecting an 

uneasy mixture of grievance and inchoate ,'unbition, it seeks to be 

a role model for other states, while aclfieving recognition of its 

rights. Nothing in its policies suggest a concrete progrzun, 

timetable or strategy; indeed everything about its behavior, 

especially in its conduct of the war with Iraq (and decision to 

terminate it) suggest a sensitivity to the domestic situation and 
SHAHRAM CHUBIN 83 

a predilection for the taclical and reactive. 

In part this rellects the decentralization and fragmentation of 

power accompanying Ihe rew)luli~n and lhe fractious nature of 

the political leadership. Public discourse is valued for hortatory 

purposes se~,ing a didactic function. The result is a cacophony 

of voices, many not authoritative on policy, while the government 

lacks the authority or will to impose a uniform policy. Khomeini 

exploited the existence of factions; his successors are stuck with 

them. One consequence is that policy is incoherent or dualistic, 

veering inconsistently between the pragmatic and the ideological, 

the moderate mad the extreme. Whether this is the unintended 

product of a domestic tug-of, war, or the deliberate eflbrt by the 

regime to have it both ways (e.g., to deal with govenunents and 

to cultivate their opponents) is not kalown with certainty. It 

leads, in either case, to a~ erratic policy which rarely achieves its 

results (Iran remains bereft of allies or friends) and raises 

questions about who is in charge and the ability of the Iranian 

goverrunent to deliver. 

In general the forces of inertia and the hardline, supported by 

interest groups (clerics, martyrs families, the oppressed, the 

revolutionary guard) have managed to prevail. By cornering the 

market in revolutionary purity, they are able to do so by framing 

issues anti debates in ways that make departures matters of 

principle. Success in domestic politics has eluded the regime, 

laced by population growth, inflation, unemployment and the 

failure of the state to manage the economy properly. F~/reign 

policy in these circumstances assumes greater impoaance. 

Posturing on that stage is easier than performing at home. 

Moreover it can provide a form of surrogate legitimacy by 

appealing to its successes and in justifying sacrifices. At the 

same time foreign policy provides an extemal focus for the 

regime which is itself increasingly divided and a diversion for 

the hapless populace. Whether it will continue to do so or have 

to manufacture crises for this purpose, as the "price of 

watermelons" become a saiient political issue in Iran, we discuss 

below. 
84 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

What are the regime's specific aims apart from the general 

aspirations for achieving independence and recognition and 

playing an influential role in the Muslim world and further 

afield? In order of priority, they are: 

• Regime security, or the security of the revolution 

• National security (maintenance of territorial integrity, 

regional influence) 

• Taking stands on Muslim issues, to the extent they 

buttress the regime's position and do not undermine it. 

Extending the principles and influence of the revolution 

serves national security as well as regime security. What those 

principles are in particular cases, are necessarily flexible: hence 

the alliance with a Syria that represses its Muslim opposition. If 

regime security requires taking stands on Muslim issues that am 

counter to national security/interest, then so be it. Opposition to 

Israel may fall into this category. Finally if regime and national 

interest dictates dealing with the enemy and ejecting principles 

(arms from Israel and the United States)--"no problem." Iran 

has been creative in (re-)interpreting its principles and in 

applying the means to carry them out. Iran's leaders are not 

worldly, they see the world in ethnocentric and manicheistic 

terms, but they are not stupid. They are shrewd, cunning and 

devious. They believe in the importance of military power, have 

few illusions about their own lack of it, and retain a healthy 

respect for that available to the West. However, they also 

believe that power can be stymied, neutralized and offset by 

guile. They am capable of miscalculation but unlikely to arrive 

at this by overestimating their own power. More likely this will 

stem from an over-elaborate plan or simple ignorance of the 

forces operating on U.S. foreign policy. 

Iran's behavior and style of operations demonstrate an 

emphasis on flexibility and the tactical, the indirect approach and 

avoidance of confrontation.In the arms area we have seen an 

emphasis on the fight to obtain technology for peaceful uses, 

adherence to conventions; permission for inspections; and 

avoidance of crash programs or crises. In seeking missiles and 
SHAHRAM CHUBIN 85 

CW and BW, Iran is seeking shortcuts or "leveraging 

technologies" (in Brad Roberts' phrase) to magnify its 

capabilities. Such weapons decouple military competence from 

effectiveness. They may also serve notice to the Gulf states that 

a qualitative buildup will serve no purpose as they will remain 

vulnerable. 

Iran's indirect approach is evident in efforts to use hostages 

to change the foreign policy of states during the Gulf war, always 

denying control of the hostage takers. Playing on divisions 

among the Gulf Arab states and on the weak point of the 

Westem "allies has been common practice. Indirect measures like 

mining or threatening third parties rather than confronting the 

USA directly has been the norm. Similarly pressure on Egypt or 

Algeria has been indirect or deniable. 

Iran's flexibility is also evident. From lrangate (which was 

not revealed by the Iranian govemment) to Tehran's willingness 

to support the Ta'if agreement of 1989 regarding Lebanon (after 

first denouncing it); to supporting Muslim groups' entering 

political coalitions after first insisting on the establishment of 

Islamic republics; to agreeing to resume diplomatic relations with 

Saudi Arabia March 1991 (against Khomeini's express wishes in 

his will), all testify to Iran's suppleness and realism. 

The question remains whether Iran is able to pursue a 

strategy over the longhaul and whether, if it has a commitment 

to a certain goal, it is able to set up the organizations and 

coordinate their plans and products in an integrated fashion to 

achieve its aim? Here there is room for doubt. The indigenous 

missile program has not made great strides, presumably in part 

due to organizational as much as technical deficiencies. The lack 

of coordination, the absence of skilled manpower on every level 

and the fragmented nature of power would make a well-thought 

out secret nuclear weapons program, with a large external 

purchasing component, costed and evaluated with a firm deadline 

in mind, unlikely. The nature of political life in Iran does not 

allow a leader to take the long-term view; unlike the one man 

rule in Iraq where it possible to do so. There is also a question 
86 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

whether the leadership could commit signific;mt resources to a 

project without gaining broad consensus, especially if the payoff 

were longlenn at best. The IR! has not hiflaeno distinguished 

itself by its capacity for longterm plamling. It seems likely that 

despite Iran's interest, its nuclear program will remain a small 

and haphazard one. 

RESOURCE CONSTRAINTS AND 

MILITARY EXPENDITURES 

Iran's military program today is a delayed response to the 

accumulated losses and attrition of the past fifleen years. It is an 

attempt at replacement, rationalization and modernization and 

suffers from numerous constraints already noted. At tile same 

time as there are areas of particular concern (mines, subrnarines, 

missiles and WMD) there is the more general question: at what 

point does Iran's military efton exceed its legitimate defense 

needs, and become a source of regional concern? 

Iran's leaders acknowledge that they are m',Ning a major 

investmenl in defense, calling it a prudent policy. They state 

that the weapons systems arc '"intended to protect the revolution" 

and that "we do not deny ourselves tile fruit of modem 

technology." Experience underlines Rafsanjani's phrase: "We live 

in a world in which one cannot afford to neglect one's defensive 

capability." At the same time, it is clear that military 

expenditures cut into resources available Ibr other pressing 

needs. President Rafsanjani has insisted that domestic 

reconstruction takes priority over arms expenditures. Ayatollala 

Khamenei, formally in charge of the military, while insisting on 

Iran's right to arm, noted: "We abhor the idea of wasting this 

nation's money for purchasing various weapons from various 

comers of the globe, which are not needed and which have no 

impact in terms of defense. We do not favor militarism for the 

govermnent and the nation." Rafsanjani insists that defense 

expenditures constitute some $850 million (or 1.5 percent of 

GNP)--smaller than that of its neighbors. The scale of the build- 
SHAHRAM CHUBIN 87 

up is seen as exaggerated by the West and criticism as 

politic'ally motivated, s 

That said, Iran is determined to reestablish itself as the 

foremost power in the Persian Gulf. This will not be achieved 

easily in part because of the military buildup across the Gulf 

(which h,'ts included force expansion as well as systematic 

modernization) leaving many of the states with qu',ditatively 

superior weapons. It will "also be harder because the opportunity 

costs of military expenditures are high and growing for an Iran 

which has reduced resources and competing claims on them. 

To reduce expenditures lran has sought to expand its 

domestic arms industries but whether this is cost-effective for 

major systems is dubious ('although it may reduce overl 

dependency). Iran is also seeking to maximize the benefits of 

military expenditures (or avoid choosing between them and 

civilian needs) by using the Guards mad the Bassidj to assist in 

civilian tasks, especially road and house construction. It hopes 

Io find practical linkages between civil and military projects 

enabling them Io use and train manpower without needing to 

demobilize these forces or create unemployment and political 

problems. Admirable as thus may be, it may further confuse mad 

dilute the Guards' military mission. 

It is worth recalling that the war with Iraq cost Iran some $90 

billion in direct damage alone. But there are also the costs of 

s See Hashemi R~d's~mj~mi "Major lnvesunent," Vision of IRI, 

August 23 in BBC/ME/1467/i, August 25, 1992; Kh~unenei "Protect the 

Revolution" ,'rod "Modem Technology," Voice of IRI, October 10 

ME/1509/A/8, October 12, 1992; :rod "Camaot Afford to Neglect" 

Rafsanjani, Voice of IRI, October 13 in ME/1512/A/I, October 15, 

1992. See ,also Tehran 1'lines October 19, 1992 ,and IRNA, October 19 

in ME/1516/A/3, October 20, 1992. Akb~u" Torkan, the Defense 

Minister, reported for 1993-94 a Defense Budget of approximately 

$850 million (or 3.8 percent of GNP ) in rials. This may represent the 

domestic component of military expenditures. See the bill submitted: 

FBIS-NES, May 18, 1993. 
88 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

what was not done, which has to be done now: "We have a lot 

of work that we did not touch because of the war. This is the 

most expensive and hidden cost that no one takes into account. 

We did not build dams, so we are facing a lack of water. We 

did not build refineries, so we have to import oil now. We did 

not allocate enough for agriculture." 

But as Rafsanjani explained, this was but half of it. Military 

expenditures would also have to rise after the war because 

peacetime needs entailed higher salaries and reconstruction, 

including the need not simply to replace but to restock as well. 6 

Hence there would be no peace dividend. 

Emerging from the war Iran had few debts and was proud of 

having controlled military spending. 7 Military expenditures under 

the IRI have not equalled those of Pahlavi Iran (being some 16.6 

percent of GNP in 1978 versus 2.2 percent in 1990). 8 Despite 

the acceleration of orders for arms between 1989-1992, there is 

no sign that more than some $2 billion per year has been spent. 

The question is whether this can be sustained. 

The heavy legacy of the war apart--requiring repair, 

infrastmctural renewal, payments to veterans, martyrs' families 

and military modemizatiorr---there is the separate question of oil 

income and population growth. Oil revenues since 1986 have 

hovered between $12-15 billion per year. In real terms they have 

6 See Rafsanjani Friday sermon, Voice of the IRI, May 24 in 

ME/lO82/A/3-5, May 27, 1991. Iran in short had lived off its military 

capital during the war. 

7 Tehran radio reported an IMF consultant mission's report indicating 

that Iran increased its defense budget by less than 4 percent of GNP 

annually during the war. IRNA in English, 26 September in FBIS-NES90-189, 28 September 1990, pp. 65-66. 

8 See Cordesman and Wagner, Lessons of Modern Wars, p. 47, and 

The Military Balance 1991-92, p. 213. [Note GNP in 1978 was 

approximately $78 billion versus a GNP in 1990 of $59 billion.] 
SHAHRAM CHUBIN 89 

dropped precipitously even as Iran's population has increased 

dramatically (at over 3.5 percent annual growth) to over 60 

million. Iran's current revenues barely cover its basic 

imports--food, pharmaceuticals, basic spare parts, oil field 

maintenance and exploration, oil products and the servicing of its 

short term debt. Subsidies, state centralization and 

mismanagement and corruption have not helped. After no 

growth in the economy for over a decade, by most criteria 

Iranians are poorer than before the revolution. (At fixed prices 

the GNP in 1988 was roughly that of 1973; per capita income in 

1988 was roughly that of 1967). The government is now facing 

a future of weak or sliding oil prices (with each $ l drop in 

prices costing it $1 billion per year), a short term debt of $30 

billion (which it is finding hard to service), and a large, young, 

restive population for which it has to find schooling, medical 

services, housing, education, employment and a sense of purpose. 

No wonder that Rafsanjani recently called this "a grave 

responsibility" for the government and country? 

The political salience of economic deterioration should not be 

underemphasized. Unlike perennially poor countries that have 

never wimessed prosperity (like Egypt or Bangladesh) 

populations that have a living memory of better times are apt to 

be politically demanding where their welfare is concerned. In 

1990 Hashemi Rafsanjani pointedly told an audience of 

Revolutionary Guards that almost all recent revolutions in 

Africa, the East bloc or Latin America were defeated because of 

economic shortages. ~° Two years later in what appeared to be 

an attempt to dampen expectations, he suggested that Iran was 

doing well economically by comparison to Pakistan,India and 

9 In his speech reviewing the first and presenting the second FiveYear Plan and present budget on 21 December, reported by Voice of 

the IRI, 22 December 1993, in Special Supplement, ME/1885/SI/12, 3 

January 1994. 

10 Tehran Radio, May 28 in FBIS-NES, May 31, 1990, p. 59. 
90 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

China, implying that these rather than richer countries were the 

appropriate yardstick for comparison. ~ In 1992 and again in 

1994 there were at least four cases of popular discontent largely 

over economic conditions, leading to riots and their suppression 

by security forces. 

THE IMPACT OF REDUCED 

RESOURCES ON POLICY 

How sustainable is Iran's drive to return as a regional military 

power in light of economic pressures'? How will it react to an 

era of reduced resources? 

• Will it seek addilional resources? By grabs and claims on 

its neighbors? By teclmologica,l equalizers, quick-fixes 

and shortcuts? 

• Will it reduce its ambitions by tailoring them to its 

shrunken resources? 

• Will it tighten its belt, dem~md sacrifices, batten down 

the hatches and m~e economies across-the-board? Or 

will it give defense priority? 

And if the axe fails on expenditures where will it fall first 

or heaviest in the military? On purchases'? On the airforce? On 

the Navy? On the CW, BW or nuclear weapons programs with 

their uncertain payoff'? 

And should economic conditions deteriorate will not the 

regime's need for reliable and contented military and security 

forces increase, thus fostering a continued pampering of the 

Revolutionary Guards over the regular military? Under pressure 

will the regime seek to revive the morale of the revolution by 

seeking to divert attention externally by making a foreign "threat" 

the scapegoat for its mistakes? Under such conditions might it 

not be tempted to resort to dangerous acts, such as the mmexation 

~ Fri&ly sermon, 18 September in ME/1491/A/10-11, 21 September 

1992. 
SHAHRAM CHUBIN 91 

of neighboring territories, or confrontation with alleged OPEC 

saboteurs of its economy (taking a lea/ from Saddam Hussein in 

1990?). 

These are all exercises in speculation. What appears clear 

is that Iran's military buildup so far has been modest. It will be 

some time before it is translated into military effectiveness. Aaa 

unfortunate lesson of the war with lraq is Iran's determination not 

to be caught napping again; this accounts for the CW, BW and 

even nuclear weapo~ls progrmns. Other weapons systems like the 

missiles are intended as a quick fix to a major deficiency while 

mines and submarines are intended a deterrents against attacks on 

Iran by outside powers. There are few plausible scenarios in 

which Iran would seek to stop navigation in the Gulf or seize 

territory from the Arab states of the Gulf. It is more dependent 

than most Oil file waterway for its exports. Good relations are 

also • dictated by its oil needs in OPEC. There is no reason to 

suppose that Iran's military buildup will make it more likely to 

overestimate its capabilities or more disposed to use force. This 

is not its modus operandi. 

Iran remains an ambitious power in terms of status. It seeks 

to expand its influence. In doing so its policies have been 

characteristically erratic. There is a danger that with economic 

stringencies it may become politically volatile as well. It could 

then be tempted to busy a dissatisfied populace with foreign 

adventures; this would certainly play to what has been one of its 

strengths--the fact that it thrives on "adversity. Yet this is an 

asset that has atrophied and Iranians are no longer in the mood 

for crusades or sacrifices. More likely then for this regime, 

which recognizes its military weakness, is increased dependence 

on the security forces for repression and a domestic witchhunt. 

The price of this would be a further strengthening of the 

Pasdar,m as an interest group. However, their material needs in 

terms of foreign exchange would not be major. 

If cutbacks fail on the armed forces, it is difficult to see the 

obvious areas. Except for the three Kilo-class submarines, most 

of the navy is intended for coastal defense. Most likely is a 
92 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

stretching out of existing programs. The nuclear program has 

already had considerable slippage and given the costs of reactors, 

this may well continue. In short, Iran will seek to muddle 

through without making major decisions. Constraints are catalysts 

for choices and will impose new discipline on the IRI's leaders 

perhaps even to consider the tradeoffs and to think, for once, 

strategically. Regime security will demand more resources used 

and liberated domestically. Regional status and influence can 

alson only come with a secure and contented home base. Absent 

a major threat, scarce resources could be concentrated at home 

and defense reconstruction slowed down. For this to happen, 

however, Iranian leaders need to cut back and redefine their 

regional ambitions, end their sense of self-created embattlement 

and seek cooperative approaches to arms control. This in tum 

requires the emergence in Iran of a government able to impose 

itself and thus transcend the revolutionary power struggle which 

produces its lowest common denominator hardline consensus that 

has stymied its external and intemal policies. Policies by other 

states that feed the sense of embattlement and victimization and 

provide no incentives for a change of direction do little to assist 

those in Iran who support such a change. 
DI~JA VU ALL OVER AGAIN? 

AN ASSESSMENT OF IRAN'S 

MILITARY BUILDUP 

Michael Eisenstadt 1 

By virtue of geography, military strength, economic potential, 

demographics, and hegemonic aspirations, Iran poses the 

greatest long-term threat to peace and stability throughout (the 

region). 

General Joseph P. Hoar, 

U.S. CENTCOM 1993 Posture Statement z 

Iran has the potential of becoming the regional superpower, or 

minisuperpower, to replace Iraq in the Persian Gulf. Iran will 

realize that potential if left undisturbed. 

Major General Uri Sagi, 

Director of Israeli Military Intelligence, April 17, 19923 

1 The author would like to thank Joseph Bermudez Jr., Benedict 

FitzGerald, Norman Friedman, Glen Howard, David Isby, Kenneth 

Katzman, and Steve Zaloga for their valuable insights in preparing this 

study. 

2 General Joseph P. Hoar, United States Central Command 1993 

Posture Statement, p. 9. 

3 Yediot Aharonot, 17 April, 1992, pp. 1, 2, 28, in FBIS-NES, 22 

April, 1992, p. 36. 

93 
94 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

In 1989, following a costly 8-year war with Iraq, Iran initiated a 

major military buildup intended to transform it into a regional 

power and rebuild its ravaged armed forces. Iran's buildup, 

coupled with indications of increased activism in its foreign 

policy--including efforts to undermine the Arab-Israeli peace 

process, unilaterally overturn the political and territorial status 

quo in the Gulf (it is engaged in disputes with Bahrain, the UAE, 

and Qatar), and support subversive and radical Islamic opposition 

movements in Algeria, Jordan, Lebanon, and among the 

Palestinians--raise disturbing questions about Iran's intentions, 

and the long-term implications of its growing military 

capabilities. 

There are a number of elements to Iran's military buildup: 

Iran is seeking nonconventional (nuclear, biological, and 

chemical) weapons and file means to deliver them (missiles, 

bombers, and strike aircraft) to provide it with regional power 

status and the means to intimidate its neighbors and deter 

potential adversaries. Likewise, it is attempting to expand and 

modernize its conventional lorces, with an emphasis on 

developing the air and naval capabilities needed to dominate the 

Gulf and defend Iranian airspace. It is doing this in accordance 

with lessons learned in two Gulf wars. This paper will examine 

Iran's military buildup in order to ascertain what it indicates 

about Iran's intentions. 

Iran's military intentions and capabilities---like those of any 

state--are inextricably linked. Although its intentions are often 

difficult to assess, they may be inferred from patterns of 

behavior, as well as official and non-official statements, speeches, 

and interviews. In addition, because its intentions shape its 

capabilities, intentions may also be inferred by analyzing Iran's 

military force structure and procurement decisions and military 

exercise scenarios. Finally, while it is important to understand 

intentions, it is equally important to understand how Iran's 

military capabilities create or foreclose policy options for its 

decisionmakers, and how this affects their likely course of action. 

Accordingly, we will attempt to piece together a coherent and 
MICHAEL EISENSTADT 95 

(hopefully) accurate picture of Iran's intentions and options from 

an analysis of its capabilities. 4 

IRAN'S MOTIVATIONS 

Iran's military buildup is motivated by its desire to become a 

major regional power, as well as its perception that ill the longrun it faces threats from Iraq, the USA, and Israel. This buildup 

is intended to accomplish several objectives, including: 

• Defend against the possibility of a resurgent Iraq. 

• Establish a capability to deter the United States from 

attacking Iran and hinder its ability to project force in the 

region. 

• Dominate the Gulf, press outstanding territorial claims 

against its Arab Gulf neighbors, and influence oil 

production levels and prices. 

• Have the capability to close the Strait of Hormuz during 

a crisis (through which about 20% of the world's oil 

flows) in order to enhance its political leverage: 

• Deter Israel from attacking its nuclear infrastructure. 

The motivations underlying Iran's military buildup---its 

ambition to be a major regional power, its defensive concerns, 

and its perception that it currently is facing a strategic window of 

opportunity--are critical to understanding Iran's intentions and 

4 It should be noted, however, that intentions and capabilities often 

exert a reciprocal influence in ways that are difficult to anticipate or 

discern--intentions shape capabilities while evolving capabilities may in 

turn modify intentions--further clouding the picture. 

5 During the Iran-Iraq War, senior Iranian ofticials repeatedly warned 

that Iran would block the Strait of Hormuz and prevent all oil exports 

from this critical region in the event that Iraq crippled its own ability 

to export oil. R. K. Ramazani, Revolutionary lran: Challenge and 

Response in the Middle East, (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University 

Press, 1988), pp. 13-18. 
96 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

the potential implications of the buildup; these are analyzed 

below. 

Regional Ambitions 

For religious and nationalistic reasons Iran's clerical leadership 

believes that the Islamic Republic plays a central role in world 

affairs as the standard bearer of revolutionary Islam, the defender 

of the interests of Muslims throughout the world, and the 

guardian of Iran's national interests. Accordingly, they believe 

that the fate of the Islamic community at large, Iran's national 

interest, and their own leadership position at home depends on 

their ability to transform Iran into a regional power. 

Iran's leadership also appears to be driven by the conviction 

that geography dictates that Iran be the dominant power in the 

Persian Gulf since it is the largest Gulf state, it has the longest 

coastline on the Gulf, and it has vital economic interests there. 

This implies an ability to dominate the Gulf, initiate and 

inlluence developments in the region, and to defend its vital 

interests in the Gulf against potential enemies such as the USA, 

Iraq, and Saudi Arabia. 

Perceived Threats 

Iran is also motivated by a variety of defensive concerns. At 

various times in the past, revolutionary Iran has seen the USA, 

the Soviet Union, Iraq, and Israel as potential threats, and while 

the Gulf War and the breakup of the Soviet Union have 

dramatically enhanced Iran's security situation, it believes that 

these countries could reemerge as threats in the future. 

The Soviet Union was the only country capable of invading 

and occupying large parts of Iran. The breakup of the Soviet 

Union and the creation of a number of independent republics 

along Iran's northem border thus eliminated the only real threat 

to its independence--even if it has created a whole new set of 

concerns that instability in Central Asia could spill over into Iran. 
MICHAEL EISENSTADT 97 

The defeat of Iraq during the Gulf War likewise enhanced 

Iran's military situation. The war resulted in the dismantling of 

Iraq's nuclear program and the near total elimination of its 

chemical and biological warfare capabilities. Iraq's conventional 

military capabilities have also been greatly reduced, and while its 

armed forces are still the largest in the Gulf region, they have 

been significantly weakened by war and sanctions. 

Finally, the United States is engaged in a major military 

draw-down that could--under certain circumstances (i.e. a 

simultaneous crisis elsewhere in the world)--reduce its ability to 

intervene in the Gull. This draw-down might eventually result in 

a reduced forward presence in the region, raising hopes in Iran 

that this might translate into increased political and military 

freedom of action for Iran vis-a-vis its neighbors. 

Former defense minister Akbar Torkan described this new 

regional environment in a recent interview: 

Around us we do not see any country which would be a threat. 

We have the best of relations with Pakistan. Afghanistan is a 

poor country which for the next 20 years will have to spend 

whatever money it has on reconstruction. We have very good 

relations with Turkey ,and (they) do not feel we are a threat to 

them. Iraq is a country which is trying to avoid being 

dismembered. The countries to the south of us are very small 

and weak and need us to help defend them. So no-one is 

threatening us. Our priority is to rebuild the country. 6 

Concerning the United States, Torkan added that: 

I do not subscribe to the view that the Americans are looking 

for trouble and want to attack us. The U.S. does not have any 

reason to attack us. Right now the Americans have many 

problems throughout the world and have to deal with them 

first. It is not logical for a country which is reducing its 

military bases around the world, and wants to reduce its 

6 Financial Times, February 8, 1993, p. 4. 
98 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

military budget, to attack us. At the same time, we do not want 

to enter a war with the Americans either] 

Not all Iranian defense officials share this rather benign 

assessment (and it is possible that Torkan toned down his own 

views in order to allay the concerns of his foreign audience). For 

instance, a senior naval officer asserted in a 1991 interview that: 

The American objective in the Persian Gulf is to establish 

domination over the oil resources of the region, and to destroy 

the Islamic culture.., but the Iranian Armed Forces equipped 

with the necessary training ,are ready to thwart any possible 

intervention? 

Given the ambiguities that emerge from such contradictory 

assessments by senior Iranian officials, and despite its current 

favorable situation, it is likely that Iran is planning for an 

eventual conflict with its traditional enemies, and is thus 

preparing for a clash with the United States or a revitalized Iraq, 

or an Israeli preventive strike against its nascent nuclear program. 

A Window of Opportunity? 

Finally, Iran may see this period of reduced threat in the Guff 

and the new opportunities to acquire advanced weapons and 

technology from the former eastern bloc states--which are 

starved for cash and are willing to supply modem arms which 

Iran cannot obtain elsewhere--as a strategic window of 

opportunity for it to increase its military capabilities unhindered. 

7 Financial Times, February 8, 1993, p. 4. 

s Admiral Ahmed Mohammad-Zadeh quoted by IRNA, October 29, 

1991, in FBIS-NES, October 30, 1991, p. 43. 
MICHAEL EISENSTADT 99 

IRAN'S MILITARY BUILDUP 

Iran's military buildup consists of two main components: 1) a 

buildup of its strategic forces, including nonconventional 

(nuclear, biological, and chemical) weapons and delivery systems 

(missiles and strike aircraft), 2) a conventional buildup entailing 

the expansion and modemization of its air, naval, and ground 

forces. 

Although precise figures are unavailable, Iran is believed to 

have set aside billions for its nonconventional weapons programs. 

Moreover, senior Iranian officials have stated that in 1989 the 

majlis allocated $10 billion over a 5-year period for foreign arms 

procurement in support of its conventional arms buildup. 9 

However, Iran's economic woes are likely to force it to curb 

its ambitions. Iran's economy is in a crisis spurred by rapid 

population growth (more than 3 percent annually), declining oil 

revenues (down by more than 30 percent this year due to 

depressed oil prices), the lingering costs of its 8-year war with 

Iraq, government mismanagement of the economy, and a rapidly 

growing foreign debt (over $20 billion in all with $7 billion in 

arrears) I° which has harmed its access to intemational credit 

markets. H These economic problems have forced Iran to reduce 

its defense spending by cutting procurement across the board, 

9 Defense Minister Torkan quoted by IRNA, March 1, 1990, in FBISNES, March 2, 1990, p. 40; President Rafsanjani quoted by Tehran TV, 

June 19, 1990, in FBIS-NES, June 20, 1990, p. 30. 

lo Middle East Economic Digest, January 14, 1994, p. 14. 

11 Patrick Clawson, Iran's Challenge to the West: How, When, and 

Why, Policy Paper Number Thirty-Three, The Washington Institute for 

Near East Policy, pp. 24-37. 
100 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

cancelling arms contracts, ~2 stretching-out procurement of key 

items, and prioritizing the allocation of scarce fmancial resources 

among the various services. D 

Moreover, Iran's economic situation is likely to worsen in the 

coming years. Oil is central to Iran's economy and real oil prices 

are unlikely to rise in the near- to mid-term since world oil 

supplies are expected to increase faster than demand during this 

timeframe. Thus, oil income is likely to remain fiat while Iran's 

population rapidly increases, leading to a long-term decline in 

per-capita income and a general deterioration of its economic 

12 Iran has reportedly cancelled more than $5 billion in arms deals, 

including a contract for a MiG-29 assembly line. Mednews, March 1, 

1993, p. 4. 

13 Because expenditures for Iran's nonconventional programs are not 

published or are hidden in other parts of the budget, the total cost of 

this effort cannot be accurately estimated. On the other hand, according 

to former Defense Minister Torkan, conventional arms procurement has 

varied between $750-$800 million per year (versus the $2 billion per 

year originally budgeted) in the past 2-3 years; while this figure cannot 

be confirmed, Russian sources claim that Russian arms sales to Iran in 

1992 amounted to $620-$790 million--a figure roughly in line with the 

Iranian claim. Financial Times, February 8, 1993, p. 4; IRNA, March 

2, 1993, in FBIS-NES, March 3, 1993, p. 39; Andrei Volpin, Russian 

Arms Sales Policy Toward the Middle East, Policy Focus Number 

Twenty Three, The Washington Institute for Near East Policy, 1993, p. 

14. The problems involved in estimating Iran's defense spending are 

formidible; it has, for instance, hidden the costs of its military 

reconnaissance satellite program (which is expected to cost between 

$900 million and $1.95 billion) in the budget for its civilian 

communications satellite program. Resalat, August 16, 1993, pp. 

3,5,6,15, in FBIS-NES, September 21, 1993, p. 11. This is probably not 

the only program whose funding is hidden in the budget. 
MICHAEL EISENSTADT 101 

conditions. 14 As a result, lran will find it increasingly difficult to 

fund its military buildup, and it will be forced to make additional 

cuts. 

Strategic Forces 

Iran's strategic weapons program is its top priority; by all 

indications, the portion of the budget devoted to this effort 

remains substantial despite the fact that severe financial pressures 

have forced major cuts elsewhere. Iran's efforts to develop its 

strategic forces is the clearest expression of its intention of 

becoming the dominant power in the Gulf, as well as a 

manifestation of its abiding sense of vulnerability. Its current 

effort is focused on the creation of the infrastructure needed to 

produce nuclear weapons, the production of chemical and 

biological weapons, and the acquisition or production of missiles 

and strike aircraft to deliver them. 

Nuclear Weapons: Although Iran's nuclear program is still 

in its early stages, the intelligence services of the USA, Russia, 

Germany, and Israel are unanimous in their belief that Iran 

intends to develop nuclear weapons. Most agree that it could 

achieve this goal within 8-l0 years---sooner if it receives foreign 

assistance, is 

T4 Eliyahu Kanovsky, The Economy of lran: Past, Present, and 

Future, System Planning Corporation, April 1992, pp. 4-5, 74-79. 

~s Testimony of Director of Central Intelligence James Woolsey, 

Senate Governmental Affairs Committee, February 24, 1993, p. 8; 

Russian Foreign Intelligence Service (hereafter FIS), A New Challenge 

After the Cold War: Proliferation of Weapons of Mass Destruction, in 

JPRS-TND, March 5, 1993, p. 28; Hamburg DPA, December 5, 1992, 

in FBIS-WEU, December 7, 1992, p. 23; Welt Am Sonntag, December 

6, 1992, p. 26, in FBIS-NES, December 16, 1992, p. 61; Director of 

Israeli Military Intelligence, Major General Uri Sagi, to Israel TV, 

February 28, 1993, in FBIS-NES, March 3, 1993, p. 22. The sole 
102 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

Iran has a number of motives for developing nuclear 

weapons: 

• It is surrounded on three sides by nuclear possessor or 

threshold states: Israel (and until recently Iraq) to the 

west; Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, and Kazakhstan to the 

north; and Pakistan and India to the east 

• The Iran-Iraq War highlighted its strategic vulnerability 

and the importance of having a powerful deterrent to deal 

with Iraq---which continues to harbor nuclear ambitions 

and to possess a significant conventional edge 

• The nuclear route may be the only way for lran to 

become a regional power without destroying its 

economy; while building a bomb could cost billions, 

rebuilding its conventional military would cost tens of 

billions 16 

• Most of Iran's leaders believe that the country is isolated, 

beleaguered, and surrounded by potential enemies--and 

may therefore feel that the country needs nuclear 

weapons as an ultimate deterrent. 

In addition, Iran may believe that in the event of a 

confrontation with the United States, only a nuclear capability 

could deter the United States and thereby enable it to avert a 

military disaster, since Iraq's chemical and biological capabilities 

did not deter the United States during the Gulf War. This 

consideration may have been behind the recent comment by 

former defense minister Akbar Torkan when he asked an 

interviewer: 

dissenting estimate is found in the Russian FIS report, which hnplies 

that it will probably take Iran at least 10 years to develop nuclear 

weapons. 

16 For instance, the South African nuclear program--which produced 

seven bombs--reportedly cost only $800 million dollars--less than a 

squadron of modem fighter aircraft. The Washington Post, May 12, 

1993, pp. A1, A26. 
MICHAEL EISENSTADT 103 

Can our air force.., take on the Americans, or our navy take 

on the American navy? If we put all our country's budget into 

such a war we would have just burned our money. The way to 

go about dealing with such a threat requires a different solution 

entirely. 17 

Finally, concems about Iran's nuclear ambitions have been 

fed by statements such as those of deputy president Ataollah 

Mohajerani who in an October 1992 interview said, "Because the 

enemy (Israel) has nuclear facilities, the Muslim states too should 

be equipped with the same capacity." Although his statement has 

subsequently been repudiated, it nonetheless raises questions 

about Iran's ultimate intentionsJ 8 

Iran had an ambitious nuclear program under the 

Shah--including weapons research and the construction of twenty 

three nuclear power plants--which was cancelled following his 

overthrow in 1979J 9 However, the Islamic Republic has revived 

the country's nuclear program. Although Iran is a signatory to the 

NPT, it is building an extensive nuclear infrastructure and 

creating a cadre of scientists and technical personnel that could 

eventually enable it to produce nuclear weapons. Iran, moreover, 

may also be investigating several routes to the bomb---including 

plutonium separation, and gas centrifuge, calutron, and laser 

enrichment. 

The centerpiece of Iran's current nuclear effort is its nuclear 

power program; it hopes to eventually produce about 20 percent 

of its electricity in this way. 2° Accordingly, it is trying to 

17 Financial Times, February 8, 1993, p. 4. 

18 The Washington Post, November 17, 1992, p. A30. 

19 For details, see: Leonard S. Spector, Nuclear Ambitions: The 

Spread of Nuclear Weapons, 1989-1990, (Boulder: Westview Press, 

1990), pp. 203-218. 

2o Mideast Mirror, March 15, 1993, p. 27. 
104 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

complete the unfinished German nuclear power plant at Bushehr 

(consisting of two 1,200 MW reactors), and has unsuccessfully 

tried to enlist the help of Argentina, Brazil, China, the Czech 

Republic, France, Germany, India, Italy, South Korea, Russia, 

Spain, and Sweden in this effort. It has also signed contracts with 

Russia and China for the construction of two other nuclear power 

plants: one to be built by Russia at Gorgon (consisting of two 

VVER 449/213 reactors), and one to be built by China at 

Darkhovin (consisting of two 300 MW Qinshan-type reactors). It 

has also concluded contracts with Russia and China for two 30 

MW range research reactors. It will be at least 5-7 years, 

however, before any of these projects are completed, and 

financial problems--which have already caused significant delays 

in the conclusion of these contracts--are likely to further delay 

their implementation. 2~ Currently, Iran's sole functioning reactor 

is the 5 MW research reactor at Tehran which was built by the 

United States and commenced operation in 1967. 22 

While Iron claims that its interest in nuclear power is 

motivated primarily by a desire to eliminate shortfalls in its 

electric power generation capacity, it is hard to accept this 

explanation since Iron has the second largest natural gas reserves 

21 See Russian and Chinese diplomatic sources quoted in AFP, 

December 19, 1993, in FBIS-NES, December 20, 1993, p. 68. In fact 

there are unconfirmed reports that Russia has cancelled the sale of the 

two 440 MW reactors because of Iran's problems financing the deal. AISharq al-Awsat, December 24, 1993, p. 1, in FBIS-NES, January 4, 

1994, p. 48. 

22 For details see: Betsy Perabo, "A Chronology of Iran's Nuclear 

Program," Eye on Supply, Fall 1992, pp. 45-71; AI-Hayat, November 

25, 1992, pp. 1, 4, in FBIS-SOV, November 27, 1992, p. 17; Welt Am 

Sonntag, December 6, 1992, p. 26, in FBIS-NES, December 16, 1992, 

p. 61; "Iran's Nuclear Weapons Program," Mednews, Jtme 8, 1992, pp. 

1-8; AFP, December 19, 1993, in FBIS-NES, December 20, 1993, p. 68; 

AI-Sharq al-Awsat, December 24, 1993, p. 1, in FBIS-NES, January 4, 

1993, p. 48. 
MICHAEL EISENSTADT 105 

in the world. Natural gas is a much cheaper source of energy 

than nuclear power when one considers total lifecycle costs, not 

to mention the risks posed by nuclear power and the problem of 

disposing of spent fuelY In light of this, it is hard to believe that 

Iran's interest in nuclear power can be explained on these grounds 

alone. 

More to the point, Iran is believed to have already layed the 

foundation for a clandestine weapons program. It is reportedly 

conducting research on gas centrifuge enrichment in Tehran with 

components acquired from Germany and elsewhere. ~ It has also 

acquired a smaU research calutron from Cltina wlfich is located 

at Isfahan, and while this caiutron is too small to produce 

enriched uranium in sufficient quantities for weapons use, it 

could provide Iran with sufficient experience with the technology 

to enable it to build larger calutrons on its own. 25 Iran also 

investigated laser enrichment techniques under the Shah and there 

are reports that research is continuing at Ma'allem Kaleyah. 26 

Iran has also reportedly purchased large quantities of lowenriched uranium fuel and beryllium (used in nuclear weapons) 

from Kazakhstan and uranium ore from South Africa, and it 

hopes to commence domestic uranium production at mines near 

Saghand with the intention of eventually producing for domestic 

use and export. 27 The development of domestic uranium 

23 Fossil fuels can cost one-third to one-half the price of nuclear 

power. Jeremy Leggett (Ed.), Global Warming: The Greenpeace Report, 

(London: Oxford University Press, 1990), pp. 9-10. 

24 Frontline (PBS), "Iran and the Bomb," April 13, 1993. 

25 The Washington Post, November 5, 1991, p. A16. 

26 Mednews, June 8, 1992, pp. 1-8. 

27 Mideast Mirror, March 15, 1993, p. 27; Frontline (PBS), "Iran and 

the Bomb," April 13, 1993. 
106 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

L0¢~tion 

Bushehr 

Darkhovin 

Gorgan 

Isfahan 

I,:araj 

Ma'allem 

Kaleyah 

Saghand 

Tehran 

Iran's Nuclear Infrastructure 

A¢~ivily 

Unfinished nuclear power plant (2 x 1200 MW reactors) 

built by Germany. 

Unfinished nuclear power plant (935 MW reactor) that 

was to be built by France (construction never progressed 

beyond a site survey) and planned site of nuclear power 

plant (2 x 300MW reactors) to be built by China. 

Planned site of nuclear power plant (2 x 440 MW 

reactors) to be built by Russia. 

Iran's premier nuclear research center--work began in 1984 

,and by 1987 had become the center of nuclear research in 

Iran; site of planned 27 MW research reactor to be built 

by China (currently under construction) and a small 

research calutron provided by China in 1987; research 

concerning reactor technology, the nuclear fuel cycle, 

uranimn enrichment, and reprocessing. 

Nuclear medical research center and site of cyclotron 

accelerator acquired from Belgium. 

Planned site of cancelled 10 MW research reactor from 

India, and location of small nuclear research facility 

possibly engaged in laser enrichment work. 

Planned site of uranium mines--5 to 7 years from being 

fully operational. 

Nuclear research center; site of 5 MW research reactor 

provided by the United States; research concerning laser 

enrichment; most research activities transferred to Isfahan 

in 1987. 
MICHAEL EISENSTADT 107 

sources would be critical to a clandestine weapons program since 

it would end Iran's dependence on foreign uranium (which could 

be controlled or monitored), enabling it to better hide its 

activities. 

In all, Iran has approached officials and finns in nearly 20 

countries---including Argentina, Brazil, China, Cuba, the Czech 

Republic, France, Germany, India, Italy, Kazakhstan, North 

Korea, South Korea, Mexico, Pakistan, Russia, Spain, and 

Swederr---in its efforts to acquire nuclear technology, materials, 

and know-how. In addition, both China and Pakistan are believed 

to have trained Iranian nuclear physicists and engineers and has 

exchanged delegations with Iran. Iran has also invited nuclear 

scientists and technicians who fled the country after the fall of 

the Shah to return home and resume their former positions. 2s 

Iran's status as an NPT signatory will pose significant--but 

not insuperable--obstacles to its efforts to build a bomb. For 

instance, in addition to its acknowledged program which operates 

under IAEA safeguards, Iran might use the experience and knowhow acquired by operating its safeguarded reactors and facilities 

to build a parallel clandestine nuclear weapons program (as Iraq 

did)--to include locally produced reactor and reprocessing 

facilities (as India did). Also possible--but much less 

likely--Iran could formally withdraw from the regime (as North 

Korea has threatened) after creating a nuclear infrastructure that 

could be used to produce weapons, if it were willing to accept 

the likely political, military, and economic 

consequences of this action. 

Iran may not possess the organizational skills, the trained 

manpower, the industrial-technical base, and the know-how 

required to build nuclear weapons on its own, 29 and without 

significant outside help it could face major obstacles to realizing 

its nuclear ambitions. However, the strengthening of export 

28 Parabo, pp. 47-63. 

z9 FIS, p. 28. 
108 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

controls around the world in recent years and the focus of world 

attention on Iran are likely to complicate efforts to acquire 

sensitive technology and materials from abroad. U.S. diplomatic 

efforts and interdiction operations have already complicated Iran's 

search for nuclear technology and know-how. In the past two or 

three years, the United States and its allies have thwarted efforts 

to transfer nuclear materials and reactor technology from a 

number of countries, including Argentina, Czechoslovakia, India, 

Italy, and Poland. 3° It is not clear, however, whether these efforts 

will ultimately succeed in thwarting Iran's nuclear ambitions. 

There are several reasons for this. 

First, the breakup of the Soviet Union may provide Iran with 

unprecedented opportunities to advance its nuclear progrmn. 

There are a number of ways in which this might happen: 

• A breakdown in the system of control over nuclear 

weapons in the former Soviet Union could enable Iran to 

acquire tactical nuclear weapons (such as bombs or 

artillery rounds) which would enable Iran to create a 

small nuclear arsenal, or to dismantle and exploit the 

weapons as a source of fissile material and components. 31 

• The emergence of a black market for nuclear materials 

3o The Washington Post, November 17, 1992, pp. A1, A30; Testimony 

of Director of Central Intelligence James Woolsey to the Senate Select 

Committee on Intelligence, January 25, 1994; Defense News, December 

13-19, 1993, p. 3; La Republica, November 12, 1993, p. 23, in JPRSTND, December 8, 1993, p. 54. 

3) Richard Garwin, "Post-Soviet Nuclear Command and Security," 

Arms Control Today, Janua.ry]February 1992, pp. 19-21. Reports that 

Iran has acquired 2-3 nuclear weapons from Kazakhstan are almost 

certainly false, since Russia retains formal custodianship over all nuclear 

devices throughout the former Soviet Union. Kenneth Timmerman, 

Weapons of Mass Destruction: The Cases of lran, Syria. and lraq (Los 

Angeles: Simon Wiesenthal Center, August 1992), pp. 52-53. However, 

the possibility that this could occur in the future cannot be entirely 

dismissed. 
MICHAEL EISENSTADT 109 

from the former Soviet bloc raises the possibility of the 

unauthorized transfer of fissile material (weapons grade 

uranium or plutonium) or other special materials; the 

acquisition of fissile material may no longer be the most 

difficult obstacle to the development of nuclear weapons. 

And while there is as of yet no evidence that significant 

quantities of fissile material have been smuggled, the 

potential for undetected transfers warrants concem) 2 

• There have been unconfirmed reports that Iran has hired 

former Soviet nuclear scientists to work on their nuclear 

program. These scientists could help Iran to establish a 

nuclear weapons development program and resolve 

problems relating to the design and development of 

nuclear weapons. 33 

Second, Iran could receive assistance,---official or 

nonofficial--from nuclear states such as Pakistan, China, and 

North Korea, that could help its nuclear program. For instance, 

if North Korea remains a pariah state it might even be 

willing--for the right price--to sell lran a nuclear weapon once 

it has built up its own inventory. Thus, Iran might in this way 

circumvent the obstacles to acquiring a nuclear capability that 

might otherwise hinder its progress if it were left to its own 

devices. 

Chemical and Biological Weapons: The evidence for 

Iran's involvement in the production of chemical and biological 

weapons is less ambiguous. The official position concerning these 

weapons was set down by Iran's current president (then Majlis 

speaker and acting armed forces commander-in-chief) "Ali Akbar 

32 William Potter, "Nuclear Exports From the Former Soviet Union: 

What's New, What's True," Arms Control Today, J,'muary/February 

1993, pp. 3-10. 

33 Der Spiegel, February 24, 1992, pp. 146-150, in JPRS-TND, March 

13, 1992, pp. 26-27; lzvestiya, October 20, 1992, p. 7, in FBIS-SOV, 

October 22, 1992, p. 4. 
110 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

Hashemi-Rafsanjani in a 1988 talk with military officers in which 

he told them that: 

Chemical and biological weapons are poor man's atomic bombs 

and can easily be produced. We should at least consider them 

for our defense. Although the use of such weapons is inhuman, 

the (Iran-lraq) war taught us that international laws ,are only 

scraps of paper?' 

Iran has a rather limited chemical warfare capability. It has 

the capacity to produce several hundred tons of blister (mustard), 

choking (cyanidal), and possibly nerve (sarin) agent a year at a 

plant near Tehran, and it produces bombs and artillery rounds 

filled with these agents. It is expected to deploy chemical missile 

warheads in the near future--if it has not already done so. 35 

Because Iran was the victim of extensive Iraqi chemical weapon 

attacks during the lran-lraq War--suffering over 50,000 

casualties (including 5,000 killed)36----it has devoted significant 

resources to developing its own chemical warfare capabilities, 

since it sees this as its only deterrent against whatever residual 

IRNA, October 19, 1988, in FBIS-NES, October 19, 1988, pp. 55- 

56. 

3s Testimony of Director of Central Intelligence J,'unes Woolsey, 

Senate Governmental Affairs Committee, February 24, 1993; FIS, p. 29; 

Mednews, December 21, 1992, p. 4; Zalmay Khalilzad, "Iran's Strategy 

for the Outer Ring," The Washington Institute for Near East Policy, 

Soref Symposium Proceedings, April 27, 1992, p. 4. Both Syria and 

North Korean--~dlies of Iran--produced chemical warheads for their 

Scud-B and -C missiles a decade ago (or more); given the level of 

military cooperation between these states it seems that Iran should be 

able to develop or acquire chemical warheads for these missiles as well. 

36 Speech by Iran's foreign minister, "Ali Akbar Velyati to the 

International Conference on Chemical Weapons, January 7, 1989, in 

FBIS-WEU, January 9, 1989, p. 7. 
MICHAEL EISENSTADT 111 

chemical warfare capability Iraq may still have. 37 

Nonetheless, Iran's chemical warfare program seems rather 

crude and unsophisticated, even by regional standards. Production 

has focused on the less lethal and complex agents; total 

production capacity remains relatively small; and only a narrow 

range of munition types have been produced to date. This, despite 

the fact that Iran's chemical warfare capability constitutes the 

core of its strategic deterrent and has thus received priority 

emphasis. 38 

Although Iran signed the Chemical Weapons Convention in 

January 1993 (which obligates it to destroy its stocks of chemical 

weapons) it is hard to believe that Iran would unilaterally give up 

the core component of its strategic deterrent---especially since the 

status of Iraq's own chemical warfare capabilities is unclear. It 

thus seems likely that lran will try to give the appearance of 

compliance with the treaty while hiding stocks of chemical 

weapons for future use. 

Finally, Iran is also developing biological weapons--although 

little is known about this program--and it is expected to be able 

to deploy these within a few years, if it is not already able to do 

SO. 

Ballistic and Cruise Missiles: As a result of its 

experience during the lran-lraq War, Iran believes that a strong 

missile force is critical to the country's security, and it has given 

the highest priority to the procurement and development of 

various types of missiles. 

37 The New York Times, January 29, 1989, pp. A1, A10. 

38 By comparison, Iraq could produce up to 1,000 tons of agent a 

year--including the highly lethal nerve agents satin and taburr---and it 

manufactured a wide range of chemical munitions--including tube and 

rocket artillery rounds, bombs, and missile warheads. Michael 

Eisenstadt, Like a Phoenix from the Ashes? The Future of Iraqi Military 

Power, (Washington D.C.: The Washington Institute for Near East 

Policy, 1993), pp. 30-31. 
112 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

Iran's interest in missiles dates to the Iran-Iraq War. During 

the war, and Iraq bombarded Iranian cities as a means of bringing 

it to the negotiating table. The February-April 1988 "War of the 

Cities" is believed to have had a particularly devastating effect on 

Iran's morale (more than a quarter of the population of Tehran 

reportedly fled the city) and probably contributed to its decision 

to seek an end to the war in the summer of 1988. As a result of 

its experience during the Iran-Iraq War, Iran saw the need to be 

able to respond in kind. 

Iran may also see its missile force as a way to compensate 

for the weala~ess of its air and air defense forces; in this way its 

missile force acts to counterbalance the air forces of its neighbors 

and serves as a deterrent to air attacks. 

Iraq's missiles attacks against Israel and Saudi Arabia during 

the Gulf War and the inability of coalition forces to locate and 

destroy these missiles underscored the importance and 

survivability of these missiles on the modern battlefield, and 

highlighted the fact that they are likely to be used in future 

conflicts. Moreover, Israeli threats to use force to prevent Iran's 

acquisition of nuclear weapons have spurred Iranian efforts to 

acquire long-range missiles such as the Nodong-l, which are 

capable of reaching Israel. 39 

The backbone of Iran's strategic missile force consists of 200- 

300 North Korean produced Scud-B and -C missiles (with ranges 

of 320km and 500km respectively) which are armed with 

39 See the interview with Israel air force commander Major General 

Herzl Bodinger, in which he warned that if Israel receives any report 

that "any country in the region is getting close to achieving a nuclear 

capability," and that efforts to prevent that eventuality "by political 

means" fail, "we may consider an attack." Kol Yisrael, June 15, 1992, 

in FBIS-NES, June 16, 1992, pp. 16-17. See also the response by 

Iranian air force commander Brigadier General Mansur Sattari, IRNA, 

June 17, 1992, in FBIS-NES, June 18, 1992, p. 40, in which he warned 

that "any adventurism on (Israel's) part against Iran would cost it 

dearly." 
MICHAEL EISENSTADT 113 

Ty[~ 

Missiles: 

Scud-B 

Iran's Missile and Rocket Forces 4° 

Range (km) Payload Source 

320 HE/CW(?) North Korea 

Scud-C 500-600 HE/CW(?) North Korea 

Nodong-1 1000-1300 HE/CW(?) North Korea 

Comments 

Local 

production 

planned 

Local 

production 

planned 

Local 

production 

planned 

Rockets: 

Shahin-2 20 Unk Local 333mm 

rocket 

Oghab 45 70kg HE Local 230mm 

rocket 

Fajr-3 45 Unk Local 240mm 

rocket 

Nazeat 90 150kg HE Local 355mm 

rocket 

Mushak 120/160 Unk Local 

4o Bermudez, "Ballistic Missile Development in Iran," p. 53. Iran 

received shipments of Scud-B missiles from Libya in 1985, Syria in 

1986, and North Korea in 1987 (only those delivered by North Korea 

remain in its inventory). Iran has reportedly also negotiated the purchase 

of M-9 and M-11 solid-fuel missiles from China. The M-11 was 

designed as a solid-fuel replacement for the Scud-B; it has about the 

same range as the Soviet version of the Scud-B (280kin) and can be 

launched from the same MAZ-543 launch vehicle. The M-9 is slightly 

larger and has a range of about 500kin. Mednews, December 21, 1992, 

p. 5. Iran has also indicated that it is developing or producing several 

other missiles and rockets, including the Tondar 68, the Ran, and the 

8610, although little is known about these. Bermudez, "Ballistic Missile 

Development in Iran," p. 53. 
114 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

conventional, and perhaps chemical warheads. These can reach 

major population centers in Iraq and Saudi Arabia. In addition, 

it is funding the development of the North Korean Nodong-1 

missile (with a range of over 1,000km) which will have the range 

to reach major population centers in Israel; the first of these 

missiles are likely to arrive in the coming year. 41 

Iran is working to acquire a capability to produce these 

missiles locally in order to end its reliance on extemal sources of 

supply. Several times during the Iran-Iraq War it nearly ran out 

of missiles and had great difficulty replenishing its inventory. To 

this end, it has obtained machinery and tectmology from North 

Korea and China for producing the Scud-C and possibly M-9, M1 1, and Nodong-1 inissiles. 

Despite the importance Iran has placed on this effort, it has 

experienced significant problems and delays in creating a 

domestic missile production capability; production bottlenecks 

have been caused by a shortage of funds, skilled personnel, key 

production technologies, and special materials. 42 Thus, although 

it has been trying since 1986 to create the infrastructure for the 

indigenous production of the Scud-B missile, this effort has yet 

to bear results. 43 This is particularly striking, given the fact that 

4J According to ,an Israeli air force intelligence assessment. Bita'on 

Cheyl HaAvir, December 1993, pp. 4-5. Iran is a little more than 

1,000kin from Israel at its closest point. For a detailed technical 

assessment of the Nodong-1 see: David C. Wright and Timur Kayshev, 

"An Analysis of the North Korean Nodong Missile," Science and 

Global Security, 1994, Volume 4, pp. 1-32. According to this 

assessment the poor accuracy of the Nodong-1 (CEP: 2-4km) limits its 

utility against anything but large area targets such as cities. 

': FIS, p. 29. 

43 Joseph S. Bermudez Jr., "Ballistic Missiles in the Third World: 

Iran's Medium-Range Missiles," Jane's Intelligence Review, April 1992, 

p. 148; W. Seth Carus, "Proliferation and Security in Southwest Asia," 

paper presented at 1993 CENTCOM Southwest Asia Symposium, May 
MICHAEL EISENSTADT 115 

this effort has received priority emphasis, and the Scud-B is 

based on World War II era technology. 44 Likewise, Iran has 

lagged in the development of chemic',d warheads for these 

missiles, even though it has close relations with North Korea and 

Syria---two countries which have produced chemical warheads 

for their own missiles. 

Iran currently produces a range of rockets systems, including 

the Shahin, Oghab, Fajr, Nazeat, and Mushak. Although 

developed primarily for the battlefield support role, some of these 

(the Oghab and Mushak) were used in the strategic role during 

the February-April 1988 "War of the Cities" and were launched 

against Iraqi cities and towns, as well as a number of military 

targets located along the border, as 

Iran was reportedly impressed by the performance of U.S. 

TLAM cruise missiles during the Gulf War, and it is reportedly 

working on its own cruise missile to deliver conventional and 

nonconventional payloads. 46 It is likely that a first-generation 

cruise missile would be based on currently deployed missiles 

such as the HY-2 Silkworm or YJ-1 (C-801) antiship 

missiles--this would both simplify and expedite initial production 

efforts; indeed there are reports that it is developing an extendedrange version of the HY-2. 47 Relatively simple modifications to 

21, 1993, pp. 6-7. 

Cams, p. 7. 

45 Joseph S. Bermudez Jr., "Ballistic Missile Development in Iran," 

unpublished paper, August 1992, p. 16. 

46 David Fulghum, "Cruise Missiles Becoming Top Proliferation 

Threat," Aviation Week & Space Technology, February 1, 1993, pp. 26- 

27. 

47 Mednews, December 21, 1992, p. 4. Similarly, before the Gulf War 

Iraq was developing a modified extended-range version of the HY-2 

which it called the Faw (with planned ranges of 70, 150, and 200 km) 
116 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

the guidance systems of these missiles, such as the installation of 

satellite navigation technology and the use of radar absorbant 

materials and coatings could tum these into relatively accurate 

and somewhat stealthy cruise missiles for use against ground 

targets. Launched in large numbers and flying below the 

engagement envelope of current and future anti-missile defenses, 

Iranian cruise missiles could pose a danger to its neighbors. 

However, it is likely to be years before Iran actually fields an 

operational cruise missile, and this effort is likely to experience 

many of the same problems that have plagued its efforts to 

produce ballistic missiles. 

Cruise missiles are ideal means for delivering biological and 

chemical agent payloads against enemy population centers since 

they can be programmed to fly attack profiles that would 

facilitate the dispersal of these agents over a large area at lower 

altitudes, where the effect of unfavorable atmospheric conditions 

(high wind speeds and lapse conditions) would be minimized. In 

addition, cruise missiles could deliver advanced conventional 

munition payloads (such as anti-runway or anti-armor munitions) 

against high-value targets in the enemy rear. While the delivery 

of nonconventional payloads by cruise missiles is probably not 

far beyond Iran's current technological capability, it will probably 

be years before it can produce advanced conventional 

submunition payloads for cruise missiles. 

Strategic Reconnaissance: As Iran extends its strategic 

reach through the acquisition and development of missiles and 

strike aircraft with greater range and accuracy, locating and 

identifying targets at long range mid in near real-time will 

become increasingly important. Accordingly, Iran has acquired 

which it probably intended to use in the ground-to-ground role. 

Christopher F. Foss (Ed.), Jane's Armour and Artillery: 1989-90, 

(Couisdon: Jane's Information Group, 1990), p. 728. 
MICHAEL EISENSTADT 117 

commercial satellite imagery for military purposes, 4g and it is 

developing a military reconnaissance satellite with the help of 

China. 49 While little is known about the reconnaissance 

satellite program, it is probably a derivative of the China-Brazil 

Earth Resources Satellite (CBERS) which is expected to be ready 

for launch in 1995 and will produce 20 meter resolution images. 5° 

This would be sufficient to enable Iran to locate and identify 

large fixed targets far from its borders, assess the effects of air 

and missile strikes against area targets, and track or target 

maritime traffic plying the Persian Gulf. 

Assessment: Iran's strategic weapons program is the most 

dangerous component of its military buildup. Iran is devoting 

significant resources to its nuclear program, despite economic 

hardships, since from Iran's perspective--only nuclear weapons 

provide a solution to the potential long-term threats facing the 

country. Consequently, Iran is likely to do everything possible to 

spare its nuclear program the cuts affecting nearly every other 

part of its armaments plan. Iran's generally unimpressive 

accomplishments in its efforts to develop and produce chemical 

and biological weapons and ballistic missiles raises questions 

about whether it has the financial means as well as the 

managerial, scientific, and technical skills needed to develop 

nuclear weapons on its own. Iran's nuclear effort, moreover, is 

heavily dependent on foreign technology inputs; this fact, plus 

48 Radio Tehran, May 7, 1990, in FBIS-NES, May 9, 1990, p. 37; 

Abrar, December 24, 1991, p. 3, in JPRS-NEA, March 17, 1992, p. 19. 

49 Resalat, August 16, 1993, pp. 3, 5, 6, 15, in FBIS-NES, September 

21, 1993, pp. 10-11; IRNA, 6 July, 1993, in FBIS-NES, July 7, 1993, 

p. 69; James Bruce, "Iran Rearms to Bond Defence Forces," Jane's 

Defence Weekly, May 27, 1989, pp. 1006-1007. 

5o Office of Technology Assessment, The Future of Remote Sensing 

From Space: Civilian Satellite Systems and Applications, (Washington, 

D.C.: GPO,1993), pp. 184-185. 
118 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

the weakness of its economy hold out the prospect that its 

nuclear ambitions could be thwarted by strategies of finance and 

technology denial, although the rapid growth around the globe in 

the number of potential suppliers of nuclear technology, 

materials, and know-how make it very hard to prevent further 

diffusion. 51 Thus, if Iran can overcome its economic and 

organizational problems and can succeed in tapping foreign 

sources of nuclear technology, materials, and know-how, it might 

eventually succeed in its efforts to acquire nuclear weapons. But 

is clear that Iran faces difficult challenges ahead. 

Finally, preventive military action--by Israel or anyone 

else--is probably not an effective way of dealing with the Iranian 

nuclear threat, lran has probably learned the important lessons of 

Osiraq in 1981 and the Gulf War in 1991, and will disperse and 

conceal its clandestine nuclear facilities, putting most of them 

beyond the range of Israeli aircraft. And with the imminant 

arrival of the Nodong- 1 missile and the development of chemical 

warheads for them, Iran will soon have a decisive retaliatory 

capability against Israel as well as any other country in the region 

that uses force in an attempt to thwart its nuclear ambitions. 

Thus, while Iran strives toward a nuclear capability, it will 

continue to develop and produce chemical and biological 

weapons, in order to deter the United States and Israel from 

using force to disrupt its nascent nuclear program, and to enhance 

its general deterrent capability. 

Conventional Forces 

As a result of war, embargo, and revolution, Iran's armed forces 

face significant obstacles to becoming a modem and effective 

fighting force. 

The Iran-Iraq War was a military catastrophe from which Iran 

has still not recovered. Iran emerged from the war with a much 

5J William C. Potter, "The New Nuclear Suppliers," Orbis, Spring 

1992, pp. 199-210. 
MICHAEL EISENSTADT 119 

smaller military than it started with, due to combat losses and an 

intemational arms embargo which made it very difficult for Iran 

to replace its losses or obtain spare parts needed to maintain its 

forces) 2 Even now, most of Iran's inventory of U.S. and British 

weapons remains non-operational--and much of the equipment 

that is operational is not fully mission capable----due to a lack of 

trained maintenance personnel and spares. 53 Consequently, most 

of its operational equipment consists of Soviet or Chinese 

systems acquired in recent years, although many of these are 

older models (F-7 fighters, Type 59 and 69 tanks, and SA-2s, -5s, 

and -6s). This is one of the most critical problems Iran's armed 

forces face, and it is unlikely to be resolved soon, since Iran still 

has problems acquiring spare parts for its westem systems (for 

political reasons) while it lacks the funds needed to replace its 

operational inventory of westem equipment with comparable 

former eastem-bloc models. As a result, the western arms in 

Iran's inventory will remain in service for years to come; Iran 

will thus continue to face the challenge of maintaining an 

inventory that includes both westem and eastem equipment types, 

and obtaining spare parts for its westem arms. 

Iran's armed forces also have significant manpower problems. 

Many talented and experienced officers, NCOs, and technical 

support personnel were purged from the armed forces early in the 

revolution and their absence is still felt--particularly in the 

technical services such as the air force and navy. As a result of 

its experience in the Iran-Iraq War, Iran's leadership has come to 

52 Peter Burleigh, "Lessons of "Operation Staunch' for Future 

Conflicts," in Eric H. Amett, Lessons of the lran-lraq War: Mediation 

and Conflict Resolution, (Washington, D.C.: American Association for 

the Advancement of Science, 1990), pp. 9-14. 

s3 Accordingly, former defense minister Akbar Torkan put Iran's 

procurement priorities as follows: "The first priority is spare parts, the 

second priority is spare parts, and the third priority is spare parts." 

Financial Times, February 8, 1993, p. 4. 
120 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

recognize this problem and it is trying to raise the level of 

professionalism in the ranks, although the armed forces still 

suffers from the legacy of the past, and will continue to do so for 

some time. 54 

Against this background, Iran has undertaken to expand and 

modemize its forces. As part of this effort, it has contracted for 

massive nun~bers of tanks, combat aircraft, and warships--mainly 

from Russia, China, and a number of Eastern European countries 

(see table)---and it has solicited help from these and other 

countries to upgrade and maintain the older equipment it owns. 

However, financial constraints have forced it to cancel a number 

of these contracts and to significantly cut procurement. In fact, 

the total number of items delivered since 1989 is in fact quite 

meager--all the more so when compared to the total purportedly 

contracted for. It includes 25 MiG-29 fighters and 12 Su-24 

strike aircraft from Russia, 20 older F-7 fighters from China, 

small numbers of SA-2 SAMs from China and SA-5 and SA-6 

SAMs from Russia, hundreds of artillery pieces from China, and 

two Kilo-class submarines from Russia. 

However, even if Iran could afford to buy most of the 

weapons on its shopping list, it would be unable to maintain such 

a large force structure without significant foreign support, or 

effectively employ this force without significant changes in 

doctrine, organization, and manpower policies. 

The Regular Military and the Revolutionary Guard: 

One of the major organizational problems affecting Iran's armed 

forces is that they are divided into two components--the regular 

Shahram Chubin, "Iran and the Lessons of the Gulf War," 

unpublished paper, Los Alamos National Laboratories Center for 

National Security Studies, pp. 4-5, 11-17; Ahmed Hashim, "Resurgent 

Iran: New Defense Thinking and Growing Military Capabilities," in W. 

Thomas Wander and Eric H. Arnett (ed.), The Proliferation of 

Advanced Weaponry: Technology, Motivations, Responses, (Washington 

D.C.: American Association for the Advancement of Sciences, 1992), 

p. 180. 
MICHAEL EISENSTADT 121 

military and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (with its 

Bassidj militia auxiliary)----each with their own ground, air, and 

naval components and support services. This division of the 

military into two competing branches dates to the origins of the 

Islamic revolution when the Revolutionary Guard was created as 

a counterbalance to the regular military, which was not trusted by 

the new regime: 5 This division has undermined unity of 

command, led to conflict and rivalry between the two, and 

diminished the effectiveness of the military. 

This organizational division also reflected divergent 

approaches to modem warfare. The regular military tended to 

embrace a more conventional approach to war with a balanced 

emphasis on hardware, technology, and the human component. 

By contrast, the Revolutionary Guard elevated the human factor 

above all others, in the belief that faith, ideological commitment, 

and morale would themselves be sufficient to bring victory. This 

latter approach came to dominate Iranian thi~ff, ing during the 

Iran-Iraq War. In light of lessons learned from the Iran-Iraq and 

Gulf Wars, however, the regime and its armed forces have 

developed a more balanced appreciation of the relative 

importance of modem arms, technology, and the human factor. 56 

After the Iran-Iraq War the regime moved to resolve some of 

the problems created by having two competing military 

organizations. In January 1992 it formed a joint Armed Forces 

General Staff that brought together the upper echelons of the 

regular armed forces and Revolutionary Guard in a single 

headquarters. In addition, the regime established a formal division 

of labor between the regular armed forces and the Revolutionary 

5s Kenneth Katzman, The Warriors of Islam: Iran's Revolutionary 

Guard, (Boulder: Westview Press, 1993). 

s6 Katzman, pp. 18-19; Sh,'trmn Chubin, "Irma's Strategic Intentions 

and Capabilities: Aims and Constraints," this volume; Ahmed Hashim, 

"Iranian National Security 1988-1994: Threat Perceptions and the 

Development of the Armed Forces," this volume. 
122 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

Iran's Military Shopping List: 1989-199457 

Gr0ond Force~ 

Russia: 200-400 T-72s, T-72 assembly line, 500 BMP-2 ICVs, 200 SP 

guns, 40 Mi-28 or Ka-50 attack helicopters 

China: 400 T-69s, hundreds of artillery pieces 

Czech Republic: 300 T-72s, 1,500 T-55s, antitank weapons plant 

Poland: 100-300 T-72s, 1,500 T-55s 

Rumania: 150 T-55s, 200 APCs, 180 tank transporters 

Ukraine, India, Hungary, Yugoslavia: vehicle upgrades, maintenance, 

and spare parts 

Air ~n~l Air Dof~n~ For~:e~ 

Russia: 48 MiG-29 fighters (and assembly line), 24 MiG-31s, 24 Su24s, unspecified numbers of Su-25s and Su-27s, 24 MiG-27s, 12 Tu22M bombers, 2 A-50 AEW aircraft, SA-5/6/10/11/13 SAMs, air 

defense C2 equipment, maintenance of Iraqi aircraft that fled to Iran 

during Gulf War. 

Georgia: Su-25s 

Czech Republic: Tamara air defense warning system. 

China: 72 F-7 or F-8 II fighters, 25 K-8 training aircraft (and assembly 

line), SA-2 (HQ-2J) SAMs. 

Ukraine: spare parts 

Naval and Coastal Defense Forces 

China: 10 Hegu-class missile patrol boats, HY-2 and JY-1 antiship 

missiles, EM52 rising mines. 

Russia: 3 Kilo-class submarines, torpedoes, mines 

Unknown: 5 mini-submarines 

57 This shopping list dramatically overstates Iran's actual procurement 

plans (particularly for the ground forces) for several reasons: 1) Iran has 

sometimes approached several sources to fill a single requirement; 2) 

the list includes equipment which has been contracted for as well as 

equipment for which no contract was ever signed; 3) the list is based 

largely on unverified press reports. 
MICHAEL EISENSTADT 123 

Guard; while the regular military was made responsible for 

defending Iran's borders, the Revolutionary Guard was made 

responsible for intemal security and the export of the revolution. 

Moreover, steps were taken to professionalize the Revolutionary 

Guard with the adoption of new uniforms and a military rank 

structure. 58 Despite these steps, the division of the armed forces 

into two separate entities remains a major obstacle to creating a 

modem and effective military. 

Ground Forces: Iran's standing ground forces consist of 

350,000 men (200,000 in the regular army and 150,000 in the 

Revolutionary Guard) organized into four army corps with about 

40 mostly understrength divisions (10-12 regular army and 28-30 

Revolutionary Guard) and 5-7 independent brigades, with a total 

of 700 tanks, 800 APCs, and 1,400 artillery pieces. In addition, 

it has about 425 helicopters, although only about 260 are 

operational. 59 

The ground forces have received the lowest priority in the 

current buildup. This may be because Iran's rugged terrain, large 

size, great depth, 6° and the fact that none of its neighbors 

58 Anoushiravan Ehteshami, "The Armed Forces of the Islamic 

Republic of Iran," Jane's Intelligence Review, February 1993, p. 77. 

59 Shlomo Gazit (ed.), The Middle East Military Balance: 1992-1993 

(hereafter MEMB), (Boulder: Westview Press, 1993), pp. 240-242, 246. 

60 Iran's large size, great depth, and rugged terrain are great assets 

which aid in its defense. Nearly all its major population centers are 

located in the interior of the country, behind the rugged mountain 

ranges that ring its heartland and serve as a formidible natural barrier 

to invasion. The road network in Iran is not highly developed, and most 

major highways permitting rapid movement are located in the interior. 

The few roads connecting border regions with the interior can in many 

cases be cut in numerous places--at mountain passes, tunnels, and 

bridges spanning deep gorges. Thus, long stretches of border can be 

defended by mech~mized and light infantry forces reinforced by 

airmobile reserves. On the other hand, almost all of Iran's oil (which 
124 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

currently pose a major threat on the ground has reduced the 

urgency of rebuilding the ground forces relative to the other 

branches of the military. 

Nonetheless, since 1989, Iran has signed contracts for 

hundreds of tanks from Russia, China, and Poland, 61 APCs from 

Russia and Rumania, and artillery from China. If honored, these 

contracts could more than double the number of tanks, APCs, and 

artillery in Iran's inventory. However, most of these contracts 

appear to have been cancelled due to U.S. pressure or for 

financial reasons; to date, only the artillery from China has been 

delivered. 62 

Iran's ground forces are incapable of modem combined arms 

combat due to its adherence to outmoded doctrinal concepts, an 

inappropriate force structure (the ground forces are still 

comprised largely of leg infantry formations), an inability to 

effectively integrate air and ground operations, the low 

professional standards of its leadership, and the poor training of 

its forces. Moreover, its ability to sustain its forces in high 

intensity combat is limited by an inadequate logistical 

infrastructure, a lack of trained technical support personnel, and 

accounts for 80-90% of foreign exchange earnings) is located in the flat, 

exposed southwestern portion of the country (Khuzistan) near the border 

with Iraq; the defense of this region requires large, highly mobile 

armored forces. Lt. Col. Ye. Gromov, "Principal Iranian Communication 

Routes and Ground Transportation," Zarubezhnoye Voyennoye 

Obozreniye, November 1987, pp. 70-76, in JPRS-UFM, May 10, 1988, 

pp. 40-45. 

61 Torkan interview in Financial Times, February 8, 1993, p. 4; Sagi 

interview in Yediot Aharonot, April 17, 1992, pp. 1, 2, 28, in FBISNES, April 22, 1992, p. 36. 

62 For instmlce, Czechoslovakia wanted to sell 1,500 tanks, and a 

Polish firm wanted to sell 100 tanks to Iran but have refrained thus far 

from doing so due to U.S. pressure. The New York Times, February 13, 

1994, p. A15. 
MICHAEL EISENSTADT 125 

a shortage of spare parts. Most of the weaknesses of Iran's 

ground forces are unlikely to be remedied in the near future; its 

organizational problems are rooted mainly in politics and thus are 

unlikely to be corrected by even massive investments of 

resources, while the modemization of its forces would require the 

allocation of massive sums which Iran currently does not have. 

Moreover, Iran would have to acquire very large quantities of 

equipment to even begin to address some of the key structural 

shortcomings of its ground forces: 

• Iran's large force structure (measured by the number of 

major formations such as divisions and brigades) far 

exceeds its limited resource base (in terms of manpower 

and equipment). Most units are understrength: for 

instance, Revolutionary Guard armored divisions deploy, 

on average, a few dozen tanks, while mechanized 

divisions have about 100 APCs. 63 As a result, most units 

lack the men and equipment required to accomplish basic 

missions. 

• Iran has emphasized the acquisition of major systems 

such as tanks, artillery, and attack helicopters, to the 

detriment of less conspicuous items--such as IFVs, 

modem C3I systems, night vision equipment, and 

advanced munitions--which are critical to building the 

kind of balanced force structure which is vital to success 

on the modem battlefield. While Iran may simply lack 

the funds to do so at this time, its force planners may 

also lack a proper understanding of the importance of 

this factor. 

• Most of the equipment owned by the ground forces is old 

and poorly maintained and would neither survive combat 

against a modem, well equiped and well trained 

adversary, nor remain serviceable for long under combat 

conditions due to an inadequate support infrastructure, a 

lack of competent technical personnel, and a lack of 

63 MEMB, p. 147. 
126 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

spares; this shortcoming is mitigated, however, by the 

fact that none of Iran's neighbors possess a large modem 

army or are likely to invade it in the ne,'u" future. 

At present, Iran's ground forces could not support or sustain 

even limited offensive action against any of its neighbors, and it 

will be limited to playing a defensive role (and perhaps fulfiU an 

intem,'d security function in the event of widespread unrest) in 

the coming years. 

Air and Air Defense Forces: Iran's experience during the 

Iran-Iraq War underscored its vulnerability in the air; during the 

war Iraq repeatedly hit military and economic targets and 

population centers in Iran with relative impunity. The importance 

of air power was further reinforced by the Gulf War, which 

demonstrated the potentially devastating impact of modem air 

power and the importance of a strong air defense. Accordingly, 

air force commander Brigadier General Mansur Sattari has stated 

that Iran needs to be able to defend its air space so that it can 

undertake the task of post-war reconstruction unhindered; if it is 

going to spend billions rebuilding the country's worn civilian 

infrastructure it needs a strong air defense force to protect it 

against attack from the air. 64 For this reason, Iran has made 

rebuilding its air and air defense forces a top priority. 

Iran's air and air defense forces however remain the weakest 

link in its overall defense posture. Although Iran h~s about 195 

combat aircraft (including about 20 F-14s, 30 MiG-29s, 35 Su24s, 40 F-4s, 45 F-5s, and 20 F-6s) only about 120 of these are 

operational, and these are divided between the regular air force 

and the Revolutionary Guard. 65 Iran's ground based air defenses 

64 Mohammed Ziarati,"Iranian National Security Policy," Middle East 

International, April 3, 1992, p. 18. 

65 In the past the Revolutionary Guard was equipped largely with lowtechnology aircraft such as the F-6, F-7, and Tucano. There ,are 

indications, however, that it recently started receiving among the best 

aircraft in Iran's inventories, including MiG-29s and Su-24s. 
MICHAEL EISENSTADT 127 

are built around a variety of older western air defense radars, a 

relatively small number of SA-2, SA-5, SA-6, Rapier, and IHAWK SAMs, and about 3,000 towed and self-propelled AAA 

guns of various caliber. It does, however, possess a network of 

excellent modem sheltered airbases built by the shah at Bandar 

Abbas, Bushehr, Ghaleh-Marghi, Isfahan, Kharg Island, Khatami, 

Mehrabad, Shiraz, Tabriz, ,and Tehran. 66 

Perhaps the greatest shortcoming of the air force is that it has 

only a small number of operational aircraft---due to a lack of 

spare parts--and it would need many more modem all-weather 

air superiority fighters (like the MiG-29) and advanced air-to-air 

missiles in order to meet its most basic defensive needs. Most 

older operational aircraft (such as its F-4Es), moreover, are not 

fully mission capable; radars and avionics are often nonoperational, thereby degrading performance. Nonetheless, Iran has 

done an impressive job at maintaining at least minimal 

operational rates under difficult circumstances. 

Moreover, Iran's air and air defense forces lack sufficient 

mass to adequately defend all of Iran's air space, since a very 

small number of fighters, SAMs, and AAA must defend a large 

number of targets spread over a very large area; as a result there 

are substantial gaps in Iran's air defenses. 67 

In addition, most of Iran's SAMs are older systems which are 

unable to function in a modem EW environment and are easily 

66 MEMB, pp. 244-247; Cordesman, p. 407. 

67 The magnitude of Iran's problem becomes clear when one considers 

the fact that Iran has about 120 operational combat aircraft to defend a 

total land-mass of 1,648,000 km square; by contrast, Israel has about 

550 combat aircraft to defend a total land-mass of 28,305 km square 

(including the West Bank, Gaza, and the Golan). Representative (air) 

force to (air) space ratios (in kilometers) of various Middle Eastern 

countries are: 1:50 for Israel, 1:1,450 for Iraq, 1:6,500 for Saudi Arabia, 

and 1:13,750 for Iran. While it is true that not every kilometer of 

airspace need be defended, these figures provide a general sense of the 

air defense challenge that Iran faces. 
128 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

jammed, while many of the eastern- and western-origin systems 

currently in its inventory are functionally incompatible, a major 

obstacle to creating a truly integrated air defense system. This is 

a particularly significant liability since several potential 

adversaries (the United States, Israel, and to a lesser extent Saudi 

Arabia and the smaller Arab Gulf states) have modem, capable 

air forces. On the other hand, the air force remains the only 

service with the flexibility to rapidly and decisively respond to 

threats anywhere along the country's borders; moreover, Iran's 

large size ensures that some vital targets will always remain 

beyond the reach of any single neighbor. 

Iran's air force received a major boost during the Gulf War 

with the arrival of 115 Iraqi combat aircraft seeking safehaven. 

These included 4 MiG-29s, 24 Mirage F-Is, 24 Su-24s, 44 Su20/22s, 12 MiG-23s, and 7 Su-25 fighter aircraft. At least some 

of the Soviet-origin aircraft--such as the Su-24s--have been 

integrated into Iran's air force and Russia is reportedly helping 

Iran to operate and maintain them, by providing spares and 

technical assistance. In addition, Iran hopes to buy 48 more MiG29 fighters and 24 more Su-24 strike aircraft from Russia and up 

to 72 more F-7 or F-8 II fighters from China. These acquisitions 

would more than double the operational strength of Iran's air 

force, significantly enhancing its air defense capabilities and 

increasing its offensive potential. 

Of its recent acquisitions, Iran's Su-24 strike aircraft are the 

source of greatest concem. The Su-24 is a advanced two-seat 

strike aircraft that offers an excellent range/payload combination, 

with a high-speed, low-level penetration capability. It offers a 

significant improvement in Iran's long-range strike capabilities 

and for the first time provides Iran with a long-range maritime 

strike capability. 6s And until Iran develops chemical warheads for 

68 Flying a lo-lo-hi mission profile, the Su-24 can carry 2,500 kg of 

ordnance 950 Ion; flying a hi-lo-hi mission prof'de and carrying two 

external fuel tanks, it can carry 3,000 kg of ordnance 1,300 Ion. Joim 

W. R. Taylor (ed.), Jane's All the World's Aircraft, 1989-90, (London: 
MICHAEL EISENSTADT 129 

its Scud-B and -C missiles, Su-24s armed with chemical bombs 

will remain its primary means of delivering chemical strikes 

against enemy population centers. 

Iran has also ordered six SA-10 batteries and 20 Baikal 

mobile C2 vehicles from Russia, and has unsuccessfully tried to 

acquire six Tamara air defense target acquisition systems from 

the Czech Republic (this deal was cancelled due to U.S. 

pressure), in order to lay the foundation for a modem, integrated 

air defense system. 69 The acquisition of the SA-10 would be a 

significant first step towards rebuilding and modemizing Iran's air 

defenses. The SA-10 is a highly capable long-range, all-altitude 

SAM which can engage several targets simultaneously, including 

tactical ballistic missiles, low altitude aircraft, and cruise missiles. 

However, the SA-10 would have to be deployed in very large 

numbers to close major gaps in Iran's air defense coverage; this 

would probably require a larger inveslment than Iran can 

currently afford. As a result, Iran's inadequate air defenses are 

likely to remain a critical vulnerability for the foreseeable future. 

Despite serious problems, Iran's air force retains a modest 

offe~tsive capability. Twice since the end of the Gulf War, Iranian 

combat aircraft have bombed opposition Mojahedin-e-Khalq 

bases deep inside Iraq (in April 1992 and May 1993) and have 

demonstrated an ability to penetrate Iraq's airspace at 

will--although this may be due as much to the weakness of Iraq's 

air defenses as the skill of Iranian pilots. Iran's air force could 

probably not repeat this performance against the Arab states of 

the southem Gulf. Moreover, Iran remains vulnerable to attack 

from the air due to the poor state of its air defenses, and will 

remain so for years to come. As a result, Iran will build-up its 

strategic missile forces as a cost-effective way of countering the 

stronger air forces of its neighbors and compensating for its 

Jane's Publishing Inc., 1990), pp. 276-277. 

69 Glen Howard, "Iran Targets Czech Air Defense Systems," Notes on 

Russia and Central Asia, August 11, 1993, p. 2. 
130 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

weakness in this area. 

Naval and Coastal Defense Forces: The Persian Gulf 

is a region of vital importance for Iran. According to Foreign 

Minister "Ali Akbar Velayati, "Our most important and strategic 

border is our southem coastline, the Gulf, the Strait of Honnuz 

and the Sea of Oman. This region is vital to us .... We cannot 

remain indifferent to its fate. ''7° There are several reasons for this: 

first, the Gulf is the main export route for Iran's oil--which is its 

main source of foreign exchange; second, key Iranian oil 

production and refining facilities are located in or near the Gulf; 

third, because most of its intemational trade passes through 

Bandar Abbas and its other Gulf ports, preserving its freedom of 

navigation in the Gulf is a vital interest; fourth, because it sits 

adjacent to the Strait of Hormuz it could block the flow of oil 

from the region if it desired; this potentially provides it with a 

degree of leverage over the Arab Gulf states and the West; 71 

finally, it is the only arena where U.S. and Iranian military forces 

operate in proximity and the Gulf is thus a potential flashpoint 

for conflict. 

Iran's navy consists of 3 frigates, 3 destroyers, 10 missile 

patrol boats, 2 submarines, 150 coastal patrol craft and small 

boats, 25 amphibious landing craft, and 3 mini-submarines. Its 

naval air ann includes air force Su-24s and F-4Es employed in 

the maritime strike role, ASW helicopters, and maritime 

reconnaissance aircraft. Its coastal defense forces include HY-2 

Silkworm and YJ-I antiship missiles. 72 Iran's navy is capable of 

70 Ziarati, p. 18. 

71 In fact, on several occasions during the Iran-Iraq War Iran 

threatened to block the Strait ,and prevent all oil exports from this 

critical region if Iraq were to cripple its ability to export oil. Ramazani, 

pp. 13-18. 

72 MEMB, pp. 247-249. Revolutionary Guard naval units include 

small-boat units, coastal missile batteries, and naval special forces. 
MICHAEL EISENSTADT 131 

limited offensive action but is restricted largely to the waters of 

the Persian Gulf and coastal areas. It is organized to fulf'tll a 

number of missions, including closing the Strait of Hormuz in 

order to disrupt international shipping or prevent foreign naval 

intervention there; denying its enemies use of the Gulf by 

attacking sea lanes and port facilities; and intimidating its Arab 

Gulf neighbors to achieve political objectives. 

Iran has the largest navy in the Gulf; however, none of its 

major surface combatants (its 3 frigates, 3 destroyers, and 10 

French Combattante II missile patrol boats) are fully mission 

capable--key radar and electronic subsystems are not operational 

or do no function reliably due to a lack of maintenance and 

spares. Consequently, Iran has einphasized tile use of airpower, 

small boats, coastal missile batteries, and mine warfare in past 

naval operations. 73 

In addition, Iran's navy suffers from several other 

shortcomings which limit its operational effectiveness. These 

include: 

• Severe shortages of modem antiship and naval 

antiaircraft missiles. This is due to the arms embargo and 

the fact that munitions delivered before the revolution 

have in many cases exceeded their maximum storage 

life. TM 

• The lack of a significant air defense capability. Iran's 

navy has neither a strong air ann nor a significant at-sea 

anti-air capability--which is key to survival in modem 

naval combat (during the Gulf War Iraq's navy was 

quickly routed by coalition airpower because it lacked an 

73 Cordesman, pp. 411-412. 

74 Cordesman, p. 412. It would be possible to refill certain types of 

munitions, however, in order to extend their shelf life. 
132 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

air defense capability). 75 

• An inability to modemize its forces as a result of a longstanding arms embargo---much of its force remains 

obsolete in an arena of warfare where technology is of 

critical importance. 

Due in part to the vulnerability of its major surface 

combatants, Iran resorted to small-boat and hit-and-run type 

tactics during the Iran-Iraq War, although these operations never 

seriously disrupted shipping in the Gulf. Nonetheless, Iran 

remains wedded to this style of warfare, and it has attempted, 

without much success, to augment its fleet of small patrol boats 

since the end of the Iran-Iraq War. TM 

Despite these shortcomings, the Iranian navy is an active and 

potent force in the region---as demonstrated by the frequent large 

naval exercises held since the end of the Iran-Iraq War. For 

example, in April-May 1992 the navy held a major l l-day 

combined-arms exercise code-named "Victory-3" which, 

according to Iranian news reports, simulated an Iranian attempt 

to "foil (a) hypothetical enemy's penetration of the strategic Strait 

of Hormuz region." The exercise, which extended over an area 

covering more than 10,000 square miles, involved more than 45 

major surface combatants, 150 coastal patrol boats, 

minisubmarines, coastal-defense missile units, air force combat 

aircraft, ASW helicopters, marines, naval special forces, and 

divers. It reportedly included "operations for blocking the sea 

mutes and mining the waters," as well as "amphibious operations 

and the deployment of marines on enemy shores," and it 

7~ David Foxwell, "Operational Lessons: Contending with Iraq's Patrol 

Boats," International Defense Review, May 1991, p. 466. There is no 

doubt that under shnilar circumstances, Iran's surface fleet would fare 

no better. 

76 This includes 30 French Naja-class fast patrol boats which Iran 

unsuccessfully attempted to buy in 1989. Mednews, May 31, 1993, p. 

3. 
MICHAEL EISENSTADT 133 

concluded with "ground combat units penetrating into the depths 

of the hypothetical enemy's coastal positions." This exercise was 

typical of others that have been held in that it highlighted Iran's 

offensive power-projection capabilities as well as its putative 

defensive concerns, and it was loudly advertised by Iran's media 

in order to intimidate the Arab Gulf states. 

Because the Persian Gulf is the focus of Iran's efforts to 

become a dominant regional power and is so important to its 

security, Iran has made the expansion and modemization of its 

navy a top priority--second only to rebuilding its air and air 

defense forces. Iran's naval expansion and modemization plans 

call for the acquisition of up to 10 Hegu-class fast attack craft, 

an additional Kilo-class submarine, 5 minisubmarines, and 

advanced antiship missiles, torpedoes, and mines. 77 

In an effort to strengthen its surface fleet, Iran hopes to 

acquire 10 Hegu-class missile patrol boats from China; these will 

reportedly be armed with the Y J-1 antiship missile. TM This class 

is a modemized version of the old Soviet Komar-class boats and 

would likely be restricted to use in the Gulf and coastal waters, 

although the YJ-I missile might have some significant ECCM 

capabilities which could make these boats a threat to the navies 

of the region. However, these ships would not pose a threat to an 

adversary--such as the United States--that owns the skies and 

77 In a June 1990 interview, navy commander Admiral Ali Shamkhani 

stated that Iran intended to acquire submarines which would expand the 

mission of the navy "in the Persian Gulf and outside the Strait of 

Hormuz," that it would acquire "more advanced, modem, and more 

readily available missiles," that "the engines of some of the vessels will 

be improved" with foreign help to increase their speed, that "the shoreto-sea missile capability of this force will be strengthened significantly," 

and that the navy "will (soon) be equipped with new airplanes." 

Ettela'at, June 12, 1990, p. 3, in FBIS-NES, August 1, 1990, p. 53. 

7s Iran reportedly wants new build craft, having been offered used 

craft from the China navy inventory. Paul Beaver, "China's Rich 

Harvest," Jane's Defence Weekly, February 13, 1993, p. 48. 
134 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

has a modem electrronic warfare capability. 

Iran has a growing fleet air ann that now includes air force 

Su-24 and F-4E aircraft whictr---among other things--fulfill the 

long-range maritime strike role (during the Iran-Iraq War, Iran 

used F-4E aircraft armed with Maverick missiles and modified 

Oghab rockets in the antiship role). Iran also possesses a number 

of helicopters configured for ASW and mine-sweeping missions, 

although little is known about its capabilities in these areas. Iran's 

long-range maritime reconnaissance capability consists of 1-2 

operational P-3F Orions which have nonfunctioning surface 

surveillance radars; consequently, its crews use binoculars to scan 

the ocean for targets. It also uses C- 130s and Fokker Friendships 

in this role. 79 The overall weakness of Iran's air force puts the 

fleet at a major disadvantage in any future conflict, since it 

cannot depend on the air force for air cover. However, the fleet 

defense capability of the air force will grow in the future as it 

takes delivery of additional new aircraft from Russia and China. 

Iran has a significant amphibious capability, which is a 

critical component of its ability to project force in the Gulf. It 

can transport 800-1200 troops and 25-30 tanks in a single 

sortie----enough to seize and hold contested islands or offshore oil 

terminals in the Gulf. 8° However, there are no indications that it 

intends to augment its amphibious capabilities in the future. 

Iran has two Kilo-class submarines and may acquire a third; 

these represent a new order of naval threat in the region, sl 

Although Iran's interest in submarines pre-dates the revolution its 

recent interest may derive, at least in part, from experiences 

during the Iran-Iraq War. Towards the end of the war, Iran lost 

79 Cordesman, p. 413. 

80 Cordesman, p. 412. 

81 Russia reportedly has decided not to transfer the third Kilo to Iran-- 

possibly in response to U.S. pressure. Al-Sharq al-Awsat, December 24, 

1993, p. 1, in FBIS-NES, January 4, 1994, p. 48. 
MICHAEL EISENSTADT 135 

a number of surface ships in clashes with the U.S. 

Navy---demonstrating the poor survivability of its major surface 

combatants against a modem navy-- while the h'an A jr incident 

(involving an Iranian ship caught laying mines in the Gulf) 

demonstrated the need for a covert mine-laying capability. The 

acquisition of submarines may thus reflect an effort by Iran to 

extend the striking range, enhance the mine warfare capability, 

and improve the survivability of its navy. In addition, Iran's 

interest in submarines may be related to its desire to attain the 

status of a regional power and the prestige of being the only state 

in the region with submarines. 

The Kilo has an effective operational range of about 400 nm 

while submerged (it can operate in this mode for up to six days), 

a maximum range of about 7,500 nm while snorkeling (for a 

maximum endurance of about 45 days), and it can carry 18 

torpedoes or 24 tube-launched mines. Because of their ability to 

run almost silently, and due to normal sea conditions throughout 

much of their likely ,area of operation (particularly the shallow 

and heavily-trafficked waters of the Persian Gulf which offer a 

favorable operational environment for smaU diesel submarines), 

they could be very difficult to detect and destroy. Moreover, they 

have the potential to dramatically expand the operational area of 

Iran's navy, providing it with the ability to interdict sea lanes at 

extended ranges, covertly lay mines on both sides of the strategic 

Strait of Hormuz, and covertly insert naval special forces near 

enemy coastal installations. 82 Despite the potential offered by 

these submarines, Iran faces a number of major obstacles to their 

effective employment: 

• Iran lacks experience in undersea warfare--which is 

s2 Russia makes the Sirena-UM swimmer delivery vehicle which can 

transport two combat divers and can be launched from the torpedo tubes 

of a submarine. It has a range of 11 nm and can travel at 2-4 kts at 

depths of up to 40 m. The sale of these underwater vehicles to Iran 

would give a significant boost to its naval special warfare capabilities. 

Jane's Defence Weekly, March 20, 1993, p. 23. 
136 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

among the most demanding and unforgiving of combat 

environments--since a single human error or mechanical 

malfunction can result in the loss of a ship and its crew. 

Iran's submarine crews have reportedly progressed 

rapidly and are likely to attain the level of skill required 

for less demanding missions--such as covert mine 

laying--in the near future. It may be several years, 

however, before they can exploit the full potential of 

these vessels. 83 

• The effective use of submarines in shallow waters and in 

high threat ASW environments requires detailed 

oceanographic data conceming the intended area of 

operation (including ocean currents, background noise, 

pressure and temperature gradients, water depths, and 

sea-bottom topography); it is not likely that Iran 

possesses this kind of data or the technical means to 

obtain it. 

• Iran has too small a submarine fleet to absorb even the 

loss of a single ship. As a result, it would probably be 

reluctant to use them to attack shipping, since it would 

be putting them at risk, especially since attacks on 

shipping are not likely to produce significant results 

because of the large volume of traffic and the small 

number of submarines involved. (During the Iran-Iraq 

War, numerous attacks on shipping in the Gulf had little 

effect on shipping or the price of oil and insurance 

rates.) 84 Iran's submarines could, however, cause 

problems and increase their odds of survival if used to 

covertly lay mines. 

• Geography imposes significant limits on Iran's 

submarines. Currently based at Bandar Abbas, they will 

83 Interview with commander NAVCENT, Vice Admiral Douglas 

Katz, Defense News, January 17-23, 1994, p. 30. 

Cordesman and Wagner, p. 568. 
MICHAEL EISENSTADT 137 

have to retum to their home base every few weeks to 

refuel, rearm, and undergo repairs; as they depart and 

return to base, they will be vulnerable to enemy ships 

lying in wait offshore. And if deployed to the Persian 

Gulf, they will have to transit the narrow Strait of 

Hormuz, increasing the likelihood of detection. 

• The United States is a world leader in ASW; for decades 

it has poured immense resources into preparations to 

fight the Soviet Union, owner of the largest submarine 

fleet in the world. Thus, it has the expertise, experience, 

and hardware to accomplish this demanding mission, and 

it is preparing for ASW in the Gulf; it is charting the 

waters of the Gulf 85 and holds regular ASW exercises 

with several Gulf states. The United States and its friends 

thus have an important advantage over Iran in this area, 

although the shallow, noisy, heavily-trafficked waters of 

the Persian Gulf are a challenging ASW environment. 86 

• Iraq has a limited submarine command and control 

capability since it lacks VLF (very low frequency) radio 

communications equipment needed to contact submerged 

submarines; this may be why Iran has used ASW 

helicopters with dipping sonar to "ping" messages to 

submerged submarines. This method of communication, 

however, limits the operating range of the submarines to 

that of the helicopter couriers (which are also vulnerable 

to enemy airpower) and risks compromising the location 

of the submarines, s7 

• Iran's submarines have only a limited over-the-horizon 

targeting and tracking capability, reducing their potential 

8s The New York Times, November 5, 1992, p. A3. 

84 Eugene Miasnikov, "Submarine Collision off Murmansk: A Look 

from Afar," Breakthroughs, Winter 1992/93, p. 21. 

87 Defense News, January 17-23, 1994, p. 30. 
138 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

effectiveness. The navy's long-range maritime 

reconnaissance assets--aircraft such as P-3F 

Oriorv---provide only a visual-range target acquisition 

capability and are of limited help in this regard. 8s The 

Kilo's ESM and DF systems provide an impressive overthe-horizon target acquisition capability, although these 

can be defeated if potential victims limit their use of 

radar and employ good radio discipline. Moreover, the 

ship's periscope and surface surveillance radar offer only 

a short-range target acquisition capability. The 

acquisition of a military reconnaissance satellite (if 

financial problems do not kill the program) would be a 

step towards filling this important gap in Iran's 

capabilities. 

Despite ",ill of this, Iran's Kilos remain a potential threat 

which the United States and its friends cannot afford to ignore. 

If equipped with advanced torpedoes and mines now available 

from Russia (such as wire-guided, wake-homing, and sonarhoming torpedoes and rocket-propelled rising mines) 89 the Kilos 

could threaten to shipping throughout the region, although in the 

event of a conflict involving U.S. forces, they would probably 

not survive beyond the first few engagements. 

Iran is also reportedly interested in expanding its small fleet 

of three minisubmarines (one is of North Korean origin, one of 

German origin, and one developed indigenously) since only one 

of these is believed to be operational. 9° Iran is reportedly 

Cordesman, p. 413. 

89 International Defense Review, April 1993, pp. 282-283; 

International Defense Review, June 1993, p. 431. 

9o One of these is a West German Seahorse II civilian utility 

submersible designed for underwater repair and maintenance tasks; it 

apparently has been modified to perform military tasks, although its 

capabilities in this role are unknown. 
MICHAEL EISENSTADT 139 

interested in acquiring up to five mini-submarines (only a few 

countries--including Russia, Italy and North Korea--are known 

to produce them). These could significantly increase its 

operational capabilities in the Gulf. 91 Mini-submarines are small 

and difficult to detect, are often not vulnerable to normal ASW 

countermeasures, and probably appeal to Iran, with its 

unconventional approach to naval warfare. 92 Within the shallow 

confines of the Gulf, they could attack surface shipping with 

torpedoes or mines or insert naval special forces to attack harbor 

installations, oil terminals, and off-shore oil platforms with limpet 

mines, freeing the larger Kilos to operate outside the Gulf where 

they would be less vulnerable. 93 

Iran also has a significant mine warfare capability. During the 

latter stages of the Iran-Iraq War, it laid about 200 mines in the 

Gulf in an effort to disrupt maritime traffic there and punish the 

southern Gulf states and the west for their support for Iraq. 94 A 

total of 10 ships were struck by mines; several were badly 

91 For more details about these minisubmarines see: Jane's Defence 

Weekly, March 20, 1993, p. 23; International Defense Review, June 

1993, p. 428; and Joseph S. Bermudez Jr., "North Korea's Intelligence 

Agencies and Infiltration Operations," Jane's Intelligence Re view, June 

1991, pp. 269-277. 

92 For the use of mini-submarines in World War II, see Richard 

Compton-Hall, "The Menace of the Midgets," The Submarine Review, 

April 1989, pp. 11-17. 

93 In a recent naval special forces exercise, Iranian combat divers 

helocasted into the Persian Gulf and Strait of Hormuz, conducted 

"underwater demolition" and "beach reconnaissance" exercises, and 

simulated "attacks on marine installations,jetties and platforms defended 

by an imaginary enemy." Radio Tehran, December 18, 1993, in FBISNES, December 21, 1993, p. 72. 

94 Cordesman and Wagner, p. 565, claim that 176 M-08 and MyAM 

mines were neutr,'dized ,as p,'u't of the international counter-mine effort. 
140 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

damaged (including the U.S. tanker Bridgeton and the frigate 

Samuel B. Roberts), and two (a small support ship and a small 

research ship) were sunk. 95 The Iranian mining of the Gulf 

created problems out of all proportion to the resources and effort 

expended. 96 (Likewise, during the Gulf War, a series of dense 

Iraqi minefields off the coast of Kuwait deterred U.S. forces from 

undertaking an amphibious landing and greatly complicated naval 

operations in the westem half of the Gulf). 97 

Mines are cheap to produce, easy to deploy, and difficult to 

counter (counter-mine operations are extremely resource intensive 

and time consuming). They pose a difficult threat even for 

modem navies and are thus particularly attractive to countries 

such as Iran which are otherwise unable to meet more powerful 

enemies on equal terms. Iran reportedly has about 2,000 naval 

mines of various types, including the Soviet M-08 and MYaM 

moored contact mines (which it formerly acquired from North 

Korea and now produces locally), and possibly bottom influence 

and limpet mines of Soviet and Yugoslav origin which it 

acquired from North Korea and Libya, 9s 

9s Ted Hooton, "The Tanker War in the Gulf: 1984-88," Jane's 

Intelligence Review, May 1992, p. 220. 

96 At about $1,000 per mine--for a total cost to Iran of about 

$200,000--it caused damage totalling well over $100,000,000. Statement 

of Director of Naval Intelligence Rear Admiral Thomas Brooks before 

the Seapower, Strategic, and Critical Materials Subcommittee of the 

House Armed Services Committee, March 7, 1991, p. 68. 

97 David K. Brown and David Foxwell, "Report from the Front: MCM 

and the Threat Beneath the Surface," International Defense Re view, July 

1991, pp. 735-738; DoD, Conduct of the Persian Gulf War, April 1992, 

pp. 199-208. 

98 Statement of Rear Admiral William O. Studeman, DirectorofNaval 

Intelligence, before the Seapower and Strategic and Critical Materials 

Subcommittee of the House Armed Services Committee on Intelligence 
MICHAEL EISENSTADT 141 

The Strait of Honnuz presents less than ideal conditions for 

mine warfare; the currents in the strait are often too strong for 

moored mines (causing the mines to dip or anchor cables to 

break) and it is too deep for bottom mines; moreover, Iran lacks 

mines designed for use in deep waters (such as rising mines). 99 

As a result, the Iranian effort during the Iran-Iraq War was 

confined largely to the lower rim of the Persian Gulf (which is 

shallow enough for moored mines). 1°° However, Iran is believed 

to be interested in acquiring rising mines--such as the Chinese 

EM52--which can be used in the strait itself) °~ With the 

acquisition of rising mines, lran would--for the first time--be 

able to mine the Strait of Hormuz; this would close a major gap 

in its mine warfare capabilities. 

Iran could use surface ships of various types, its Kilo-class 

submarines, and mini-submarines to lay mines. Only surface 

ships have the ability to lay mines rapidly in numbers sufficient 

to have a significant impact on shipping in and near the Gulf 

(due to the number of surface vessels available and their large 

capacity); however, by relying on surface ships, Iran would risk 

compromise, political embarrassment, and loss of these assets. 

While Iran's two Kilos can covertly lay mines, each can lay only 

Issues, 1 March 1988, pp. 60-61; Defense News, March 1-7, 1993, p. 

29. 

99 Carus, Proliferation and Security, p. 12. 

~oo Cordesman, p. 589, n. 57. 

lo~ Defense News, January 17-23, 1994, pp. 1, 29. Both the Russians 

and Chinese are offering sophisticated rising mines for export. The 

Chinese EM52 rising mine can be laid by surface ships and can operate 

at depths of up to 110m. It has a ship counter option and, once laid, can 

remain dormant for up to 360 days. The Russian MSHM rising mine 

can be laid by air, surface ship, or submarine, and can operate at depths 

of 60-300 m. International Defense Review, June 1991, p. 625; 

International Defense Review, June 1993, p. 431. 
142 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

24 mines per sortie. This may not be enough to have a significant 

impact on shipping, although it could cause problems. And 

because submarine-laid mines have a distinct cylindrical casing 

(since they are launched through the ship's torpedo tubes) it 

would be difficult for Iran to plausibly deny involvement in the 

act. 

Finally, Iran's coastal defenses are organized around its 

mobile HY-2 and Y J-1 missile batteries which are mainly 

deployed near the Strait of Hormuz. 1°2 The HY-2 is an old 

system which could threaten civilian shipping, but which can be 

easily defeated by any warship with a modem EW capability. 1°3 

Iran reportedly intends to upgrade the guidance system of its 

Silkworms, however, probably in order to improve their accuracy 

and survivability in an EW environment. ~°4 On the other hand, 

the YJ-I is an unknown quantity; it is a surface-skimmer, which 

makes it difficult to detect in flight, and it might have a 

significant ECCM capability which could make it difficult to jam. 

Because both the HY-2 and Y J-1 are mobile systems, they could 

be difficult to destroy by preemptive action (the Gulf War 

highlighted the difficulty of locating and destroying Iraqi mobile 

coastal missile batteries). ~°5 

Thus, while Iran could disrupt maritime traffic in the Persian 

Gulf and as far away as the Indian Ocean---with its recent 

lo2 Reports that Iran has acquired eight SS-N-22 Sunburn supersonic 

antiship missiles from the Ukraine and deployed them as part of its 

coastal defenses appear to be false. Defense Week, September 27. 1993, 

pp. 1, 10; Defense Week, October 4, 1993, pp. 1, 13. 

lo3 Michael A. Palmer, On Course to Desert Storm: The United States 

Navy and the Persian Gulf, (Washington D.C.: Naval Historical Center, 

1992), p. 122. 

lo4 Defense News, January 17-23, 1994, p. 29. 

los GWAPS, p. 101. 
MICHAEL EISENSTADT 143 

acquisition of Kilo-class submarines and Su-24s--it lacks the 

ability to completely block the Strait of Hormuz at this time. 

However, the acquisition of more modem coastal defense missiles 

and more advanced mines will bring it closer to this goal. 

Moreover, Iran has an impressive amphibious capability and it 

could seize and hold contested islands or offshore oil terminals 

in the Gulf. Finally, its naval special forces have the ability to 

sabotage offshore oil terminals, port facilities, and ships docked 

in ports througout the lower Gulf, disrupting oil production and 

maritime traffic there. 

Conventional Arms Production: Prior to the 1979 

revolution, Iran relied on foreign arms suppliers--mainly the 

United States and Britalrv--for its requirements. After the 

revolution, Iran had significant problems obtaining arms due to 

an intemational arms embargo imposed in 1983. Following from 

this experience, Iran has devoted significant resources to 

establishing an indigenous military-industrial base, in order to 

reduce its dependence on foreign suppliers. Iran's military 

industries are run by the Ministry of Defense's Defense Industrial 

Organization and the Revolutionary Guard's military production 

authority (which is often assisted by the civilian Construction 

Jihad organization). TM Together, they oversee more than 240 

factories employing 45,000 people engaged in the development 

or production of surface-to-surface and surface-to-air missiles, 

light helicopters, RPVs, rocket artillery, light armored vehicles, 

minisubs, small patrol boats, mortars, anti-tank missiles, 

ammunition, small arms, naval mines, tactical communications 

systems, and spare parts) °7 

This impressive list, however, gives an exaggerated 

lo6 Ahmed Hashim, "Iranian National Security 1988-1994: Threat 

Perceptions and the Development of the Armed Forces," unpublished 

paper, pp. 22-26. 

lo7 Jane's Defence Weekly, February 1, 1992, pp. 158-159; February 

11, 1989, p. 219; November 19, 1988, pp. 1252-1253. 
144 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

impression of Iranian military production capabilities. While Iran 

produces a wide range of arms, production levels (except perhaps 

for ammunition and spare parts) are actually quite modest. Many 

weapons Iran produces are crude reverse-engineered copies of 

obsolete foreign systems, and production is focused largely on 

low-tech infantry weapons. I°8 

Consequently, Iran will remain dependent on foreign 

suppliers for all but a few categories of arms as well as spare 

parts for the foreseeable future. And despite attempts to diversify 

its sources to reduce its dependence on any one supplier, it 

essentially relies on one country--Russia--for nearly all its 

modem arms. This is a source of vulnerability since Russia is a 

potentially unreliable supplier because of the chaotic state of its 

economy and its vulnerability to U.S. pressure. 1°9 

Assessment: Overall, Iran's conventional capabilities are 

quite limited. A decade of fighting, an international arms 

embargo, financial hardship, poor leadership, and deep internal 

divisions have left the armed forces in shambles. It would take 

tens of billions of dollars--which Iran simply does not have at 

this time--to make it a major conventional military power. 

Nonetheless, Iran is attempting to redress its most critical 

weaknesses through the selective modemization of its armed 

forces. Iran's offensive options are limited; while it could 

launch limited air strikes into neighboring countries (and has 

done so in Iraq in recent years), it lacks the means to support and 

sustain ground operations into any neighboring state due to the 

small size and poor condition of its ground forces. Thus, the 

main conventional threat from Iran is not on the ground or in the 

air, but it is in the naval arena; specifically, the threat posed by 

lran to shipping in the Gulf (and hence the flow of oil from the 

lo8 Defense News, February 22-28, 1993, pp. 1, 21. 

lo9 Hashim, Iranian National Security, p. 32. Indeed, Russia's refusal 

to transfer a third Kilo-class submarine to Iran may be a result of U.S. 

pressure. 
MICHAEL EISENSTADT 145 

region), the security and stability of the southem Gulf states, and 

the ability of the United States to project force in the region. 

Iran's growing ability to disrupt maritime traffic in the Gulf is 

thus a source of concem. The acquisition of new Kilo-class 

submarines, Su-24 strike aircraft, new coastal defense missiles, 

and advanced mines will boost Iran's capabilities in this area, 

enabling it to seriously disrupt shipping, and perhaps even 

temporarily close the Strait of Hormuz in a crisis. Moreover, 

although the Gulf is a significant barrier to major acts of 

aggression against the southem Gulf states, Iran could conduct 

limited amphibious operations there to seize and hold lightly 

defended islands or offshore oil platforms, and its naval special 

forces could attack harbors, offshore platforms, and oil terminals 

in the southern Gulf. 

It is unclear, however, what policy objective could be served 

by these actions; closing the Strait of Hormuz would harm Iran 

as much as any other state since it has no other way to bring its 

oil to market. It is likely to do this only as a last resort in a crisis 

or in wartime in order to prevent foreign intervention or to deny 

its enemies the use of the Gulf after it had lost its ability to do 

so. More likely, it would use the threat of closing the strait to 

deter undesired enemy actions or as a source of leverage over its 

adversaries. Likewise, attempts to intimidate the Arab Gulf states 

for political gain would only serve to drive these countries deeper 

into the embrace of the United States and could prompt the very 

foreign intervention Iran seeks to avoid. Nonetheless, the capacity 

of the regime to miscalculate the outcome of its actions should 

not be underestimated. 

Iran's defensive capabilities are also limited, although the 

military weakness of its neighbors, its strategic depth, and its 

nonconventional retaliatory capability are major factors 

compensating for its conventional weakness. Meanwhile, it will 

continue to selectively modemize its conventional 

forces--particularly its air force and navy--while maintaining its 

ability to engage in subversion and terrorism--perhaps the most 

effective lever of influence left to Tehran in light of its political, 
146 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

military, and economic weakness. 

Thus, the future threat from Iran comes from the two 

extremes of the threat spectrum: nuclear weapons on the one 

hand, and its ability to intimidate and engage in subversion and 

terror on the other. However, the United States will find these 

two threats particularly difficult to counter; a nuclear Iran would 

raise the stakes of continued U.S. involvement in the region (and 

might ultimately require it to extend a nuclear deterrent umbrella 

to its friends there), while Iran has in the past shown an ability 

to hide its involvement in subversion and acts of terror in order 

to escape retribution. By contrast, the United States and its 

friends in the region are relatively well prepared to deal with the 

conventional threat Iran poses. 

While Iran wants to avoid a confrontation with the United 

States,--it recognizes the potentially devastating consequences 

this could have--it might eventually be pushed by economic 

pressures to take ill-considered steps (such as using intimidation 

or force to alter the territorial status quo in the Gulf or to 

influence OPEC production and pricing decisions) that might 

inadvert,'mtly further isolate Iran, drive the Arab Gulf states to 

cooperate more closely with the United States, and perhaps even 

set the stage for a military confrontation with U.S. forces. 

Iran: The Next Iraq? 

In light of the foregoing analysis, the assessment that lran will be 

the next Iraq or that it is an ascendent regional power seem 

somewhat overdrawn. While there are some superficial 

similarities between the two, there are important differences 

between Iraq of the 1980s and Iran of the 1990s that make it 

unlikely that Iran will follow in Iraq's path. And while Iran might 

be the main threat to U.S. interests in the region in the near term, 

Iraq is likely to emerge as the greater long-term threat to U.S. 

interests. 1~° First, Iraq's financial situation was much more 

No Carus, p. 3; Eisenstadt, pp. 1-6, 77-80. 
MICHAEL EISENSTADT 147 

favorable throughout the 1980s--it was able to borrow over $80 

billion from its westem and Arab supporters in the course of the 

war. It started experiencing fin,'mcial difficulties only after it had 

completed much of its buildup (albeit before it succeeded in 

developing nuclear weapons). Iran, by contrast, has experienced 

financial problems almost from the outset of its buildup; a 

precipitous drop in oil income and its loss of access to foreign 

credit have thus forced it to drastically slash military procurement 

before its rearmament program really got off the ground. 

Second, whereas Iraq had broad access to westem and eastern 

markets for arms and technology for nearly a decade, Iran is a 

pariah state that has access to only a few major sources of arms 

and technology--and most of these (countries like China and 

North Korea) cannot offer Iran the latest in this area. Moreover, 

the world has learned much from its experience with Iraq and 

worldwide efforts to tighten export controls will make it much 

harder for Iran---which is a major focus of counterproliferation 

efforts today--to replicate Iraq's feat. 

Third, while Iraq displayed superior organizational skills and 

ingenuity in its effort to develop nonconventional weapons, it is 

not clear that lran has the skills required to overcome the 

organizational, managerial, and technical constraints it faces in 

this area, although it may eventually circumvent these obstacles 

with foreign help. lxl 

Fourth, the long-term outlook for Iraq--if it can get sanctions 

lifted---is good. Among its assets are an efficient--if 

ruthless--regime, massive oil reserves, a large army, and a 

skilled and experienced manpower base. By contrast, the longterm outlook for Iran is poor, due to an incompetent regime, an 

devastated economy, a weak military, and a rapidly growing and 

increasingly disatisfied population. Once sanctions are lifted, Iraq 

is likely to reemerge as a major regional power; consequently, it 

could become the major long-term threat to U.S. interests in the 

m Carus, p. 8. 
148 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

region.In 

Thus, while it may not be the next Iraq, Iran--with its 

aspirations for regional power status, its nuclear ambitions, and 

its capacity for subversion and terror--remains a potential threat 

to U.S. interests in the region. It is thus vital that the United 

States continue to focus its efforts on containing Iran to ensure 

that it does not become any more of a threat than it now is. 

Iraq: Counterbalance to Iran? 

The foregoing analysis also has implications for file argtunent 

that Iraq needs to be rehabilitated so that it can serve as a 

counterbalance to an ascendent Iran. 

Because the main threat posed by Iran is its desire to acquire 

nuclear weapons and its capacity for subversion in the region, 

Iraq is ill-suited to counterbalance lran: 

• Balancing Iran in the nuclear arena would logically require 

rearming Iraq--perhaps with nuclear or other 

nonconventional weapons--thereby creating two threats 

instead of one. 

• Iraq is not the solution to the threat posed by Iranian 

subversion and terror; the way to deal with this threat is 

through promoting economic development and democracy in 

the region. 

Moreover, experience has shown that Iraq would not be 

easily manipulated as a counter to Iran and that it would 

ultimately use its strength to menace the very Gulf states it is 

being asked to protect--since it still harbors a grudge against 

these states for their participation in the Gulf War. T h e 

United States is the best counter to Iran; only it can counter Iran's 

nonconventional capabilities (without actively promoting 

proliferation in the region) or the conventional threat it poses in 

the Gulf. Thus, a forward military presence is a vital component 

of U.S. efforts to contain Iran, as well as Iraq. 

112 Cams, p. 3; Eisenstadt, pp. 1-6, 77-80. 
MICHAEL EISENSTADT 149 

Iran and Iraq: Cooperation Against 

"Dual Containment"? 

Iran and Iraq remain bitter enemies. Because both countries 

ultimately seek to dominate the Gulf, and because many of the 

issues that have led to conflict in the past remain unresolved, 

future relations between the two countries are more likely to be 

characterized by conflict and competition than by cooperation. 

Neither country, however, is likely to attack the other in their 

currently weakened state; this balance of weakness between Iran 

and Iraq makes a major military conflict between the two 

unlikely--at least in the near-tenn. 1a3 

The U.S. adoption of a policy of "dual containment" towards 

Iran and Iraq TM has, however, fed speculation that common 

interests and circumstances might prompt the two countries to 

work together to thwart U.S. aims, and that this might even take 

the form of military cooperation. ~5 There are, in fact, precedents 

for such a scenario. 

Just before the Gulf War, Iran and Iraq signed a series of 

agreements in January 1991 conceming cooperation during the 

impending conflict. As part of this agreement, Iran agreed to 

provide safehaven to thirty-three Iraqi civilian passenger and 

transport aircraft which arrived on the eve of the war. 

Additional agreements were conluded conceming the 

provision of refuge for Iraqi ships in Iranian territorial waters, 

granting access to Irani,'m satellite ground station and 

~13 Eisenstadt, pp. 64, 73. 

114 For more on dual containment, see Martin Indyk, "Clinton 

Administration Policy Toward the Middle East," Soref Symposium 

Proceedings, The Washington Institute for Near East Policy, May 18, 

1993. 

11s The Washington Post, May 23, 1993, p. A26; The Washington Post, 

July 1, 1993, p. A18. 
150 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

telecommunication services, the use of Iranian airspace, and the 

transshipment of oil throught Iranian ports. There is no evidence, 

however, that any of these were implemented. 

During the war, Iraq dispatched more than 115 combat 

aircraft (including some of its best fighters) and eleven naval 

vessels to Iran; nearly all the aircraft and two ships survived the 

trip. These movements--which were apparently not covered by 

any of the pre-war agreements came as a surprise to the 

Iranians. Iraq had apparently hoped that Iran would permit it to 

use these assets later in the war to bloody the United States; on 

this count, it appears to have miscalculated. Both the aircraft and 

the naval craft remain in Iran to this day. 

Moreover, in the past year there have been reports that Iraq 

has bartered quantities of oil, steel, and possibly cement and 

fertilizers to Iran in return for foodstuffs and spare paris. 116 

Experience has thus shown that economic cooperation 

between Iran and Iraq is much more likely than military 

cooperation, although the latter cannot be completely ruled out. 

The potential for cooperation will be limited by the fact that both 

Iran and Iraq are pursuing fundamentally incompatible regional 

objectives, by Iran's desire that any assistance not significantly 

enhance Iraq's military capabilities or tip the military balance in 

its favor, and by the mutual distrust which characterizes relations 

between the two countries. 

Because it is in Iran's interest to weaken both the United 

States and Iraq without exposing itself to retribution by either, 

Iran is not likely to openly challenge the United States in the 

Gulf. In the event of a confrontation involving the United States 

and Iraq, it is not likely to openly join with Iraq or openly assist 

it (although before the Gulf War some in Iran called for an open 

alliance with Iraq against the United States and the coalition). At 

best, in the event of a confrontation between the United States 

1~6 The Washington Post, March 28, 1993, p. A1; The Washington 

Post, May 23, 1993, p. A26; The Washington Post, July 1, 1993, p. 

AI8. 
MICHAEL EISENSTADT 151 

and Iraq, Iran would quietly help Iraq by: 1) helping Iraqi air 

defenses to locate and identify U.S. aircraft; 2) providing combat 

intelligence; 3) providing target data that could be used to plan 

attacks against U.S. warships in the Gulf. While such assistance 

could conceivably complicate U.S. military operations against 

Iraq, it would probably not have a decisive impact on the 

outcome of any conflict. 
IRAN'S MILITARY SITUATION, 

Ahmed Hashim 

INTRODUCTION 

Since the end of the Iran-Iraq War, and particularly since the 

defeat of Iraq in the second Gulf War, the popular press in the 

West, the Arab world, and Israel, as well as more academic 

publications and policy-makers have been addressing the issue of 

the scale, nature, and quality of Iran's reannanlent program. 

According to these accounts, the IRI has been on an arms-buying 

binge over the last two years intended to make it the most 

powerful nation in the Persian Gulf and the second most 

powerful nation in the Middle East after Israel. Similarly, it is 

believed to be very determined to acquire all kinds of weapons 

of mass destruction. 2 

1 This paper is a short, modified and up-dated version of a longer 

paper done for the Henry Stimson Center in Washington, D.C. It also 

incorporates some analysis from the Adelphi paper I am currently 

working on at the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London. 

2 See for example Philip Finnegan, "Fractured Cooperation May Dash 

Gulf Security: Iranian Rearmament Poses New Threat to Mideast 

Nations," Defense News, March 16, 1992, 6-7; Charles Miller," Iranian 

Buildup May Spark Mideast Sales, King Says," Defense News, January 

27, 1992, 4, 45; Jack Nelson, "Arms Buildup Making Iran Top Gulf 

153 
154 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

More recent articles have addressed the potentially adverse 

consequences for the West of the massive flow of dual-use 

technology into Iran and express worry that the West is 

witnessing the rise of another Iraq. 3 The United States is very 

worried by the prospect of resurgent Iranian military power and 

two years ago Bush Administration launched a diplomatic effort 

aimed at preventing other Western states from providing Iran 

with the wherewithal to develop a sophisticated defense industrial 

base. 4 

Whether Iran's forces in the future will be used as the 

spearhead of an "imperialistic" Islamic ideology cannot be 

answered one way or the other with any degree of finality. 

However, a heavily armed Iran would most likely fight as a result 

of the unresolved dispute with Iraq. Iran shares the 

determination of the West and its local Arab allies to see the 

downfall of Saddam Husayn and to hobble Iraqi military power. 

This attitude is not conducive to improved Iraqi-Iranian relations. 

Competition with Turkey for influence in Central Asia could 

Power" Los Angeles Times, January 7, 1992, A1, A6; Kenneth 

Timmerman, "lran Poised to Become Regional Superpower," Mednews, 

January 20, 1992, 1-2; on July 31, 1992 ABC Nightly News ran a story 

about the Iranian build up; Tony Banks ,and James Bruce, "Iran Builds 

Its Strength," Jane's Defense Weekly, February I, 1992, 158-159; 

Jeffrey Smith, "Gates Warns of Iranian Arms Drive," Washington Post, 

March 28, 1992, A1, A17. 

3 Steve Coil, "Technology From West Floods Iran," Washington Post, 

November 10, 1992, A1, A28-A29. 

a Ibid. The Japanese and others are not too convinced by American 

arguments; they see Iran as a strategically important country and one 

wilh tremendous potential for economic and industri~d development. 

Furthermore, the fact that the USA is a major arms supplier to the 

region's allegedly moderate and conservative states detracts from its 

position against proliferation. 
AHMED HASHIM 155 

conceivably produce a clash. 5 

Finally, massive economic failure coupled with depressed oil 

prices could lead to Iranian threats or pressures against the 

resource-rich but weak Gulf states. 6 In other words, in the latter 

part of the 1990s a heavily armed and regionally preponderant 

Iran faced with tremendous economic problems might be akin to 

Iraq on the eve of its invasion of Kuwait in 1990. The fact that 

these scenarios could take place makes Iran a potentially 

destabilizing force in the medium and long-term. 7 

Like Iraq--whose veterans chose to flee instead of fighting 

in the Gulf War--Iran is a nation exhausted by eight years of 

sanguinary war and almost unimaginable personnel losses. Many 

of the country's seasoned veterans were either killed or maimed 

in Iran's last large-scale make-or-break offensive in front of Basra 

in January 1987. In the last year of war, Iran had difficulty 

5 We must not overestimate the influence of secular Muslim Turkey 

or of theocratic Muslim Iran in the newly independent Central Asian 

republics. Turco-Iranian rivarly in the region has been greatly 

exaggerated. There are two undeniable political facts in the region: the 

continued domination of the region by Russia and the region's pressing 

need for the most modern technology an dinfusion of capital. Neither 

Turkey nor Iran can compete with Russia, nor can they provide the 

desperately needed economic resources. Conversation with US expert 

on the Middle East who had recently visited Central Asia, July 1993. 

6 This scenario has been briefly touched upon by Yahya Sadowski in 

his book, Scuds or Butter: The Political Economy of Arms Control in 

the Midlde East, Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution, 1993, 62. 

7 One could argue that certain policy choices on the part of the West 

could mitigate Iranian propensity for "trouble-making' as it were: help 

with integration into the international economy, substantial aid for 

economic reconstruction ,and development; reduce Iranian worries over 

its national security in the Persian Gulf; stop promoting Turkey as a 

model rival in Central Asia with the ultimate aim of shutting Iran out 

of that region. 
156 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

finding enough volunteers to go to the front and those who were 

sent were of very low quality and no match for the Iraqi units. 

Furthermore, many of Iran's surviving battle-hardened veterans, 

who had fought an infantry-intensive war with low technology, 

are not capable of using the more sophisticated weapons making 

their way into Iran's order of battle. They will need years of retraining ,and familiarity with these weapon systems in order to be 

able to conduct combined arms operations using armor, artillery 

and air assets. 

On the other hand, one can take too sanguine a view of Iran's 

rearmament program. Shireen Hunter ascribes nothing but the 

most benign intentions to Iran's recent foreign policy activism 

and its rearmament drive. She argues that Tehran's rearmament 

is motivated solely by motives of self-defense. Furthermore, she 

states, "Militarily, it [Iran] is weaker than all of its neighbors. ''8 

This assertion no doubt would come as a surprise to the militarily 

weak states of the Arabian Peninsula. These monarchies formed 

the Gulf Cooperation Council in 1981 to counter what was seen 

as the Iranian Islamic menace. Despite billions of dollars spent 

on Western weapons, none of these peninsular countries have 

developed militarily effective forces and the Gulf War against 

Iraq starkly highlighted their collective military weakness and 

their absolute need to rely on outside forces. With the exception 

of the small Royal Saudi Air Force none of the Gulf 

forces--whether aerial or ground--performed creditably in Desert 

Storm. 

Shireen Hunter uses quantitive comparisons to show how Iran 

lags its neighbors. But this comparison says nothing about 

geography, operational readiness, level of training, the 

sophistication of equipment or the ability of a national army to 

use it. For example, Turkey outnumbers Iran almost four to one 

s Shireen Hunter, "Iran Through a Distorted Lens," Christian Science 

Monitor, March 2, 1992, 19. 
AHMED HASHIM 157 

in tanks (3,700 versus 700 for Iran), 9 but much of Turkey's armor 

is antiquated, and the terrain on the Turco-Iranian border is not 

suited for armored warfare. 

Tehran's Views of the Controversy Over Its 

Rearmament Program 

What have Iran's leaders said about their current plans and 

aspirations and the intemational debate about them? Firstly, they 

reiterate that Iran is acquiring arms in order to modernize its 

armed forces and to replenish a depleted inventory. They claim 

that their defense budget is lower than that of their neighbors. In 

particular, they point to the Gulf Arabs who are acquiring large 

amounts of high tech weaponry which they have no idea of how 

to use, and which will increase their dependence on their Western 

patrons. 

Secondly, they note the West's motives in creating a 

controversy over Iran's arms imports: (1) to increase sales to 

Iran's neighbors because Westem economies are in depression 

and need the infusion of capital, (2) the West wishes to heighten 

tension between Iran and its neighbors so that the United States 

can expand its military presence in the Persian Gulf, (3) the sale 

of arms creates a dependency on the West, and this dependency 

in rum enables it to dominate a geostrategically important region 

containing a critical resource. ~° 

Thirdly, faced with what they see as a hostile West, the 

Iranians have adopted a conspiracy theory remarkably similar to 

9 Under the Conventional Forces in Europe Agreement Turkey will 

eventually have 2,800 tanks. It will procede with modernization of its 

armor, however. It will probably seek more of the German-built 

Leopards to supplement the 150 in its inventory. 

lo See "Niru'i Darya'i Zamen Manafe' ma dar Khalij Fars," (The 

Navy: Guardian of our Interests in the Persian Gulf), Saff, no. 155, 1371 

(1992); FBIS-NES, December 3, 1992, 37. 
158 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

Iraq's between 1988 and 1990. Tehran believes it is being set up 

as the regional bogeyman of the 1990s whereby a Western- and 

"Zionist"-inspired (and Arab-supported) attack would be launched 

against it in order to destroy its scientific and industrial 

infrastructure. ~1 Iranian officials believe that the USA, in 

particular, is behind a combination of pressures being exerted 

against the integrity of the country as a whole and the Islamic 

Republic as a polity. Officials and academics point to certain 

policies as indications of an increasingly hostile attitude toward 

the IRI: the controversy over the Iranian rearmament program; 

the worsening of relations with NATO-member Turkey; the 

exaggerated fears of Iranian influence in Central Asia; and the 

Abu Musa island dispute with the UAE in summer of 1992, 

which the West and other Arab states used to make Iran look like 

an expansionist power. 12 

Last but not least, as evidence of continued U.S. hostility 

even under the Democratic administration of Bill Clinton, 

Iranians point to the new policy of "dual containment" proposed 

by U.S. National Security Council staffer Martin Indyk, which 

classifies both Ba'thist Iraq and Islamic Iran as threats to U.S. 

national security and to regional stability in the Middle East. 

From the Iranian perspective the policy is not only designed to 

thwart the reconstruction of the country's military capabilities, but 

also to ensure that Iran does not get Western technology or the 

wherewithal to modernize and develop its economy. The 

proposed policy is not only motivated by the Democrats' fear of 

getting embroiled once more vis-a-vis Iran, it is also, say 

Iranians, a "Zionist"-inspired document intended to advance 

1~ This belief came out in discussions with Iranians during the 

author's recent trip to Tehran in mid-June 1993; see a/so FBIS-NES, 

November 20, 1992, 48. 

~2 See FBIS-NES, December 3, 1992, 37. For the views of President 

Hashemi-Rafsanjani concerning the controversy over Iranian 

rearmament, see FBIS-NES, February I, 1993, 64-68. 
AHMED HASHIM 159 

Israeli strategic interests. 

Structure of This Study 

This study attempts to give an objective analysis of Iranian 

national security concerns and perception of threat, and an 

account of the country's arms build-up over the last 5 years) 3 

Following this Introduction, the paper is divided into three parts. 

Part II examines possible Iranian motivations over the past 6 

years for their arms buildup. The paper will not deal in any great 

detail with the specifics of the lran-Iraq war which occupied the 

energies and attention of the Islamic Republic of Iran for almost 

a decade. But the war was important for the IRI in the manner 

in which it forced its officials and defense planners to take heed 

of Iranian national security concerns, to address their strategic 

failures and mistakes, and to examine the very important lessons 

it imparted to them, particularly in light of the series of defeats 

which Iran suffered in 1988. Part III examines current Iranian 

military capabilities. It is divided into a section which deals with 

domestic sources of military capabilities, and one which deals 

with arms acquisitions from abroad and reorganization of the 

various branches/services. In light of the controversy about Iran's 

arms build-up, it is critical to differentiate between what the 

country has contracted to buy and what it has actually received; 

and between what it has received and what it has actually 

integrated into its order of battle and made part of operationally 

ready forces. Iranian capabilities may be growing, but the 

country does not have the ability to project its power much 

beyond its borders. Currently the major thrust of the Iranian 

defense acquisition program is the revitalization of conventional 

13 Although domestic/regime security is an important dimension of 

national security in Iran, as it is in all Third-World states, space and the 

focus on externally-directed national security policies, defense 

procurement, and threat perceptions, does not permit us to examine the 

very critical dimension of domestic security. 
160 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

military power destroyed during the Iran-Iraq war and the 

building up of effective deterrent and retaliatory forces. Part IV 

examines Iran's endeavors in the area of weapons of mass 

destruction. Iran's attitude toward ballistic missiles and chemical 

weapons is well documented because of their extensive use 

during the Iran-Iraq war. Although Iran is suspected of seeking 

to acquire the ultimate weapon of mass destruction, namely 

nuclear weapons, this is inherently more tricky subject to acquire 

accurate information about. 

MOTIVATIONS FOR THE 

IRANIAN ARMS BUILDUP 

Iran's determination to re-build its armed forces after the lran-Iraq 

war stemmed from the military lessons learnt as a result of the 

war, their assessment of the post-war regional security 

environment, and their assessment of the post-war material needs 

of their armed forces. To avoid needless duplication of analysis 

we will look at Iranian assessment of the needs of the military in 

Part II when examining the evolution of the military and growth 

of capabilities. 

War Lessons Learnt by the Islamic Republic 

During the course of the war not only did the clerical regime 

awaken to the importance of military power as a Ibundation of 

national strength, but they began to recognize the importance of 

the material and technical elements after many years of devaluing 

their importance in war. Early in the war there many statements 

and declarations by leading officials that spiritual faith, 

ideological commitment, and morale were the determinants of 

victory. For example, Ayatollah Khomeini declared in 1982, 

"Victory is not achieved by swords, it can only be achieved by 

blood.., it is achieved by strength of faith." 

With the end of the war, officials and officers began putting 

new stress on the need for advanced weaponry. Iran's defeat by 
AHMED HASHIM 161 

a better-equipped Iraq discredited the view that ideological 

commitment, spiritual faith, and fervor (the purely human 

elements) were the sole determinants of military power and of 

victory. Probably nothing illustrates this point more than two 

sets of very different observations made by Mohsen Reza'i, 

commander of the IRGC, a force which put great stress on the 

human elements. In mid-1986 he stated: 

We do not need advanced planes and tanks for victory. 

Employment of infantry forces with light weapons, four times 

more than the number of Iraqi troops, will be enough for Iran 

to overcome the enemy. 14 

Two years later, after Iran had been defeated, the same IRGC 

commander declared that the causes of failure were that Iraq had 

heavy weapons and advanced technology at its disposal, while 

Iran did not. The Iranians began noting that professionalism, 

technical expertise, organizational rationalization (defined as the 

elimination of waste and duplication), the establishment of 

efficient logistics, acquisition of advanced weaponry, and 

thorough and extensive training in their use, are of paramount 

importance. In short, they realized that a truly effective military 

needs the human, the organizational, and the material elements 

working together in balance. 

Iraq's defeat in Operation Desert Storm by better organized 

and better trained troops reinforced in a dramatic manner the 

importance of technology in modem warfare, the need for 

coherent military organization, and highlighted western expertise 

in the art of combined arms operations characterized by 

maneuver, mobility, deep-strike into the enemy rear, massive use 

of air power and superiority in firepower. And finally, the 

Iranians were impressed by the coaltion use of psychological and 

14 BBC/SWB/ME/A/2, June 3, 1986. 
162 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

electronic warfare. 15 

The need to avoid being taken by surprise militarily was 

another painful lesson learnt by Iran. For years, Tehran feared 

strategic surprise attack at the hands of Soviet Russia. In the 

1970s Imperial Iran added Ba'thist Iraq to its list of concerns. 

When the Shah was in power the Iranians who -knew that they 

could not cope with a Soviet attack by themselves, planned a 

holding strategy against the Soviets until help arrived. But they 

did plan lightning offensives against Iraq along the central border 

region, whose terrain can support armored warfare. 

The revolution had devastated the operational readiness of the 

armed forces. After the outbreak of the war with Iraq, highranking officials like the country's first president, like AbolHasan Bani Sadr, pointed out on numerous occasions that Iran's 

military disorganization and lack of readiness contributed greatly 

to Iraq's decision to attack Iran, and to the relative ease with 

which it seized Khusistan. Bani-Sadr spent most of his brief 

period in power trying to rehabilitate the armed forces ,and its 

combat capabilities. 

On the other hand, then speaker of the Majlis, HashemiRafsanjani, blamed the Shah for constructing an army that could 

not protect Iran. Yet at a more practical level, he noted that with 

the revolutionary hiatus between 1979 and 1980, there were no 

effective forces guarding the border regions with Iraq, and that 

government officials had found that at one point there were no 

more than 50-60 tanks at the front. 

By the end of the war, Iran had armed forces it could trust 

armed with valuable combat experience, but which had lost a 

substantial part of its remaining inventory by mid-1988. The 

need for military preparedness has been one of the most 

important lessons learnt by Iran, and one way to ensure it was to 

build up the armed forces, as Hashemi-Rafsanjani said in August 

1~ For a representative Iranian view, see Colonel (Armor, Retired) 

Behzad Tirdad, "Darshaye az Jang Niruhaye Gharbe va Iraq" (Lessons 

from the War between the West and Iraq), Saff, no. 137, 1370 (1991). 
AHMED HASHIM 163 

1988, "Our armed forces must reach a level suitable for 

protecting the revolution so that no one will dare attack us. ''16 

Iranian Threat Perceptions 1988-1994 

A clearcut motive for Iran to rearm stemmed from its perception 

of the post-war regional threat environment. In May 1990, a 

senior Iranian official, Mohammed Javad Larijani, stated that 

there were two major threats to Iran at that time: (i) Iraq and (ii) 

the hostile Gulf Arab states which had not only actively helped 

Iraq in the war but whom Iran feared would actually form a USaided and abetted anti-Iranian Arab front. 17 

In the eyes of the Iranian leadership the primary enemy was 

Iraq. Iran did not see the war with that country as having ended, 

since U.N. Security Council Resolution 598 was merely a 

ceasefire and not a peace treaty. Iraq was a mischievous and 

dastardly enemy which could re-start the war anytime. On 

August 30, 1988, Ayatollah Khomeini told the Iranian nation 

that, despite the ceasefire, "We must not believe that the war is 

over. We must consider ourselves at war. ''is Even as the 

ceasefire stabilized and the threat of renewed hostilities receded, 

Iraq inexorably widened the military gap between it and Iran. 

The former continued to buy arms and to build its military 

industry. Between the ceasefire in August 1988 and the invasion 

of Kuwait two years later, Iraq "imported nearly three times as 

many arms as lran, steadily adding modem weapons and 

technology to a battle-proven force structure that suffered only 

16 FBIS-NES, August 11, 1988, 32. 

17 FBIS-NES, May 1, 1990, 30. 

is FBIS-NES, September 2, 1988, 45. 
164 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

minimal losses during the final phases of the Iran-Iraq War) 9 

Indeed, by the end of the war in 1988, Iran had fewer than 200 

operational planes and about 500 tanks, compared with about 700 

planes and more than 5,000 tanks for Iraq. 2° 

Finally, in Larijani's view, lraq and Iran were bound to 

remain locked in a struggle for regional influence and power 

because Iraq was determined to maintain (military) preponderance 

over Iran, establish itself as regional gendarme in the Persian 

Gulf, and become overlord of the Arab world. Although Larijani 

does not say this, it is clear that military power was an important 

pillar of Iraqi strategy. Last, but not least, Iran feared the 

United States, which had given Iraq wartime intelligence and had 

helped swing the tide against Iran in the last stages of the war. 

In the Iranian strategic mindset the Great Satan (the USA) had 

played a devious and important role in dissipating Iran's energy 

during the war. Iraq had not won its war alone in 1988; it had 

been ordered by its masters in Washington and Moscow to attack 

and strangle the Iranian revolution at birth. Both superpowers 

had provided weaponry and material support while the Arabs 

provided either financial support or advisers. When it seemed 

that Iraq would lose and that the conflict was threatening the oil 

flow out of the Gulf, the intemational community decided that 

lran would not be allowed to win the war; hence the increased 

presence of naval forces from Western states in the Gulf and the 

U.S. acquiescence to a Kuwaiti request to escort oil tankers out 

of the Gulf. In the course of its naval escort operations in the 

Persian Gulf, 1987-1988, the U.S. Navy confronted both Pasdaran 

and regular Iranian naval forces sinking one frigate and severely 

damaging another and destroying other smaller vessels. 

19 Anthony Cordesnmn, "The Changing Military Balance in the Gulf: 

Iraq's Invasion of Kuwait and Its Aftermath," in Brassey's Defence 

Yearbook, London: Brassey's, 1991, 221. 

2o The International Institute for Strategic Studies, The Military 

Balance, 1990-1991, London: Brassey's Publishers, 1990, 103-106. 
AHMED HASHIM 165 

Although the Iran-Iraq war was the critical event in shaping 

the evolution of Iranian national security thinking, the close of 

the 1980s witnessed other important events of global regional 

import which were to have a major impact on the IRI's foreign 

and national security policies in the post-Iran-Iraq War period. 

These included the second Gulf War and the effect of the 

collapse of the Soviet Union on Iran's northern borders. The 

Iraqi invasion of Kuwait and the subsequent arrival of foreign 

forces in Saudi Arabia created a real national security dilemma 

for Iran. Iraq's action in Kuwait convinced the Iranians that they 

must maintain their military preparedness and deterrent 

capabilities in order to thwart threats against the revolution and 

Iranian national interestsfl In Iranian eyes Saddam's Iraq was a 

militaristic, expansionist and aggressive power whose behavior 

has caused further regional instability and disorder. As President 

Hashemi-Rafsanjani put it: "The spirit of expansion and 

aggression coupled with the pride that existed in the Iraqi Ba'th 

party.., this attitude caused them to start the war against the 

Islamic Republic some time ago.., they did exactly the same 

with Kuwait in a similar move; that time they moved east and 

this time they went south. Only they know the direction that 

their arrows are pointing for the next time. ''22 Naturally, Iran 

thoroughly condemned Iraq's aggression, and President Rafsanjani 

made it clear that even if the rest of the world tacitly accepted 

the Iraqi action, Iran itself would not. 

But the international community had no intention of 

accepting such a dramatic change in the regional balance of 

power. On the other hand, the massive presence of foreign (i.e. 

Western) forces in Saudi Arabia was viewed with great unease by 

Iran. Tehran wondered loudly why the Arabs had invited 

foreigners into the region, how long these forces would stay in 

the peninsula, and whether it would have been better for all the 

21 FBIS-NES, August 15, 1990, 52. 

22 FBIS-NES, March 12, 1992, 41-42. 
166 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

regional states to work together to undo the invasion and to move 

toward some form of regional security cooperation. 

Concerning Iran's options in the crisis, an intense debate took 

place within the leadership. The leadership knew that whatever 

it decided to do would have an important impact on the country's 

national security. The post-Khomeini fractious nature of the 

Iranian political scene complicated the debate. One group of socalled "radicals" (ideological purists) contended that Iran's real 

enemy was the United States, and that Iran was morally bound 

to support Iraq. Other "radicals" like Hojjatolislam Khoeyniha 

and head of the Center for Strategic Research 23 were not so sure. 

Iraq had opened the way for the massive entrance of US forces 

into the Persian Gulf. Yet, Iran should not support Saddam in 

his rape and pillaging of Kuwait, even though Iran had no reason 

to feel sympathy for Kuwait given its financial aid to Iraq during 

the Iran-Iraq war. Khoeyniha, despite his radical credentials 

advocated a strategy of neutrality, z4 

This was exactly the position adopted by a third group 

centred around President Rafsanjani and pragmatists/realists who 

perceived things in terms of their impact on tangible national 

interests. In the view of this group, for Iran to support Saddam 

would be sheer lunacy. If the Iraqi ruler had succeeded in 

consolidiating his hold over Kuwait, he would have made 

Iraq--hitherto a geopolitically constrained state in terms of access 

to the sea--into a bona-fide naval power in the Persian Gulf. 

Iraq would then be able to compete effectively with Iran for 

supremacy over the Persian Gulf. Iraq would also get rid of its 

massive debt burden, thus giving it an enhanced resource base 

which would enable it to further widen the military gap between 

it and Iran. A dominant Iraq would be even more of a regional 

maverick and could tum on Iran again. Last but not least, what 

:3 This center is "alternatively known as the Center for National 

Strategic Studies. 

:4 In The Echo of lran, vol.XXXVNI, no.33, October 1990, 14. 
AHMED HASHIM 167 

if Iraq's adventure were to fail with the Western-led coalition 

ultimately liberating Kuwait? The Iranian president stated that he 

had no intention of committing "suicide" by aiding a potential 

loser. 

Although the 1991 war between Iraq and the US-led coalition 

did not involve Iran directly, it had both positive and negative 

outcomes as far as Iran was concemed. With the destruction of 

much of Iraq's military power during the Gulf War, there is, for 

the time being, no longer a vast imbalance of power in favor of 

Iraq. But Tehran is determined never to allow the imbalance 

which existed between 1988 and 1990 to arise again, believing 

that there is a deep-seated desire for vengeance in Baghdad 

deriving from Iran's alleged back-stabbing role during the Iraqi 

insurrections of March-April 1991. 

Iranians are not impressed by Iraq's conduct of foreign 

policy, nor by its strategic failures and military inaction during 

the time of Desert Shield, believing that Iraq could have done 

much to disrupt the political and military build-up of the 

coalition. 25 Yet Iraq remains the one neighboring Arab state that 

Iran both fears and respects. Iranian analysts seem impressed 

with and anxious over Iraq's intrinsic capabilities and powers of 

regeneration. That Saddam still remains in power is a source of 

wonderment to the Iranians, they are impressed by the ability of 

the Iraqi leader and his Ba'th party to survive during the lranIraq war, Operation Desert Storm, and two severe insurrections. 26 

Not surprisingly, Iran has cited the threat to it from Ba'thist Iraq 

as a reason for its build-up, z7 Fuahermore, he presides over a 

country which retains tremendous potential, and which will arise 

25 Conversation with Iranian analysts in Tehran, June 1993. 

26 Observations of the author after talking with Iranian analysts at the 

Center for Strategic Research, June 1993. 

27 Andre Borowiec, "Iranian Defends Arms Build-up, Cites Iraqi 

Threat," Washington Times, February 20, 1992, p.9. 
168 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

again. The U.N.'s disarmament of Iraq does not inspire longterm confidence in Iran because it is seen as a temporary solution 

imposed on a defeated country and because like the rest of the 

world the Iranians have been very impressed by the extent of the 

Iraqi military-industrial complex and by the tremendous ingenuity 

displayed in its construction. 2s There are indications currently that 

Iran and Iraq, both of whom are targeted by the Clinton 

administration's dual containment policy, maybe trying to 

stabilize bilateral relations and to remove the major irritants in 

their relationship with one another. But a shared strategic 

outlook is unlikely, and both remain major threats to one another. 

Nor is Tehran likely to feel any more at ease with reports 

about the allegedly impressive revitalization of Iraqi military 

power. Most of these reports are intended to ensure that the 

determination to disarm Iraq remains intact. It is also argued in 

the press in the West, Israel, and some Gulf states that a 

resurgence of Iraqi military power would be a threat to the Arab 

states of the Gulf and to Israel. z9 But almost nowhere is mention 

made of the threat posed to Iran by the revival of Iraqi military 

power. If one were to admit that Iraqi military revival represents 

a threat to Iran, then one would be forced to concede the 

legitimacy of much of Iran's rearmament program. 

Establishing security and ensuring Iranian interests in the 

Persian Gulf are of paramount importance for the IRI. A major 

problem exists in that Iran and its Arab neighbors do not see eyeto-eye on what actually constitutes security in the Persian Gulf; 

and when Iran exercises what it sees as its legitimate interests in 

the area, it succeeds in frightening its weaker neighbors. More 

28 Observations of the author following meeting with analysts at the 

Center for Strategic Research, June 1993. 

29 Other Arab countries like Egypt and Syria have been quite anxious 

about what they perceive to be--and quite rightly so---fanatical singleminded pursuit of the disarmament of Iraq by the "international 

community." 
AHMED HASHIM 169 

to the point, the IRI, like it predecessor Imperial Iran, does have 

genuine security concerns in the Persian Gulf. For the Islamic 

Republic these include securing unconstrained access to the 

waters of the Gulf, securing the free flow of its oil and of its 

imports, fear of the domination of the Persian Gulf region by the 

West, and unease over its neighbors' large arms purchases after 

the Gulf war. 

After Iraq's invasion of Kuwait, there was a brief warming 

trend in Gulf Arab-Iranian relations. But the goodwill on both 

sides did not last long. The decision of Iran's neighbors to 

exclude lran from their plans for Gulf security raised hackles in 

Tehran. 3° As Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Velayati stated 

at one point, "Our most important and strategic border is our 

southem coastline, the Gulf, the Straits of Hormuz and the Sea 

of Oman. This region is vital to us .... We cannot remain 

indifferent to its fate. ''31 Furthermore, the Iranian tendency to 

adopt airs of superiority with respect to the peninsular states has 

not helped their case much, but this is not a "failing' of the 

current regime. Coupled with Iran's determination to deal with 

threats to its tangible national interests in the Persian Gulf is the 

existence of the deeply ingrained Iranian view that the Persian 

Gulf is Persian despite what the upstart Arabs say or do. Thus 

an Iranian naval and military build-up in the Persian Gulf area 

would not only be designed to protect vital and tangible national 

interests but also to show the flag and to impress upon the Arabs 

that the presence of Iran in the Gulf is a fact. 32 

3o See, for example, Nora Boustany, "Iran Seeks Wider Mideast 

Role," Washington Post, October 12, 1992, A25, A28. 

3~ Quoted in Mohammed Ziarati, "Iranian National Security," Middle 

East International, April 3, 1992, p.18. 

32 On the importance of the Persian Gulf in Iranian nationalist 

thinking, see Hooshmand Mirfaki~aei, "The Imperial Iranian Armed 

Forces and the Revolution of 1978-1979," (Ph.D dissertation, S.U.N.Y. 
170 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

Iran has vehemently opposed the involvement in Gulf 

security of both non littoral powers like Egypt and Syria, and 

Western powers. 33 Iranian concems about Gulf security and 

naturally its own national security are heightened by the now 

permanent presence of Westem forces (primarily American) in 

the Persian Gulf and the close strategic relations the USA has 

established with Kuwait. Although this presence is currently 

directed at Iraq, Iranian officials see it as a long-term threat to 

their national interests, territorial integrity and the security of 

their revolution because of the West's rising fear of Iran and 

Islam. 34 

Another serious problem emerged in Arab-Iranian relations 

in mid-1992 when Iranian officials suddenly decided to throw 

foreigners out of the island of Abu Musa, over which it shares de 

facto joint sovereignty with the United Arab Emirates. This 

action caused a storm of protest throughout the Arab world. The 

latter feared that Iran was about to annex the whole island, and 

fears grew that Iran was reverting to the old expansionist and 

irredentist policies of the Shah, who had sent the Iranian military 

in 1971 to assert Iranian sovereignty over the island. Tehran, 

clearly taken aback by the vehemence of the Arab response, 

thought that the issue was magnified by the non-littoral Arab 

powers in order to impress upon the Gulf Arabs that they needed 

outside protection. 

Buffalo, 1984), 136-137. 

33 E.g.,Mohammed Ali Besharati, the Iranian Foreign Ministry's 

Under-Secretary, stated in early 1992, "The region does not need 

foreign military forces of any sort. This was our position before the 

Iran-Iraq war and before the occupation of Kuwait, and it remains our 

position today," in Mideast Mirror, January 10, 1992, 13. 

For example see the interview with Major General Mohsen Rezai, 

commamder of the IRGC, in Jane's Defense Weekly, November 16, 

1991, 980. 
AHMED HASHIM 171 

Iran is not impressed by Western calls for arms control in the 

Middle East in the aftermath of the Gulf War. They are seen as 

plans by the West to funnel large quantities of sophisticated 

weaponry to their regional allies and puppets while keeping 

potential enemies of the West disarmed. The collapse of the 

communist menace and the existence of surplus sophisticated 

weaponry Westem powers do not need is coupled, in Tehran's 

view, with the West's need to keep their domestic arms industries 

"alive. 3~ The Iranians feel that they to have to keep pace. As an 

editorial in the Tehran Times pointed out: "It's our right to 

prepare the defense of our territorial integrity at a time when the 

US is selling some of the Gulf countries the most sophisticated 

weapons .,,36 

Iran also faces momentous changes on its northern flank. 

Given the historical threat posed by the USSR, Iran ought to 

have unequivocally welcomed its collapse in 1991, indeed, 

President Hashemi-Rafsanjani expressed joy that the discredited 

Marxist ideological system had finally expired. Officials of the 

IRI have admitted that the subjugation of the region to Soviet 

control for so many years has left them with little knowledge or 

understanding of their northern neighbors despite shared cultural, 

ethnic and religious values in most instances. But Iran now 

perceives an opportunity to expand its political and economic 

relations with its northern neighbors. 37 But the resulting 

instability and conflict between former Soviet republics--the 

emergence of independent but fragile Muslim republics in Central 

35 See, for example, the commentary in Resalat, October 29, 1991, 

1, 12. 

36 Cited in Claude van England, "Iran Steps Up Arms Purchases to 

Prop Military," Christian Science Monitor, April 20, 1992, 4. 

37 For more details see the Tehran Times interview with Abbas 

Maleki, Director of the Institute for Political and International Studies 

in Tehran as exercepted in FBIS-NES, March 5, 1993, pp.59-60. 
172 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

Asia which are being courted by Turkey, the West and Israel, and 

civil war in Georgia and war between Azerbaijan and 

Armenia---in a wide swath of territory on Iran's northem borders 

have been cause for alarm in Tehran. Continued instability in 

Central Asian republics like Tajikistan, spill-over effects of ethnic 

conflict, 38 and the possibility of Turkish success in establishing 

influence in the area are the major problems for Iranian national 

security. Matters were much simpler and straightforward when 

there was just one sovereign power to deal with. 39 

However, the major threat to Iranian national security on its 

northern flank currently stems from the sanguinary ArmenianAzeri war over the Nagomo-Karabagh, a territory partly inhabited 

by Armenians but which lies in the former Soviet republic of 

Azerbaijan. The Armenians have scored impressive victories and 

have captured almost 30 percent of Azerbaijan. Iran's concern 

over the growing instability in the Caucasus has been 

underscored by its movement of two divisions of infantry to the 

border with Azerbaijan, and by the fact that its initial support for 

Christian Armenia to counterbalance Turkish support for their 

kinsmen and fellow Muslims, the Azeris, is wearing thin. 

Specifically, it fears a major influx of Azeri refugees into 

northern Iran for reasons that are both financial--Iran has the 

38 In this context the most troubling conflict is the one between 

Armenia and Azerbaijan over Nagorno-Karabakh. The strategic 

situation has taken a turn for the worse for the Azeris--who have an 

unstable government and poorly-trained forces--as the Armenians of 

Nagorno-Karabkh have chalked up some impressive victories, capturing 

one-fifth of Azerbaijan. Naturally, Turkey which supports its Muslim 

Azeri kinsmen is increasingly worried. Iran which had hitherto 

supported Christian Armenia is now worried by the impact of this 

runaway Armenian victory on the security of its border regions---it 

certainly does not want any more foreign refugees straining its meager 

resources--and the impact on its own large Azeri population. 

39 Observations at the Center for Strategic Research, Tehran, June 

1993. 
AHMED HASHIM 173 

largest refugee population of any nation in the world---and 

ideological--northern Iran is inhabited by Iranian Azeris who are 

growing more and more agitated about the disaster taking place 

in independent Azerbaijan. The Iranian govemment is also 

worried that the emergence of an independent Azerbaijan in the 

north could lead to rising demands for the unification of former 

Soviet Azerbaijan and Iranian Azerbaijan. Fearful that its own 

Azeris might be infected with an irredentist Azeri nationalism, 

Tehran has been returning Azerbaijani refugees home as quickly 

as possible, and has promised to provide financial aid for the 

upkeep and maintainance of refugee camps in former Soviet 

Azerbaijan itself. 4° 

The most direct military threat from the north emanates from 

Iran's large and powerful secular Muslim neighbor which is a 

member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Turkey, no 

longer preoccupied by the Soviet threat--but still naturally 

concemed by the emergence of a Russian behemoth with a 

muscular foreign policy--is now able to pay more attention to its 

southern flank. 41 It has re-directed much of its forces to the 

south and during the Gulf War it became a base for aerial attacks 

by coalition airforces against Iraq. In 1986 the Turkish General 

Staff instituted a ten-year program to modernize a technologically 

backward infantry-based army by transforming it into a smaller 

more sophisticated and potent armored and mechanized army 

with more firepower and mobility. The air force is in the process 

of retiring obsolete planes and integrating scores of F-16s into its 

40 See Amalia von Gent, "Azerbaijan: Oil, Armenians, Russians and 

Refugees," Swiss Review of World Affairs, no.2, February 1994, 24. 

41 This does not mean that Turkey is not worried by threats from 

Russia, which continues to retain forces in the Urals and the Caucasus 

and remains heavily involved in the southern republics of the former 

Soviet Union. See Mohammed Ziarati, "Turkish security policy ,after 

the Cold War," Middle East International, February 5, 1993, 19. 
174 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

order of battle and is acquiring air refuelling tankers. 42 At the 

moment, the Iranians profess not to be unduly worried by a 

Turkish military threat to their country; 43 yet they have expressed 

worry over what they perceive to be ominous developments, 

including the entry of Turkish forces into Iraq to suppress 

dissident Turkish Kurds, while at the same time lending support 

to the enclave of the Iraqi Kurds, extensive US support for the 

upgrading and modernization of the Turkish armed forces, the 

growing role of Turkey as NATO's southernmost bastion, and as 

a potential channel for the application of pressure against Iran. 

EVOLUTION OF IRANIAN 

MILITARY POWER 

Defense Resources and the 

Defense Industries Organization 

In 1986, the Iranian defense minister declared that the defense 

industries of Iran have priority over other industries, adding that 

the fom~er ensure a measure of sell-sufficiency and protect Iran's 

independence politically, economically, and militarily. The war 

with Iraq also provided the Iranians with a painful lesson in that 

it showed Iran was too overly dependent on outside suppliers for 

weapons systems and also for spare pans. Too often Iranian 

offensives were either put on hold or failed because of inadequate 

42 Mohammed Ziarati, Turkish security policy after the Cold War," 

19; Bruce George and Mark Stenhouse, "Turkey Comes to Terms with 

Its Vulnerability," Jane's Defence Weekly, July 2, 1988, 1377-1379; 

Giovanni de Briganti, "Turkish Defense: Modernization Plan Is at 

Crossroads," Defense News. August 3 l-September 6, 1992, 6; Michael 

McNamara, "Turkey's Modernization Serves the West," Defense News, 

November 18, 1991, 22-23. 

43 Conversations with Iranian analysts in Tehran, June 1993. 
AHMED HASHIM 175 

supplies of arms and munitions. Finally, the Iranians, like other 

Middle Eastern states have learnt that a foreign supplier as a 

source of arms is never completely reliable all the time, and may 

choose or be pressured into not supplying arms. For example, at 

the height of the Iran-Iraq war in 1984, it was reported that the 

Soviet Union tried to pressure China and North Korea--then 

Iran's two biggest suppliers--to stop providing Irma with arms, 

while the Unites States was ostensibly trying to pressure other 

westem states from providing that country with spare parts and 

light weapons. The development of Iran's defense industrial 

infrastructure will not be an insuperable burden because a defense 

base already exists in the country, and is over 60 years old. The 

Shah had wanted to make Iran self-sufficient in certain areas of 

military production as part of his ambitious long-range strategy 

of industrialization. By 1979 the Iranian defense industries could 

assemble artillery pieces, small arms, large-calibre weapons, 

rockets, and spare parts for armored vehicles. Iran Aircraft 

Industries built spare parts for the F-5s, while Iran Helicopter 

Industries, a joint-venture with Bell Helicopter Corporation, 

assembled and maintained the country's large fleet of 

helicopters. 44 Despite this, Iran's defense industrial efforts under 

the ancien regime were still low-key, there were only four major 

arms production complexes. Since the revolution a further 240 

plants have been built as well as thousands of military repair 

shops and depots, most of which are under the management of 

the Defense Industries Organization. 

The leaders of the Islamic Republic believe that the defense 

industries built by the Shah were too dependent on Western 

experts and technicians loath to transfer any real technical skills 

44 On the Shah's defense industries, see Anoushiravan Ehteshami, 

"Iran's Revolution: Fewer Ploughshares, More Swords," Army Defence 

Quarterly Journal, vol.20, no.l, January 1990, 41-50; Eckehart 

Ehrenberg, Rftstung und Wirtschaft am Golf: lran und seine Nachbarn 

1965-1978 (Armaments and Economics in the Gulf: Iran and its 

Neighbors), Hamburg: Deutsches Orient Institut, 1978. 
176 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

to Iranians. The Iranians also are aware that not only is there no 

such thing as military autarky, but that their defense industries 

,are currently unable to design, develop and build sophisticated 

weapons platforms. 

Consequently, they have adopted a two-pronged strategy. 

Through the "self-sufficiency jihads" which exist in each branch 

of the military, Iran has learnt the tricks of repair, maintainance, 

and modification of weapons systems. For example, according 

to the Iranians, the "self-sufficiency jihad" of the ground forces 

have built chemical decontamination equipment for personnel 

and for military vehicles, field telephones, and communication 

equipment for M-60 and Chieftain tanks. By relying as much as 

possible on its own cadre to engage in depot and workshop level 

activities, it not only avoids dependence on foreign specialists, 

but also saves on foreign exchange and advances its own 

technical knowledge. 45 

Iran's medium-term goal is an industrial-military 

infrastructure closely tied to key sectors of the civilian industry, 

which will build components for weapons obtained from foreign 

suppliers, be able to make major modifications to foreign 

weapons, and to mass produce simple weapons based on 

indigenous designs. Because Iran has faced severe shortages of 

spares and of components for its U.S.-made equipment since the 

revolution, the country has developed a considerable capacity for 

modernization/retrofit and has acquired the capability to 

acquire--through clandestine or circuitous importation routes---or 

to produce the spares and components that will enable it to keep 

existing equipment in service for extended periods of time. 

The Iranians claim they can now produce reconnaissance 

cameras, laser range-finders, artillery fire control systems, 

armored personnel carriers, gravity bombs, light aircraft (the Fajr 

and Parastu), small naval craft, remotely piltJted planes, and 122- 

45 See "Jihad Khodkafa'i Niru'i Zamini Sazmaneh Portalash Amma 

Gonumm" (The Self-Sufficiency Jihad of the Ground Forces: a LittleKnown but Important Unit), Saff, no.106, 1365 (1986), 31-33. 
AHMED HASHIM 177 

mm artillery pieces. They have also made modifications to 

existing platforms, fixed radar systems, and produced ammunition 

and spare parts for Soviet-built equipment captured from the 

Iraqis. The Defense Industries Organization has also made a 

debut in intemational arms exhibitions. In early 1989 it appeared 

at the SECARM exhibition in Libreville, Gabon, with assortment 

of indigenously produced and reverse-engineered weapons. More 

recently Iran also participated in an arms show in the UAE. But 

Iran is unlikely to develop a large export market. Its neigbors are 

not likely to buy weapons from it for political reasons, and most 

of what it produces is at the low end of the technological 

spectrum and is more likely to attract the poorer states of the 

Third World. 

Developing an export market is the least of the Iranians' 

worries. Iran's defense industries have been plagued with 

duplication of efforts, tremendous waste, poor quality control, 

inadequate storage facilities, and corruption. For a long time the 

regular military and Pasdars had parallel but separate weapons 

production efforts. The Pasdar endeavor under the control of the 

IRGC Ministry was subjected to a stinging critique in the Majlis 

in late 1988. When he was appointed Minister of Defense and 

Logistics in August in 1989, Akbar Torkan moved to integrate 

these separate efforts. 

Iran also needs to invest huge amounts of capital into the 

industry to expand the personnel base and Research and 

Development for it to become efficient and more technically 

sophisticated. When the revolution broke out, thousands of 

qualified professionals fled the country, and for many years the 

educational system has remained in a shambles. Hence, the 

country lacks sufficient technical, scientific, and engineering 

cadre in both the civilian and military fields. President 

Hashemi-Rafsanjani has often called upon expatriates to return 

and serve the country. But with the current unsettled economic, 

soical, and political not too many are keen to retum. 

Iran's existing research centers and higher education 

institutions have been deemed sub-standard by the govermnent 
178 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

for many reasons. There is a stifling and obstructive educational 

bureaucracy and an archaic university examination system which 

are insensitive to student needs, wishes and educational 

aspirations. There is a lack of creativity, initiative, and research 

ability among the student body, since many are forced into fields 

in which they have no interest. The research and development 

structure in Iran is weak because there is no culture of research 

and because of the poor training of researchers. Finally, the 

institutions of higher education suffer from inadequate resources: 

"The libraries of many of the universities in Iran do not comply 

with world and academic standards, and the existing resources are 

in some cases old and unusable. ''46 In order to improve the 

situation several steps were suggested, such as giving students 

more initiative and freedom in their educational choices, 

improving research and development, obtaining more books, 

equipment, publications from outside, and establishing contact 

with the world's scientific circles. 

The Status of the Armed Forces: Evolution, 

Acquisitions, and Outlook 

The Rebuilding of Iranian Air Power: The Imperial Iranian Air 

Force was the pride of the Iranian armed forces. This service 

was the Shah's favorite, and as such the Iranian monarch---who 

was an avid pilot himself--ensured that it received the greatest 

attention in terms of resources and qualified personnel. But the 

Shah was not merely building a prestige service, he was seeking 

to make the air force Iran's premier deterrent capability. By 

1979, after a half decade of large-scale acquisitions, the Imperial 

Iranian Air Force was the most advanced not only in the Middle 

East but also in the entire Third World, and included almost 200 

F-4 Phantom fighter-bombers, 77 of the sophisticated F-14 

Tomcat interceptors, over 150 F-5 short-range interceptors, one 

46 Quoted in FBIS-NES, October 27, 1988, 54. 
AHMED HASHIM 179 

squadron of Boeing 707 aerial re-fueling tankers, and a transport 

fleet consisting of 64 C-130E/H Hercules, 6 Boeing 747s, and a 

variety of light transports. On the eve of the revolution the 

Shah was planning to spend several biUion more dollars on the 

latest generation U.S.-made fighters like the F-16. In short, the 

Imperial Iranian Air Force--an overwhelmingly American 

creation--was a high quality force with impressive offensive and 

defensive capabilities. 47 

Despite some early successes in the Iran-Iraq war, when it 

showed itself to be more aggressive and armed with greater 

initiative than its counterpart the Iraq Air Force, the 

technologically advanced Iranian Air Force ultimately was not 

able to overcome the many obstacles encountered as a result of 

revolution, combat induced wear and tear, and shortages of spare 

parts. Ravaged by profound political divisions with the onset of 

the revolution, as hundreds of technical warrant officers joined 

the anti-Shah movement, then by a precipitous decline in 

operational readiness caused by the withdrawal of American 

experts, imprisonment of hundreds of Iran's best pilots, collapse 

of the computerized inventory system and of command and 

control, the air force was a shadow of its former self when the 

war commenced. 48 

47 Robert Pranger and Dale Tahtinen, "American Policy Options in 

Iran and the Persian Gulf," in American Enterprise Institute Foreign 

Policy and Defense Review, vol.1, no.2, 1979, 12-14. 

48 On the problems of the Iranian Air Force, see Anthony Tucker, 

"The Gulf Air War," Armed Forces, June 1987, 270-271; Ronald 

Bergquist, The Role of Air Power in the lran-lraq War, Maxwell Air 

Force Base: Air University Press, 1988, 25-26. For representative 

Iranian veiws, see "Goftegu ba Baradar Sarhang-khaliban Hushang 

Sadeghm Farmandeh Niru'i Hava'i Artesh Jumhumiyeh Islami Iran 

(Interview with Air Colonel Hushang Sadegh, Commander of the Air 

Force of the Armed Forces of the Islamic Republic of ban), Saff, no.74, 

1364 (1985), 14-16, 62-72; "Goftegu ba Farmandeh Niru'i Hava'i Artesh 

Jumhuriyeh Islami," (Interview with the Commander of the Air Force 
180 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

Yet Iranian sources claim that, despite its problems, the air 

force was the most prepared branch of the regular military when 

the war broke out. In a 1983 interview with Saff, the Speaker of 

the Majlis Hashemi-Rafsanjani noted that the air force had played 

an important role in supporting Iran's ground forces at the front, 

in defending Iran's territorial waters, and in halting Iraqi armored 

thrusts into Khuzistan. 49 

The operational capabilities of Iran's American-built planes 

declined as the war dragged on. By 1984, the Iranian Air Force 

had no more than 55 F-5s, 50 or so F-4s, and 12 F-14s 

operational. 5° The Iranians were obliged to buy second-rate 

fighters from the People's Republic of China and North Korea. 

Nonetheless, the air force remained pivotal in Iranian military 

thinking. In 1986, the Iranians instituted a 15-year plan for longterm recovery and re-building of the capabilities of their air force 

under the helm of the Air Force commander, Mansur Sattari, who 

was given a mandate to engage in a large-scale reorganization 

and revitalization of this branch. 

With the end of the Iran-lraq War, Hashemi-Rafsanjani 

reiterated the importance of the air force when he stated, that 

despite the end of the war and the losses sustained by the air 

force, (it) "should still remain strong so that no one will entertain 

any thoughts of attacking this country," adding later that "the 

of the Armed Forces of the Islamic Republic), Saff, no.107, 1367 

(1988), 32-36. 

49 See "Deedgahaye Riyasat Majlis shura'i Islami Darbareh naqsh 

Artesh," (The Speaker of the Majlis views the role of the military), Saff, 

no.50, 1362, 8-12, 18-19; see also "Goftegu ba Fannandeh Niru'i 

Hava'i" (Interview with the Air Force Commander), Saff, no.98, 1366 

(1988), 12. 

50 Anoushiravan Ehteshami, "The Military Balance in the Gulf and Its 

Chequered Career," in Charles Davies (ed.), After the War: lraq, lran 

and the Arab Gulf, Chichester, England: Carden Publishers, 1990, pp. 

358-359. 
AHMED HASHIM 181 

government and the Majlis have seen the strength of the Air 

Force in the war.., they will strive to complete its offensive 

and defensive chain.., and, God willing.., the Air Force will 

be one of the strongest forces in the region in the future. ''5~ 

One of the most important achievements of the long-term 

modernization plan has been the creation of an Aeronautical/Air 

University. According to the commandant of the university, 

Brigadier "Ali Akbar Showki, the school was designed to meet 

the pressing need for pilots, warrant officers, technicians, ground 

crew, and engineers in order to enhance the "operational 

capability (of the air force) and to improve operational and 

maintainance systems. ''52 The Iranians have been particularly 

keen to train their own pilots, technicians, and crew within Irma 

itself, in order to avoid squandering scarce resources in training 

them abroad and "contamination" of the air force by foreign 

ideas. The suspicion with which pilots, in particular, were 

viewed by the clerical regime, was underscored by frequent 

defections of pilots with their planes to neighboring countries 

during the war. 

The modernization plan also involves keeping the inventory 

of American-built fighters airworthy tor as long as possible. Due 

to a lack of spare parts, degraded avionics, and inoperable 

weapons systems, many of these planes are not combat capable, 

and many have been mothballed. Yet Iran, which thinks very 

highly of its American planes, desperately wants to keep them 

flying. In a very revealing interview with the Financial Times of 

London, Akbar Torkan, the former Minister of Defense and 

Logistics, stated that maintaining the flyability and raising the 

combat capabilities of these planes is a priority. He feels that 

Iran can keep them flying for another twenty years if it ensures 

a high level of maintainance, and can obtain upgraded avionics 

51 FBIS-NES, November 18, 1988, 49. 

52 Quoted in FBIS-NES, September 17, 1992, 38. 
182 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

and the necessary spare parts. 5s Iran apparently has had some 

success in upgrading and providing spare parts for the fleet of F4s and F-5s, as this can be done without recourse to the United 

States, as there is a sizeable inventory of these planes in the 

world. The F-14s are not only more complicated, they are flown 

only by the U.S. Navy and the Iranian Air Force. 

The time will come, however, when the Iranians will be 

faced with the issue of what to do when the fleet dwindles and 

becomes totally obsolete. Given the tenor of Iranian-American 

relations, the United States will not in the foreseeable future 

provide Iran with high performance fighters. The only other 

large-scale supplier is financiaUy-strapped Russia, which has 

proved willing to sell high-quality fighters. Iranian defense 

magazines are increasingly featuring articles extolling the virtues 

of Russian planes likr the MIG-29. 54 The first sigtfificant arms 

deal with the former Soviet Union came in mid-1989 when the 

latter agreed to sell Iran a squadron of MIG-29 Fulcrum air 

superiority fighters and to provide help in establishing an air 

defense network. In late 1990, the Soviets exhibited in Tehran, 

the MIG-31 Foxhound, a long-range interceptor equipped with a 

large phased-array radar and a shoot-down/look-down capability; 

and the SU-27 Flanker, which is an advanced all-weather air 

superiority fighter. Iran has not yet received any of these planes, 

but their acquisition would be logical in light of deficiencies in 

air defenses. 

Much has been made of the 91 Soviet-built Iraqi warplanes 

that fled to Iran at the height of the coalition aerial assault on 

Iraq in January 1991. Some of these planes like the SU-20/22s 

are obsolete, yet they make up almost 50% of the planes Iran so 

fortuitously acquired. Iran acquired only four of the coveted 

53 Financial Times, February 8, 1993, 5,7. 

54 For example see, "MIG-29, Havapayma Masum beh Rita" (MIG-29, 

a Plane called Rita), Majallah Parvaz (Flight Magazine), nos.12-13, 

1371 (1992). 
AHMED HASHIM 183 

MIG-29s, and seven of the potent ground-attack and close airsupport SU-25s. At the same time, Iran acquired all 24 of Iraq's 

newest Soviet planes, the SU-24 Fencer, which is a twin-seat 

long-range strike and interdiction aircraft with the capability to 

carry a large bomb-load. However, all these planes were flown 

to Iran without logistical support, spare parts or maintainence 

manuals. At the time, Iran had a squadron of modem Soviet 

planes that it was just beginning to integrate into its force 

structure. Iran did not have sufficient Soviet-trained pilots or 

ground crews to maintain the equivalent of 4 squadrons of Soviet 

planes that appeared out of the blue. There were reports in early 

1992 that Russia was going to provide Iran with technical 

expertise and spare parts in order to make the Iraqi planes 

operational again. 55 Yet, later that same year it was reported that 

Iran was going to sell the Soviet-built planes to the China, in 

retum for the transfer of technology by the Chinese to Iran. 56 

Yet other reports suggest that Iran has integrated the MiG-29s 

and the SU-24s into its regular air force and IRGC air force order 

of battle. 

When Iranian Air Force Commander Mansur Sattari visited 

Moscow in July 1991, Iran and the USSR concluded a $6 billion 

arms deal designed to re-equip the Iranian Air Force and the 

ground forces. The air force segment of the agreement allegedly 

called for the delivery of an additional 100 MiG-29s, the 

construction of a MiG assembly plant in the future, and the 

delivery of a squadron of SU-24s in order to supplement the 

squadron of Iraqi SU-24s inherited at the height of the Gulf war 

of 1991. Military links between Iran and the USSR were not 

severed following the Soviet Union's collapse. Indeed, Russia 

needs more than ever to sell aMls which are an important source 

of hard currency for its strapped economy, and has indicated that 

it will continue to play an instrumental role in rebuilding the 

5s See Mideast Mirror, January 9, 1992, 20. 

~6 See FBIS-NES, November 18, 1992, 49. 
184 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

Iranian Air Force and in training its personnel. 

Russia is designing high quality fighters; its latest generation 

of war planes have received high praise at intemational air 

shows. But Russia as an arms supplier poses tremendous 

problems. First, the country is in chaos and cannot be trusted to 

be timely with delivery of weapons, spare parts and technical 

advice. Second, it is susceptible to pressure from the West and 

could be persuaded to reconsider its arms relationship with the 

IRI. Third, Russo-Iranian relations could deteriorate because of 

political differences in Central Asia, and instability in the 

Caucasus. Russian foreign ministry officials have made it clear 

that the continuation of good Russo-Iranian relations depended on 

responsible Iranian behavior in Central Asia, by which is 

presumably meant that Iran should avoid encouraging Islamist 

groups in these new nations. 

Nonetheless, there have been some alarmist reports about the 

growth of Iranian air power; for example, one analyst reported 

that Iran's Air Force would soon grow to 400. 57 In July 1992 it 

was reported that Iran and Russia had concluded a massive arms 

deal which included the sale of 24 MiG-31 interceptors, two IL76 Mainstay airbome waming and command and control radar 

aircraft, An-72 maritime reconnaissance aircraft, 48 more MiG-29 

air superiority fighters, and 24 MiG-27 ground-attack fighters. 

Despite denials by Moscow, these reports also asserted that this 

arms deal included a squadron of 12 Tu-22M Backfire supersonic 

bombers, an airplane with an unrefueled combat radius allowing 

it to strike targets in the entire Middle East, South and Central 

Asia, much of North Africa, and southeastern and central Europe, 

which makes Russian denials credible. 58 

57 See Kenneth Timmerman, "Iran Poised to become Regional 

Superpower," Mednews, vol.5, January 20, 1992, 1-2. 

ss For more details, see Glen Howard and Bob Kramer, "Backfires to 

Iran: Increased Combat Potenti,'d or Headache?" in Notes on Russia and 

Central Eurasia, The Foreign Systems Research Center of Science 
AHMED HASHIM 185 

Air Defense Systems. In the mid-1960s the Iranians began noting 

acute deficiencies in their air defenses. In 1970 the Iranians 

ordered the Marconi Radar Systems consisting of mobile air 

defense radars and communications systems from Britain. In 

1975 a very critical US Senate report pointed out the glaring 

weaknesses of Iranian air defenses when it declared that: 

The operational capability of the IIAF (Imperial Iranian Air 

Force) is hampered by the lack of commitment to air defense. 

The Iranian Air Defense Command does not appear to have the 

support at the highest levels anywhere near that given to 

acquisition of advanced aircraft. IIAF deficiencies in such 

areas as radar, automatic data processing, and implementation 

of the I-Hawk (anti-aircraft missiles) program leave the air 

force exposed to attack. 

By the mid-1970s the Shah of Iran had developed an ambitious 

air defense program called "Seek Sentry" which would have 

created a ground-based radar system to cover the whole country, 

linked army and air force HAWK surface-to-air missiles, and 

established point defense of critical and vulnerable installations 

like airbases and oil refineries. Its F-14 fighters also would have 

Applications International Corporation, Denver, CO; August 20, 1992, 

3; Norman Friedman, "Iranian Air Threat Emerging," Proceedings, 

September 1992, 123. Estimates of the size of the arms deal---which 

includes other weapons systems--range from a low of $2.5 billion to ,as 

high as S11 billion. It is difficult to see how a f'mancially strapped Iran 

can spend the latter sum of money on its armed forces. For the size of 

the air force as of 1994, see The Military Balance 1993-1994, IISS, 

London: Brassey's, 1993, 115-116; and Shlomo Gazit. et al. The Middle 

East Military Balance 1992-! 993, Jaffee Center for Strategic Studies, 

Tel Aviv University, Boulder: Westview Press, 1993. 
186 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

been linked into the network. 59 

The fuU-scale "Seek Sentry" program would have been 

prohibitively expense, and when Iran suffered a budgetary crisis 

in the latter 1970s it was scaled back considerably. Even then, 

little of the scaled-back program had been implemented when the 

revolution occurred, and the revolutionary government claimed 

that much of the Shah's program would have left gaps in 

coverage of the southern and southwestem parts of the country. 

The revolutionary govemment naturally blamed the United States 

for focussing the program on the Soviet threat. The Americans 

left behind partially installed ground radar systems and poorlytrained technicians. 6° For whatever reason, poor radar coverage 

facing Iraq contributed to Iranian vulnerability to air attack 

during the Iran-Iraq war. 6~ Iran's air defenses were so bad that 

lraqis were able to use their slow Soviet-built TU-16 and TU-22 

bombers, to bomb from high altitude with impunity. Iraqi air 

raids on Tehran, other cities, and on industrial installations 

became quite serious from 1985 onwards, forcing Iran to 

approach both the Soviets and the French--both of which were 

Iraq's biggest arms suppliers--for surface-to-air missiles. Iran in 

particular sought unsuccessfully to buy the highly coveted French 

Crotale SAM. As the war progressed, Iraq acquired more 

sophisticated longer-range planes like the French-built Mirage F 1 

and in-flight refueling capabilities, and more and more of Iran 

59 On Iran's air defense program under the Shah, see Eckehart 

Ehrenberg, Rustung und Wirtschaft am Golf." lran und seine Nachbarn 

(1965-1978), 31-33. 

60 "Pas az Farar Amerika'i, Radarhaye Niru'i Hava'i Cheguneh 

Amadeh Kar Shod" (How the Air Defense Radar Systems Were Made 

Operational following the Departure of the Americans), Saff, no.53, 

1363 (1984), 28-33. 

~ "Iran's Military Preparedness Crucial at This Time," Tehran Times, 

December 31, 1990, 2. 
AHMED HASHIM 187 

came under threat. A more competent air force than Iraq's would 

have been to do more massive damage to Iran, ultimately though, 

Iraq's economic war of attrition was successful in that it damaged 

Iran's ability to export its oil, and had an adverse impact on Iran's 

motivation and readiness to prosecute the war until victory. 62 In 

February 1992, the Russian arms carrier Ivan Moskalenko 

delivered the first batch of SA-5 Gammon long-range SAMS, and 

Iran is planning to buy the SA-11 Gadfly and SA-13 mobile 

surface-to-air missiles. 

Revitalization of Iranian Naval Power: Under the Shah, 

Iran's navy was the largest and most modem in the Persian Gulf. 

With its destroyers, frigates, corvettes, and amphibious capability 

consisting of hovercraft, landing craft and three battalions of 

marines, it had a theoretically impressive capability to project 

power anywhere on the shores of the Persian Gulf. 63 On the eve 

of the Iranian Revolution, the Shah made impressive and 

ambitious plans for the future of the Imperial Iranian Navy. Iran 

was planning to go to the Netherlands and West Germany, and 

according to sources the scale of the purchases were staggering: 

sixty-five vessels and submarines with a total value of $5 

billion. 64 

Like its predecessor, the current government in Tehran sees 

the Persian Gulf as a waterway critical to its economic well-being 

62 See Eliyahu Kanovsky, The Economy of lran: Past, Present, and 

Future, Final Report SPC 1415, April 1992, 14. 

63 For the inventory of weapons, see The Military Balance, 1978- 

1979, International Institute for Strategic Studies, London, 1978, 37. 

64 Nicholas Cumming-Bruce, "West GennaJls, Dutch Compete for 

Massive Naval Orders," Middle East Economic Digest, March 10, 1978, 

13; "Irml Planning Massive Naval Build-up," International Defense 

Review, no.4, April 1978, 305. 
188 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

intends to re-build its navy. 65 As noted earlier, the navy had 

received a beating at the hands of the U.S. Navy in 1988 as the 

Iran-Iraq war was winding down. The U.S. Navy sank the the 

British-built frigate Sahand, severely damaged a sister ship the 

Sabalan--which the Iraniarts fixed---and sank two Kaman fast 

attack craft and armed speedboats. 6~ Nonetheless the Iranian 

navy contributed to Iranian war aims by protecting Iran's 

merchant marine, defeating Iraq's navy, and shutting down that 

ports. 67 To prove that their navy had some fight left in it after the 

brush with the U.S. Navy in May 1988, the Iranians undertook 

their largest naval exercise to date. Zolfaqar-3 involved more 

than 50 warships, including missile destroyers, frigates, 

minesweepers, logistic vessels, and landing ships. Marines, naval 

commandoes, army special forces and the air force also 

participated in an exercise which tmderwater operations, sweeping 

channels clear of mines, electronic warfare, and landings on 

"hostile' territory. 6s Zolfaqar-3 set the stage for fm~,her intensive 

Iranian naval exercises between 1989 and 1993. 

The various naval exercises undertaken since 1988 have had 

several aims: 

• Improve the operational readiness and training levels of 

65 See John Jordan, "The Iranian Navy," Jane's Defence Review, vol.4, 

no.5, May 1992, 216; Irina Hetsch, "Die islarnische Republik Iran im 

Konfliktfeld des Nahen und Mittleren Ostens-Aussen und 

Sicherheitspolitik wahrend der letzten Gollkrise (The Islamic Republic 

of Iran in the conflict environment of the Near and Middle East-Foreign 

and National Security Policies), Asien, Afrika, Lateinamerika (Berlin), 

no.19, 1991, 940. 

66 James Bruce and Tony Banks, Defiant Iran finds 50 warships for 

Zolfaqar-3," Jane's Defence Weekly, June 4 1998, 1091. 

67 "Goftegu ba Farmandeh Taktiki Niru'i Darya'i," (Interview with the 

Operations Commander of the Navy), Saff, no.53, 1363 (1984), 64-68. 

6, Ibid.; see also BBC Sulmnary of World Broadcasts, ME/O161/A/1. 
AHMED HASHIM 189 

both the regular and the Pasdar naval forces 

• Practice electronic warfa.re 

• Establish better coordination between the regular navy 

and the Pasdaran naval units, 

• Practice night operations 

• Conduct operations by naval frogmen, mine-clearing 

• Block sea routes, assault enemy installations, conduct 

logistical operations, amphibious and naval commando assaults, 

replenishment at sea. 69 

Iranian President Hashemi-Rafsanjani has stated that the tasks 

of the Iranian navy are to safeguard peace in the Persian Gulf, 

ensure the security of Iran's territorial waters and of Iran's 

maritime trade, and stand guard against the U.S. Navy or the 

navy of any other power. But Iran's current naval strategic 

problem is one that has been faced by weaker naval powers 

throughout history: how to deal with the might of vastly more 

powerful navies. It is unlikely to implement a conventional naval 

strategy against potential enemies like the U.S. Navy, despite the 

fact that the Iranian Navy retains sizeable conventional naval 

forces, including frigates, destroyers, corvettes, and fast attack 

craft. 7° Rather, Iran is likely to adopt a naval guerilla strategy, 

or what has been traditionally called une guerre de course. In 

69 For example, see FBIS-NES, December I0, 1992, 50; February 8, 

1993, 70-71; April 27, 1993, 64; April 29, 1993, 60; May 3, 1993, 56; 

May 4, 1993, 60; "Maneuvre "azim Zulfaqar-5" (The large Zulfaqar-5 

maneuvers), Saff, no.87, 1368 (1989); "Gozareshe az Mancuvre 

Foghoradeh Peykan Yek" ( Report on the Large Peykan-1 Exercises), 

Saff, no.107, 1369 (1990). "Maneuvre Moshtarek Sahand Namayesh 

Qodrat dar Abhaye Shomal Khalij Fars" (Sahand Combined Arms 

Maneuvers: a Show of Force in the North of the Persian Gulf), Saff, 

no.127, 1369 (1990); Michael Collins Dunn, "Iran's Amphibious 

Maneuvers Add to Gulf Neighbors' Jitters," Armed Forces Journal 

International, July 1992, 23. 

70 Lloyd's List, July 15, 1992. 
190 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

Iran's case, this would be one of sea denial designed initially to 

prevent the deployment of hostile forces into the Persian Gulf by 

sealing the Straits of Hormuz. In the last two years, for the first 

time since the revolution, Iran has extended the operational radius 

of its naval forces into the Indian Ocean, a first line of defense 

of the Straits. It Ibreign naval forces entered the Persian Gulf 

proper, Iran would plan to hit them with a spectrum of forces, 

ranging from conventional naval forces, to aircraft, naval guerilla 

units, land-based missiles and artillery. A potential source of 

worry for the West and regional states is apparently the growing 

Iranian interest in cruise-missiles for use in the naval theatre. 71 

Although there is little information on the subject, Iran has had 

Silkworm surface-to-sea missiles from China for a long time, and 

did use them during the Iran-Iraq war. 72 Only recently it was 

reported that Iran had received eight supersonic, sea-skimming 

cruise missiles from the Ukraine. 73 

lran has also invested heavily in mine-warfare capabilities 

over the past several years, and there are indications that it 

continues to believe in their great nuisance value in the confined 

and shallow waters of the Persian Gulf. TM Iran is also determined 

to build up its fleet of fast attack craft. Its original fleet of 10 

Kaman (French Combattante II) is old. The ancien regime had 

wanted to equip the boats with the US-made Harpoon missile, 

but by 1978 only seven missiles had been delivered. Due to 

shortage of spare parts--Franco-Iranian relations were extremely 

71 See Alan George, "Cut-price Cruise Missiles?" The Middle East, 

March 1993, 15. 

72 "Iran Builds new Silkworm Base," Jane's Defence Weekly, June 

11 1988, 1143. 

73 The Houston Chronicle, May 11, 1993, 7. 

74 See Philip Finnegan, et at. "Iran Pursues Chinese Mine To Bolster 

Gulf Clout," Defense News, January 17-23, 1994, 1, 29. 
AHMED HASHIM 191 

poor in the 1980s--Iran was forced to limit their use to patrolling 

off the coast, and in 1986 only five of the original boats were 

thought to be operational. With the end of the war, Iran 

approached France to provide spare parts, long-range radar, and 

Exocet and Otomat missiles with 60 kg explosive warheads and 

a 60 km effective range. France agreed to provide the spare parts 

only. North Korea has delivered three Chaho-gun-armed fast 

attack craft (called the Zafar class by the Iranians), while China 

is believed to be delivering up to twelve Hegu-class missilearmed fast attack crafts. These craft may be armed with the Hai 

Ying-2 (otherwise known as the Silkworm) or the more powerful 

Ying Ji anti-ship missile (also known as the C. 801) and which 

is a sea-skimmer with a range of 40 km at a speed of Mach 0.9. 

Iran is laying the foundations for a submarine force with the 

purchase of Russian-built Kilo-class submarines. The Kilos are 

modem diesel-powered boats armed with 18 torpedos, carry a 

sophisticated sonar system, and can lay up to 24 mines. 75 

Although officials of the Islamic Republic are correct in stating 

that it was actually the previous regime which initially considered 

purchasing submarines, and that they are completing an important 

military modemization plan, Iran's immediate neighbors and the 

West are worried because the Iranians have introduced a new 

weapons system to an already tension-ridden region and thus 

forcing its neighbors and Westem powers to find ways to deal 

with the threat posed by this enhancement of Iranian naval 

power. 76 

Naturally, as big ticket items, submarines enhance prestige, 

75 Christopher Dobson, "Iran Boosts its Military Might," Sunday 

Telegraph, September 27, 1992; Joris Janssen, "Russia Delivers First 

"Kilo' to Iran," Jane's Defense Weekly, November 21, 1992, 9. 

7s See for example, Michael Evans, "Iran Takes Delivery of Russian 

Submarine," The Times, September 25, 1992; John Fialka, "Iran's New 

Submarine, Built by Russia, Stirs Concern in US Navy," The Wall 

Street Journal, November 16, 1992, 1,10. 
192 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

but more importantly they provide leverage both during peace 

vis-a-vis neighbors and during wartime when the naval forces of 

major powers would be forced to spend an inordinate amount of 

time and resources stalking this threat. On the other llanO, 

because mastering a submarine itself as well as submarine tactics 

is a difficult task, it may well be many years before Iran's 

submarines represent all operational threat to anyone. Russian 

reports in the newspaper Izvestia, have suggested that whereas a 

professional submarine crew can keep a Kilo submerged for 

several weeks, the newly trained Iranian crews are having trouble 

keeping their submarines submerged for more than a few hoursS 

Revitalization of Iranian Ground Forces: In the initial 

invasion battles, the army was largely absent from the front. 

Many of its units were either still in a state of disorganization, 

fighting counterrevolutionaries in Kurdistan, or on the borders 

with the Soviet Union. TM Iranian guerilla forces, other irregulars. 

volunteers known as the Bassidjis, and the newly-established 

Pasdaran (IRGC), bore the brunt of the firepower of Iraqi 

mechanized and armored forces. These Iranian forces slowed the 

Iraqi offensive, and fought heroically in cities like Khorramshahr 

and Abadan. Created in early 1979 as an internal security force 

designed to act as defender of the revolution, and as a 

counterweight to left-wing forces and the regular army, the 

Pa.sdars quickly emerged as the most powerful and most 

important of the irregular forces at the warfront, providing light 

77 Cited in Glen How~trd, "Russian Press Examines Operational 

Limitations of Iranian Kilo Subs," Notes on Russia ,and Central Eurasia, 

Science Applications International Corporation, Denver, March 23 1993, 

4. 

78 See FBIS-NES, October 15, 1980, I13-I15; October 17, 1980, I8- 

I9; December 11, 1980, I3-15. 
AHMED HASHIM 193 

training and support to volunters like the Bassidjis. 79 

One high-ranking revolutionary official, Mustapha Chamran, 

pointed out that the essenti',d difference between the regular army 

and the Pasdars was that the former was an institution possessing 

"teclmical power" and was steeped in conventional methods of 

warfare; the Pasdars, on the other hand were volunteers with a 

stronger spirit of faith and devotion, s° Initially this three was 

staffed by personnel more devoted to the revolution and 

characterized by a fanatical courage, was not successful in 

conducting conventional operations. As army units arrived at the 

front, there was little love lost between the two forces, and even 

less cooperation between the two. Given the clerical regime's 

suspicion of the regular armed forces in the early stages of the 

war, the clerics promoted the Pasdars. Reliance on the Pasdars 

fitted in well with the regime's ideological perception that the 

79 There is some literature in English on the Pasdaran; see lran Press 

Digest, June 15, 1982, 17-20; "The Islamic Revolutionary Guards 

Corps," Echo oflslam (Tehran), vol. 5, no.7 February-March 1986, 15- 

16; "Iran's Revolutionary Guards: Evolution and Prospects," Royal 

United Services Institute News Brief, vol.7, no.10, October 1987, 1-3; 

Jane's Defence Weekly, November 16, 1991, 980; "On the Occasion of 

the Islmnic Revolutionary Guards Corps Day," Message of Revolution 

(Tehran), no.18, May 1983, 8-12; "Mohsen Rezaie and IRGC 

Background," Arab Press Service Organization, vol.21, no.4, April 8, 

1991; James Bruce, "IRGC-Iran's Shock Troops," Jane's Defence 

Weekly, October 24, 1987, 960-961; Ronald Perron, "The Iranian 

Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps," Middle East Insight, June-July 

1985, 35-39; "Revolutionary Guard Accepts New Role," lran Focus, 

November 1991, 8-9; Kenneth Timmerman, "Iran's Pasdaran," Israel 

and Palestine, April 1988, 9-10; Susan Merdinger, "A Race for 

Martyrdom: The Islamic Revolution~u'y Guards Corps," (M.A. thesis, 

Naval Postgraduate School, Monterey) December 1982; the most 

detailed an~dysis in English is Kermeth Katzman, The Warriors of 

Islam: Iran's Revolutionary Guard. Boulder: Westview Press, 1993. 

so FBIS-NES, December 11, 1980, I4. 
194 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

most important elements in the war and ultimately an Iranian 

victory were spiritual faith, dedication and commitment. This 

was coupled with a concomitant distrust and minimization of 

professionalism, technical expertise and the role of weaponry. 81 

Naturally, the army feared that the Pasdaran would eventually 

supplant it, and was generally contemptuous of the of their 

modus operandi on tile battlefield. What further compounded the 

Iranians' problems was the awesome task of trying to achieve a 

semblance of battlefield command and control between a plethora 

of forces that included not only the regular army and the Pasdars, 

but also the Bassidj free-lance guerillas, tribal units, and the 

Gendarmerie. s2 

Over a period of one and a half years during 1981 and 1982, 

the Iranian regime built a three-tiered army consisting of the 

regular army, the Pasdars, and the irregular and generally illtrained forces of the Mobilization of the Oppressed. the Bassidjis. 

As the technical service, the army gave a good account of itself 

in the war and provided much needed firepower, artillery and 

armored support and helicopter mobility throughout the conflict 

and was slowly but grudgingly rehabilitated. 

Eventually, the Pasdars became a well-trained but lightly 

equipped (lightly equipped should not be construed as being 

poorly equipped) infantry-intensive organization. To enhance the 

skills of small-unit commanders and to sharpen their tactical 

knowledge, it established professional military schools and also 

8~ For more details on the Iranian style of warfare, see Shahram 

Chubin and Charles Tripp, Iran and lraq at War, Boulder: Westview 

Press, 1988, pp.36-43; Shahr,'un Chubin, "Iran and the Lessons of the 

War with Iraq: Implications for Future Defense Policies," in Shelley 

Stahl ,and Geoffrey Kemp (eds.), Arms Control and Weapons 

Proliferation in the Middle East and South Asia, New York: St. 

Martin's Press, 1992, p.106. 

82 See "Power Struggles in Tehran," Middle East Intelligence Survey, 

vol.8, no.14, October 16-31, 1980, 105-106. 
AHMED HASHIM 195 

sent junior and middle cadre to China for advanced training. 

Pasdar formations were equipped with low to medium technology 

weaponry of Iranian, Soviet, Chinese and North Korean origin, 

including the G-3 and AK-47 rifles, an abundance of Warsaw 

Pact machine-guns, rocket-propelled grenades, recoilless-rifles 

and mortars (60mm, 80mm, and 120mm). Human-wave assaults 

were associated with the early days of the Pasdaran (and then 

later with the Bassidj, see below), but by the mid-1980s, smallunit infiltration into the Iraqi rear to attack soft rear-area targets 

such as artillery batteries, dug-in tanks, lines of communications, 

command and control centres, listening posts and sensors, at 

night or under adverse weather conditions became a Pasdar 

specialty. 83 The Bassidjis who consisted of deeply religious 

young and old illiterate men from rural areas remained cannonfodder for "human-wave' assaults designed to create maximum 

psychological shock. 

Iran's ground forces came under increasing strain as the war 

dragged on. The three-tiered structure was designed to hamess 

Iran's nationalistic fervor and existing capabilities in order to 

eject the Iraqis out of Iran. It did not have the logistical and 

organizational capabilities to support or sustain large-scale Iranian 

offensives into Iraq and in the face of superior Iraqi fortifications. 

The army with its limited resources was less than enthusiastic 

about going into Iraq. Its enthusiasm diminished yearly as each 

of Iran's "final offensives" dashed themselves against Iraq's 

defenses. Furthermore, the animosity between the more 

restrained regular army and the gung-ho Pasdars re-emerged as 

problems over coordination between the two forces at the frontline, over doctrinal differences, and over the timing of final 

offensives surfaced between the two organizations. The years 

1984-85 were particularly bloody for Iran in terms of casualties. 

Dissension grew within the country over the horrendous 

casualties suffered by the Bassidj forces in every major offensive. 

83 These tactics are detailed in the enormous number of monographs 

put out by the Pasdaran War Information Center. 
196 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

Even the Pasdars were not immune; by 1987 fully 88 percent of 

this force consisted of conscripts, and atter the particularly savage 

infantry battles of the Kerbala 4-5-6 offensives between 

December 1986 and February 1987 when the Pasdaran lost much 

of their best-trained cadre, the force wimessed a rapid loss of its 

elan and zeal. 

Up till fall 1986 it had been quite easy for Iran to acquire 

sufficient quantities of arms and to arrange with third parties for 

transport and end-user certificates which hid the fact that the final 

destination was Iran. Between late 1986 and early 1988, Iran's 

armed Iorces witnessed a rapid decline in stocks of weaponry and 

operational readiness. In 1988 Iran desperately needed new 

barrels for its remaining M-60s. Supplies of artillery shells were 

non-existent in many sectors of the front, as the army was short 

of 130-mm, 155-mm and 203-mm shells. There were armored 

brigades without operational tanks. Many of Iran's top-of-the-line 

tanks, the Chieftains, were non-operational because they needed 

new engines which could be provided only by British Leyland. 

Britain even turned down a desperate Iranian plea to buy a whole 

Leyland production line. Iran's ground forces totally collapsed in 

1988. Many of its units, including combat-proven aald elite army 

and Pasdar divisions simply collapsed or fled and Iraq captured 

or destroyed 40 to 50 percent, of Iran's armor and tons of 

weapons and munitions. 84 

Iran's post-war priorities included replacing all the equipment 

lost in 1988, building levels to meet current force structure needs, 

and acquiring modem systems. It imported a modest quantity 

of artillery, tanks, and armored vehicles between 1989 and 1992. 

The country is now interested in acquiring more modem 

systems; for example, it is seeking sophisticated fire control and 

target acquisition systems for its artillery, and it wants selfpropelled rather than towed artillery pieces, as well as armored 

84 Anthony Cordesman, After the Storm: The Changing Military 

Balance in the Middle East, Boulder: Westview Press, 1993, 404. 
AHMED HASHIM 197 

infantry fighting vehicles rather than armored personnel carders. 85 

But it does not seem that Iran will acquire weapons for their own 

sake since a plan to buy 1500 T-54/55 tanks from 

Czechoslovakia in 1991, led Iranian papers to question the 

spending of scarce resources on antiquated and wom-out tanks, s6 

It seems that Iran is focusing most of its effort in military 

reorganization, intensive training, and formulating new doctrine 

in light of the severe problems uncovered during the war with 

Iraq. The three biggest problems faced by Iran's ground forces 

the war with Iraq included the immense difficulties of 

commanding a massive army consisting of three different forces 

with three vastly different philosophies of war, the establishing 

of reliable coordination and organizational between these forces, 

particularly between the Pasdaran and the regular army, and in 

general the unhealthy competition between the Pasdaran and the 

regular army for access to precious equipment and the waste 

brought about by duplication of efforts in logistics and supply 

and in the defense industries. 87 

The recriminations started following Iran's severe defeats in 

spring and summer of 1988. In May 1988 Brigadier-General 

Ismail Sohrabi was dismissed as the armed forces chief-of-staff 

as a result of Iran's failures military failures, while IRGC 

commander, Mohsen Reza'i, was publicly humiliated on TV when 

he was forced to take responsibility for Iran's major setback at 

Faw in April and to admit to IRGC misappropriation of public 

85 Ibid.; 404-405. 

86 "Did Iran Really Need Those Outmoded T,'mks?" Tehran Times 

International Weekly, August 1, 1991, 2, also cited in FBIS-NES, 

August 12, 1991, 69. 

~7 See for example, Andrew Gowers and Scheherazade Daneshku, "A 

War Machine Split into Two Camps," Financial Times, June 28, 1988; 

James Bruce, "Reviving the Force of Ishun," Jane's Defence Weekly, 

June 30, 1989, 1299-1300. 
198 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

funds. In late September 1988 a closed Majlis debate resulted in 

virulent criticism of the IRGC: delegates attacked the Pasdaran 

strategy during the war, and Guardsmen were were accused of 

mass desertion, cooruption, and of seeking safe and easy jobs in 

Tehran. But the biggest criticisms concerned the almost total 

lack of co-ordination that appeared in 1988 between Iran's myriad 

forces. 

The Iranian attempt to bring about more cohesion between 

these two forces came with Rafsanjani being appointed acting 

commander-in-chief of the armed forces, in June 1988, following 

Iran's severe defeats in the ground war. Rafsanjani was 

specifically tasked with establishing a general command 

headquarters, bringing about coordination between all three 

forces, elimination of waste and of duplication of effort, 

consolidating the logistical capabilities of the armed forces and 

combining the military industries efforts of the Pasdaran with 

those of the regular armed forces. But attempts from 1988 

onwards to amalgamate or merge the regular army and the 

Pasdars into one force were unsuccessful, even though, as an 

editorial in the Tehran Times in May 1989 argued, an important 

lesson of the Iran-Iraq war was that Iran needed effective coordination between its forces. Some elements in the govemment 

believed that the merging of a force like the Pasdars with a more 

conventional establishment like the regular military would 

decrease the former's effectiveness in defending the revolution, 

the purpose for which it was ultimately created. When the issue 

of the merger of the two forces was debated within the Majlis, 

apparently many members of that body were concerned with the 

potential dissolution of an important pillar of the revolution. 

Furthermore, it is generally assumed that neither organization was 

amenable to the idea, and the Pasdaran, in particular, who 

constitute a powerful political and socioeconomic constituency, 

feared the loss of their priveleges and elite status. The army, for 

its part, feared the dilution of its professionalism and technical 

skills, or even being completely "submerged" in a merger. But 

in 1992 a single office of the joint chiefs of staff was set up with 
AHMED HASHIM 199 

the regular armed forces, thus eliminating the wasteful system of 

separate command structures. 

Nonetheless, the Iranians remained very concemed with the 

need to delineate the duties of the IRGC and to modemize it as 

a fighting force. In late 1988 when Rafsanjani was still speaker 

of the Majlis, he expounded the government's views on the future 

direction of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, indicating 

that one of the govemment's major military concerns was to 

ensure the further material development and professionalization 

of the Pasdars. Rafsanjani admitted that one of the main reasons 

behind the war-time successes of the revolutionary guards 

stemmed from their morale, but added that in the post-war era 

they needed more discipline, a more professionally structured 

organization, and more arms. The increasing professionalization 

of the IRGC seems evident in the assertion of the Mohsen Reza'i, 

commander of the force, that advancement to higher rank will 

depend on a soldier's or officer's knowledge of military skills, 

combat experience, educational status, level of military training, 

and organizational skills. They have been forced to 

professionalize themselves by accepting a hierarchical rank 

slructure like the regular army ss The Pasdars will continue to 

protect the internal security of the country, and to provide the 

army with support in the event of an attack by foreign forces. 

The army itself is reorganizing into a smaller, more highly 

professional force capable of conducting combined arms warfare 

under all kinds of conditions, including chemical attack. 

IRAN AND WEAPONS OF 

MASS DESTRUCTION 

The Iran-Iraq War was the first one in the Middle East which 

saw large-scale use of both chemical weapons and of ballistic 

ss "Revolutionary Guard Accepts New Role," lran Focus, 

November 1991, 8-9. 
200 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

missiles. In fact, the war provided a significant impetus for the 

further spread of such weapons in the region at large. For most 

of the war Iron was at the receiving end of both chemical 

weapons and of ballistic missiles. Both types of unconventional 

weapons contributed to the demoralization of Iranian civilian and 

military morale toward the end of the war, but their use has been 

perceived as having spurred the Iranian leadership to acquire 

weapons of mass destruction. However, in the last two years 

most of the attention has been focused on Iran's nuclear weapons 

program, which we will examine first. 

Iran's Nuclear Program 

Imperial Iran had extensive plans in the nuclear field. In 1957, 

Iran and the United States agreed to cooperate in the peaceful 

use of nuclear energy and in 1970 Iran signed the NonProliferation Treaty. In 1974, Iron lent its support to a call for 

making the Middle East a zone free of weapons of mass 

destruction. That same year the Shah established the Atomic 

Energy Organization of Iron (AEOI) and began the most 

ambitious commercial nuclear energy program in the Middle 

East, which would have provided Iran with 23 nuclear power 

stations by the mid-1990s. In 1976, the Federal Republic of 

Germany agreed to build two 1,300- megawatt plants at Bushehr, 

which were 60 percent and 75 percent complete when the Shah 

fell from power. Like its neighbor Iraq, Iran sent thousands of 

students to study nuclear physics and technicians to receive 

advanced training in the West, 89 and it tried to implement 

agreements for the long-term provision of non-weapon grade 

uranium for its massive project. Imperial Iron argued that it 

needed civilian nuclear power for long-term modemization and 

,9 "The Islamic Bomb: Ir,'mian Nuclear Aspirations," Royal United 

Services Newsbrief, September 1992, 69. 
AHMED HASHIM 201 

development, and because its oil reserves were limited. 9° 

Analysts were divided on whether Imperial Iran had a 

clandestine nuclear weapons program. In the 1970s, Alvin 

Cottrell, an American analyst sympathetic to the Shah, dismissed 

speculations about Iranian nuclear-military ambitions as 

"premature and exaggerated. ''9~ After all, Iran was a signatory 

of the NPT and a fervent advocate of a nuclear free Middle East. 

Although the Shah stated that he had no intention of acquiring 

nuclear weapons, he made it very clear that Iran's non-acquisition 

of such weapons depended a great deal on the extent of nonproliferation in the region. As he told the noted Egyptian 

joumalist Mohammed Hasanein Heykal: "I tell you quite frankly, 

that Iran will have to acquire atomic bombs if some upstart in the 

region gets them. ''92 

Other analysts like Leonard Spector believed that the Shah 

was ultimately working to get the bomb. 93 Imperial Iran did have 

a set of incentives which included: (i) the potential for a 

nuclearized Arab-Israeli conflict, (ii) the nuclearization of the 

Indian sub-continent in 1974 with India's "peaceful nuclear 

explosion," (iii) prestige and regional influence. The Shah had 

embarked on a long-term strategy of making Iran a political, 

economic, industrial and military powerhouse in regional and 

9o K.R. Singh, lran: Quest for Security, New Delhi: Vikas 

Publishing House, 1980, 326. 

9~ Alvin Cottrell, "Iran's Armed Forces under the Pahlavis," in George 

Lenczowski (ed.), lran under the Pahlavis, Stanford: Hoover Institution 

Press, 1978, 428. 

92 Kayhan International, September 16, 1975, quoted in K.R. 

Singh, lran: Quest for Security, 329-330. 

93 For a detailed analysis see Leonard Spector, Going Nuclear: The 

Spread of Nuclear Weapons 1986-1987, Cambridge: Ballinger 

Publishing Company, 1987, 45-57. 
202 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

global affair. Would the Shah have continued to believe that an 

awesome conventional military capability would have sufficed? 

The years between 1979 and 1984 were a period of turmoil 

as the revolutionary hiatus and the war with Iraq shut down the 

nuclear power program and as thousands of Iranian technical 

experts and scientists fled the country. 94 The current regime itself 

conceded that this period was a low-point in the development of 

the Iranian nuclear program. 95 Furthermore, the country had no 

money to spare. As a so-called pariah state, no country wanted 

to help Iran too much with its nuclear program. However, 

nuclear research at the Tehran Research Center went ahead using 

a small research reactor, and a nuclear research center was 

opened in 1984 at the University of lsfahan with Chinese, 

French, and Pakistani help. 96 Between 1984 and 1985 the 

Pasdaran were reportedly put in charge of research at a number 

of AEOI installations including the newly opened Isfahan 

Research Center. 97 

In early 1984 the respected defense joumal Jane's Defense 

Weekly uncritically reported a sensationalist Gulf newspaper 

claim that Iran was only two years away from having the bomb. 

Jane's suggested that Iran might complete work on its unfinished 

Bushehr nuclear reactor and eventually divert plutonium for 

purposes of making an atomic device. Most govemments and 

94 "Iran: Nuclear Journey," Issues, March 1992, 8. 

95 The newspaper Ettela'at carried a detailed analysis of the 

development of the Iranian Atomic Energy Organization beginning April 

3, 1993, cited in FBIS-NES, April 9, 1993, 44-45. 

96 "Der Iran und die Bombe," Osterreiches Militarische Zeitschrift, 

March-April 1992, 165. 

97 "ban: Nuclear Journey," 8. 
AHMED HASHIM 203 

defense analysts dismissed this claim. 98 What is certain, 

however, is that in the mid-1980s, Iran also began seeking 

renewed nuclear cooperation with countries that had nuclear 

expertise. In 1986, it was reported that Pakistan offered to train 

Iranian scientists in return for financial aid for Pakistan's own 

nuclear program. In 1987, Pakistan and Iran signed an agreement 

on technical cooperation in the military-nuclear field that 

included the dispatch of 39 Iranian nuclear scientists to Pakistani 

installations for training. 99 After the Iran-Iraq and Gulf wars, 

Pakistani-Iranian contacts and cooperation may have deepened, 

particularly after the visit to Pakistan by the Iranian Speaker of 

the Majlis in February 1991. In 1987, Iran signed a large 

agreement with Argentina which called for the supply of uranium 

enriched to 20% for the small Tehran research reactor and the 

training of Iranian scientists at an Argentinian nuclear center. 

Some accounts believe that between 1987 and 1991, Iran's efforts 

to acquire nuclear-related technology appears to have gathered 

momentum. A report that is very hard to verify claims that in 

February 1987, at a meeting of members of the AEOI then 

Iranian President Ali Khamene'i allegedly called upon Iran's 

scientists to "work hard and at great speed" to obtain atomic 

energy for Iran. ~°° 

98 Warren Getler, "ban Is Unlikely to Have Atom Bomb in 2 Years, 

Nuclear Experts Assert," International Herald Tribune, May 7, 1984. 

99 "Pakistan, [ran Nuclear Cooperation Revealed," Defense and 

Foreign Affairs Weekly, November 21-27, 1988, 2; see also "An IranPakistan Link?" Foreign Report, December 17, 1987. 

10o David Segal, "Atomic Ayatollahs," Washington Post, April 12, 

1987, D2; Segal relied on a usually unreliable source Nameh Mardom, 

the newspaper of the opposition communist Tudeh party. Another 

source which must be treated with some caution is the People's 

Mujahedeen which has often provided contradictory information about 

massive Iranian defense expenditure and secret locations for nuclear 

weapon-making. To say that these sources must be treated with caution 
204 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

After the war with Iraq ended in 1988 and with the 

emergence of Hashemi-Rafsanjani, who stated in 1989 that "Iran 

cannot afford to ignore the nuclear factor in the modem 

world, ''1°1 Iran issued a call for the retum home of exiled 

scientists and technicians. Some analysts believe that Iran may 

have moved to obtain---often in a clandestine manner through the 

setting up of dummy companies and fronts the equipment and 

technology which would ultimately give it the bomb. 1°2 Iran has 

also moved with mixed results, to obtain further aid from 

advanced nuclear powers for its nuclear program. It attempted to 

purchase German nuclear technology that was transferred to 

Brazil in the mid-1970s; specifically, Iran wanted to buy millions 

of dollars worth of equipment incorporated in the now obsolete 

Angra III nuclear power station. Both the United States and 

Germany as well as the Brazilian Foreign Ministry, which does 

not want Brazil to be blacklisted as a source of proliferation, 

objected to the proposed sale. I°3 Iran has tried unsuccessfully to 

lure Germany into finishing the still dormant reactors at Bushehr, 

which were severely damaged by the Iraq air force on three 

separate occasions during the Iran-Iraq war. The German refusal 

to finish the project has angered lran considerably. Because a 

tremendous amount of money already has been sunk into the 

project, its completion would be a visible sign of post-war 

is not meant to deny the possibility that some information might be true 

but these groups, caught in a mortal struggle with the clerics have every 

reason to embarass the Tehran regime. 

lo~ Quoted in "ban: Nuclear Journey," 8. 

~02 See "Iran: Nuclear Journey," 8; and L. Spector, "Threats in the 

Middle East," 197-188. The former source states that the Iranian 

Foreign Ministry has set up a special office involved in the acquisition 

of nuclear-related technology. 

~o3 For details, see Mednews, vol. 5,7, January 6, 1992, 4. 
AHMED HASHIM 205 

reconstruction success. TM Iran has approached the Czech 

company Skoda---which is partly owned by Siemens--to discuss 

the possibility of finishing the project. An Indian offer to sell 

Iran a 10-megawatt nuclear research reactor has been dropped 

apparently because of strong pressure from the United States, 

with whom India wants to improve historically luke-warm 

relations. 

It is Iran's military relationship in unconventional weaponry 

with the People's Republic of China that has aroused the most 

concem, l°s US officials believe that Iran is receiving help from 

the China that will ultimately aid it in nuclear weapons 

development. In 1990, Iran and China signed a 10-year 

agreement for scientific cooperation. That same year, HashemiRafsanjani met with a visiting official from the Chinese Council 

of Science and Technology, which is in charge of that country's 

nuclear program. China is training Iranian scientists who may 

eventuaUy work at a nuclear research reactor to be built by the 

Chinese at Isfahan. What has caught the attention of analysts and 

the media, was that China's sale of an electromagnetic isotope 

separator or calutron, which is an antiquated method of separating 

the weapons-grade uranium-235 isotope from naturally occuring 

uranium-238. Calutrons recently gained notoriety because of 

Iraq's massive calutron-based enrichment installations at 

Tanniya. TM 

1oa For the Iranian view of this controversy, see JPRS, Nuclear 

Developments, July 24, 1991, 16-18; December 30, 1991, 29. 

lo5 See lran Focus, December 1991, 3; Jim Mann, "Ran Determined 

to Get A-Bomb, U.S. Believes," Los Angeles Times, March 17, 1992, 

A1. 

lo6 This method of isotope separation is very well described in the 

following books, Richard Rhodes, The Making of the Atomic Bomb, 

New York: Simon and Schuster, 1988, 486-492; and Henry Dewolf 

Smyth, Atomic Energy for Military Purposes: The Official Report on 
206 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

In reality, it is unlikely at this stage that Iran would use the 

calutron method for uranium enrichment for the following 

reasons: (i) the calutron China supplied is a small-scale one 

solely for the separation of medical isotopes and for research 

purposes, 1°7 (ii) this method of enrichment needs a huge scientific 

and technical infrastructure with thousands of people, which Iran 

currently lacks; (iii) the calutron method needs a huge amount of 

electrical power and lran has a chronic shortage of electricity, 

and (iv) electromagnetic isotope separation is currently under 

careful scrutiny by the intemational community. However, Iran 

could use this calutron to help it in developing larger and more 

advanced calutrons. I°8 

Iran clearly has not yet developed a nuclear weapons 

capability and reports of secret locations being built or already 

built and camouflaged are unsubstantiated, as are reports in 

Middle Eastem newspapers that Iran has acquired from three to 

five tactical nuclear weapons or the components for such 

weapons from Kazakhstan. More plausible are reports that lran 

and other Middle Eastern countries have recruited or tried to 

recruit former Soviet scientists to work in various fields of 

military research and development. 1°9 Both the West and Israel 

are doing the same, partly in order to neutralize the recruitment 

of Soviet scientists and engineers by Middle Eastem (i.e. Islamic) 

the Development of the Atomic Bomb under the Auspices of the United 

States Government 1940-1945, Stanford: Stanford University Press, 

1989 (originally published in 1945 by the US Government), 164-165, 

187-205. 

lo7 David Albright and Mark Hibbs, "Nuclear Proliferation: Spotlight 

Shifts to Iran," The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, vol.48, no.2, 

March 1992, I0. 

108 Ibid. 

109 Bill Gertz, "Nuclear Emigres Work in Mideast," Washington 

Times, February 24, 1992. 
AHMED HASHIM 207 

states and partly in order to benefit from some of the various 

research programs and technological advances of Soviet science. 

Iran's activities and agreements in the field of nuclear energy 

have been a cause of concern not only in the West but among 

Arabs and Israelis. The latter have stated that Iranian nuclear 

infrastructure could become the target of what one could 

euphemistically call "coercive non-proliferation," as happned to 

Iraq in 1981 with the destruction of the Osirak nuclear reactor by 

the Israeli air force, if the "international community' is unable to 

exert political pressure to stop Iran. 11° 

It is very difficult to say what Irma ultimately intends to do 

or what its achievements in the field have been, but the 

revelations about Iraq's enormous program by the United Nations 

Special Commission has led analysts and officials outside of Iran 

to err on the side of caution and to believe that Iran's ultimate 

goal is nuclear weapons. TM The inspection by the International 

Atomic Energy Agency of Iranian nuclear installations early in 

1992, which gave Iran a clean bill of health, should not be 

construed as conclusive proof that Iran is not working on nuclear 

weapons as the Iranians only took the inspectors to sites that they 

wanted them to see. 112 Iran is not a nation defeated in war and 

subject to international sanctions and inspections. Even if the 

IAEA manages to increase its intrusive powers to detect covert 

11o See Mideast Mirror, May 31, 1992, p.2 and June 16, 1992, 3-4; 

Hugh Camegy, "Israel Worried over Iran's Nuclear Plans," Financial 

Times, January 29, 1992, 4. 

111 For such a position, see the article by Leonard Spector, "Nuclear 

Proliferation in the Middle East," Orbis, vol.36, no.2, Spring 1992, 181- 

190. 

u2 "IAEA Visit to Iran," International Atomic Energy Agency Press 

Release, February 14, 1992; Charles Richards and Robert Bloch, 

"Inspectors Give a Clean Bill of Health," The Independent, November 

3, 1992. 
208 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

or undeclared nuclear facilities it is unlikley to have the powers 

of the U.N.-IAEA Special Commission in lraq. 

lran, naturally, has vehemently denied that it is seeking 

nuclear weapons but has stated that it has the right to and 

intention of acquiring nuclear power for peaceful civilian 

purposes. This was bluntly stated by Hashemi-Rafsanjani in 

early 1992: "We seek nuclear technology for peaceful uses and 

consider this path to be right for all countries which have the 

potential to acquire it. ''113 while various Iranian newspapers have 

castigated the United States for arrogating to itself the right of 

unilaterally deciding who can or cannot have nuclear 

technology.114 

Yet one could argue that the country could be following in 

the footsteps of the covert proliferants like India, Pakistan, Israel 

and Iraq who always denied--particularly when their nuclear 

program was in its infancy--any intention of producing nuclear 

weapons. It has not been politically wise for any would-be 

proliferant to claim that their nuclear program is designed to 

produce atomic bombs because of the political, moral, and 

economic pressure that could be exerted by powerful antiproliferation parties and because of the risk of military attack. 

Iran would clearly have every reason to camouflage its own 

activities in light of recent Israeli claims that nuclearization of 

Irarv--or of any hostile party--is a threat to it. In the aftermath 

of the Gulf War and the discovery of Iraq's massive nuclear 

weapons program, Iran and any other would-be proliferant would 

be unlikely to engage in intemational acts that would give any 

p,'u-ty the excuse to engage in coercive disarmament. Rather such 

states would adopt a long-term, incremental strategy of building 

the required infrastructure. Ivan may have certain motivations 

113 FBIS-NES, February 12, 1992, p.55. 

11a See, for example, Kayhan International, November 9, 1991, p.2; 

Steve Coil, "Tehran Ambiguous on Its A-Arms Plans," Washington 

Post, November 17, 1992, p.A30. 
AHMED HASHIM 209 

for acquiring nuclear weapons. First, there is the factor of 

enhanced prestige and regional status that comes from possession 

of nuclear weapons. Prestige was a particularly important element 

in the case of the British and French decisions to build a nuclear 

arsenal. Iran's acquisition of nuclear weapons may be thought to 

give the country greater regional standing. Second, nuclear 

weapons may be thought to have both strategic and political 

value, both providing deterrence against nuclear threats or 

attempted intimidation by other powers, and reducing the military 

options of "global arrogance"--4he United States and its 

allies--in the region. Third, the nuclearization of the larger 

region has proceeded apace since the mid-1970s. 1~5 In 1991, the 

head of the AEOI stated that throughout the 1980s Iran had 

constantly pointed out the dangers of proliferation in the region, 

but nobody paid attention. Finally, Iran might choose to go 

nuclear in order to bring about a regional nuclear balance 

between Israel and the Islamic world, arguing that the Arab 

failure to do so makes it the responsibility of the wider Islamic 

world. This has been the line of thinking espoused by Deputy 

President Ata'oUah Mohajerani who has stated on a number of 

occasions that if Israel continues to have nuclear arms, then the 

Muslim states should cooperate to arm themselves with such 

weapons. Otherwise, he asserted, Israel would use her nuclear 

weapons to maintain regional superiority. The only altemative 

to further regional nuclearization, he argued, is to deprive the 

lsraelis of such weapons, although Mohajerani's tough rhetoric 

seems to indicate that he believes Israeli de-nuclearization to be 

115 For a brief analysis of nuclearization in the 1980s, see Joseph 

Yager, Nuclear Proliferation Strategy in the Middle East and North 

Africa, Center for National Security Negotiations, vol.1, no.I, Science 

Applications International Corporation, 1989; and the detailed series of 

analyses over the 1980s by Loeanard Spector in his Carnegie 

Endowment books on nuclear proliferation. 
210 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

urdikely. H6 

Iran's Chemical Weapons Program 

The Iran-lraq War was the first conventional war since World 

War I which saw extensive use of chemical weapons. Although 

Iraq was the first to use these weapons, Iranian allegations that 

Iraq made use of them from the very outset cannot be 

substantiated and are presumed to be propaganda. Iraq's first use 

of chemical weapons came in 1982 when its forces used nonlethal tear gas in an assault that panicked an Iranian division that 

may have thought it was under attack by lethal chemical 

substances. This event may have impressed the lraqis into 

believing that more lethal chemicals could be a significant 

weapon. But Iraq's difficulties in the war from 1982 onwards 

and concem that its national existence was at stake propelled it 

to use chemicals as a defensive weapon of last resort against 

massive Iranian offensives between 1983 and 1985. Iraq's 

defensive use of chemical weapons blunted these attacks 

conducted by troops generally poorly equipped or trained to deal 

with such weapons. By 1986, chemical weapons had been 

integrated into Iraqi counter-attacks. By 1988 such use had 

become more professional, systematic, and routine, playing a 

significant role in panicking already demoralized Iranian troops. 

Iran's response to chemical weapons was two-pronged. One 

was to take the moral high ground and to condemn and expose 

their use by Iraq in the hope that the world would pressure it to 

stop. The United Nations investigated and confirmed use of 

chemical weapons, but the resulting international outcry was not 

sufficient to bring it to a halt, partly because Irma was not too 

popular a country in intemational circles. In June 1988, Iranian 

Foreign Minister, Ali Akbar Velayati, urged the U.N. to take 

116 See JPRS, Nuclear Developments, November 7, 1991, 23. Given 

the fractious nature of Iranian politics, it is not altogether clear whether 

Mohajerani represents an official line of thinking. 
AHMED HASHIM 211 

measures to prevent the sale of the materials neccessary for the 

production of chemical weapons and to establish a mechanism to 

inspect Iraqi chemical weapons facilities, lran also stated that its 

moral and religious beliefs prohibited it from using chemical 

weapons even though it had the capacity. 

The second track was to acquire defenses against chemical 

warfare and to develop its own chemical warfare capability. It 

sought defense and decontamination equipment and chemical 

precursors in order to produce its own chemical weapons for use 

against Iraq. The purchase of defensive equipment may have 

helped reduce total chemical casualties (50,000, of which 10 

percent were fatal), but in reality Iranian forces---particularly the 

huge infantry forces on which it relied in--never mastered fully 

the use of chemical decontamination equipment nor became very 

proficient in the quick and correct use of masks and chemical 

suits. Nor were they able to conduct successful operations under 

chemical attack. Although Iran began to use chemicals in the 

war, such use was sporadic and episodic, as it lacked technical 

sophistication in the manufacture, handling, and employment of 

lethal chemicals. Although the Shah had shown some concern 

about chemical weapons the Imperial Iranian military had not 

received offensive or defensive training in chemical warfare from 

the Americans. In a speech in an Iranian military joumal, 

Rafsanjani attacked the former regime for being unprepared to 

wage or defend against chemical weapons. 

Iran's greatest fear came to be use of chemical weapons by 

Iraq against Iranian civilian centers, especially after their use by 

Baghdad against the village of Halabja in Iraqi Kurdistan. The 

massacre of thousands in Halabja caused no major intemational 

outcry, and in Iranian eyes, this showed that nothing would have 

stood in the way of the Iraqis committing greater crimes, i.e. 

chemical weapons attacks against Iranian cities. Rafsanjani 

claimed that Iraq dropped chemicals on the town of Oshnoviyeh, 

killing 2,000 people. 

In light of these factors, Iran had decided by the end of the 

war to: (i) develop a retaliatory capability to equal that of an 
212 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

enemy like Iraq for use on future battlefield. Rafsanj,'mi has 

pointed out that chemical--and biological--weapons are 

relatively easy to acquire and stressed that there is a need for 

Iran to acquire chemical weapons as a deterrent, even though Iran 

would never use chemical weapons first; ii) develop a strategic 

deterrent to prevent an enemy from even considering using 

chemicals against civilians in cities; (iii) intensify the preparation 

and training of its soldiers to function with confidence on the 

chemical battlefield. In the future, the Iranians do not intend to 

be at a technological disadvantage in such weapons. By 1989, 

reports indicated that the country seemed to have enhanced 

considerably its chemical weapons capability. A more recent 

report suggests that Iran is seeking German aid to build a plant 

for the production of pesticides which may entail the manufacture 

of the precursors for the nerve agent VX. 

The Gulf War reinforced certain lessons from the Iran-Iraq 

War and added some new ones. Iraq's non-use of chemicals 

against coalition forces suggested prudent restraint in the face of 

overwhelming firepower. One may speculate that, even though 

Iran continues to conduct tactical field exercises wherein its 

forces repel and neutralize chemical attacks, the country may be 

reconsidering the value of chemical weapons. After the Gulf 

War, an Iranian officer, Hussein Firuzabadi, stated that there was 

a need for studies on how to avert the use of chemical weapons 

and to neutralize their effects. Iraq's caution also may have 

suggested to Iran that use of chemical weapons on the battlefield 

against the armies of advanced powers may not be worth the 

cost. All in all, lran may have moved from the earlier 

characterization by Hashemi-Rafsanjani of chemicals as the "poor 

man's atomic bombs," to a more realistic appraisal of the utility 

of chemical fires in the future battlefield. Iran's signature of the 

Chemical Weapons Convention in early 1993 calling for the 

prohibition of the development, production, stockpiling, and use 

of chemical weapons, possibly indicates Iran's genuine desire to 

see the disappearance of these weapons from the Middle East. 
AHMED HASHIM 213 

Iran's Ballistic Missile Program 

Ballistic missiles were not very import,ant in the early stages of 

the Iran-Iraq war. Iraq had Soviet Frog missiles with a 40-mile 

range, which it tried to use initially against Iranian military 

targets, but the missiles were wildly inaccurate; consequently, it 

reverted to using them against Iranian border towns. Iran did not 

have the means to retaliate with missile attacks and the 

predecessor of the Islamic regime had not equipped Iran with a 

ballistic missile capability although there were secret plans to coproduce missiles with Israel. Although the Iraqi missile attacks 

devastated small towns and caused many refugees they were not 

strategically important as to merit an immediate Iranian riposte. 

When Iraq began using longer-range Scud-Bs, however, 

particularly from the mid-1980s onwards, Iran was forced to 

obtain a retaliatory capability in the form of Scud-Bs from Libya, 

North Korea, China, and Syria. It began using them in 1985 

against Iraqi cities, including Baghdad. Iran had much more 

strategic depth than Iraq, and could hit politically important cities 

like Baghdad and Basra, which were 90 and 10 miles respectively 

from the Iranian border, with unmodified missiles. Iran's ability 

to hit Baghdad with Scud-Bs, which have a range of 175-190 

miles, forced Iraq to seek a means of reaching Tehran and other 

potential targets like the holy city of Qom, several hundred miles 

inside Iranian territory. For two years Iraq worked on enhancing 

its retaliatory capability. When the final war of the cities came 

between February and April 1988, Iran was stunned to find that 

Iraqi modified Scud-Bs called "A1-Husayn," with a range of 400 

miles, could hit many of Iran's important urban centers. Between 

160-200 Iraqi missiles were launched against Tehran, Isfahan and 

Qom. Iran suffered 2,000 deaths, 8,000 injuries and 

considerable property damage. Ayatullah Khomeini's remark that 

in spite of the missiles, "People are still sitting where they were, 

and are laughing," was not a reflection of reality. The missile 

attacks caused mass terror and hundreds of thousands of residents 

of Tehran fled the city. The direct military significance or the 
214 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

AI-Husayn attacks was negligible, but nonetheless they had a 

considerable impact, terrorizing a war-weary population, and 

highlighting the lack of effective defense or deterrent. H7 Iran 

launched about 60 Scud-Bs against Baghdad--most landed in the 

sparsely populated south-east areas of the city--and other cities. 

But Iraq seemed to have an apparently inexhaustible supply and 

could control the escalatory and retaliatory process in a way Iran 

could not. This humiliating situation gave an added impetus to 

Iran's attempts to develop and to acquire long-range ballistic 

missiles as a future deterrent or retaliatory capability. Iran had 

considerably exaggerated its own capabilities in the mid-1980s, 

and despite its ability to target Baghdad, it had neither the ability 

to sustain a prolonged missile offensive nor the capability to 

retaliate on a one-to-one basis against Iraq. 

Most of Iran's desire to acquire or develop ballistic missiles 

in the aftermath of the Iran-Iraq war was motivated by continued 

Iraqi developments in the field and by the general proliferation 

of ballistic missiles in the Middle East. The Iranians have 

pointed to the presence of ballistic missiles in Saudi Arabia, 

Pakistan, Afghanistan, Syria, and Israel. But naturally, Iraq 

remained the focus of concern. The Iranians assumed as early as 

1988 that the Iraqis were capable of putting chemical warheads 

on their ballistic missiles. 

As of 1994 the broad outlines of Iran's ballistic missile 

117 An Iranian defense analyst told that, given the current limitations 

of guidance systems and of limited payload, ballistic missiles in the 

Iran-Iraq War were not so much weapons of mass destruction nor of 

military significance, but weapons of psychological terror; for 

descriptions of the impact of the Iraqi missile blitz on Tehran, see 

Patrick Tyler, "As Missiles Arrive, Tehran Skips a Beat," International 

Herald Tribune, March 22, 1988; Arnold Hottinger, "Raketenangriffe 

zu Neujahr in Tehran," Neue Zurcher Zeitung, March 23, 1988, where 

the author points out that the impact of the missiles on Tehran's 

structures was not as great as the psychological impact on its 

inhabitants. 
AHMED HASHIM 215 

program can be ascertained. The program is the outcome of two 

separate but interrelated initiatives: first, there has been outright 

acquisition from North Korea DPRK, China, Libya and Syria; it 

was noted above that Iran had obtained Scuds from Libya in 

1985 and from Syria in 1986 for purposes of retaliation during 

the war with Iraq. Second, Iran has striven for production of 

indigenous missiles aided by acquisition of the requisite 

technology, again from North Korea and China. It seems that in 

1985 Iran made the decision to invest in a major way in an 

indigenous missile production capability. 

The North-Korea-aided program relates to the Scud series of 

missiles and originated in a 1985 agreement to transfer to Iran 

manufacturing know-how for SAM missiles. This technology 

transfer reportedly helped lran with the production of its 

indigenous series of artillery rockets and a production facility for 

the Scud-B. In early 1990 Iran received 100-200 missiles from 

North Korea and further help in setting up missile production 

facilities and the training of Iranians in the manufacture, 

deployment and testing of ballistic missiles. It was reported that 

some of the missiles were Scud-Cs acquired in order to provide 

the basis for an indigenous Scud-C program. In fact, in 1991 

Iran may have converted a missile plant in eastern Iran to the 

assembly of Scud-Cs. These missiles are more accurate than the 

Scud-B, have double the range, and carry a warhead which is 

three times more powerful. In early 1992, it was reported that 

Iran and North Korea were cooperating to produce the long-range 

liquid-propelled Ro Dong-1 missile that will carry a 1,760 pound 

conventional warhead. This missile would be more powerful 

than anything currently in Iran's arsenal. The status of the 

program is still unclear, but the North Koreans did test fire the 

missile in June 1990. 

Although it was often reported that China had played an 

important role in Iran's Scud program, this is probably inaccurate. 

The collaboration with Otina led to the transfer of technology 

which resulted in the development of artillery rockets like the 

Oghab, which has the same characteristics as the Chinese 273- 
216 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

mm artillery rockets. 11s There have also been agreements with 

the Chinese Great Wall Industry Corporation under which the 

Chinese would fix warheads to Iranian sounding rockets. In 

1988 Iran and China concluded an agreement to produce a 

variety of missiles with ranges of between 700 and 1000 km. 

These reportedly included the Iran-700 with a range of 700 km 

and a warhead of 500 kg; and the Tondar-68, with a range of 

1000 km and a 400 kg warhead. But neither missile has been 

confirmed to be in development. 

Very little is known about joint cooperation between regional 

states in the development and production of ballistic missiles, 

partly because of the sensitivity of the issue and partly because 

of acute mutual hostility. However, in late 1991 it was reported 

that Iran and Syria--which have been de facto allies since the 

early 1980s--had agreed to pool their resources to develop 

ballistic missiles. Other reports suggested that Iran was 

branching out and approaching other countries like Brazil--which 

had helped Iraq tremendously in the field of ballistic missiles and 

artillery rocket systems----for missile technology. Brazil is a 

logical country which Iran could collaborate with, as it is rapidly 

becoming one of the leading ballisitic missile producers in the 

Third World. It is currently developing its MB/EE-150, 350, 

600, and 1000 series (the numbers indicate the range in 

kilometres) of missiles. More recently, it was reported that Libya 

has sold Iran designs for its AI-Fatah missile, which it had tried 

but failed to develop with technical help from German 

specialists. 119 

In January 1991 Iran announced that it would start massproduction of long-range, surface-to-surface missiles with great 

118 Defense and Foreign Affairs Weekly, May 8-14, 1989, 4. 

119 Alan George, "Libya Sells Al-Fatah Design to Iranians," Flight 

International, April 14, 1993, 4. 
AHMED HASHIM 217 

destructive powerJ 2° lran is not the only major regional power 

with a baUisitc missile program; others like Egypt, Israel, Iraq, 

Syria, and Saudi Arabia have ballistic missilesJ 2~ Until its defeat 

in the Gulf War, Iraq had a program which, although it was not 

as advanced technologically as Israel's, was the largest in the 

Middle East. Currently, under the provisions of the U.N. 

disarmament agreement, Iraq will be stripped of ballistic missiles 

with a range greater than 150 kilometers. This will prevent Iraq 

from striking Israel, but it can still hit Iranian border areas with 

short-range missiles. 

Although the direct military effectiveness of Iraqi ballistic 

missile attacks during the Gulf war was not great, lran was 

impressed, as were other regional states, by the psychological 

impact and urban damage they caused in Israel, and by the 

inordinate amount of time coalition air assets spent unsuccesfully 

looking for Scud launchers. In fact, after the Gulf War, Iranian 

commentators urged more investment in short-, medium-, and 

long-range surface-to-surface missiles in order to deter enemy air 

or missile strikes against economic or urban centres in the future. 

In other words, Iran may have drawn the lesson that surface to 

surface missiles are both survivable assets--how much harder 

would it be to look for them in a country like Iran, which is three 

times the size of Iraq---potentially useful retaliatory weapons. 

CONCLUSIONS 

This paper has examined motivations for the Iranian rearmament 

program and the development of military capabilities between 

12o FBIS-NES, January 29, 1991, 51. 

121 Israel, Egypt, and Iraq have the most advanced indigenous 

production capabilities. Iran and Syria are trying to develop more 

advanced development and production infrastructures. Saudi Arabia 

purchased outright the CSS-2 long-range ballistic missiles from the 

People's Republic of China in the late 1980s. 
218 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

1988 and 1994. These years constitue a watershed for Iranian 

national security as a whole, in that for the past five years Iranian 

policy-makers have been faced with an extremely fluid and 

uncertain domestic, regional, and international environment. At 

the same time, Iran has been trying to revitalize military 

capabilities devastated during the Iran-lraq war. The outside 

world did not view Iran's defense procurement effort with as 

much alarm between 1989 and 1990 because its efforts were 

completely overshadowed by Iraq's massive across the board 

acquisition programs and because Iran had not found any reliable 

source for advanced weaponry. In the aftermath of the Gulf War, 

Iraqi military power had been reduced substantially, and the 

country remains under a devastating sanctions regime. Suddenly 

by default, Iran emerged as the strongest power in the Persian 

Gulf. 

By 1992, however, Iran had succeeded in finding reliable 

sources of arms, such as Russia and other successor states of the 

former USSR. A close reading of Iran's rearmament strategy 

reveals that, given the country's limited financial resources, it is 

focusing on rebuilding critical areas such as the air force, air 

defenses, and the naval forces. Re-building does not solely mean 

acquisition of arms, it also means thorough re-organization, 

improved training methods, and continuous field training 

exercises by these forces in order to enhance combat capabilities 

in light of lessons learnt as a result of the Iran-Iraq war. In 

short, Iran is concentrating on those ,areas where it will get the 

most bang for the buck. 

It is Iran's activities in the field of unconventional weapons 

development which has generated the most unease globally. 

Given the highly destabilizing and controversial nature of 

chemical weapons, ballistic missiles, and nuclear weapons, 

countries tend to be very secretive concerning their activities in 

these fields. Most of the attention has been focused on Iran's 

alleged nuclear weapons program. At this stage it is extremely 

difficult to reach solid conclusions one way or another. Given 

the immense difficulties standing in Iran's way, such as lack of 
AHMED HASHIM 219 

finances, underdeveloped infrastructure, lack of research and 

development culture, and growing international scrutiny, Iran's 

road to nuclearization will be rocky. 

The whole debate itself has been suffused with blatant 

political partisanship and with unhelpful and unenlightening 

orientalist metaphors stating that an irrational, pariah, or rogue 

state cannot be allowed to acquire such weapons because they 

might use them. Irrationality must not be seen as the preserve of 

one set of rulers or peoples with whom we happen to disagree. 

What is meant by the terms rogue or pariah states? All in all, a 

nuclearized Middle East will be safe neither for the regional 

states nor for the United States. Neither the existence of one 

nuclear state with relatively well-developed nuclear forces nor a 

coterie of nuclearized Middle Eastem states with immature and 

fragile nuclear forces in close proximity to one another, but with 

peoples and elites still suffering from great social distance from 

one another, constitutes a recipe for stability in the region. 

Iran's views on chemical weapons and ballistic missiles can 

be addressed with greater confidence, as Iran had direct and 

prolonged experience with both types of weapons during the lranIraq War. Its moral outrage--partly contrived to gain worldwide 

sympathy--was tempered by the realization that it had to do 

something practical to neutralize Iraq's arsenal. But it has been 

unable to equip its massive infantry forces with offensive 

chemical weapons, and has probably decided to focus its 

attention on equipping them with decontamination systems and 

to train them to deal with chemical fires. At the same time any 

offensive chemical weapons would remain in the hands of trained 

specialist regular forces. 

The Iranians view ballistic missiles--technically not an 

unconventional weapon but a delivery system--as effective 

instruments of war as proven by both the Iran-Iraq and Gulf 

Wars. Given the regional trend toward the acquisition of more 

and more sophisticated and longer-range ballistic missiles, Iran 

is determined to acquire these weapons as well. 
ABREVIATIONS USED 

AEOI 

APC 

ASW 

BBC 

BW 

CENTCOM 

CIA 

CW 

EC 

FBIS 

FBIS-NES 

FBIS-WEU 

GDP 

GNP 

IAEA 

IMP 

IRGC 

IRI 

IRNA 

JPRS 

MTCR 

MW 

NATO 

NCO 

NPT 

OPEC 

SAM 

UAE 

U.N. 

USSR 

VLF 

WMD 

Atomic Energy Organization of Iran 

armored personnel carrier 

anti-submarine warfare 

British Broadcasting Corporation 

biological warfare 

U.S. Central Command 

Central Intelligence Agency 

chemical warfare 

European Community 

Foreign Broadcast Information Service 

FBIS, Near East and South Asia 

FBIS, Westem Europe 

gross domestic product 

gross national product 

International Atomic Energy Agency 

International Monetary Fund 

Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps 

Islamic Republic of Irma 

Islamic Republic News Agency 

Joint Publication Research Service 

Missile Technology Control Regime 

megawatt 

North Atlantic Treaty Organization 

noncommissioned officer 

Non-Proliferation Treaty 

Organization of Petroleum Exporting 

Countries 

surface-to-air missile 

United Arab Emirates 

United Nations 

Union of Soviet Socialist Republics 

very low frequency 

weapons of mass destruction 

221 
ABOUT THE AUTHORS 

SHAHRAM CHUBIN teaches at the Graduate School of International 

Studies in Geneva, Switzerland. He is the author of Iran's 

National Security Policies: Motivations, Capabilities, and Impact 

(1994); Iran and h'aq at War (1988) with Charles Tripp; and 

numerous articles on Persian Gulf security. He was formerly 

Director of Regional Security Studies at the International Institute 

of Strategic Studies in London. 

PATRICK CLAWSON is a senior fellow at the Institute for National 

Strategic Studies, where he recently wrote McNair Paper Number 

22, How Saddam Hussein Has Survived: Economic Sanctions 

1990-1993. He is the author of Iran's Challenge to the West 

(1993); Uprooting Leninism, Cultivating Liberty, with Vladimir 

Tismaneanu (1992); and Economic Consequences of Peace for 

Israel, Palestinians and Jordan, with Howard Rosen (1991), as 

well as two dozen articles on Iran. A past editor of Orbis, Mr. 

Clawson was a senior economist at the World Bank and the 

International Monetary Fund. 

IVIICHAEL EISENSTADT is Military Affairs Fellow at The Washington 

Institute for Near East Policy. He is the author of several 

monographs, including Like a Phoenix from the Ashes? The 

Future of Iraqi Military Power (1993) and Arming for Peace? 

Syria's Elusive Quest for Strategic Parity (1992). In 1992, he 

served as an analyst with the U.S. Air Force Gulf War Air Power 

Survey. He is a reserve officer in the U.S. Army, speaks Arabic 

and Hebrew, and has an M.A. in Arab Studies from Georgetown 

University. 

223 
224 IRAN'S STRATEGIC INTENTIONS 

JOHN HANNAH is deputy director of The Washington Institute for 

Near East Policy. From 1991 to 1993, he served as a senior 

member of the State Department's Policy Planning Staff 

responsible for Soviet/Russian affairs. He is the author of At 

Arms Length: Soviet-Syrian Relations in the Gorbachev Era 

(1989). 

AHMED HASHIM specializes in Middle East strategic and defense 

issues. A research associate at the Intemational Institute of 

Strategic Studies in London, he is writing a monograph on 

Iranian national security. A graduate of Warwick University and 

the Massachussetts Institute of Technology, he is the author of 

several articles on Iraqi and Iranian security. 

STUART E. JOHNSON has been Director of Regional Studies for the 

Institute of National Strategic Studies, National Defense 

University since 1988. He has also served as Director of the 

Institute and, from 1985 to 1988, as Director of NDU's 

Command and Control Research Program. He has edited and 

contributed to The Science of Command and Control: Coping 

with Uncertainty and The Science of Command and Control: 

Coping with Complexity. 

FARHAD KAZEMI is Professor of Politics at New York University. 

A former editor of Iranian Studies, he has authored Culture and 

Politics in Iran (1988) and Poverty and Revolution in h'an (1980) 

as well as numerous articles on Iran. 

LAURENT LAMOTE is currently working at the Centre National de la 

Recherche Scientifique (Paris, France), on scholarly studies and 

on social change and geopolitics in Iran. He lived in Iran during 

the Islamic Revolution and has traveled there every year, 

following from inside Iran the internal evolution of the country 

and the society. He has published numerous papers on Iran's 

urban society and the Islamic revolution. 
McNair Papers 

The McNair Papers are published at Fort Lesley J. McNair, 

home of the Institute for National Strategic Studies and the 

National Defense University. An Army post since 1794, the fort 

was given its present name in 1948 in honor of Lieutenant 

General Lesley James McNair. General McNair, known as 

"Educator of the Army" and trainer of some three million troops, 

was about to take command of Allied ground forces in Europe 

under Eisenhower, when he was killed in combat in Normandy, 

25 July 1944. 

1. Joseph P. Lorenz, Egypt and the New Arab Coalition, February 

1989. 

2. John E. Endicott, Grand Strategy and the Pacific Region, May 

1989. 

3. Eugene V. Rostow, President, Prime Minister, or Constitutional 

Monarch?, October 1989. 

4. Howard G. DeWolf, SDI and Arms Control, November 1989. 

5. Martin C. Libicki, What Makes Industries Strategic, November 1989. 

6. Melvin A. Goodman, Gorbachev and Soviet Policy in the Third 

World, February 1990. 

7. John Van Oudenaren, "The Tradition of Change in Soviet Foreign 

Policy," and Francis Conte, "Two Schools of Soviet Diplomacy," in 

Understanding Soviet Foreign Policy, April 1990. 

8. Max G. Manwaring and Court Prisk, A Strategic View of 

lnsurgencies: Insights from El Salvador, May 1990. 

9. Steven R. Linke, Managing Crises in Defense Industry: The 

PEPCON and Avtex Cases, June 1990. 

10. Christine M. Helms, Arabism and Islam: Stateless Nations and 

Nationless States, September 1990. 

11. Ralph A. Cossa, lran: Soviet Interests, US Concerns, July 1990. 

12. Ewan Jamieson, Friend or Ally? A Question for New Zealand, May 

1991. 

13. Richard J. Dunn III, From Gettysburg to the Gulf and Beyond: 

Coping with Revolutionary Technological Change in Land Warfare, 

March 1992. 

14. Ted Greenwood, U.S. and NATO Force Structure and Military 

Operations in the Mediterranean, June 1993. 
15. Oscar W. Clyatt, Jr., Bulgaria' s Quest for Security After the Cold 

War, February 1993. 

16. William C. Bodie, Moscow's "Near Abroad": Security Policy in 

Post-Soviet Europe, June 1993. 

17. William H. Lewis (ed.), Military Implications of United Nations 

Peacekeeping Operations, June 1993. 

18. Sterling D. Sessions and Carl R. Jones, lnteroperability: A Desert 

Storm Case Study, July 1993. 

19. Eugene V. Rostow, Should Article 43 of the United Nations 

Charter Be Raised From the Dead? July 1993 

20. William T. Johnsen and Thomas Durell-Young; Jeffrey Simon; 

Daniel N. Nelson; William C. Bodie, and James McCarthy, European 

Security Toward the Year 2000, August 1993. 

21. Edwin R. Carlisle, ed., Developing Battlefield Technologies in the 

1990s, August 1993. 

22. Patrick Clawson, How Has Saddam Hussein Survived? Economic 

Sanctions, 1990-93, August 1993. 

23. Jeffrey Simon, Czechoslovakia's "Velvet Divorce," Visegrad 

Cohesion, and European Fault Lines, October 1993. 

24. Eugene V. Rostow, The Future of Palestine, November 1993. 

25. William H. Lewis, John Mackinlay, John G. Ruggie, and Sir Brian 

Urquhart, Peacekeeping: The Way Ahead? November 1993. 

26. Edward Marks and William Lewis, Triage for Failing States, 

January 1994. 

27. Gregory D. Foster, In Search of a Post-Cold War Security 

Structure, February 1994. 

28. Martin C. Libicki, The Mesh and the Net: Speculations on Armed 

Conflict in a Time of Free Silicon, March 1994. 

29. Patrick Clawson, Iran's Strategic Intentions and Capabilities, 

March 1994. 

30. James W. Morrison, Vladimir Zhirinovskiy: An Assessment of a 

Russian Ultra-Nationalist, April 1994. 
JFQ: Joint Force Quarterly is a new professional 

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conducted by the unified commands, and joint force 

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The journal is a forum for examining joint and 

combined warfare and exchanging ideas of importance to all services. JFQ will appeal to a wide audience across the defense community with an interest 

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