IRAN, IRAQ, AND THE UNITED STATES:

THE NEW TRIANGLE’S IMPACT ON 

SECTARIANISM

AND THE NUCLEAR THREAT

Sherifa D. Zuhur

November 2006

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iii

FOREWORD

Many observers are concerned about the best means 

of discouraging sectarian conflict in Iraq while still 

waging counterinsurgency efforts. Another tension 

between regional policy goals concerns American and 

Iraqi desires to constrain growing Iranian influence in 

Iraq, and in the region as a whole, and advocating more 

scrutiny over transnational dealings and control over 

weapons proliferation, while also promoting peaceful 

co-existence and stricter observance of sovereignty in 

the Middle East. One pole around which these tensions 

circumambulate is the tensions between Sunni and Shi`a 

political and religious entities. Bilateral state relations 

are one level of consideration, to which must be added 

American concerns and those of other nations of the 

region. This monograph explores the various doctrinal, 

historical, and political facets of these issues. 

The analysis and recommendations offered here 

by Dr. Sherifa Zuhur are intended to contribute to the 

debate over these issues, and hopefully clarify some 

of the underlying questions for those who follow new 

developments in these issue areas.

DOUGLAS C. LOVELACE, JR.

Director

Strategic Studies Institute 
iv

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH OF THE AUTHOR

SHERIFA D. ZUHUR is Research Professor of Islamic 

and Regional Studies. She has lectured widely, 

holding faculty positions at Massachusetts Institute of 

Technology; the University of California, Berkeley; the 

American University in Cairo; and other universities. 

Dr. Zuhur’s research interests include Islamic movements, war and peace in the Middle East, modern 

Middle Eastern politics, Islamic political and religious 

philosophy, and social and cultural developments in 

the Middle East. She is the author of 12 books and 

monographs, and more than 51 articles and book 

chapters. Dr. Zuhur holds a B.A. in Political Science 

and Arabic from UCLA, an M.A. in Islamic Studies 

from UCLA, and a Ph.D. in Middle Eastern History 

from UCLA.
v

SUMMARY

What is the best possible response to growing Iranian 

influence in Iraq? How does this issue relate to the 

crisis over Iran’s efforts to obtain nuclear capabilities? 

Can the United States leverage one issue against the 

other, offering Iran incentives to shift down its nuclear 

program and, at the same time, withhold judgment on 

that country’s influence in Iraq? Or are these concerns 

best dealt with separately from the American policy 

perspective? Beyond American foreign policy and 

policy analysis, European, Arab, Israeli, Russian, and 

Chinese interests are factors in the new equation.

Perhaps there is no optimal response to an Iran 

determined to acquire nuclear capabilities, nor to an 

Iraqi Shi’i revival fostered or enhanced by Iranian “soft 

power.” Still, to understand the dire predictions about 

the growth of Shi`a power, or to offer constructive 

advice about the trilateral relations of Iran, Iraq, and 

the United States, we must consider Iraqi-Iranian 

popular, religious, and state-level dynamics. If we 

appreciate the strongly varying interests and political 

experience of the Shi`a of Iraq and Iran, our fears of 

the dire scenarios predicted in the Arab world may 

diminish.

Iran and Iraq historically have influenced and 

threatened each other. However, the triangle of U.S.-

Iraq-Iran relations outweighs the two Middle Eastern 

states’ bilateral history, their contrasting political aims, 

respective grievances, and competition. Now, Iran’s 

nuclear ambitions cast a shadow on the future of both 

countries, the Arabian Gulf states, Israel, and American 

forces and facilities in the region. 

European efforts to extend incentives to Iran so that 

it would cease uranium enrichment contrasted with 
vi

the American administration’s initial approach to the 

dilemma. The U.S. offer to join multistate negotiations 

with Iran in June 2006, breaking with 27 years of 

official silence, was conditional on Iran’s promise to 

give up uranium enrichment. Yet, European nations 

already had attempted negotiations with Iran in lieu 

of its compliance with International Atomic Energy 

Agency’s (IAEA) conditions.

Are these differing approaches to diplomacy the 

outcome or a reflection of varying responses to the war 

in Iraq? Does the American posture stem from longtime anger over the 1979 hostage crisis? Its projection 

for Iran in the “New Middle East”? European nations 

sometimes claim to be more knowledgeable about the 

Middle East than the United States due to their firsthand experiences in the colonial and Mandate eras and 

their lengthier tradition of Oriental studies. Possibly 

this could enhance their pragmatism, resignation, 

diplomatic skills, or policy approaches to Middle 

Eastern democratization, or the issue of proliferation. 

European nations also may be more sanguine about 

the potential for containing radical Islam in the region 

than the United States is.

When regime change in Iraq became a certainty, 

nearly all observers realized that the Shi`a of Iraq could 

only gain political influence in a new government 

organized on a representational basis. Leading figures 

in the Arab world, as well as some Westerners, sounded 

the alarm on Iran’s goals in a weakened Iraq. In some 

cases, their charges proceed from the claim that Shi`a 

influence or Iranian-style militant fundamentalism 

has increased throughout the region. The Shi`a, in 

Iraq as elsewhere in the Middle East and Central Asia, 

have been accused of being Iranian agents.1 But some 

believe, like Reuel Marc Gerecht, resident scholar at the 
vii

American Enterprise Institute, that Iraqi nationalism 

provides the best defense against undue Iranian 

influence. Or, that foreign nations have other reasons 

for calling “wolf” in Iraq, namely, their Iran policies.2

One even hears that the Shi`a could be a positive 

force offsetting or detracting from radical Sunni 

salafism. This idea stands in stark contrast to the vision 

of Iraq as a future Islamic Republic, or at least, the 

breeding ground of a new Hizbullah. Some observers, 

like Thomas Friedman, foreign affairs columnist at the 

New York Times, urge others not to make too much of 

an Iranian bogeyman, pointing out that Iran had and 

will continue to have influence in Iraq, but that it is the 

Shi’i Iraqis whose status had been transformed.3

In contrast, Iran’s political system has not changed, 

and there is probably little hope for encouraging reform 

from afar. In fact, Islamic revolutionary values are 

being reinvigorated by the new President, Mahmud 

Ahmadinejad. Has he become a lightening rod for 

populist sentiment in Iran, a catalyst for anti-American 

and anti-Western grievances? Under his leadership, 

and that of a young Iraqi government struggling 

with daily crises, how will these two very important 

situations play out and what sorts of resulting risks 

and threats may be anticipated in the future?4

ENDNOTES

1. Craig Gordon cites General George Casey on Iranian and 

Hizbollah training of Iraqi insurgents. “Iran Cited as Threat in 

Iraq,” Newsday.com, June 23, 2006; Raymond Tanter, “Iran’s Threat 

to Coalition Forces in Iraq,” Washington, DC: Institute for Near 

East Policy, January 15, 2004.

2. Reuel Marc Gerecht, “Will Iran Win the Iraq War?” Wall 

Street Journal, December 14, 2004; Mahan Abedin, “Britain, Iran 

Playing with Iraqi Shi’ite Fire,” Asia Times, October 1, 2005, www.

atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/GJ22Ak01.html.
viii

3. Thomas Friedman, “A Political Arabesque,” New York Times, 

December 19, 2004. 

4. The informational cut-off date for this monograph was 

August 1, 2006. It was written between January and June 2006. 
1

IRAN, IRAQ, AND THE UNITED STATES:

THE NEW TRIANGLE’S IMPACT ON 

SECTARIANISM

AND THE NUCLEAR THREAT

INTRODUCTION

Many observers are doubly concerned by the 

growing Iranian influence in Iraq and Iran’s announced 

determination to develop nuclear capabilities. Is there 

an optimal way for the United States to respond to 

either issue, or both? The linkage of these issues affects 

Iran’s neighbors, other Arab states, European nations, 

Russia, and China. A single example may be seen in 

British charges of an Iranian hand in the bombs that 

killed British soldiers in southern Iraq reported by 

the BBC. The “evidence” concerned similarities to 

Hizbullah-wielded devices. The correspondent drew 

a conclusion and then asked a loaded question. First, 

he noted that Iranian-British diplomacy was at such a 

low as a result of stalemate on the nuclear issue that 

the Foreign Office did not muzzle such accusations 

(which are rampant in Iraq). The question concerned 

which foreign powers know how Hizbullah makes a 

bomb.1 Other accusations focus on Iranian connections 

with Shi`a militias, insurgents in Iraq, or that Iranian 

religious officials are infiltrating Iraq and spreading a 

more militant version of Shi’ism.2

In fact, there may not be a “best response” to the 

question of Iranian or Shi`a soft and hard power, but 

in order to select the least dangerous path forward, 

we must first understand Iran’s influence on Iraq, 

Iran’s national self-image, and the fears of neighboring 

countries regarding their minority populations, or Iraq 

and American influence there.
2

Iran and Iraq historically have influenced and 

threatened each other. However, the triangle of U.S.-

Iraq-Iran relations now overshadows the two Middle 

Eastern states’ bilateral history, their contrasting 

political aims, respective grievances, and competition. 

Iran’s decision to pursue the development of nuclear 

technology further complicates the relationship 

between the three states. In addition, European efforts 

to extend incentives to Iran so that it would cease 

uranium enrichment contrasted with the American 

administration’s approach to the same situation. Is this 

an outcome of differing approaches to the war in Iraq? 

Does it express long-standing American anger with 

Iran? Or have the Europeans adopted an essentially 

different attitude to Middle Eastern affairs in general 

that is based on their economic interests, and extends 

to questions of proliferation or democratization in the 

region?

When regime change in Iraq became a certainty, 

all informed observers realized that the Iraqi Shi`a 

population would gain political influence in a 

government organized on a representational basis. 

Many are comfortable saying that the Shi`a of Iraq 

represent about 60 percent of the population. But in 

fact, it is quite possible that they make up much closer 

to 70 percent. Because of 1) the nature of political 

development and organization in Iraq throughout 

the 20th and early 21st centuries, 2) the American 

alliances forged with Iraqi opposition groups prior to 

spring 2003, 3) the emphasis put on communitarian 

representation, and 4) outlawing the Ba`th party, Shi`a 

religious parties and clerics hold more influence in Iraq 

than ever.3

The prominence of Islamist actors and ideas, 

whether Shi`i or Sunni, is reflected in public opinion. 
3

Many Iraqis state that Islamic parties and values 

should be represented.4 Not all Shi`a agree on the 

separation of religion and state, but more Shi`i Iraqis 

supported Islamist parties and principles in the 

December 2005 elections than secularist figures like 

former Prime Minister Iyad Allawi. Voters in the city 

of Hillah said, “The important thing is to satisfy God,” 

and “We’re with the marja`iyya,” meaning that they 

had voted for the United Iraqi Alliance because they 

believed the Shi’ite religious leadership based in Najaf 

endorsed that list.5 Secularism has declined in Iraq in 

this community, possibly through peer pressure.6 Iraq 

is not unique in this respect as was demonstrated in 

the Saudi 2005 municipal elections and parliamentary 

elections in Egypt and the Palestinian Authority. 

Nonetheless, even religious Shi`i politicians represent 

a range of views about political Islam and its future in 

Iraq.

Quite a few figures, including King Abdullah of 

Jordan, charged Iran with electoral fraud and undue 

influence in Iraq, and they referred to a potential Shi`a 

crescent of power in Iran, Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon 

that would “alter the balance of power between the 

two main Islamic sects and pose new challenges to 

U.S. interests and allies.”7 Gulf leaders feared that 

such an outcome would, or already had, stirred up 

their own Shi`a populations, whether a minority as 

in Saudi Arabia,8 or a majority as in Bahrain.9 Prince 

Saud, Foreign Minister of Saudi Arabia, and President 

Hosni Mubarak of Egypt also expressed their concerns 

about the Shi`a of Iraq and Iran’s intentions toward the 

country. Mubarak declared, “The Shiites are always 

loyal to Iran. Most of them are loyal to Iran and not 

to the countries in which they live.”10 These public 

statements reflect anti-Shi`a and anti-Iranian sentiment 
4

that predominates in the Arab Middle East and some 

discontent with U.S. Iraq policies.

Egypt, Tunisia, and Saudi Arabia all blamed Iran 

for fomenting Islamist opposition at the very least, 

if not more directly charging the country for inciting 

radicalism in their own (Egypt), funding opposition 

movements (Tunisia), and unleashing violence (Saudi 

Arabia). Iraq could be the breeding ground of a new 

Islamic Republic, or at the very least, a new Hizbullah. 

Some observers, like Thomas Friedman, foreign 

columnist at the New York Times, caution against 

making too much of an Iranian bogeyman, pointing 

out that Iran had and will continue to have influence 

in Iraq, and that it is the Shi`i Iraqis whose status had 

been transformed.11 In contrast, Iran’s Islamic political 

system remains in place, and Iranians were not able 

to effect changes at the polls. Their reform movement 

is not extinct, but it cannot stand up to other forces in 

society or the power of the hardliners in government. 

Iranians, moreover, see few problems with their own 

policies in Iraq. Instead, their official government press 

blames attacks on the Shi`a on the misguided policies 

of the American government. As always, there is a 

more cooperative aspect to Iran’s relations with Iraq, 

in that the country has been willing to negotiate certain 

border issues and to communicate informally with the 

American Embassy in Iraq.

Iran’s Iraq policy gave way to concerns about Iranian 

brinkmanship on the issue of nuclear development. 

Tensions circled around the person and statements 

of the Iranian President. Was the new President 

Ahmadinejad a lightening rod for populist sentiment 

in Iran, a catalyst for anti-American and anti-Western 

grievances? How will these two very important 

situations play out and what sorts of risks and threats 

can we anticipate in the future?
5

IRAQ AND THE FUTURE

Iraq is America’s most important project in a newly 

imagined and more democratic Middle East. To date, 

a transformation of the Middle East, despite all the 

difficulties encountered in “post-conflict” Iraq and 

Afghanistan, remains a plank of U.S. foreign policy. 

Paradoxically, that ambition places conservatives, 

including neoconservatives, on the same side of the 

room as those in the region who have long opposed 

authoritarianism or called for reforms, increased 

pluralism, or some counterweight to their ruling 

elites. These U.S. intentions for the region, if they 

are sincere, break with realism in our foreign policy 

which, in Kissingerian mode, maintained alliances 

with undemocratic rulers to promote stability and a 

balance of power in the area. The prevailing wisdom 

for decades was that the slow steady growth of stronger 

political institutions would produce increasingly 

mature political systems. These eventually should 

democratize, especially if free market economies were 

encouraged. That thesis of political development 

dominated from the 1960s well into the 1980s when the 

Middle East and the Muslim world entered an entirely 

new phase.

Today’s neo-realist vision for the Middle East echoes 

some past efforts to transform the region. At the end of 

World War II, the British and French expected educated 

elites to promote “liberalism” or liberal thought in 

their societies. The British-sponsored Brothers of 

Freedom, organized by Freya Stark and others, held 

lectures and discussions with promising members of 

the effendi class (gentlemen bureaucrats) in Egypt and 

Iraq.12 Instead of white collar liberalism, the Syrian, 

Egyptian, and Iraqi revolutions brought an end to elite-
6

based parliamentarianism and political pluralism, and 

altered the class basis of regime beneficiaries in those 

countries.13 Thereafter, Arab unity and Arab socialism 

were the chief concerns of U.S. and European interests 

in the region.

American foreign policy sought an alliance of 

non-Arab states with more conservative Arab states 

to balance the Arab socialism and anti-Israeli stances 

of Gamal `Abd al-Nasser, President of Egypt, and the 

Ba`th in Syria and Iraq. This produced a cold war in 

the region, periodically expressed in proxy conflicts as 

in Yemen. Virtually no one anticipated that political 

opposition, as well as social development, eventually 

would be expressed in Islamic terms in Arab states 

(with the possible exception of Saudi Arabia) rather 

than in Marxist/socialist discourse. It was therefore a 

great shock to many observers, even in Iraq, when an 

American ally, Shah Muhammad Reza Pahlavi, was 

overthrown in an Islamic revolution, and country after 

country faced the activities of home-grown Islamist 

movements.

Today, what Sunni Iraqi Arabs fear is vengeance 

at the hands of some of their Shi`a compatriots due to 

their horrendous treatment under Saddam. And they 

protest their exclusion from power in the new Iraq. 

Their Arab supporters predict a Lebanonized Iraq, 

and exude paranoia about a new cold war by proxies 

that might pit Afghanistan, Iraq, Israel, and possibly 

Iran against Arab states influenced by the salafi and 

revivalist movements. Since then, not only these Arabs, 

but others who shed no tears for Saddam Hussein are 

concerned about the American dream of a New Middle 

East, particularly as it has been iterated as part of the 

Global War on Terror (GWOT). They view American 

injunctions on Arab (or Muslim) reform as the latest 
7

mode of imperialism, and warn that they open the 

door to regime insecurity for Iraq’s neighbors. Other 

observers have drawn attention to the destabilizing 

features of intersectarian conflict in Iraq as well.14

Given these fears, we wonder if American redrawing 

of the Middle East with Iraq as its centerpiece may be 

too ambitious. Can Arab liberals be unified to take 

advantage of new circumstances, or have they been 

utterly marginalized?15 Are critics in the region correct 

when they assert that America really is not committed 

to democratization; that this is merely a domestic 

appeal to rationalize the sacrifices made in Iraq and 

controversial aspects of the GWOT?

The theme of transformational change in Iraq that 

would provide courage and support to other Arab 

and Muslim democrats, and incentives for ruling 

elites to reform is appealing. It is more attractive than 

alternative explanations for U.S. policy, for instance, 

those revolving around the need for oil security. 

According to Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice,16

America could not simply leave the Middle East as it 

was, dominated by authoritarian figures like Saddam 

Hussein. Iraq was a destabilizing force in the region 

under his regime.

Secretary Rice also asserted that America would no 

longer do business with dictators; that authoritarianism 

must give way, an idea with great resonance in the 

region. Meanwhile, within Iraq, the essential structures 

of a confessional democracy, one based on ethnic or 

sectarian membership, are being erected. Secretary 

Rice has explained the difficulties and resistance to this 

project by suggesting that such major transformations 

are not easy; patience is called for.

One of these difficulties is intersectarian strife, 

specifically Sunni-Shi`i violence, whether in daytime 
8

attacks or in the gruesome discovery of bodies. Many 

Arab and Muslim states opposed America’s campaign 

in Iraq. Among their chief voiced concerns were the 

oft-stated uncontrollable nature of Iraqi society and the 

strength Iran wields in the regional balance of power, 

which they see as key factors in intersectarian conflict.

Iran’s Islamic Republic presents an entirely different 

national model to Islamists throughout the region. It is 

both populist and committed to popular representation, 

though power ultimately rests with the Supreme 

Faqih (jurist), Ayatullah Khamene’i, who succeeded 

Ayatullah Khomeini, and a conservative Council 

of Guardians. In Iraq, now that Islamism is strongly 

rooted, one could only expect Iranian-influenced 

Iraqi Islamist parties like the Supreme Council for the 

Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI, sometimes referred 

to as SAIRI) to promote movement toward the Iranian 

model. However, other Iraqi political actors, including 

the leading Shi`i cleric in the country, Ayatullah Sistani, 

do not favor the Iranian state model, nor does Sistani 

promote Ayatullah Khomeini’s doctrine of vilayet-e faqih

(rule of the jurist). The question is, then, whether the 

newly structured forms of democratic representation 

will irrevocably heighten the political aspects of Iraqi 

Shi`i Islamism? And if so, which ones, and how might 

they affect Iraq over time? Will the sectarian violence 

that has plagued the country since the bombing of the 

golden dome of the al-Askari mosque17 in Samarra 

on February 22, 2006, finally die down, only to erupt 

periodically? Can such tensions be lessened through 

federal and local measures, and contained with a fully 

operational military and police force?

Democratization elsewhere in the Arab Middle 

East has mired down. An eventful 2005 “democratic 

spring” led to a Syrian withdrawal from Lebanon, 
9

and the country now lies devastated by the 2006 

Israeli offensive. Most Middle Eastern governments 

still are authoritarian, albeit slight movement toward 

pluralism in Egypt, governmental reforms in Morocco, 

a new public discourse on reform in Saudi Arabia, 

and then the electoral success of Hamas has occurred. 

Three-quarters of the Egyptian parliament voted to 

extend the long-protested Emergency Laws in that 

country which essentially allow a suspension of 

normal legal processes and repression of opposition. 

Arab states complain that the battle against terrorism 

in their countries is hampering civil society’s efforts at 

reform, and that governments hastened to make some 

cosmetic changes to please the United States, but these 

are far from sufficient. Some Americans make much of 

the divergence between a Jeffersonian-style secularist 

democracy and the types of democracies and political 

parties that may prevail in the region. From inside the 

Middle East, would-be democracy advocates complain 

that it is a matter of business as usual between the 

United States and undemocratic allies, who provide 

lip service to reform, but not substantive changes. 

They are managing this because alternatives to their 

governance are likely to be Islamist in nature.

Iraq’s fledging elected government is dangerously 

weak. Many observers express concern about Iran’s 

influence at a time pregnant with uncertainty about 

Iraq’s cohesion. The formation of the first independent 

elected Iraqi government was contentious and lengthy. 

The draft constitution is to undergo reform, and the 

exact shape of federalism in Iraq is being debated. 

If federalism in the Iraqi context were to lead to a 

Shi`i provincial grouping, as SCIRI’s leadership had 

proposed, like that of the Kurds, then the specter of 

a de facto Islamic Republic of Iraq might be more than 

fantasy.
10

SEPARATISM OR UNITY

Federalism in Iraq may lead to separatism. A 

Shi`i mini-state could be created in a completely legal 

manner. However, a Shi`i region, or state, might not be 

feasible for practical reasons. Either a three-province or a 

nine-province grouping would be highly controversial 

to certain elements in the Shi`a population, as well 

as Sunnis. The presence of oil facilities in these areas, 

and centers of mixed population are only part of the 

problem. Iraq needs a unified national vision, which 

the Ba`th party provided, if only through extremely 

repressive practices and elimination of its political 

competitors. Also, separatist schemes previously 

were proposed in southern Iraq and were defeated 

in the interest of a united Iraq. In the 1920s, Southern 

separatists tried to found a state in the Basra area. This 

idea was supported mainly by Sunni immigrants from 

Najd and wealthy date merchants. Shi`i men of Basra, 

far less influential than its supporters, defeated this 

scheme and waved the banners of Iraqi nationalism. 

Certain historians and those bemoaning the postSaddam chaos in Iraq have called it an artificial state, 

or a British creation. It is intriguing to realize young 

Basrans and others in the Ottoman administration had 

defined an “Iraq” reaching from Basra to Samarra and, 

with that idea, defeated the separatists of their day.18

Iraqi unity and nationalism are of paramount 

importance to the success of the state. Still, under the 

current draft Iraqi constitution, the ambivalent language 

that supports a Kurdish entity, and independent 

legislation in it, provides the very same rationale to any 

other region, now defined as “one province or more.”19

In Article 116, Section 2, the constitution states that 

the regional authority may amend implementation of 
11

the federal law, and Article 111 says that priority will 

be given to the region’s law in cases of dispute.20 The 

legal vagueness that has and could permit significant 

Kurdish autonomy also would support particular 

regional rules in a “Shi`i region,” at least where matters 

“do not pertain to the exclusive powers of the federal 

authorities,” according to Article 111. One could 

envision the application of Ja`fari family law or Islamic 

criminal punishments in such a region as many Iraqis 

and others fear.

Oddly, the United States supported political 

leadership by the very party, SCIRI, that has made the 

case most strongly for a Shi`i region.21 And the Badr 

Corps, SCIRI’s militia, is accused of having direct 

connections with Iranian Revolutionary Guards, 

Iranian intelligence, and training.22 Following the Iraqi 

elections and a period of debate over the designation 

of portfolios, Secretary Rice and her then British 

counterpart, Jack Straw, pressured Iraqis to form a 

national unity government, meeting in Iraq with alJa`fari, President Talabani, and others opposed to alJa`fari. The Iraqis still were attempting to work through 

the dispute over the nomination for prime minister, 

which was first claimed by Ibrahim al-Ja`fari of the 

United Iraqi Alliance. The United States preferred 

a SCIRI candidate, previous Vice President Adel 

Abdul Mehdi.23 Secretary Rice said at that time, on 

the Newshour with Jim Lehrer, that the Prime Minister, 

“must be somebody who can unify the various blocs, 

the various groups of voters, who also went to the 

polls and now represent the interests of their voters.”24

Commenting on her statements on the same program, 

Professor Babak Rahimi of the University of California 

said, “I think it’s giving the impression especially to 

the Shia Iraqis and just generally Iraqis at large, that 
12

really the Americans are the ones calling the shots.”25

There were other factors in this effort. Clearly a key 

concern was Shi`i-Sunni strife which had heightened 

since February 22, 2006, when an attack was launched 

on the golden Askari mosque of Samarra. A campaign 

to unseat al-Ja`fari circulated around intimations that 

he was ineffective and had difficulty managing his 

government.26 According to journalist David Ignatius, 

Ambassador Khalilzad “viewed Jafari as too weak and 

sectarian,” and organized a rival coalition of Kurdish 

and Sunni politicians that outnumbered the Shi’ite 

alliance nominating al-Ja`fari.27 The Kurds believed 

him to be stalling on the issue of Kirkuk, whose ethnic 

status is yet to be determined in a referendum, and the 

media reported that Sunni parties were irritated by 

al-Ja`fari’s failure to take a stand against alleged Shi`i 

death squad attacks on Sunnis.28 American preferences 

toward the Shi’ite political party, SCIRI, appear to be 

based on Washington’s need for more malleable and 

effective leadership. But might not SCIRI leadership 

even more swiftly promote Iran’s growing influence in 

Iraq?

A slightly different explanation of the political 

jostling that did not focus on al-Ja`fari’s personal 

qualities goes like this. The al-Da`wa Party, more 

authentically Iraqi than SCIRI, was bolstered by the 

support of Muqtada al-Sadr, allowing al-Ja`fari to 

defeat narrowly SCIRI with the additional support of 

independents.29 The United States sought to outbalance 

the Sadrists by defeating al-Ja`fari,30 and also obtain 

more concessions to Sunnis and Kurds.31

In the end, Iraqis selected Jawad al-Maliki of the 

al-Da`wah Party as Prime Minister. A leading Sunni 

politician described al-Maliki as being “stronger, 

more insistent, and more practical” than al-Ja`fari, in 
13

addition to being a good communicator.32 Nevertheless, 

intersectarian violence remained at an intolerable level 

by July. Insurgent attacks continued as well.

SCIRI and its militias are just one worry. The 

Jaysh al-Mahdi, the militia forces of Muqtada alSadr, are culpable in the violence, and their pursuit of 

“Wahhabis” and other Sunnis is a definite concern that 

should be addressed through punitive measures by 

Muqtada himself. He has been a source of overblown 

accusations concerning Iran’s undue influence in Iraq 

as well. More importantly, he and his forces may play 

a role in future Shi`a in-fighting. Muqtada is a populist 

figure who has attracted those elements who want 

a qa’id (leader) rather than a spiritual guide, and an 

activist less-Iranian-influenced figure. His authority 

within Shi’ism is very limited, accruing from his 

family connections to Muhammad Baqr al-Sadr, and 

his father, Muhammad Muhammad Sadiq al-Sadr. The 

leader of his father’s devotees is Ayatullah Kadhim alHa’iri, who is in Iran and has now separated himself 

from Muqtada, at least in part, because he cannot 

control him.33

Intersectarian violence is an immediate concern, a 

grave obstacle to Iraq’s future. A slow-moving, possibly 

unavoidable Iranian influence is not as tangible. But it 

is possible that there is no solution to the former issue 

without addressing the latter. A high degree of anxiety 

about Iran’s strength in Iraq and the region is a more 

general and widespread phenomenon.

Is it better for Iraqis to accede to American ideas 

regarding their new democracy, specifically that 

concessions and promises made to Sunni Iraqis could 

reduce the friction between the two groups and that 

they need to be institutionalized in certain ways? Are 

Americans conceptualizing Iraqi-Iranian relations in 
14

light of intergroup tensions, or more along the lines of 

interstate influences that have emerged with regularity 

in Europe? U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Zalmay Khalilzad 

suggested a new approach:

It’s not the U.S. policy to advocate or promote a hostile 

relationship between Iraq and Iran. They are neighbors. 

We want to see these two countries have good relations 

with each other. But good relations also mean . . . that 

there is no interference in Iraqi affairs. Good relations 

with regard to all the neighbors means not to seek to 

dominate, particularly Iraqi institutions or Iraqi areas, 

and to work together to have an Iraq . . . that can stand 

on its own feet, is at peace internally and as well as . . . 

with the neighbors, to be a model.

There is a need for a change in the way one thinks about 

regional relations in this part of the world. And that is 

not to look at things in a zero sum way, in an old geopolitical . . . way, that in the weakness of one’s neighbor 

to see advantages for oneself. That’s what Europe did 

for centuries . . . in post-World War II, there was a 

change in . . . that, in fact, if your neighbor is poor, if 

your neighbor is in distress, it can only send problems 

for you. You can’t sell goods to a neighbor that has that 

kind of problems. And Europeans learned through a 

huge number of wars.

. . . the time has come for the countries of this region as 

well to take another look, not to seek grandeur in the 

misery . . . or in the fragmentation of the neighbor or 

to use elements of neighboring powers’ state against the 

interest of that country. And I think this is the message 

that I’d like to send on the relations between Iraq and its 

neighbors.34

It is true that during the horrible and lengthy civil war 

in Lebanon, many countries in the region supported 

particular clients in that conflict. That may be why the 

144 militias and fighting forces were able to continue 
15

fighting for so many years. On the other hand, the 

participation of other regional powers effected truces 

and eventually the 1991 Ta’if Accords that ended the 

violence.

This leads us to the strong expressions of concern 

about Iraq voiced in the region: that it is now the 

plaything of Iran, that Iranian agents are hard at 

work organizing the new Iraq, and that the United 

States apparently is blind to these trends, or worse, 

it is encouraging them in order to create a bloc of 

new entities that will battle Sunni salafism and 

simultaneously promote U.S. interests. Further, the 

Iran-Syria-Hizbullah axis is a matter of concern, not 

only to observers who support America’s New Middle 

East, but also to Arab observers, especially in the 

absence of other effective regional alliances.35

As with most fears or anxieties, a kernel of truth 

supports its exaggeration. If Iraq, under a new, more 

just system of representation, has emancipated Shi`i 

Iraqis, then with their newfound majority and Islamist 

discourse, they might well choose to emulate aspects of 

the Shi`i state next door. Islamic law, moral guidelines, 

and gender restrictions already are being drawn on, 

albeit crudely, in areas of the country. If we add to 

this germ of truth the fact that Iran is a fairly strong 

and populous state with a huge clerical establishment 

and Shi`i legitimacy whereas Iraq is still weak and 

threatened by a high level of insurgent violence, it is 

more difficult to refute the pundits’ claim.

No Regional Shi`a Threat.

Could the Shi`a unite? Would they support U.S. 

policy objectives? Democratization? A necessary 

corrective here is that observers should not think of 
16

the Shi`a as a monolith, either religiously or politically, 

in the past or present. Throughout the Islamic world, 

the Shi`a do not maintain common interests beyond 

certain key aspects of theology, historical experience, 

and legal tradition. Subsects and offshoots of Shi`a 

Islam developed over time. These major groupings 

are: 1) the Ithna `Ashariyya (Twelver) Muslims who 

belong to the Ja`afari legal school; 2) the Zaydiyya 

(of Yemen) who have their own legal school, and 3) 

the Isma`iliyya. Offshoots of Ismaili Islam include the 

Druze (Muwahhidun) and the `Alawi sect. The Ithna 

`Ashariyya tend to regard members of the offshoot sects 

as heretics, much as contemporary Sunnis, impacted 

by the Wahhabi rejection of Shi`ism, think of the Ithna 

`Ashariyya.

In the brief explanations of Shi’ism available to 

the general public, its diversity is underemphasized. 

A few aspects of theology and praxis usually are 

covered. These are the institution of the Imamate, 

the celebration of `Ashura (where permitted; it is not 

alllowed in mixed towns in Saudi Arabia, nor was it in 

Saddam’s Iraq) in a flagellant procession, and passion 

plays based on the history of the Shi`i cause. Sunni and 

Shi`i Muslims alike believe in the doctrine of shafa` or 

intercession on behalf of the believers, but in Shi’ism, 

members of the ahl al-bayt (Muhammad’s family) and 

certain Imams may provide it; for instance, Sayyidna 

Fatima (the Prophet Muhammad’s daughter) may 

intercede on behalf of one who is a muhibb (a lover of 

God), even if he is a sinner. A theme of redemptive 

suffering, collective in nature, is ingrained deeply in 

Shi`i rituals, lamentation poetry (marathi), and visiting 

of holy sites.36 The concepts of ghayba (occultation, the 

state of the Twelfth Imam, the Imam Mahdi) and the

intizar (the period of waiting for the return of the Imam), 
17

and other beliefs concerning the Twelfth Imam’s return 

are key to Ithna `Ashari (Twelver) Shiism.

Other differences between Sunnism and Shi’ism 

pertain to Islamic law, specifically Shi`ism’s use of and 

basis for ijtihad (a juridical principle that literally means 

self-exertion to attain a conclusion), which was excluded 

by the Sunni schools of law as a source of jurisprudence. 

The two groups also regard ijma`, consensus, another 

legal principle somewhat differently, with the Shi`a 

clerics following the ijma` of the Imams and criticizing 

the Sunni use of qiyas, or analogy in deductive form 

(mustanbit al-`illa) in jurisprudence.37

Shi`ism subdivided because of differing opinions 

on the chain of religious leadership, specifically the 

designation of the Imam within the institution of the 

Imamate. Put very simply, the idea of the Imamate is 

a religious authority recognized by the Party of `Ali 

(the Shi`a) after the Prophet’s death, personified in an 

Imam. This Shi`i Imam must be distinguished from an 

ordinary prayer leader in Sunni Islam, also known as an 

imam, who may or may not have any advanced religious 

training. The Shi`i Imam is Allah’s servant, infallible, 

and conversant with all Quranic interpretations.38

Each Imam should designate his successor, however, 

the sixth Imam, Ja`far al-Sadiq, died in 765 without 

doing so. The ensuing differences of opinion produced 

at least six subsects, including the Isma`ili Shi`is who 

trace the line of Isma`il to their leader, the Agha Khan, 

the 49th Imam. Their esoteric teachings were spread 

by missionaries and the powerful navy of the Fatimid 

empire, but are today rejected by Sunnis and Twelver 

Muslims in Iran, Iraq, and Lebanon. The larger Twelver 

grouping in these countries recognized Musa as the 

seventh Imam, and acknowledge a line of 12 Imams, 

the last of which is in occultation (neither dead nor alive 
18

until his return to earth). The caliphs, concerned by the 

potential popularity of Imams, kept them thereafter 

under house arrest,39 establishing another theme of 

Shi’ism, the tension between temporal and religious 

authority.

The Zaydi Shi`a of contemporary Yemen, and 10th 

century Tabaristan, followed Zayd bin `Ali as their 

Imam, who rebelled against the Ummayad ruler, 

Hisham, in 740. The Zaydis do not believe in the 

infallibility of the Imams, nor in the doctrine of the 

hidden (occulted) Imam.

Other inter-Shi`i rifts emerge from the competition 

between different centers of religious scholarship. 

For instance, Hillah in Iraq was an important center 

of Shi`i activity, but was eclipsed in modern times by 

Najaf and Qum in Iran. Today, some speculate that 

Najaf might eclipse Qum,40 since the former possesses 

an undisputed marja` (Marja` al-taqlid al-mutlaq means 

the ultimate source of emulation, meaning the most 

distinguished cleric). Other clerics and Shi`i Muslims 

could follow his rulings and intellectual approach, 

namely Sistani. Whereas in Iran, the office of marja` has 

been supplanted to some extent by the political office 

of the Supreme Faqih (jurist), currently Ayatullah 

Khamene’i. This dispute, which will be explained more 

thoroughly below, relates to the various acceptance or 

rejection of doctrine of rule by the jurist, vilayat-e faqih, 

and the future of political Islam in Iraq and Iran.

Further differences within Twelver Shi`ism that 

have affected Iraqis and Iranians stem from doctrinal 

disputes between usuli (rationalist) and akhbari

(traditionalist) Shi`a. Usuli Shi`ism was the version 

originally spreading from Hilla, Iraq, the center of Shi`i 

learning to Iran and Lebanon. Akhbari Shi’ism, which 

contested the emulation of the Shi`i mujtahids (religious 
19

authorities who can utilize the legal principle of ijtihad), 

temporarily revived. Then, a neo-usulism, or an usuli 

revival, overcame akhbarism to a great extent, which 

survives today in Bahrain and in the city of Basra.41

The two were antagonistic to the extent that akhbaris

would avoid “touching an usuli text without using a 

handkerchief.”42 The usuli tradition supports the role of 

intellectual clerics who possesses `aql (intellectualism) 

and can exercise ijtihad.

Ijtihad is a method of jurisprudence solely employed 

by certified Shi`i jurists after the 10th century, when the 

“door to ijtihad” was closed in Sunni Islam, and Sunni 

clerics instead emphasized ijma`, or consensus of the 

jurists (or the community of Medina) and the traditions 

of the Sunni legal schools. They utilize ijma` as a source 

of law, along with the Qur’an, hadith (“traditions” 

or short texts about the Prophet’s deeds, words, or 

preferences or those of his Companions), and qiyas 

(analogy). This is why Shi`i jurists may attain the rank 

of mujtahid (one who can make ijtihad) in contrast with 

Sunni clerics who cannot claim this title. Modern-day 

Sunni reformers have called for ijtihad’s reinstatement 

in Sunni jurisprudence. On this point and others, 

Shi`ism and Sunnism may not be irreconcilable; there 

are elements in each sect aiming at a more peaceful, 

equitable, less tradition-bound manner of realizing 

Islamic law, society, and possibly government.

Also important is that marja’ism, (marja`iyya) the 

reverence and emulation of a particular living Shi`i 

religious scholar, was upheld in usulism, thus leading 

to the designation of an ultimate authority, marja`

al-taqlid al-mutlaq. The emergence of this position 

lent more power to the elite Shi`i `ulama.

43 There has 

not always been a marja` at this level, nor would he 

necessarily be the authority for both Iran and Iraq. 
20

Individuals may follow their own marja`. In addition, 

usulism is attributed with injecting more activism into 

the sect, but that may be as much an outcome of other 

20th century intellectual trends, like Marxist-Islamism, 

as in the views of the highly influential Iranian writer, 

`Ali Shariati.44

The concentration of Shi`a in Iran and the historical 

conjunction of Shi’ism and Iranian nationalism make 

the Islamic Republic and its clerical rule unique. 

Yet, Sistani could reject the official philosophy of 

Islamic governance held by Ayatullah Khamene’i 

and earlier iterated by Ayatullah Khomeini in Islamic 

Government, and that is a powerful statement about 

the decentralization and independence of Shi`i 

leadership.

The Shi`a of Iraq and the Iranian population further 

diverge ethnically, linguistically, and historically. It 

may not be practical to consider the two groups as 

religious, rather than political actors. Historian of 

Iran Nikki Keddie complained that the Shi`a were 

believed to “behave in ways that express their 

religiosity” everywhere, a myth that stemmed from the 

Iranian Revolution. At the time, she suggested that 

the “Shi’is worldwide have been more inclined to 

favor secularist governments and policies and to join 

secularist parties than have Sunnis.”45 The major 

reason for this is that outside of Iran, they have either 

been minorities (as in pre-civil war Lebanon, or Saudi 

Arabia) or a disenfranchised majority (as in Iraq). This 

was so in Iraq due to their exclusion from upper 

military ranks in the Ottoman army, their derivation 

from impoverished rural areas, and because of the 

threat that organized Shi’ism posed to Ba`thist Iraq.46 In 

Bahrain, the Shi`a were alienated, underemployed, and 

their exclusion from the army and police underlined 
21

regime fears of their loyalty.47 In light of the regionwide growth of Islamism since the 1970s, it does not 

seem likely that Iraqi Shi`is would support secularism 

as avidly today. Still, one should be very careful about 

assumptions that an Iranian-style Islamic Republic of 

Iraq will obtain strong popular support everywhere. 

Further, American foreign policy has provided a new 

opportunity for Iraqi Shi`a. In contrast, the United 

States has regarded the Shi`a of Lebanon in a very 

different way. Although they also were and remain 

an underrepresented majority, the U.S. Government 

regards Hizbullah, the most popular Shi`a political 

party in Lebanon, as a terrorist organization. Support 

by the Syrians for Hizbullah and pressure on Syria 

to withdraw from Lebanon further complicate this 

picture.

American interests concerning the Shi`i minority 

in Saudi Arabia appear to waver between the goal of 

maintaining tighter security over the oil-rich Eastern 

province, and promoting more religious tolerance in 

the Saudi system. As Syria is also a part of the imagined 

Shi`a crescent, one notes an additional foreign policy 

dilemma there. It is a stretch to characterize Syria as a 

religious state of any type; indeed, the Ba`thi ideology 

downplays religious allegiances. Still, despite Hafez alAsad’s crushing of Sunni Islamism in 1982, the Muslim 

Brotherhood has revived. And should Bashar al-Asad’s 

government ever falter, the Sunni majority in Syria’s 

major cities might well support a political dominance 

of moderate Islamists like the Brotherhood.

We might extend the discussion to the Shi`i 

populations in Pakistan and India. Militant attacks 

have targeted the Shi`a of Pakistan on far too many 

occasions, but the sect’s relationship with the state 

and its legal system differs from their counterparts in 

Saudi Arabia, since they have obtained a certain right 
22

to follow the Ja`fari madhhab, the Shi`a school of law in 

Pakistan.

It should be mentioned that where Shi’ism has 

served as a force for centralization and community 

support, it has been effective. That may be a function 

of the Shi`a clergy’s more independent economic basis 

and more clearly defined hierarchy. Preachers in the 

mosques loyal to Sistani’s network in Iraq, and in the 

Sadrist networks, have demonstrated their skills in 

community organization in Iraq,48 and Sistani himself 

used his stature to calm his community and restrain 

vengeance. In the Muslim diaspora, it has been 

difficult for Shi`a Muslims to unite; they have tended 

to meet only in their linguistic-national groupings, but 

more recently some endeavors, like the Young Muslim 

Association, support community activities and provide 

a counterpoint to anti-Shi`a or anti-Muslim bias. Perhaps these examples, added to the history of organized 

clerical education and its dissemination in Shi’ism, 

can support the argument of Vali Nasr49 that Shi’ism 

could serve as an antidote to violent salafism. The only 

problem is that Shi’ism also has produced violence of a 

revolutionary and now state-Stalinist type emanating 

from Iran. Therefore, for this and other reasons, it 

would be better for American policymakers to avoid 

the modern-day “divide-and-conquer” formula if that 

means utilizing Shi’ism against Sunni salafism. Rather, 

the two sects need to seek reconciliation, especially 

in efforts in the GWOT, and in the Muslim world’s 

responses to Western attacks on Muslim propensities.

IRAN AND IRAQ

Iran and Iraq have a very specific history of mutual 

and conflicting interests. We can examine these along 

with American-Iranian and American-Iraqi relations 
23

at the global, regional, and national levels. For much of 

Saddam Hussein’s reign, competitive symbiosis would 

best describe this relationship. Contemporary IranianIraqi relations are both complex and symbiotic.50

Ethnic tensions between Iranians and Arabs have 

played a role in regional politics since the initial Arab 

conquest of Iran. Other ethnicities are represented 

in Sunni-Shi`i tensions elsewhere; for instance, the 

Taliban made use of Pushtun Sunni hatred for the 

Shi`i Hazara in Afghanistan. The Hazara were treated 

as heretics religiously and socially, something akin 

to inherited slaves in mixed communities,51 and their 

ethnic distinctiveness played a role in this process. 

Bahraini Shi`a are often of Iranian origin, but a more 

limited number of Iraqi Shi`a are ethnically Persian, 

including many of the clerical families. The Shi`a of 

Yemen, Saudi Arabia, and Lebanon are, on the other 

hand, Arabs. Shi’ism itself was originally both an 

Arabian peninsular and a Mesopotamian movement. 

The Indian and Pakistani Shi`i communities, and East 

African Indian offshoots, are neither Arab nor Iranian.

The Shi`a, like Sunni Muslims, emphasize the 

commonality of all believers, regardless of race or 

national origin, based on the Prophet’s hadith, or 

tradition, “I have been sent to the Red and Black.”52

Yet a historical and modern problem has been the 

Arabs’ assertion that they best understand religious 

traditions because the Qur’an was revealed in Arabic. 

In some areas of the Muslim world such as Indonesia, 

a reverence for Arab customs or authenticity is posed 

against local and more syncretic practices and beliefs. 

This tension, which manifests itself in a modern 

debate about which Islamic practices are actually Arab 

cultural patterns, exists in Shi’ism as well as Sunnism. 

Likewise, clerical leadership in Shi’ism is Indian, 
24

Turkic, Iranian, and Arab. Nevertheless, in Iraq, there 

is some significance to the fact that Arabs were among 

the leading clerics of Najaf. Muqtada al-Sadr and his 

followers emphasize his Arab identity to provide a 

contrast to the sometimes quietist and intellectually 

elite Shi`i clerics of the Hawza in Najaf, who are not 

Arabs (for instance, Ayatullah Sistani).

Sunni hatred of the Shi`a became more or less 

virulent at certain historical junctures. For example, 

though the Fatimids were Isma`ili Shi`i rulers over 

Egyptian Sunnis, anti-Shi`i discourse did not develop 

there particularly until the emergence of contemporary 

jihadism and anti-Iranian discourse by the state. (Egypt 

actually outlawed Shi’ism in the 1990s.) However, much 

of the justification for modern-day salafi antipathy to 

the Shi`a was provided by Ibn Taymiyya, in the 14th 

century.53 Later, during the long wars of the Ottomans 

against the Safavid Empire along what is now roughly 

the Iraqi-Iranian border, flight and killing on the basis 

of sect took place on a large scale. When Sunni Afghan 

tribes conquered Persia, hundreds of Shi`i scholars and 

merchants left for the shrine cities of Iraq.54

In 18th century Arabia, Muhammad `Abd alWahhab led a movement against what he viewed as 

corrupt innovative practices, including Shi’ism and 

popular reverence for the tombs of holy persons. The 

Wahhabis sacked Karbala in eastern Iraq in 1801 where 

the tomb of Husayn, grandson of the Prophet and 

leader of the Shi`i rebellion against the Ummayads, is 

located. The Wahhabi movement regarded the Shi`a 

as heretics, and, though they number up to 45 percent 

of the population of Saudi Arabia’s Eastern province, 

they could not build mosques or observe or march 

at Shi`i holidays. The government forbade the call to 

prayer, the adhan, in the Shi`a manner, and they were 
25

discriminated against in terms of their access to jobs, 

education, and participation in government. Prior to 

public demonstrations in Hasa in 1979 and 1980, the 

Shi`i towns lacked paved roads, schools, and medical 

facilities. There was no education about the Shi`a 

themselves in the national system; their authors, 

history, and beliefs were not taught; and Shi`i women, 

unlike other Saudi women, were not allowed to 

teach.55 Paradoxically, the government used to arrange 

for religious students’ clerical study in Iraq, but the 

intent seems to have been to supply the community 

with its own source of religious guidance. Because 

of all of this, Shi`i invective toward Sunni militance 

coming from Iran, Lebanon, or Saudi Arabia tends to 

identify Wahhabism, rather than Qutbism—the brand 

of militant Islam inspired by Sayyid Qutb, martyred 

Guide of the Muslim Brotherhood.

Sunni antipathy to the Shi`a conflict is constructed 

primarily on the basis of doctrinal and historical 

disagreements. The animosity between Iraqi sects is, 

then, a local version of a much broader dislike or hatred. 

Muslims have made some efforts to bridge this gap, for 

instance, in the efforts of the Kubrawiyya Sufi order, 

especially under its leader, Muhammad Nurbaksh 

(d. 869/1464), and when Nadir Shah (d. 1747), ruler 

of the Afsharid state, tried to prohibit Shi`i cursing 

and repudiation of the first Three Caliphs and to have 

Imam Ja`far al-Sadiq’s legal teachings recognized as a 

fifth school of Islamic law on a par with the four Sunni 

schools. However, Iranian `ulama at the time were 

opposed to Shi’ism’s reduction to the status of a legal 

school.56 Nineteenth century Islamic reformer Jamal 

al-Din al-Afghani called for the Sunnis and Shi`a to 

unite against Western imperialism. And the effort to 

recognize the Twelver or Ja`afari Shi`i madhhab (school) 
26

of Islam as a legitimate legal school continued when 

Shaykh Mahmud al-Shaltut, the rector of Al-Azhar 

University in Cairo, the foremost center of instruction 

in Sunni Islam, gave a fatwa to permit the instruction 

of that Shi`i madhhab at the university in 1959.57 In Iraq, 

a Sunni, Shaykh Abd al-Aziz al-Badri, leader of the 

Hizb al-Tahrir, bravely preached against the Ba`thi 

regime’s arrest, torture, and public accusations against 

Sayyid Mahdi, the son of Ayatullah Hakim. He was 

then arrested and killed in prison, his tortured body 

dumped at his doorstep—one of the first martyrs of 

the al-Bakr-Hussayn regime.58

Sunni objections to the Shi`a stem from the latter’s 

support of `Ali ibn Abi Talib as Caliph, and in his 

status as Imam in the Shi`i institution of the a’imah,

the ultimately legitimate Muslim rulers. Therefore, 

Sunnis protest the Shi`i phrase Ashhadu anna `Aliyan 

wali Allah” (I testify that `Ali is the designated agent 

of Allah), which the Shi`a add to the customary 

testimony of faith (shahada). Similarly, the Shi`a cite 

Quranic verses that they say were deleted from the 

standard Qur’an which mention `Ali’s right to succeed 

as Caliph. As was explained above, Shi`a believe that 

the a’imah, or chain of Imams, are infallible and can 

intercede on behalf of the believer. Sunnis object to all 

of these ideas, as well as the Shi`i deemphasis on the 

Companions of the Prophet and the practice of reviling 

the first three Caliphs. They consider the Shi`i practices 

of temporary marriage (mut`ah in Arabic, sigheh in 

Farsi) and dissimulation called taqiya (not revealing 

that one is a Shi`a) illegal.59 Often Sunnis, unfamiliar 

with Shi`i doctrine, accuse the Shi`a of worshipping 

`Ali, rather than God, or of not recognizing the Prophet 

Muhammad at all, which is decidedly not the case in 

Shi’ism.
27

In addition, the ethno-historical distaste of Persians 

for Arabs, the bitterness generated by the Iran-Iraq 

war, unwillingness of Iraqi Shi`i organizations to 

assume subservience to Tehran (with the exception of 

SCIRI) are all factors that discourage alliances between 

the two groups. Anti-Arab feeling stemming from the 

destruction of the Sassanian empire by the Muslim 

army is not paralleled in other conquered regions—

North Africa for example. When the mawali, clients 

of the Muslims, were disadvantaged as compared 

to earlier converts’ privileges (for example, in their 

sharing of the conquest booty), territorial and ethnohistorical loyalties created frictions in the Ummayad 

and Abbasid eras. East of the Tigris river, the population 

failed to adopt Arabic as a popular language, in contrast 

with the territories of the former Roman empire to the 

West and Egypt. Instead, the old language, Pahlavi, 

gave way to a Muslim Persian (written in Arabic 

script) which enjoyed a literary revival from 1111 to 

1274.60 The elite elevation of Persian as a language and 

culture continued into the Ottoman period. An entire 

century of that Ottoman era featured a war between 

the Safavids of Iran and the Ottomans. This period, 

more than any other, defined Iran’s national identity 

with Shi’ism and established the Iraqi-Iranian borders, 

more or less up to the present. Saddam Hussayn used 

a specific term for that earlier Persian literary revival 

to demarcate Shi`i Iraqis whom he said were disloyal 

to their country, shu`ubi.61 The word implied one 

who rejected Arab identity. Saddam was not the first 

contemporary Iraqi leader to use this invective against 

the Shi`a; it had been a favorite epithet of Sati` al-Husri, 

Director of Education in Faysal’s Iraq, and a proponent 

of Arab unity.62

Iranian anti-Arab sentiment strengthened during 

the bitter 8-year Iran–Iraq war, particularly after the 
28

Iraqis employed chemical weapons against their 

enemies. Iranians recruited students as young as age 

9 for the war by justifying it as a jihad,63 a battle by the 

faithful against the Godless Saddam. The resentments 

of that war are strongest on a personal level, due to 

the high death and injury figures. On the other hand, 

Shi`i pilgrimage and corpse traffic ensured that Iraqis 

continued to encounter Iranians, and when the Shi`a 

were exiled from Iraq in the 1990s, as well as the late 

1970s, many found a refuge in Iran.

Beyond pilgrim traffic, which also distinguishes 

the holy cities of Mecca and Medina in Saudi Arabia, 

Mashhad in Iran, with the tomb of Imam Reza, and at 

a smaller scale, Damascus (for the Shi`a), the Wadi alSalam grave area in Najaf is either the largest or second 

largest in the world. The corpse traffic has markedly 

defined Shi`i interstate relations for centuries. Its 

political economy with some 100 funerals a day, 

motivates much of local politics. All of this, along with 

the demise of Saddam Hussein, points to the resurgence 

of Najaf al-Ashraf (Najaf the Noble) as the center of 

Shi’ism.

With so many Iranians traveling to Iraq, the Iranian 

government carefully monitors their movements. 

A grave security risk to Iran is posed by their 

disappearance, recruitment while on pilgrimage, or 

misdeed. The pilgrim and corpse traffic, the growth 

of Islamist Shi`a political parties in Iraq, and the 

intersectarian conflict there all play a role in the various 

stories of Iran’s influence in Iraq.

Neighboring countries have accused the United 

States of emphasizing sectarianism, and hence 

intersectarian tensions. Saddam treated sectarianism 

as a political sin, but at the same time engaged in 

sectarianism in his attacks against the Shi`a and the 
29

Kurds. Whether because of the theme of Ba`thi Arab 

unity, or due to the overwhelming unfamiliarity of 

Sunnis with Shi’ism in other parts of the Muslim world, 

the prevailing wisdom in Iraq and outside of it is that 

sectarianism simply did not exist before 2003. This is 

disingenuous. It is true, however that neither Sunnis 

nor Shi`a tended to identify themselves as such before 

the fall of the Baathist regime; in fact, it was considered 

quite rude, or shameful to ask what sect one was,64 but 

communitarian membership certainly mattered.

Al-Qa’ida’s brand of virulent anti-Shi’ism unfortunately has had a great impact, both on the Sunni 

population in Iraq and more broadly on Muslims 

throughout the Islamic world, including those 

sympathetic to salafism. Anti-Shi`i rhetoric, together 

with the theme that the Iraqi Shi`a were American 

allies, sharpened contemporary anti-Shi’ism.65

The salafi Islamists identified the Shi`a as rafidhin,

or renegades or apostate rafidhin, since they allied with 

Westerners in Iraq. The late Abu Mus`ab al-Zarqawi 

called Ayatullah Sistani, “the leader of infidelity and 

heresy,” and the Shi`a in general, “the crafty evil 

scorpion, the enemy lying in wait with a poisonous 

bite,” who are intent on exacting revenge on the 

Sunnis, who had superiority over them in the Ba`thist 

regime.66 He, too, alluded to their desire for a Shi`a 

super-state extending from Lebanon to Iran, enlisting 

their alleged acts of treachery, including their “cursing 

of Sunnis.” To bolster his opinions, he quoted from the 

plentiful anti-Shi`a comments of Imam Malik Bukhari, 

Ibn Hazm, and Ibn Taymiyya, important medieval 

Islamic figures.67 Zarqawi saw targeting the Shi`a as 

an essential strategy in “awakening” the Sunnis, as 

he defined four enemies in a letter to bin Ladin: 1) the 

Americans; 2) the Kurds; 3) [Iraqi] soldiers, police, and 

agents; and, 4) the Shi`a:
30

Those in our opinion are the key to change. I mean that 

targeting and hitting them in [their] religious, political 

and military depth will provoke them to show the Sunnis 

the hidden rancor working in their breasts. If we succeed 

in dragging them into the arena of sectarian war, it will 

become possible to awaken the inattentive Sunnis as 

they feel imminent danger.68

Sunni fears of the Shi`a were awakened; political 

entities like the Iraqi Islamic Party, as well as ordinary 

citizens, have received numerous threats.69 American 

and Iraqi troops discovered bodies of Iraqi Sunnis in 

facilities where militias had operated, perhaps with the 

knowledge of the Ministry of the Interior. These semiofficial killings compounded daily gory discoveries in 

streets, neighborhoods, and roads, which unfortunately 

did not abate with the death of al-Zarqawi, at least to 

the time of this writing. The Shi`a also have suffered 

tremendously from bombings, massacres, kidnappings, 

and assassinations, with the greatest losses of life in 

the attacks on mosques, buses, and military and police 

recruitment stations.

In Iraq, an immediate result is cantonization. 

In mixed communities, Shi`a and Sunnis are being 

targeted, resulting in flight, broken families, and 

relocation. It is now estimated that more than 500,000 

people have left their homes for these reasons. Further, 

Iraqis actually are changing their names so as not to 

be as easily identified by either personal or family 

names.70

Iraqis can differentiate between Shi`i Iraqis and 

Iranians. Some Shi`a, for example, clerical families, are 

Iranian in origin. Others were classified as such in the 

earliest censuses of modern Iraq. Apparently, at that 

time, a great many Arab Shi`a stated their origin as 

being “Iranian” rather than “Ottoman,” the only two 

choices proferred, in order to avoid military service. 
31

Of these, nearly 200,000 Iraqis were exiled in the late 

1970s. Earlier, Fayli Kurds, who are Shi`a, were exiled 

from 1971-72.71

In addition to the problem of sectarianism, some 

evidence suggests that Iraqis are more xenophobic than 

other nationalities. This xenophobia was measured in 

relation to particular nationalities, rather than religious 

sects. A survey in 2004 of 2,325 adults was compared to 

data from the useful World Values Survey from other 

countries. Ronald Inglehart, Mark Tessler, and Mansoor 

Moaddel found that more than 80 percent of the Iraqi 

public rejected foreigners as neighbors—more than 

twice the level of rejection found in any other society. 

This can be broken down by nationality, with 61 percent 

of the Iraqis studied rejecting Turks as neighbors, 55 

percent not wanting Iranians as neighbors, and 44 

percent rejecting Jordanians as neighbors.72

SHI’ISM’S LEGACY IN IRAQ

The Shi`a legacy in Iraq is that of a people who were 

thoroughly suppressed, deprived, and discriminated 

against on the basis of their religious identity. Yet, 

the story is more complicated than the simple facts 

of discrimination, under-representation, and the 

state’s confiscation of Shi`i property or endowments. 

The Shi`a had consisted of diverse groups: clerics; an 

urban lay class, including armed guilds, merchants, 

landowners, tribes-people, peasants; and somewhat 

later, a middle class. Their elites in the period up to 

1958 were disempowered after the revolution through 

land reform and other policies. Besides the Shi`i 

social legacy, Arab nationalism and secularist policies 

negatively impacted the Shi`a and their clerics,73

although many among the Shi`a did support Ba’thism 
32

and other secular ideologies. Arab nationalism initially 

was not as popular in Iraq as in Syria, but the Iraqi 

officer corps, entirely Sunni, welcomed such ideas 

and opposed “Iraqism.”74 The chief official means for 

targeting the Shi`a was by way of calling them a sect, 

ta’ifa, that was responsible for divisive sectarianism 

(ta’ifiyya), particularly in the service of imperialism.75

To understand the gravity of this charge, one must 

keep in mind the way that imperialism was identified 

in the Arab world. British and French imperialism, for 

instance, famously promoted minorities at the expense 

of the unity of the conquered population, whether the 

Druze and Alawis in Syria, the Maronites in Lebanon, 

the Berbers in North Africa, the Copts in Egypt, or 

the Assyrians in Iraq.76 “Divide and conquer” policies 

weakened the fabric of the Arab world, according to 

this way of thought, allowing for Zionist victories in 

Palestine and weakening local governments.

While Saddam Hussein was well aware of and 

manipulated growing Islamist sentiments in the 

Sunni community, the Shi`i Islamist movement, which 

developed decades earlier, was repressed at different 

stages. The `ulama first organized the Shi`i Islamic 

movement to deflect the inroads made on piety by 

communism, Ba`thi secularism, and Arab nationalism.77 They established study circles, published books 

and periodicals, and opposed certain government 

policies such as land reform. The al-Da`wah Party, 

which dates from this period, contacted their Sunni 

counterpart, the Muslim Brotherhood, for support of an 

Islamic state, and together they obtained a license for the 

Islamic Party in 1960. The Islamic Action Organization, 

formed in the mid-1970s, was the second response to 

Ba’thist suppression, and it coalesced around attacks 

on Hassan Shirazi, his brother, Muhammad Hussain 
33

Shirazi, and their nephews, Muhammad Taqi alMudarisi and Hadi al-Mudarisi. This particular group 

was from Karbala, certainly Hassan Shirazi was more 

politically active than the al-Da`wa leaders, and to 

some degree, rivaled them.78

Repression heightened when the Shi`i Islamic 

movement became increasingly militant after the 

Iranian revolution had shocked the Ba’thi regime. 

The Islamist movement acquired its own martyrs, 

for instance, Ayatullah Muhammad Baqir al-Sadr; 

Shahid al-Rabi` (the Fourth Martyr) or `Alima Amina 

al-Sadr; and his sister, also known as Bint al-Huda, 

who was hanged to death with her brother on April 

8, 1980. Because of the violent suppression of this 

movement, and its longevity and renaissance under a 

new government, the Islamist revival that has swept 

the entire region has impacted the largest segments 

of the Shi`a community and characterizes the more 

successful Shi`i political parties.

In the aftermath of the Iranian revolution and the 

crushing of the Iraqi Islamists, the Supreme Assembly 

of the Islamic Revolution (SCIRI) was first established, 

and its Iranian patronage aimed at the demise of the 

Ba`thi system. The highly structured administrative 

body of SCIRI has been effective particularly in 

the early organizational period of the new Iraqi 

government. SCIRI, and its competitors, Muqtada alSadr’s followers, and the Fadhila Party are all political 

actors who contrast with the hawza, the religious 

establishment in Najaf where there is an expectation 

that the clerics will remain outside of politics. In postinvasion Iraq, that ideal has not always been possible, 

even for Ayatullah Sistani, who urged his followers 

and community to cooperate with Americans. That 

is why jihadi salafists like al-Zarqawi labeled Sistani 
34

the arch-rafidhi (renegade) apostate. The traditional 

clerical institution sees the future of Shi’ism more in 

terms of moral and educational, rather than political 

influence. On the other hand, Sistani insisted on a 

speedier transfer to an Iraqi authority than some might 

have preferred. And, to maintain his legitimacy, Sistani 

does not meet with Americans (nor non-Muslims). To 

suggest that his and the hawza’s role was returning to 

its normal state and was separate from Iraq’s political 

parties, Sistani announced that he would not support 

any particular political party in the 2005 elections.

Iraq provides a very great contrast with Iran on the 

issue of politics. Its recent experience with American 

state-building distinguishes it from its neighbor in a 

different way.

SHI’ISM’S POLITICAL LEGACY IN IRAN

The United States had a lengthy relationship with 

Iran that was curtailed following the Islamic Revolution 

and the hostage crisis in 1979. U.S. desired outcomes 

for Iran ran counter to Shi’ism’s political legacy and 

the clerical system’s struggle to continue its influence 

in the country. Most experts could not see any collision, 

as they believed that religion was a waning influence 

in modern society.

Iran79 was first centralized and unified under the 

Safavid rulers, the first of whom, Shah Isma`il (1487-

1524) was also a Sufi master and poet. Declaring 

Shi’ism their official sect and forcibly converting 

Sunnis,80 the Safavids provided a transition to a 

modern consciousness of Iran as a Shi`i nation. The 

Safavids battled with the armies of the Ottoman 

Empire in Iraq, deepening Sunni-Shi’ite tensions and 

roughly establishing today’s borders between the two 

countries.
35

Some centuries later, Iranian intellectuals reached 

out in two directions to modernize their ideas and 

society to Western Europe and Russia. They were 

unhappy with their rulers’ claims to be the Shadow of 

God on Earth and strove to break their absolute political 

authority. They also struggled or colluded with the 

political ambitions of the British and the Russians and 

other Europeans who saw the potential for great profits 

in Iran. The language of this struggle was both Islamic 

and modernist. As their leaders sold off economic 

concessions, Persians warmed to antiauthoritarian and 

antiimperialist ideas like those of the Islamic reformer, 

Jamal al-Din al-Afghani,81 whose servant assassinated 

the Qajar Shah in 1898. Al-Afghani had sparked an 

anticapitalist and proto-democratic Islamic movement 

in 1891 called the Tobacco Rebellion,82 under which 

some Shi`i leaders stood for antiimperialism. In 1906, 

Iranians organized themselves in political societies 

and militated for a constitution. Their constitutional 

effort failed in 1911, and soon thereafter World War 

I embroiled the Middle East. By the end of the war, a 

new Middle East took shape. The Ottoman Empire that 

had governed Iraq ended, and the British assumed the 

mandate for that country. Britain and Russia, the chess 

players of the Great Game, continued their rivalry 

in Iran. A Cossack commander, Reza Khan, stepped 

into the power vacuum, occupying Tehran with his 

brigade in 1921, and then evacuating Russian troops. 

He became prime minister in 1923, and abolished the 

Qajar dynasty, in 1925, inventing a new royal lineage 

for himself with the family name Pahlavi, and crowned 

himself Shah.

Reza Shah and his son, Muhammad Reza Shah, 

attempted to centralize and modernize Iran, repressing 

in turn clerics, leftists, and nationalists, along with 

many other varieties of intellectuals. The United States 
36

allied with both shahs, hoping to prevent the spread 

of Soviet influence. When the Anglo-Iranian Oil 

Consortium feared Iran would nationalize its oil under 

nationalist Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadegh, 

the United States participated in a plan to return the 

young Mohammad Reza Shah to power in 1953.

In the 1960s, many American political thinkers 

predicted that the Shah’s modernizing state eventually 

would democratize. No one imagined that religious 

elements would defeat the Shah and his terrifying 

secret service, SAVAK. The Shi`i `ulama maintained 

a certain distance from the state through continued 

control over religious education in the holy cities of 

Mashhad and Qum in Iran and in Najaf and Karbala in 

Iraq. Some clerics opposed the government, however, 

others, like the last Iranian Grand Ayatullah (a marja` 

al-taqlid al-mutlaq) Burujerdi, were politically quiescent. 

In contrast, Khomeini responded vociferously to the 

state’s modernizing efforts. He was arrested in 1964 

and exiled to Turkey, traveling from there to Iraq in 

1965. In addition to Khomeini’s opposition to the 

Shah, a different version of a religious critique based 

on economic and cultural trends characterized nascent 

activist Shi’ism. One theme was the growing financial 

encroachment of the West on Iran as the Shah bought 

weapons from the United States and the economic 

situation in the country reflected the deviation of 

funds that could have aided development, while the 

presence of many Westerners pushed up rents in 

Tehran. Another theme was the “Westoxification” of 

Iranian society, that should be resisted Islamically.

Another locus of support for Shi`i activism came 

from the merchant bourgeoisie, the more traditional 

segment known in Iran as the bazaris. Merchants do not 

risk their livelihoods in political ventures frequently. 
37

It is possible that they might not have supported 

the religious opposition if the Shah had not referred 

to them as flea-ridden disgraces and punished them 

through taxes and new regulations.

THE UNITED STATES AND IRAN

The Shah’s alienation of other social groups and 

his Macchiavellian tactics were compounded by his 

relationship with the United States. First, the United 

States had helped to return him to his throne. He then 

used the United States to build up his military and 

political strength in the Gulf. That tainted the regime. 

Iran forged good relations with Israel, an additional 

point of contention for the religious opposition. The 

Shah’s economic ambitions for the country made for 

trouble as well, as did his imperial image and grand 

style. Trouble ignited quickly with demonstrations in the 

late 1970s, and the regime’s violent response triggered 

more demonstrations.83 In retrospect, it is somewhat 

difficult to determine how American officials viewed 

the prospect of a Shi`i Islamist take-over of Iran; they 

apparently did not give any credence to the prospect of 

revolution until it was too late. Then questions quickly 

arose as to whether discussions should be held with 

the opposition, and how the United States should treat 

long-time allies like the Shah.84

A revolution is, by definition, “the forcible 

overthrow of an established government by a people 

governed.”85 That is what took place in Iran after a 

series of demonstrations and crippling strikes in the oil 

industry and newspapers in 1978. The Shah departed 

Iran, and Khomeini triumphantly returned on February 

1, 1979.
38

The ensuing hostage crisis arose out of a struggle 

between Iranians about the character and “red lines” 

of the revolution. A cultural war against “imperialism” 

and Western influence began and heightened from 

1979 through 1981. As part of this process, Iranian 

students took over the American Embassy and seized 

hostages to protest the Shah’s arrival in the United 

States for medical treatment. His entry into the United 

States countered the advice of Ambassador Sullivan 

to Cyrus Vance, although Henry Kissinger, Zbigniew 

Brezinski, and David Rockefeller had lobbied for the 

Shah’s admittance.86 The hostage takers played on 

paranoid fears that the United States would unseat the 

new regime, and popular anger that the Shah and his 

family had escaped Iran with their great wealth intact. 

To punish these Americans for being “spies” and their 

country’s close relationship with the Shah, the hostages 

were held for 444 days, although their captors released 

five women, eight African-Americans, and more than 

30 non-U.S. citizens.

Ayatullah Khomeini, who most likely was unaware 

of the plan to seize the embassy, fully supported the 

hostage takers once they had accomplished this action. 

The seizure of hostages was wildly popular with 

ordinary Iranians, and the Majlis (the Iranian Parliament) 

eventually adopted Khomeini’s four demands from 

the United States.87 The hostage crisis powerfully and 

psychologically affected Americans. The crisis led to a 

gasoline shortage and rationing. Although official U.S. 

policy was to refuse to deal with terrorists, a military 

attempt to rescue the hostages failed and enraged the 

Iranian public and disappointed Americans. President 

Jimmy Carter, himself, considered the hostage crisis 

to be the foremost of three issues leading to his 

failure to be re-elected.88 The United States eventually 
39

negotiated the release of the hostages by promising not 

to intervene in Iranian affairs, unfreezing $11 billion 

in frozen assets,89 and freezing the Shah’s family’s 

property. The announcement of successful negotiations 

ending the hostage crisis coincided with President 

Ronald Reagan’s inauguration on January 20, 1981. 

The hostage release precipitated a struggle between 

Iranian political forces as well as a showdown between 

Khomeini and then-President Bani Sadr.

Under President Reagan, the United States was 

overtly hostile both to Iran and its Islamist ideals, yet its 

representatives again negotiated with Iran for the lives 

of U.S. hostages in Lebanon. Iranians suffered from 

the long war with Iraq, in which the United States, as 

well as Arab states, supported Saddam Hussein, who 

initially thought he could seize Iranian territory.

The Clinton administration initially improved trade 

relations with Iran but subsequently toughened its 

stance.90 In January 1995, President Bill Clinton called 

for an overthrow of the Iraqi and Iranian governments 

and reportedly authorized a Central Intelligence 

Agency (CIA) covert operation against Iran because 

of reports that the Russians were going to build two 

nuclear power reactors in Iran.91

Iran’s Foreign Policy and Support for Terrorism.

Iranian leaders proclaimed an “Islamic” foreign 

policy in the sense that they, like other Islamists, 

view Islamic goals as universal. In the revolutionary 

Shi`i worldview, Iran was to support the oppressed 

masses elsewhere, meaning the Shi`a of Lebanon, 

other Shi`i minorities, but also the Palestinians, who 

are predominantly Sunni Muslims. Khomeini and 

his Hezbe Jumhuriyye Islami (Islamic Republican 
40

Party, or IRP) explained that the Shah had betrayed 

Muslims with his support of Israel. In contrast, 

Iran now supported the Palestinians’ revolutionary 

struggle because Palestine is the vaqf (waqf, Arabic), or 

endowment-in-perpetuity (mortmain) of all Muslims, 

not only Arabs, or Palestinians. It cannot be sacrificed 

through negotiation.

Iran indirectly supported Iranian Shi`i cleric in Tyre, 

Imam Musa Sadr’s92 establishment of the Movement of 

the Dispossessed in Lebanon in 1974. Then in 1982, Israel 

invaded Lebanon, setting up a security zone. Iranians 

supported the growth of Hizbullah, providing funds, 

training, and a reported 1200 pasdarans in the Biqa` 

valley during the 1980s. Iran also has been accused 

of fomenting mayhem in Saudi Arabia in plots timed 

during the hajj, and the Khobar Towers incident. Earlier 

the more activist Khomeini regime verbally attacked 

the House of Saud for its misuse of oil wealth, alliance 

with the United States—the Great Satan—and because 

it is a monarchy, an improper form of government.

Iran’s Syria connection was forged in 1973 when 

Musa Sadr issued a fatwa legitimizing the Syrian 

president’s `Alawi sect.93 In terms of Khomeini’s Islamic 

foreign policy goals, Hafiz al-Asad was an odd ally, 

having massacred between 10,000 and 30,000 of his own 

Islamist agitators, sympathizers, and ordinary citizens 

in the city of Hama. Demonstrating that its support of 

Islamic revolution was less important than its need for 

regional allies, Iran used Syria to counter Iraq’s power. 

Iran maintained a pilgrim traffic to Damascus where 

Syria supported numerous dissidents, including 

the anti-Fatah Palestinians, anti-Saddam Iraqis, and 

anti-Hashemite Jordanians, as well as Hizbullah 

representatives from neighboring Lebanon.

Iran’s regional revolutionary influence was more 

of a chimera than a reality, perhaps because of the 
41

anti-Shi`a sentiment expressed even within moderate 

Sunni Islamist entities. What local governments found 

dangerous was the degree of inspiration their own 

opposition saw in Iranian revolutionary populism 

and anti-Americanism. This extended even beyond 

the Muslim world as was seen in the Salman Rushdie 

incident.

Shahram Chubin at the Geneva Centre for Security 

Policy explains that Iran utilized terrorism in the 

service of its political goals rather extensively through 

Rafsanjani’s tenure as president, but notes a change 

from 1997 under Khatami. Notably better relations 

with the Gulf states were formalized in an April 2001 

agreement with Saudi Arabia.94

While Iran’s foreign policy became less proactive, 

due to the pressures of the Iran-Iraq War, it continued 

to support Hizbullah rhetorically, though the party 

has now secured a firm local Lebanese support base. 

The Palestinian issue is perhaps the exception to a 

moderating of Islam’s regional policies. In this case, 

reformists or conservatives alike tend to see the 

struggle of the Palestinians in terms of defensive jihad. 

Iran’s relations with Hamas and Islamic Jihad, or 

Hizbullah’s activities in the Territories are a sore point 

for the United States. After the eruption of the al-Aqsa 

intifadha in 2000, the Israelis claimed that Iran had 

shipped some 50 tons of weapons on the ship, KarineA, to the Palestinian Authority. This incident was used 

to further discredit President Arafat, and showed that 

Iran had never abandoned its meddlesome support 

of terrorist activity despite its quieter profile on other 

fronts.

Actually, Iraqis also broadly support the Palestinians. Iraqi Shi`a point to Hizbullah as a credible 

organizing force in Lebanon, as do many Sunnis. So it 
42

is ironic that some Iraqis would accept and propagate 

America’s critique of Iran as a destabilizing force that 

supports terrorism, and when they do so, often they 

are expressing explicit political rationales.

Iran’s antipathy toward Iraq sharpened because 

of the long war with that country, but also due to the 

ideological character of the regime. Azar Nafisi, writer 

and professor of literature, remembers:

The war with Iraq began that September [1980] and did 

not end until late July 1988. Everything that happened 

to us during those 8 years of war, and the direction our 

lives took afterward, was in some way shaped by this 

conflict. It was not the worst war in the world, although 

it left over a million dead and injured. At first the war 

seemed to pull the divided country together; we were all 

Iranian and the enemy had attacked our homeland. But 

even in this, many were not allowed to participate fully. 

From the regime’s point of view, the enemy had attacked 

not just Iran; it had attacked the Islamic Republic, and it 

had attacked Islam.

The polarization created by the regime confused every 

aspect of life. Not only were the forces of God fighting 

an emissary of Satan, Iraq’s Saddam Hussein, but they 

were also fighting agents of Satan inside the country. At 

all times, from the very beginning of the revolution and 

all through the war and after, the Islamic regime never 

forgot its holy battle against its internal enemies. All 

forms of criticism were now considered Iraqi-inspired 

and dangerous to national security. Those groups and 

individuals without a sense of loyalty to the regime’s 

brand of Islam were excluded from the war effort. They 

could be killed or sent to the front, but they could not 

voice their social or political preferences. There were 

only two forces in the world, the army of God and that 

of Satan.95
43

CLERICAL AUTHORITY IN THE ISLAMIC 

REPUBLIC96

Khomeini’s doctrine of clerically-guided government was not the centuries-old Shi`i approach to 

political authority. Since the Revolution, however, it 

has defined the structure of Iran’s government and 

its regional and international foreign policies. Clerical 

rule came to be identified with Shi’ism, radicalizing the 

sect still further in the eyes of other Muslims and nonMuslims. In other respects, the Iranian government is 

modern, and in some ways more democratic, with a 

weaker executive, than certain Arab nations. The word 

“democratic” has to be qualified not so much because 

of the system of Islamic governance, but its particular 

practices. Nearly 1,000 candidates were disqualified 

from participating in the elections in Iran. This clearly 

shows that Iranians desire pluralism, and that is an 

aspect of democracy.

Under the current system, the Supreme Faqih, 

currently Khamene’i, advises a President who is elected 

every 4 years. The Faqih appoints and advises the 

Council of Guardians. Of these, he directly appoints 

six fuqaha (the clerics qualified to pronounce on Islamic 

law) and the remaining six members must be lawyers 

selected by the High Council of Justice (who is also 

appointed by the Faqih) and approved by a majority 

vote of the 290 member Islamic Consultative Council 

(referred to as the Majlis). Every 3 years, half of the 

members of the Council of Guardians are replaced 

as each serves 6 years. The Council has veto rights 

over legislation by the Majlis and can interpret the 

Constitution, serving in the capacity of a Constitutional 

Court. Further, the Council could disallow candidates 

for Parliament and President. The chair of the Council 
44

is Ayatullah Jannati, and the other fuqaha members 

currently are Mohammad Reza Modarresi-Yazdi, 

Mohammad Momen, Sadegh Larijani, Gholamreza 

Rezvani, and Mohammad Yazdi. The advocate 

members of the council are Abbasali Kadh kodai, who 

is the deputy chair; Ebrahim Azizi; Mohammad Reza 

Alizadeh; Gholamhossein Elham; Mohsan Esma`ili; 

and Abbas Ka`bi.

The Faqih also advises the High Council of Justice. 

The elected President appoints a Cabinet to be approved 

by the Majlis (the Parliament). When there is a dispute 

between the Majlis and the Council of Guardians, 

the matter is referred to the Expediency Discernment 

Council. This system of Islamic governance revolves 

around the Faqih. The system, however, does not 

emanate solely from that single office. Now the locus 

of power includes the Faqih and the two Councils. In 

contrast, the presidential office weakened, particularly 

in the early years of regime infighting when Bani 

Sadr challenged Khomeini and was forced to flee. 

Khamene’i, who was technically at the rank of hujjate islam, was President for two terms until he became 

the Faqih, when he was elevated artificially to the rank 

of Ayatullah. A schism within the IRP, Khomeini’s 

party, between militants and traditionalists identified 

more specifically as maktabis and hojjatieh, essentially 

brought this about.

The Iranian conservatives’ need to dictate the 

office of Supreme Faqih essentially has weakened 

the principle of vilayat-e faqih based on merit. Instead, 

political considerations, which the regime expressed 

as a need for tohid (unity), has constrained pluralism 

and bolstered censorship. The Shi`i believer can 

choose his own supreme source of emulation. Thus 

it would be more logical for the most respected and 

senior of clerics to be eligible for Supreme Faqih, rather 
45

than selection on the basis of political loyalties. Most 

characterize Khamene’i as a political appointee because 

at the time of Khomeini’s death in 1989, there were 

Grand Ayatullahs who outranked him. Khomeini had 

annointed a successor, Grand Ayatullah Hossein Ali 

Montazari from 1985-1989, when Khomeini dismissed 

him from this status and Montazari eventually returned 

to teaching. Ayatullahs Kho’i, Golpayegani, and Najafi 

were not sufficently radical in the eyes of the maktabi 

bloc, and they were in their 80s. Montazari was viewed 

as a “liberal” though he certainly was not one in terms 

of Iran’s foreign policy, being highly anti-American 

and supportive of the global Islamic Revolution. His 

views contrasted with Rafsanjani, and yet he formed 

an alliance with him.97 Since Khamene’i’s credentials 

were disputed, an elderly cleric, Grand Ayatullah 

Mohammad Ali Araki, was named the marja` for 

Khomeini’s followers. The highest ranked Ayatullahs—

Najafi, Kho’i, Golpayegani, and Araki—died. That left 

Tabataba’i, Sistani, Ruhani, and Montazari after 1994. 

To sum up, the succession of supreme religious and 

political authority in Iran are likely to reach another 

difficult impasse; sooner than in Saudi Arabia, but 

not nearly as soon as could be the case in Iraq. That 

is because the political edifice of the vilayat-e faqih, 

so strongly influenced by the older anti-Pahlavi 

revolutionaries, now relies on the neo-conservatives, 

the next generation of leaders who fought in the IranIraq war.

President Khatami fought to strengthen the 

Presidency since 1997, differing with Khamene’i 

about Iran’s ability to survive in isolation.98 However, 

his reform challenge was undone by hardliners. The 

United States would be ill-advised to rely on a revival 

of the reform movement to bring about regime change 

in Iran.
46

The Iranian constitution is similar to France’s; 

however, other areas of law underwent neo-Islamic 

revision. The inclusion of the hudud punishments in 

the criminal code and traditional (and discriminatory) 

treatment of women and girls in the criminal and family 

codes similarly identified Shi’ism with activist Islamism 

and what the West characterized as a “throwback to 

medieval Islam.” While the new punishments for 

abortion or sexual offenses are horrifying, the country 

has managed to legislate the first type of Islamic 

alimony for wives and has brought its birth rate down 

by mandating family planning, primarily on the 

grounds of national economic need.

The Islamic Republic of Iran identifies itself with the 

Shi`a concern for the oppressed masses and holds that 

good Islamic governance is the best remedy for that 

oppression. Yet, certain demographic and economic 

trends are troubling. Iran’s population is 68,688,433 (as 

compared to Iraq’s 27,783,383 as estimated in 2006) and 

demonstrates a youth bulge, with 26.1 percent of the 

population age 14 or younger. More than 35 percent of 

Iran’s families live in poverty, and homeless children 

sleep in the streets of large cities, even in the day hours. 

While educational levels are higher than in some other 

countries, still 23 percent are illiterate. Iran had an HIV/

AIDs population of 31,000 in 2001 and a drug problem 

due to the large number of intravenous drug users of 

at least 2 million.99 These public health concerns stem 

from Iran’s past production and importation of opium 

and opiates and status as a transit site for heroin from 

southeast Asia moving to Europe.

Urban migration contributed to poverty prior to the 

Revolution, and when it accelerated in 1983, the regime 

decried migration itself, denied rations to migrants, and 

eventually tried improving rural conditions as a way 
47

of discouraging the growth of the urban poor sector. 

Squatters, some of whom had acquired living sites 

during the revolutionary period 1979-81, were attacked 

by state forces as well.100 Afghan and Iraqi refugees add 

to Iran’s poverty issues; a fairly conservative estimate 

gives 952,802 from Afghanistan and 93,173 from Iraq 

(2005).

In tandem with internal economic concerns, the 

Iranian media plays up the current misery of Iraqis, 

arguing that it is the American occupation that 

has killed so many civilians; impoverished them; 

and failed to restore security, electricity, and other 

services. Ayatullah Khamene’i said in a meeting with 

Jalal Talabani in which he urged a timetable for a U.S. 

withdrawal: “Iran considers the United States to be 

responsible for all crimes and terrorist acts in Iraq, and 

the suffering and misery of the Iraqi people.”101

Foreign policy is set primarily by the Supreme 

Faqih and the National Security Council, along with 

the Majlis and the Council of Guardians. The Supreme 

National Security Council (SNSC) currently is headed 

by `Ali Larijani,102 who is simultaneously Iran’s chief 

spokesperson and negotiator on nuclear issues. He, like 

Ahmadinejad, is close to the Supreme Faqih, Ayatullah 

Khamenei. The membership of the SNSC includes 

military leaders from the army and Revolutionary 

Guard, and top ministry officials. Beyond formal politics, influence on decisionmaking is achieved through 

informal and quasi-formal networks in Iran, which 

exist for purely social reasons as well, and are called 

dowreh. Through acknowledged advisory networks, or 

informal ones, about 600 persons are connected with 

the Office of the Supreme Faqih.103 Among them are 

important voices on Iran’s relationship with Iraq, or on 

nuclear issues.
48

Generally there is a far larger clerical presence, 

in government, and throughout society, than most 

Westerners are used to thinking about, even though no 

exact figures are at hand. Estimates from 15 years ago 

ranged from 90,000 to 300,000 educated clerics, 40,000 

religious students, about 60,000 ordinary preachers 

or religious leaders who had not received specialized 

training, and possibly some 50,000 to 60,000 others 

with some degree of training.104

It also is not entirely clear what role the professional 

military plays in Iran’s decisionmaking, nor do we 

have an accurate picture of Iran’s air, land, and sea 

capacities. Statistics vary widely, though we are 

certainly speaking of a larger force than any in the 

Gulf with an army of approximately 350,000 and some 

15,665,725 men fit for military service. Iran’s equipment is in disrepair as compared to certain other armies 

(Israel or Pakistan), and its military technology has 

lagged behind the West. Iran had acquired Western 

equipment under the Shah, but its American-made 

combat aircraft, for example, have been outstepped 

by neighbors.105 Iran spent about 4.3 billion dollars in 

2003 on its defense budget, roughly 3.3 percent of its 

gross domestic product (GDP). The populist basis of 

the revolution has enhanced the political role of the 

paramilitary, namely, Revolutionary Guards (Sepah-e 

pasdaran enghelab-e islami) formed by Khomeini’s decree 

of May 5, 1979. This security apparatus grew from 4,000 

to 350,000 in 1986.106 Today it possesses a naval and air 

force as well. An additional paramilitary force that has 

supported this President is the basij. Khomeini formed 

this militia (the Popular Mobilization Army) early on 

in November 1979. In 1993, the Ashura Brigades were 

created in response to antigovernment riots in urban 

areas and are now estimated at 17,000. Both the IRG 
49

and the basij are strong bases of support for President 

Ahmadinejad.

With the election of President Khatami in 1997, 

American-Iranian relations improved somewhat. 

Iranian students began the Do-e Khordad protest 

movement in response to regime repression. 

Unfortunately, continuing application of repressive 

measures took their toll on the movement, while 

hardliners pressured Khatami to the point that he provided insufficient support to the movement. The hardliners attacked Khatami’s allies like Gholamhossein 

Karbaschi, the popular mayor of Tehran, on corruption 

charges. Reformers tried to obtain international 

support, but state security services heightened their 

techniques of collective and individual intimidation. 

The regime trend of identifying political enemies as 

traitors of the Revolution by trying them on trumped 

up charges continued. In addition to Karbaschi, one 

could mention Ayatullah Abdullah Nouri, former 

Minister of the Interior; Ata’ollah Mohajerani, former 

Minister of Culture and Islamic Guidance; former 

President Rafsanjani’s daugher, Faezeh Rafsanjani; 

Mousavi Khoinha; journalists Abbas Abdi and Akbar 

Ganji; and numerous authors and publishers.

Iran’s Islamic revolution was supposed to bring 

about social justice and benefits for the poor, and reform 

aspects of Islamic life. Some social elements benefited 

from the revolution—loyalty to its values, endeavor 

to be good Muslims (meaning more observant), yet 

more modern and rational.107 Iranian judges rule 

according to the new Islamic family law, but they also 

attempt to control men’s violence against women by 

issuing restraining orders and enforcing maintenance 

payments. The state has bureaucratized elements of 

Iranian Shi`i practice further, emphasizing the new 
50

character of public space,108 more rational, rulebound, and overtly “Islamic.” Supporters of the idea 

of fomenting Iranian reform from outside point to the 

fact that the rules and enforced religiosity of the Islamic 

Republic are not popular with all citizens, especially the 

youth. It is not at all clear that this is a definitive picture, 

and the surprise election of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad 

in the summer 2005 attests to that.

PRESIDENT AHMADINEJAD

Ahmadinejad projects the image of both a javanmard

(new Islamic man) and a mardomyar (a people’s man), 

ordinary and plain. He appeals to Iranians outside the 

bases of power, who remain deeply pious, but want to 

live in better circumstances. The son of a blacksmith, 

Ahmadinejad was born in Aradan, Iran, in 1956 and 

raised in a working class neighborhood in east Tehran. 

He was still a student during the protests against the 

Shah. He has been charged falsely with being one of the 

hostage takers or of planning the take-over of the U.S. 

Embassy in Iran in 1979.109 The actual hostage takers 

emphatically denied these rumors,110 which may have 

been spread by an opposition group, the Mujahidin-e 

Khalq. He is characterized as a hard-worker, an excellent 

student, and a talented soccer player. Childhood and 

student friends say he was obstinate and confident 

of popular support. After graduating to teaching his 

own classes, he distinguished himself by wearing a 

Palestinian headscarf while on campus.111 Ahmadinejad 

served in the basij (militia) after the Revolution, then 

in the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps during the 

Iraq-Iran war. During that conflict, many of Iran’s 

second-wave revolutionaries came of age. Many belong 

to the Abadgaran112 (Builders, or Developers of Islamic 

Iran), a neo-conservative alliance. The Abadgaran, 
51

together with the conservatives, now form a majority 

in the Majlis, and have contained the reformers, or 

what some call “the Left” in Iran. Ahmadinejad also 

has acknowledged his role as a leading member of 

a different party, the Islamic Revolution Devotees 

Society.113

Ahmadinejad earned a doctorate in traffic 

engineering, became a professor, an advisor in the 

Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance, and a 

governor. He was appointed the Mayor of Tehran 

on May 3, 2003, and attained a reputation for quiet 

efficiency that won him the support of Tehran’s poor 

in the presidential election and a short-listing in 

the 2004 Mayor of the Year awards. Critics mention 

that he redesigned the capital while mayor, with the 

Imam Mahdi’s return in mind, broadening the streets 

for his return,114 and some in Tehran said he was so 

conservative that he would have established separate 

male and female sidewalks, elevators, and graveyards 

had that been possible. More recently, Ahmadinejad 

supported women’s attendance of soccer games.115

Like populist leader Egyptian President Gamal abd 

al-Nasser, his lifestyle reflected his values; he lived in 

a modest home in his childhood neighborhood and 

drove a Paykan, Iran’s cheapest car.

He made numerous campaign appearances in 

mosques and prayer areas where he focused on the 

needs of the lower classes. He is not a cleric, in fact, he 

is the first noncleric in the office of the President for a 

quarter of a century. His speech is understood easily 

by the Iranian population, unlike the clerics with their 

references in classical Arabic, and he identifies with 

their millenarian passions. It is rumored that his list 

of cabinet members had been dropped into the well 

at the Jamkaram mosque, the locus of Mahdi-centered 

worship, according to local custom.116
52

Ahmadinejad fired many senior financiers, bankers, 

and senior diplomats, replacing them with more junior 

personnel frequently with IRG backgrounds, and 

replaced all governors with his loyalists. These point 

to the degree of power in his office and connections, 

though Iran-watchers commented on his naiveté and 

novice clumsiness. Nevertheless, the Supreme Guide 

Khamene’i seemingly had wrapped his cloak around 

him, urging patience.

ISRAEL

Ahmadinejad appears unafraid of conflict or 

heightened jihad, and wants Iranians to reembrace 

the international and domestic ideals of the Islamic 

Revolution. Khomeini significantly overturned the 

Shah’s close alliance with Israel to regain Iran’s 

leadership role in the Muslim world, where Palestine 

represents a vaqf, a religious endowment that cannot be 

negotiated away even by the Palestinians themselves. 

And since Khomeini’s era, Israel’s nuclear profile and 

continuing hardnosed approach to the Palestinians 

has troubled and angered Iranians. In this vein, 

Ahmadinejad attacked Israel as a “tumor” that should 

be “wiped off the map of the world.” This is hardly a 

new theme, but the timing of these comments and the 

attention they received were significant. The uproar 

coincided with growing Muslim anger over Danish 

cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad, and those led 

an Iranian newspaper to announce a countercontest 

for cartoons about the Holocaust. All of this might 

be understood in terms of internal Iranian political 

jousting. Just prior to the Fall 2005 flurry of interest in 

Ahmadinejad’s anti-Semitism, Khamene’i had granted 

more power to Rafsanjani, a rival of Ahamadinejad. 
53

The Council of Guardians had decided to meet again 

with the Europeans regarding the nuclear issue. 

Ahmadinejad may well have needed to reassert 

presidential power and reclaim center stage.117

However, Ahmadinejad won the election primarily 

because he ran on a fairness and anticorruption 

platform. Many poor and lower-class Iranians voted for 

him because they want their economic circumstances to 

improve. A heightened conflict with the West is unlikely 

to improve these circumstances. For this reason, as well 

as observations that Iran tends to act in stealth and with 

calculated rationality rather than Islamic revolutionary 

zeal, some analysts suggested that even this president 

will retreat from brinkmanship.

NUCLEAR IRAN

Iran’s decision to pursue the development of nuclear 

technology further complicates its global and regional 

future. A weak Iraq is a close target for Iran. A nuclear 

Iran is a red flag to Israel. While Israel might strike Iran, 

it could not do so without American assistance. Were 

Iran to counter by attempting to strike Israel, it might 

well hit Palestinians. The European nations’ efforts to 

engage Iran on this issue owe something to the interest 

that they have in profitable trade with Iran. Russia and 

China’s attitudes toward Iranian proliferation have a 

relationship to Iran’s role as oil producer.

Iran’s aim to obtain nuclear technology and, 

though unacknowledged, efforts to develop nuclear 

weapons technology demonstrates the concerted effect 

that external pressures can have on nation-states. 

Iran has discussed its right to nuclear energy, not 

nuclear weapons. Basically, it states that one day its 

energy reserves will be depleted, and it needs to create 

alternatives.
54

What role does Iraq play here? First, Iran’s cry of 

“rough neighborhood” has changed in that Saddam 

Husayn’s intense anti-Iranian policies are no more. 

However, the U.S. presence in Iraq and in Afghanistan 

on Iran’s other border places Iran in a strategic sandwich. 

Even with an eventual American withdrawal from 

Iraq, that country’s army is going to be a very large 

one. Iranians can reason that Iraq’s new government 

may wish to revive a nuclear program if they continue 

their own efforts. What we need to keep in mind is 

how Iranian influence in Iraq can be affected by the 

prospect of a nuclear Iran, now and in the future.

Background.

Iran’s nuclear program grew from Muhammad 

Reza Shah’s vision of Iran as the prime military power 

in the Gulf region. He built up a military arsenal via 

petrodollars and actively funded opposition in Iraq, 

including Jalal Talebani and his Kurdish supporters, 

and supported the Sultan of Oman and the royalists 

in Yemen. Iran’s nuclear research program goes 

back to the 1960s. In 1967, a five megawatt thermal 

research reactor at the Tehran Research Center was 

established and supplied by the United States, then an 

ally of Shah Muhammad Reza Pahlavi. The Americans 

trained Iranian technicians as well. Nuclear power and 

weapons development continued with the assistance 

of Germany, and later China and Russia, though the 

United States ended all nuclear agreements with Iran 

in 1979.

The Bushehr nuclear facility dates to 1974 and 

was constructed by the German Siemens firm. It 

was nearly completed by the Islamic Revolution, 

but bombed during the Iran-Iraq war. Minatom, the 
55

Russian Ministry of Atomic Energy, finally agreed 

to finish the planned two reactors in an $800 million 

dollar agreement, which essentially meant building 

new reactors. Bushehr was to be a light water facility, 

with low-enriched uranium to be provided by Russia. 

President Clinton attempted to obstruct the deal and 

then imposed sanctions on Iran.

Iran signed nuclear cooperation agreements 

with Pakistan in 1987 and with China and the Soviet 

Union in 1990.118 In 2002, an Iranian opposition group, 

Mujahidin-e Khalq, held a press conference to reveal 

news of two facilities in Iraq, a heavy-water production 

plant at Arak and a uranium-enrichment facility at 

Natanz. The very fact of a uranium enrichment facility 

implied Iran’s possession of gas centrifuge technology. 

All of this, along with the fact that buildings at Natanz 

were being constructed underground and hardened, 

strengthened the sense that Iran could not be trusted. 

It was only after the public “outing” of the Arak and 

Natanz sites that the Iranians acknowledged them and 

announced their intent to process their own fuel. By 

2003, they had completed a fuel fabrication plant. In 

2004, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) 

of the United Nations (UN) met to discuss Iranian 

issues, and Director General Muhammad El Baradei 

provided a report on Iran’s possible treaty violations in 

November 2004. As Iran responded to the concerns of the 

European Union (EU) and IAEA regarding its nuclear 

program, it continuously restated its bottom line—that 

Iran has the right to develop a peaceful nuclear energy 

program as well as enrichment capacity.119 The Iranian 

Majlis approved a bill that would allow Iran to block 

inspections if the IAEA were to refer the country to the 

UN Security Council for sanctions.120

Incidentally, fatwas against use of nuclear weapons 

frequently are attributed to the late Ayatullah Khomeini, 
56

but he did not oppose the development of nuclear 

energy alternatives. Iran’s Foreign Ministry officials 

also refer to a fatwa of Ayatullah Khamene’i disallowing 

nuclear weapons.121 Recently, cleric Mohsen Garavian, 

a disciple of Ayatullah Mesbah-Yazdi, has stated that it 

is only “natural” that Iran should have nuclear bombs 

as a “countermeasure” to other nuclear powers.122

The principle that extreme measures are permitted in 

defensive jihad underlies this statement.

Has the ascent of Iran’s neoconservatives worsened 

the issue? Was Iran more malleable to European, if not 

American, concerns under Khatami? Would it have 

been easier to resolve the nuclear issue if Rafsanjani 

and not Ahmadinejad were President? Ahmadinejad 

appeared far less concerned with improving relations 

with the United States in his first year in office. 

However, if we compare Khatami, Rafsanjani, and 

Ahmadinejad and the Iranian nuclear issue, we see 

that the presidential office basically is a reflection of 

the issues’s deep importance to the regime. President 

Khatami’s public statements gradually deteriorated 

from hopeful pledges to open Iran to the outside 

world and be less hostile to the West to extremely 

volatile statements nearer the end of his term when 

he, too, spoke forcefully, declaring Iran’s sovereign 

rights to pursue its uranium enrichment if it so chose 

in February 2005. Had Rafsanjani been elected, he may 

not have been able to avoid the nationalist bottom line, 

either.123

In spring 2006, the Iranians defiantly revealed that 

they had enriched uranium. The IAEA documented 

that Iran had produced uranium hexafluroide sufficient 

for 20 nuclear weapons and that it had moved from 10 

machine and 20 machine cascades up to a 164-machine 

cascade (the feeding process of UF6 into centrifuges), 
57

assembling two more 164-machine cascades. Despite 

these and other accomplishments, experts point out 

that Iran cut corners in its research and development 

process, and therefore would require more time 

now for development and testing.124 At issue is the 

perception that Iran wished to give that its progress in 

enrichment was inexorable, and, second, that the time 

frame towards an actual weapon might be further off 

than thought. David Albright projected about 3 years 

toward a single nuclear weapon (2009), whereas John 

Negroponte, Director of National Intelligence, has 

suggested a lengthier waiting period.125

Ahmadinejad wrote an 18-page letter directly to 

President Bush breaking with a diplomatic embargo on 

contact with the Americans. The letter was described in 

the American press as being full of religious language 

and unclear intent. It addresses President Bush as a 

proponent of Christian values, questions America’s 

foreign policy in general, its actions in Iraq, commitment 

to Israel, and attitude toward Iran’s nuclear quest. 

Ahmadinejad decries the actions of September 11, 

2001 (9/11), but says that the U.S. response to 9/11 is 

unsatisfactory and claims that “liberalism and Western 

style democracy have not been able to help realize the 

ideals of humanity”; instead people now await the will 

of God.126 Confusing as this communication may have 

been, it effectively paved the way for other Iranians to 

address the United States directly and possibly to meet 

with Americans, something that had been outlawed 

by the Revolution. In fact, this proscription had been 

violated earlier during the Reagan administration in the 

arms for hostages deal, but that, one could argue, was 

behind the scenes, not an executive communication.

As the diplomatic dance with Europe continued, 

opponents to negotiations with Iran reminded the 
58

world that it has played for time before. It could be 

continuing its scientific process over the summer 

2006. An agreement might be unattainable. Or Iran 

may well agree and then default. Those who argue for 

some form of negotiation in addition to containment, 

or “rollback”127 and deterrence, also suggest grave 

implications for Western interests from Iran’s nuclear 

ambitions. First, Iran might be less vulnerable to U.S. 

conventional force, and, second, Iran’s program cannot 

but encourage proliferation elsewhere.128 In other 

words, the most obvious concerns about Iran’s nuclear 

program have little relationship to the ideological 

character of the state.129 One of these particular analysts 

suggests that the “West” offer butter for guns (but be 

willing to conduct an air campaign against the nuclear 

facilities, or otherwise pursue containment).130 And the 

European nations most interested in Iran economically 

have concurred with the former policy.

One source of anxiety concerning Iran’s intentions in 

Iraq is the threat a nuclear Iran will pose to Iraq. On one 

level that threat will be no more than its conventional 

counterpart since Iran is most likely developing 

nuclear power in order to deter, not to utilize. But will 

the achievement of nuclear power secure Iran a higher 

level of influence in Iraq?

Iran’s existing rationale for pursuing nuclear 

activities has been somewhat heightened by American 

policy in Iraq. The “rough neighborhood” argument fits 

in with new Iranian concerns about the large American 

military presence in Iraq and its degree of permanence, 

and the size of the Iraqi force that Americans are 

training today. In other words, the neighborhood 

already was rough, with Israeli nuclear capacity in 

place and the large conventional U.S. forces bolstering 

armies to the west and the east of Iran, make the country 
59

more anxious. The proponents of the New Middle 

East argue that Iran is worried about the spectacle of 

democratic freedoms in Iraq or Afghanistan on its own 

people. Perhaps. But security concerns are more of a 

motivation.

When asked to identify his greatest concern with 

Iran, President Bush said he was concerned about 

“having a nuclear weapon in the midst of the Middle 

East,” “political blackmail,” and that “they would 

harm our ally, Israel.”131 One wonders if Iran would 

target Israel if that meant significant loss of Palestinian 

lives. A concern about a further race by other countries 

for weapons is hard to gauge as the Saudi, Egyptian, 

Syrian, and Turkish programs have been analyzed, 

but some sources query whether Pakistani scientist, A. 

Q. Khan, might not have illicitly supplied one of them 

technology as he did for Iran and Libya.132

Certainly, in the U.S. formulation of responses to 

Iran’s nuclear program, Iraq’s (like Afghanistan’s) 

vulnerability needs to be kept in mind. Here, some 

experts suggest that the available options are all 

problematic, as is a failure to respond. Considered 

responses to Iran include: a) sanctions; b) military 

responses, from limited strikes ranging all the way 

to regime change; c) broader negotiations in which 

Iran might be offered noninterference (and no regime 

change); and, d) containment.

Anthony Cordesman and Khalid Al-Rodhan, 

like other experts, explored the viability of various 

responses. Most importantly, they suggest that the 

effect of economic sanctions are far from certain, since 

there is no reason for certain countries to comply with 

them.133 European nations—specifically Italy, France, 

Germany, and the United Kingdom (UK) as well as 

Japan, Russia, and China—would likely lose a great 
60

deal of money if they ceased exporting to Iran and 

importing oil from it.134 Other countries, Saudi Arabia 

and Egypt, are unlikely to support sanctions, though 

for strategic rather than economic reasons.135 Existing 

sanctions against Iran in place since the revolution did 

not accomplish their goals.136

Problems with targeting Iran’s nuclear facilities 

make the option of military strikes more complicated 

and less attractive than it might otherwise be. Military 

strikes, rather than sanctions, are more likely to generate 

some kind of Iranian response to the United States in 

Iraq, and some experts then cite the existing Iranian 

influence in Shi`i entities there, including militias, as a 

serious concern.137 Ken Pollack points out that military 

action could empower Iran’s hardliners, illustrating 

their need for nuclear weapons.138 Further, it would 

anger and thus unite Iranians against America and any 

allies. He argues that sanctions will work best because 

of Iran’s dire economic situation and need for currently 

profitable markets. However, some Iranians say that 

the country is not in such bad shape, with growth at 

5.5 percent per year and a doubling of GDP per capita 

in the last 5 years. The country possesses a $10 billion 

stabilization fund and other resources. If Iran is not 

so desperate economically, then Pollock’s proposed 

“butter for guns” solution, threatening severe sanctions 

if Iran will not cease its nuclear program, may fail.

If these alternatives are unattractive, nonaction 

also is problematic. Should Iran proceed to nuclear 

capabilities, some experts believe that Saudi Arabia or 

Egypt may heighten efforts to obtain nuclear weapons. 

Further negotiations with heightened incentives to 

cease the nuclear enrichment process and disincentives 

toward its continuation therefore make sense, at least 

at this time of writing.
61

CONCLUSION

To conclude, Iran’s influence in Iraq is not a direct 

outcome of tense Iran-U.S. relations nor the showdown 

over Iranian nuclear ambitions. It could, however, take 

on more markedly negative aspects of this conflict 

than at present. As we have noted in some detail, 

the new importance of the Iraqi Shi`a should not be 

misread as a Shi`i plot, or master-plan for the region. 

On the contrary, every possible avenue for Shi`i-Sunni 

accommodation and healing needs to be mustered up 

for an Iraq that will benefit all of its people.

The dynamics between Iran and the United States 

and Iraq and the United States are symptomatic of the 

globalization of foreign policy, the “new world order,” 

and the ambitions for a New Middle East. They contrast 

with centuries of Iranian-Mesopotamian rivalry, symbiosis, and sometime synthesis. Ambassador Khalilzad 

is on the right track in discouraging the zero-sum games 

of the past in the pattern of Middle Eastern proxy cold 

wars, and in encouraging communication that would 

aid the development of both neighbors, Iran and Iraq.

There is no easy answer to the prospect of Iran’s 

nuclear ambitions. One can, however, see that it is 

centered in Iran proper, and not in its alleged “satellites,” the various Shi`i groups in Iraq that maintain 

Iranian connections or support.

We may suggest the following recommendations:

1. More clearly differentiate between Iraqi, Iranian, 

and Shi`i interests. When allies of the United States 

do not distinguish these factors clearly, use the advice 

of experts and analysts to understand their political 

purposes.

2. Take all steps possible to diminish intersectarian 

conflict in Iraq. First, understand it as a process 

radiating outwards to the region, not vice-versa. 
62

Second, establish city and town-based initiatives that 

can meet regularly, offer funds to those displaced 

through sectarian violence, repress vengeance killings 

through peer mediation, moderate public discourse, 

and seriously engage and control militia activities.

3. Continue monitoring the relationship of Shi`i 

parties and entities with Iran, but acknowledge their 

independence and the separation between U.S. and 

Iraqi policy formation.

4. Negotiate Iraq’s existing border issues with Iran, 

serious matters concerning the border control and 

pilgrim travel. The body doing so could continue to 

meet on an ad-hoc basis to address bilateral concerns 

usefully.

5. Be cognizant that continuing ambiguity as to 

Iran’s progress on the nuclear front, or failure to strike a 

deal with Iran, will lead to an increase in Sunni vs. Shi`a 

tensions and invective, despite that in this monograph 

we have tried to point out the relative independence of 

the issues of sectarianism, bilateral tensions, and Iran’s 

nuclear ambitions.

6. Recognize Iraqi vulnerabilities in any consideration of preemptive or punitive strikes on Iran.

7. Continue to pursue diplomatic negotiations 

as avidly as possible, even if they require more time 

than desired since the alternatives are either unlikely 

to dissuade Iran from its intent or would present an 

extremely serious threat to peace and stability in the 

region as a whole.

8. Do not hold high expectations for indigenously 

generated regime transformation in Iran at this time. 

Rather, craft policy that will more directly engage the 

existing regime.

9. Consider carefully the risks and implications 

of regime transformation via military means carried 
63

forward with the justification of a nuclear threat in Iran. 

Such a policy would most likely mean U.S. unilateral 

action or a very limited alliance, perhaps with Israel, 

the UK, and possibly Australia.

ENDNOTES

1. Paul Reynolds, “Hardball Diplomacy Goes Public,” BBC 

News, October 5, 2005.

2. Craig Gordon cites General George Casey on Iranian and 

Hizbollah training of Iraqi insurgents. “Iran Cited as Threat in 

Iraq,” Newsday.com, June 23, 2006; Ivan Eland, et al., “Occupied 

Iraq: One Country, Many Wars,” Middle East Policy, Vol. 12, Issue 

3, Fall 2005; Raymond Tanter, “Iran’s Threat to Coalition Forces 

in Iraq,” Washington, DC: Institute for Near East Policy, January 

15, 2004.

3. Mahan Abedin, “Amrika-ha midonad har intikhabat-ye dar `Iraq 

shi`iyan hastand,” Mehr News, January 3, 2005, www.mehrnews.com/

fa/NewsDetail.aspx?NewsID=271504.

4. “Survey of Iraqi Public Opinion,” International Republican 

Institute, July 9-July 14, 2005, www.iri.org/pdfs/08-10-05-Iraq 

percent20poll percent20presentation.ppt.

5. Ashraf Khalil, “Religion Again Holds Sway Among Shiite 

Voters,” Los Angeles Times, December 16, 2005.

6. Ibid. 

7. Robin Wright and Peter Baker, “Iraq, Jordan See Threat to 

Election from Iran,” Washington Post, December 8, 2004. 

8. The Shi`a of Saudi Arabia are approximately 10 percent of 

the total population, but 45 percent of the Eastern province. Saudi 

Shi`i movements of various types arose in Saudi Arabia, from 

radical activists of the 1970s to pacific, but demonstrative groups 

later, and the terrorist Hizballah of Saudi Arabia. International 

Crisis Group. “The Shiite Question in Saudi Arabia,” Middle East 

Report, No. 45, September 19, 2005.

9. Fred Lawson analyzes the tactics and different groups 

involved in Bahrain’s 1994-98 Shi’a uprising, a serious event, but 

one that primarily featured protesting of local conditions. Fred 

Lawson, “Repertoires of Contention in Contemporary Bahrain,” 

Quintan Wiktorowicz, ed., Islamic Activism: A Social Movement 
64

Theory Approach, Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2004. 

Attributing the Bahraini Shi`a organization solely to Tehran, 

either then or now, could be a bit of a red herring. 

10. This idea was perhaps earliest put forth in an article by 

Sayyid Vali Nasr, “Regional Implications of Shi’a Revival in Iraq,” 

The Washington Quarterly, Vol. 27, No. 3, Summer 2004, pp. 7-24; 

see interview with President Mubarak on al-`Arabiyya, April 8, 

2006, a sweeping condemnation of the Shi’a. Prince Saud al-Faisal 

of Saudi Arabia, the Minister of Foreign Affairs, stated that Iran 

was already sending money and weapons into the south of Iraq, 

Joel Brinkley, “Saudi Warns U.S, Iraq May Face Disintegration,” 

New York Times, September 23, 2005.

11. Thomas Friedman, “A Political Arabesque,” New York 

Times, December 19, 2004.

12. Freya Madeline Stark, Dust in the Lion’s Paw, Autobiography, 

1939-46, first published 1961, New York: Vintage, 1985.

13. Hanna Batatu, The Egyptian, Syrian and Iraqi Revolutions: 

Some Observations on Their Underlying Causes and Social Character, 

Washington, DC: Center for Contemporary Arab Studies, 

1983; Hanna Batatu, The Old Social Classes and the Revolutionary 

Movements of Iraq, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1978.

14. Peter Neumann and Joshua Kilberg, “Does Iran Want 

Another Lebanon?” New York Times, September 6, 2004; W. 

Andrew Terrill, Strategic Implications of Intercommunal Warfare in 

Iraq, Carlisle Barracks, PA: Strategic Studies Institute, U.S. Army 

War College, February 2005. 

15. Amr Hamzawy, “Arab Liberals Unite!” Al-Ahram Weekly, 

February 2-6, 2006, reprinted by the Carnegie Endowment for 

International Peace, www.carnegieendowment.org/publications.

16. Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice in an interview with 

Wolf Blitzer, CNN, March 25, 2006.

17. Robert Hillenbrand, a professor of Islamic art, explained 

that a parallel to this mosque might be that of St. James at Santiago 

de Compostela; BBC, February 22, 2006. It is spiritually important 

because the 10th and 11th Imams died in Samarra, and the 12th 

Imam, the Imam Mahdi disappeared here. 

18. Reidar Visser, “Iraq’s Partition Fantasy,” Open Democracy, 

May 19, 2006; Reidar Visser, Basra, the Failed Gulf State: Separatism 

and Nationalism in Southern Iraq, Lit-Verlag, 2005.
65

19. “Text of the Draft Iraqi Constitution,” Associated Press, 

news.bbc.co.uk. 

20. Alexander R. Dawoody, “Federalism and the Kurdish 

Quest for Self-Rule in Iraq: Examining the Kurdish Political 

Parties’ Proposal for a Federated Iraq and the Road toward 

Secession,” Paper presented to the 39th Annual Middle East 

Studies Association Meeting, Washington DC, November 21, 

2005.

21. Lionel Beehner, “U.S. Intervention in Iraqi Politics,” 

Council on Foreign Relations, March 30, 2006-09-01, www.cfr.org/

publication/10314.

22. Ivan Eland, et al., “Occupied Iraq: One Country, Many 

Wars,” Middle East Policy, Vol. 12, Issue 3, Fall 2005.

23. The preference was not secret. Ambassador Robert 

Blackwill who served as Deputy National Security Adviser 

and the President’s special envoy in Iraq suggested prior to the 

election that Adel Abdul Mahdi likely would become Prime 

Minister, had Ayatollah Sistani’s backing, and was a “competent” 

and “formidable” person. “Iraq: The Way Forward,” Transcript 

of meeting held with David Ignatius and Ambassador Blackwill, 

Council on Foreign Relations, December 12, 2005, www.cfr.org/

publication/9417. Talabani attempted to convince al-Ja`fari to step 

aside in favor of Abdul Mahdi. 

24. “Stalemate in Iraq,” Online News Hour, PBS, April 3, 2006, 

www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/middle_east/jan-june06/iraq_4-3.html. 

25. Ibid.

26. Jim Hoagland, “Al-Jafari Fights Back,” Washington Post, 

March 6, 2006.

27. David Ignatius, “In Iraq’s Choice, A Chance for Unity,” 

Washington Post, April 26, 2006; see also Patrice Claude, “Jaafari 

Refuse de Negocier Avec des Terroristes,” Le Monde, March 16, 2006. 

28. “Iraq: Main Shi`ite Alliance to Decide Al-Ja’fari’s Fate,” 

Radio Free Europe, April 10, 2006.

29. Nelson Fernandez, “Iraqi Shiites Nominate Jafari for Top 

Position,” Washington Post, February 13, 2005.

30. Hoagland, Washington Post, March 16, 2006; see also Abbas 

Kadhim, “The Sleeping Giant,” Al-Ahram Weekly, Issue No. 788, 

March 30-April 5, 2006.
66

31. Charles Krauthammer, “The Kurd Card,” Washington Post, 

March 10, 2006.

32. Yassin Musharbash, “Iraq’s New Prime Minister 

Designate: Can He Stop the Violence?” Spiegel Online, April 26, 

2006, service.spiegel.de/cache/international/spiegel/0,1518,412928,00.

html.

33. International Crisis Group, “Iraq’s Muqtada al-Sadr: Spoiler 

or Stabiliser,” Middle East Report 55, July 11, 2006.

34. Zalmay Khalilzad, “The U.S. and the Future of Iraq,” 

Foreign Press Center Briefing, July 13, 2005, fpc.state.gov/fpc/48758.

htm, last viewed February 2, 2006.

35. Mustafa El-Labbad, “Three Become One,” Al-Ahram Weekly, 

Issue No. 779, January 26-February 1, 2006, weekly.ahram.org.eg.

36. Mahmoud Ayoub, Redemptive Suffering in Islam, The Hague: 

Mouton, 1978.

37. These are very simplified explanations of al-Tusi’s ijtihad. 

See Mahmud Ramyar, “Ijtihad and Marja`iyyat,” in Seyyed 

Hossein Nasr, Hamid Dabashi, and Seyyed Vali Reza Nasr, eds.,

Shi`ism: Doctrines, Thought and Sprituality, Albany: State University 

of New York Press, 1988, pp. 228, 231-234.

38. Arzina R. Lalani, Early Shi`i Thought: The Teachings of Imam 

Muhammad al-Baqir, I. B. Taurus, 2004, pp. 65, 69. Imam al-Baqir 

was the Fifth Imam according to the Isma’iliyya and the Ithna 

`Ashariyya.

39. A useful overview is provided by Heinz Halm, Shi`a Islam: 

From Religion to Revolution, Princeton: Markus Wiener, 1997.

40. Pepe Escobar, “Who’s in Charge, Qom or Najaf?” Asia 

Times, October 10, 2005.

41. Halm, pp. 112-114.

42. Faleh A. Jabar, The Shi`ite Movement in Iraq, London: Saqi, 

2003, p. 166. 

43. Abbas Amanat, “Between the Madrasa and the Market 

Place: The Designation of Clerical Leadership in Modern Shi`ism” 

in Said Amir Arjomand, ed., Authority and Political Culture in 

Shi`ism, Albany: State University of New York Press, 1988, p. 102. 

44. Ali Rahnema, An Islamic Utopian: A Political Biography of Ali 

Shariati, London: I. B. Tauris, 1998. 
67

45. Nikki Keddie, Iran and the Muslim World: Resistance and 

Revolution, New York: New York University Press, 1995, p. 186.

46. Sherifa Zuhur, “Neonationalism, Insurgency, and 

Reconstruction in Iraq,” in Wojciech Burszta, Tomasz Kamusella, 

and Sebastian Wojciechowski, eds.,Nationalisms Across the Globe: An 

Overview of the Nationalisms of State-Endowed and Stateless Nations, 

Vol. 2, Poznan, Poland: Wyzsza Szkola Nauk Humanistycznych i 

Dziennikarstwa, 2005.

47. Louay Bahry, “The Opposition in Bahrain: A Bellwether 

for the Gulf?” Middle East Policy, Vol. 5, May 1997, pp. 42-57; and 

Lawson, p. 90. 

48. David Patel, “Ayatullahs on the Pareto Frontier: The 

Institutional Bases of Religious Authority in Iraq,” Presentations 

at Stanford University and at the 39th Annual Middle East Studies 

Association Meeting, Washington DC, November 19-22, 2005, and 

in additional meetings with the author, 2006.

49. Vali Nasr.

50. The basic biological divisions of mutualism (both benefit), 

parasitism (one benefits, the other is harmed), commensualism 

(one benefits, the other is unaffected), competition (neither 

benefits) and neutralism (both are unaffected) are useful to an 

understanding of Iraq-Iranian relations.

51. As depicted by Khaled Hosseini, Kite-Runner, New York: 

Riverhead Books, 2003.

52. Annemarie Schimmel, And Muhammad Is His Messenger: The 

Veneration of the Prophet in Islamic Piety, Chapel Hill: University of 

North Carolina Press, 1985, pp. 52, 62.

53. In Minhaj al-sunnat al-nabawiyya fi naqd kalam al-Shi`at alqadariyyah (The Way of the Prophetic Tradition in the Critique of the 

Theology of Qadari Shi`ism), which is a response to the renowned 

Shi’a cleric of that era, al-Hilli, who had written Minhaj al-sunnah 

fi ma`rifat al-imamah (The Way of the Tradition in Understanding the 

Imamate). 

54. Jabar, p. 168.

55. Jacob Goldberg, “The Shi`i Minority in Saudi Arabia,” in 

Juan R. I. Cole and Nikki Keddie, eds., Shi`ism and Social Protest, 

New Haven: Yale University Press, 1986, p. 238.

56. Hamid Enayat, “Shi`ism and Sunnism,” in Seyyed Hossein 

Nasr, Hamid Dabashi, and Seyyed Vali Reza Nasr, eds., Shi`ism: 
68

Doctrines, Thought, and Spirituality, Albany: State University of 

New York Press, 1988, pp. 75-78.

57. Ibid., pp. 80-81; also see Shmuel Bar, “Sunnis and Shiites—

Between Rapprochement and Conflict,” in Hillel Fradkin, Husain 

Haqqani, and Eric Brown, eds., Current Trends in Islamist Ideology, 

Vol. 2, Washington, DC: Hudson Institute, 2005.

58. Joyce Wiley, The Islamic Movement of Iraqi Shi’as, Boulder, 

CO: Lynne Rienner, 1992, p. 46.

59. Bar, “Sunnis and Shiites.” 

60. Marshall Hodgson, The Venture of Islam: Conscience and 

History in a World Civilization, Vol. 2, Chicago: University of 

Chicago Press, 1974, pp. 293-315.

61. Ofra Bengio, Saddam’s Word: Political Discourse in Iraq, New 

York: Oxford University Press, 1998, pp. 103-106.

62. Samir Khalil, Republic of Fear: The Inside Story of Saddam’s 

Iraq, New York: Pantheon Books, 1989, pp. 154-155.

63. Maryam Elahi, “The Rights of the Child under Islamic Law: 

Prohibition of the Child Soldier,” in Elizabeth Fernea, ed., Children 

in the Muslim Middle East, Austin: University of Texas Press, 1995, 

pp. 172-173. Khomeini issued a fatwa in 1982 allowing children to 

enlist in the army without informing their parents.

64. This might seem peculiar to non-Muslim readers, but prior 

to the extensive media coverage of Sunni-Shi`i strife and certainly 

in Iraq of the 1980s, an Iraqi (like a Saudi, Lebanese, or Bahraini) 

identified himself as being a Muslim, not a Sunni or Shi`i, or 

Wahhabi, or Akhbari). In fact, an individual would most probably 

volunteer information about her geographic origin; natal town, 

neighborhood, or village. A local would often, but not always, be 

able to determine her sect from her family or personal name. 

65. Anti-Shi`i statements are heard so commonly in the 

Muslim community today that utterly conflate the sect with Iran, 

and such a high degree of ignorance on this issue is evident in 

the professions, including the military, that I thought it necessary 

to include this rather lengthy explanation of the sect in this 

monograph.

66. Sherifa Zuhur, A Hundred Osamas: Islamist Threats and 

the Future of Counterinsurgency, Carlisle Barracks, PA: Strategic 

Studies Institute, 2006.
69

67. Letter of January 23, 2004, included in Appendices of JeanCharles Brisard, Zarqawi: The New Face of Al-Qaeda, New York: 

Other Press, 2005, originally published by Librarie Arthème 

Fayard, pp. 235-241.

68. Peter L. Bergen, The Osama bin Laden I Know, New York: 

Free Press, 2006, p. 363.

69. Edward Wong, “Sunni Candidates in Iraq Find Enemies on 

All Sides,” New York Times, December 5, 2005. 

70. Reuters, “What’s in a Name in Iraq? Maybe Survival . . .,” 

reprinted in China Daily, April 14, 2006.

71. Khalil, pp. 19, 135-136.

72. Richard Morin, “Unwelcome Neighbors,” Washington Post, 

July 3, 2005 p. B05.

73. Faleh A. Jabar, The Shi`ite Movement in Iraq, London: Saqi, 

2003, pp. 63-71.

74. Marion Farouk-Sluglett and Peter Sluglett, Iraq Since 1958: 

From Revolution to Dictatorship, London: I. B. Tauris, 1990, p. 20. 

75. Bengio, Saddam’s Word, pp. 100-101. 

76. Sherifa Zuhur, The Middle East: Politics, History, and 

Neonationalism, Carlisle: Institute for Middle Eastern, Islamic, and 

Diasporic Studies and Xlibris, 2005, pp. 243-245. 

77. Wiley, The Islamic Movement, pp. 31-44; and Jabar. Also 

see Hanna Batatu, “Shi`i Organizations in Iraq: Al-Da`wah alIslamiyah and al-Mujahidin,” in Juan Cole and Nikki Keddie, 

eds., Shi`ism and Social Protest, New Haven: Yale University Press, 

1986.

78. Jabar, pp. 217-219.

79. The historic name, Persia, does not apply to all of Iran nor 

all of its people, as not all originate in the province of Fars. The 

majority or 51 percent are Persians in the ethnic and linguistic 

sense, but Azeris, at 23 percent, are Turkic. Other minorities are 

the Kurds (7 percent), Gilanis and Mazandaranis (8 percent), 

Arabs (3 percent), tribal groups like the Bakhtiaris, Luris, Baluchis 

and Qashqai (about 5 percent), and Turkmen (2 percent). 

80. Anti-Shi`a rhetoric regarding the conversion of Iran’s Sunnis 

is provided by Shaykh Abd al-Rahman al-Baluchy. His sense of 

history is also plagued with polemical language: “However, the 

Safawids conspired with the crusaders and the imperialists to 
70

halt the Islamic expansion into France and Vienna,” “Plight of the 

Sunnis in Iran,” al-Jamiat, Vol. 3, No. 9, n.d.

81. Nikki Keddie, Sayyid Jamal al-Din “al-Afghani”: A Political 

Biography, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1972.

82. When a Westerner finalized a deal for the concession to 

tobacco, a railway concession and many others had already been 

agreed on. This was this last straw for al-Afghani. He and other 

clerics declared the exploitation of cash crops un-Islamic, which 

led to the rebellion.

83. Zuhur, The Middle East, pp. 212-213.

84. Michael Ledeen and William Lewis, Debacle: The American 

Failure in Iran, New York: Vintage Books, 1982, pp. 61-63, 65-96.

85. Random House Dictionary, New York: Ballantine, 1980, p. 

757.

86. Two fierce arguments swirled on the fate of the Shah and 

whether U.S, diplomacy in Iran could have led to a different 

outcome. See William H. Sullivan (former ambassador to Iran), 

Mission to Iran, New York: Norton, 1981; Gary Sick, All Fall 

Down: America’s Tragic Encounter with Iran, New York: Random 

House, 1995; William J, Daugherty (one of the hostages), “A Look 

Back,” AmericanDiplomacy.org, March 16, 2003; and Marvin Zonis, 

“Someone Else’s Problem,” New York Times, July 6, 2006, which is 

a review article on William Shawcross, The Shah’s Last Ride: The 

Fate of An Ally, New York: Simon & Schuster, 1995. 

87. The four demands were that the Shah’s wealth should be 

returned to Iran; all financial claims against Iran be dropped; 

Iranian assets would be unfrozen by the United States; and the 

United States was to promise not to intervene in Iran. David 

Menashri, Iran: A Decade of War and Revolution, New York; Holmes 

and Meier, 1990, pp. 204-205, also see pp. 146-149, 153. 

88. W. Carl Biven, Jimmy Carter’s Economy: Policy in an Age 

of Limits, Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina, 2002. 

“Domestically, Carter’s inability to respond effectively to the 

Islamic Republic of Iran—let alone free the U.S. hostages there—

coupled with his failure to communicate his policy on Iran and on 

the hostages in particular to the American public, became one of 

the main rocks on which his presidential reelection bid crashed.” 

Fawaz Gerges, America and Political Islam: Clash of Cultures or Clash 

of Interests? Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999, p. 60. 
71

See also Michael Ledeen and William H. Lewis, “Carter and the 

Fall of the Shah,” The Washington Quarterly, Spring 1980.

89. Of the $11 billion, about $5 billion was returned to Iran, 

with the remainder repaying loans or was held to cover possible 

claims and damages against Iranians. 

90. Presidential responses to Islamism are reviewed usefully 

by Fawaz Gerges, America and Political Islam: Clash of Interests or 

Clash of Cultures? Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999.

91. Ibid. 

92. Musa Sadr, a prominent cleric, political leader, and 

philosopher trained by Tabataba’i, cleric and political leader 

born in Qum, Iran, went to Tyre, Lebanon, in 1960, and was also 

associated with the founding of the first Shi`ite political party, 

AMAL. Due to his disappearance in or in transit to Libya in 1978, 

he is regarded as a martyr and a key spiritual figure. Fuad Ajami, 

The Vanished Imam: Musa al Sadr and the Shia of Lebanon, Ithaca, NY: 

Cornell University Press, 1986. Intermarriage between Lebanese, 

Iranian, and Iraqi clerical families is common, and Imam Musa’s 

niece is former Iranian President’s Rafsanjani’s wife, while his 

cousin was the late Ayatullah Muhamad Baqir al-Sadr of Iraq.

93. Abbas William Samii, “Syria and Iran: An Enduring 

Axis,” Mideast Monitor, Vol. 1, No. 2, April/May 2006, www.

mideastmonitor.org/issues/0604/0604_4.htm.

94. Shahram Chubin, Whither Iran? Reform, Domestic Politics 

and National Security, London: International Institute of Strategic 

Studies, 2002, pp. 92-93. 

95. Azar Nafisi, Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir in Books, 

New York: Random House, 2004, pp. 158-159.

96. Material in this section of the monograph has been previously 

published as “Orgoglio Iranio” (“Ahmadinejad: The People’s Man 

and the Iranian Dilemma,”) in Rivista di Intelligence.

97. Homa Omid, Islam and the Post-Revolutionary State in Iran, 

New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1994, pp. 135-138.

98. Chubin, pp. 24-26.

99. Central Intelligence Agency, “Iran,” The World Factbook, 

www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/index.html.

100. Asef Bayat, Poor People’s Movements in Iran: Street Politics, 

New York: Columbia University Press, 1997, pp. 101-108. 
72

101. “Iran Tells Baghdad to Push U.S. Out,” Washington Times, 

November 23, 2005.

102. Larijani is connected closely with leading clerics as the 

son of Ayatullah Hashim Amoli and the son-in law of the late 

Ayatullah Mortaza, Motahhari. One of his brothers, Sadegh, is a 

member of the Council of Guardians, and two others are Iran’s 

foreign service. He ran for President in the 2005 elections but 

was less popular than Ahmadinejad or Mohammad Ghalibaf, 

receiving only 5.9 percent of the vote despite his centrality to 

the neoconservatives. His blog diary was posted on Jamjam 

in preparation to the elections and is quite revealing. See www.

jamejamonline.ir/shownews2.asp?n=65634&t=feet.

103. Abbas William Samii, “The Iranian Nuclear Issue and 

Informal Networks,” Naval War College Review, Vol. 59, No. 1, 

Winter 2006.

104. Ibid. 

105. Statistics in this section are mainly from CIA open sources. 

On equipment, see Mahan Abedin, “Iranian Public Opinion and 

the Military Stand-Off,” Middle East Monitor, Vol. 1, No. 2, April/

May 2006.

106. Mohammad-Reza Djalali, Diplomatie Islamique: Strategie 

internationale du khomeynisme, Paris: Presses Universitaires de 

France, 1989, pp. 94-95.

107. Fariba Adelkhah, Being Modern in Iran, New York: 

Columbia University Press, 2000. 

108. Ibid. 

109. “Iran Victor ‘Kidnap Role’ Probe,” BBC News, June 10, 

2005. “Sources: CIA Finds Iranian President Likely Not HostageTaker,” cnn.com, August 12, 2005. Most sources who spread this 

rumor apparently hoped to discredit Ahmadinejad prior to, or 

shortly after the June 2005 election. Certain non-Western sources 

repeated these allegations. For example, Wikipedia relies on 

information from Al Jazeera “Profile,” June 19, 2005. 

110. Student leaders from those days, Abbas Abdi and Ibrahim 

Asgharzadeh, who in no way support Ahmadinejad, in addition 

to three other student leaders, denied that he took part in the 

action or played any leading role. New York Times, July 1, 2005; 

Washington Post, July 1 2005; “Iran Victor ‘Kidnap Role’ Probe.” 

111. Iason Athanasiadis, “Ahmadinejad: A Study in Obstinacy,” 

Asia Times, May 19, 2006.
73

112. www.abadgaran.ir/.

113. Abbas William Samii, “The Iranian Nuclear Issue and 

Informal Networks.” 

114. Scott Peterson, “Waiting for the Rapture in Iran,” Christian 

Science Monitor, December 21, 2005. The Imam Mahdi (the 

Twelveth Imam, the Guided One) will appear to lead the Muslims 

before the Day of Resurrection and fight alongside a returned 

Jesus against the Anti-Christ.

115. Athanasiadis. 

116. Peterson. 

117. Karim Sadjapour and Ray Takeyh, “Behind Iran’s Hardline on Israel,” Boston Globe, December 23, 2005.

118. For details on Iran’s military ties to China and purchases 

of hardware, see Bates Gill, “Two Steps Forward, One Step Back: 

The Dynamics of Chinese Nonprofliferation and Arms Control 

Policy-Making in an Era of Reform,” in David M, Lampton, ed., 

The Making of Chinese Foreign and Security Policy in the Era of Reform, 

1978-2000, Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2001; and Richard 

Russell, “China’s WMD Foot in the Greater Middle East’s Door,” 

Middle East Review of International Affairs, Vol. 9, No. 3, September 

2005, who cites Gill in this segment. 

119. Erich Marquardt, “Iran’s ‘Right to Enrich’ Uranium,” Asia 

Times, March 12, 2004; Alissa J, Rubin “Iran Builds Support for 

Right to Nuclear Power,” Los Angeles Times, June 28, 2006. 

120. Associated Press, “Iran May Block Nuclear Inspections,” 

November 20, 2005.

121. Hamid Reza Assefi, Voice of the Islamic Republic of Iran, 

September 12, 2004; “Iran, U.S. Nuclear Fears Overblown,” Los 

Angeles Times, November 5, 2004.

122. Sunday Telegraph, February 19, 2002.

123. International Crisis Group, “Iran: What Does AhmadiNejad’s Victory Mean?” Middle East Briefing No. 18, Tehran/

Brussels, August 4, 2005, pp. 12-13. 

124. Robert Einhorn, “The Iran Nuclear Issue,” Testimony 

before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, May 17, 2006. 

Available at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, 

Washington DC, p. 3. 
74

125. David Albright and Corey Hinderstein, “The Clock is 

Ticking, But How Fast?” The Institute for Science and International 

Security, March 27, 2006; Einhorn, p. 4. 

126. “La lettre de Mahmoud Ahmadinejad á George W, Bush,” 

Le Monde, May 5, 2006.

127. Judith S. Yaphe and Charles D Lutes, “Reassessing 

the Implications of a Nuclear-Armed Iran,” McNair Paper 69, 

Washington, DC: Institute for National Strategic Studies, National 

Defense University, 2005.

128. Kenneth Pollack, “ A Multilateral Approach to Iran,” in 

Ivo Daalder, Nicole Gnesotto and Philip Gordon, eds., Crescent 

of Crisis: U.S.-European Strategy for the Greater Middle East, 

Washington, DC: Brookings Institute, 2006, p. 16; and Yaphe 

and Lutes, pp. 30-31. Yaphe and Lutes present various possible 

scenarios if Iran achieves nuclear weapons á la Iraq (preemptive 

strike), North Korea (Iran cheats), or India (the world condemns 

Iran but does nothing). 

129. Bruno Tertrais, “The Iranian Nuclear Crisis,” in Dallder, 

Gnesotto, and Gordon.

130. Pollack, “A Multilateral Approach.”

131. Transcript of Larry King with President and Mrs. Bush. 

Available at www.cnn.com, July 6, 2006.

132. Wyn Q. Bowen and Joanna Kidd, “The Nuclear Capabilities 

and Ambitions of Iran’s Neighbors,” in Henry Sokolski and 

Patrick Clawson, eds., Getting Ready for a Nuclear-Ready Iran, 

Carlisle Barracks, PA: Strategic Studies Institute, 2005, p. 52.

133. Anthony Cordesman and Khalid Al-Rodhan, “Iranian 

Nuclear Weapons? The Options if Diplomacy Fails,” Draft, April 

7, 2006, Center for Strategic and International Studies, pp. 15-18, 

29.

134. George Perkovitch with Silvia Manzanero, “Iran Gets the 

Bomb—Then What?” in Henry Sokolski and Patrick Clawson, 

eds., pp. 185-189.

135. Cordesman and Al-Rodhan, p. 17.

136. Ibid., p. 18.

137. Ibid., pp. 11-38.

138. Kenneth M. Pollack, “Iran: Three Alternative Futures,” 

Middle East Review of International Affairs, Vol. 10, No. 2, June 

2006.
75

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