Newsgroup: it.politica.internazionale
Titolo: Why Iran needs to drop Assad

http://english.alarabiya.net/views/2011/06/17/153718.html
Why Iran needs to drop Assad
By AMIR TAHERI
Is Iran beginning to abandon the Syrian despot Bashar Al Assad?
Officially, the Baathist regime in Damascus and the Khomeinist regime in 
Tehran remain strategic allies. Under a treaty, signed in 2004, they are 
committed to helping one another against "external threats". They also 
hold annual meetings of senior military commanders, ostensibly to 
"coordinate efforts to strengthen regional stability." Iran supplies 
arms to Syria and has been training Syrian security personnel since the 
mid-1990s. Iran's annual aid package to Syria amounts to more than $500 
million.
Specialists believe that, after the disintegration of the Communist 
bloc, the Islamic Republic has replaced the Soviet Union as Syria's 
protector.
Syria has been useful to Iran in several ways.
It has prevented the emergence of a united Arab bloc against the 
Khomeinist regime and acted as a channel for Iranian influence in Lebanon.
Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has made no secret of his ambition 
to see Iran secure a presence in the Mediterranean for the first time 
since the 7th century. That, he hopes, would be achieved by dominating 
Iraq and using Syria and Lebanon as client states. Tehran media depicted 
the recent appearance of an Iranian war flotilla in Syrian ports as a 
dramatic occasion to "show the flag".
Over the past year, a new factor has increased Syria's value as an 
Iranian asset in the geostrategic competition in the Middle East.
That factor is Turkey.
Convinced that joining the European Union is more of a mirage than a 
possibility, Turkish leaders have switched to a "neo-Ottoman" foreign 
policy aimed at creating a zone of influence from the Caspian Basin to 
North Africa.
Turkey's new ambitions clash with Iran's hegemonic plans.
Their rivalry is not limited to geopolitics. There is also a subtext of 
ideological competition. Turkey's current leadership is a moderate 
branch of the Muslim Brotherhood using the label of the Justice and 
Development Party (AKP).
"Today, Turkey is offering a model to the Muslim world," Prime Minister 
Recep Tayyib Erdogan told an election victory rally in Istanbul last 
Sunday. "Turkey wants to become a voice for Muslims throughout the world."
For Khomeinists in Tehran, Mr. Erdogan's claim is as provocative as 
waving a red cloth at a Spanish bull. (The Khomeinist Constitution 
claims that Ali Khamenei is "Leader of all Muslims throughout the world.")
For some three years, Turkey has been assiduously courting Syria. The 
two have signed business deals amounting to $1 billion, a large sum for 
Syria's small economy. Turkey has also served as "facilitator" in talks 
between Syria and Israel. That, in turn, has reinforced Israel's 
traditional policy of supporting the Mr. Assad clan against an "unknown 
future."
Since the mullahs seized power in 1979, Tehran has harbored the hope of 
emerging as "regional superpower". With the United States apparently 
bent on strategic retreat under President Obama, Tehran's hubris reached 
its peak under Ahmadinejad. Turkey's unexpected entry in the competition 
threatened Tehran's ambitions.
Suddenly, Syria looked like a key pawn.
It is no surprise that the media in Iran have chosen to ignore the 
uprising against the Syrian regime. Until this week, whenever the 
uprising was mentioned it was branded "an American-Zionist plot". And, 
yet, there are signs, still faint, that Tehran might be reconsidering 
the situation in Syria.
For the first time since the uprising started, the official news agency 
IRNA has ran an item about "the need to respond to the legitimate 
demands of the Syrian people." The daily Kayhan, controlled by the 
office of the "Supreme Guide" Ali Khamenei, advises Syrian leaders to 
carry out "necessary reforms" to defeat "American-Zionist conspiracies." 
Hard-line members of the Islamic Majlis, Iran's fake parliament, claim 
that Syria is in trouble because it "dabbled in secularism."
More importantly, perhaps, Tehran has decided to stop the flow of 
pilgrims to a "holy shrine" near Damascus. The excuse given by the 
Khomeinist Cultural Attachï¿œ in Syria is that the pilgrims also travel to 
Lebanon where they visit "Christian majority areas" and become exposed 
to "wrong ideas."
It is, of course, too early to tell whether Tehran will jettison the 
Assad clan. However, such an eventuality could not be ruled out. 
Khomeinists have never hesitated to drop a protï¿œgï¿œ when he looked like a 
loser. (Recently, Tehran dropped the al-Hakim clan in Iraq, having 
supported it for three decades. Tehran diverted its support to the group 
led by Muqtada Al Sadr.)
If Tehran's attitude changes, the key, once again, would be Turkey. 
Having initially backed the Assad clan, Turkey has now switched to 
supporting the uprising. By doing so it is banking on the future as the 
Assad clan increasingly looks like the past. Iran, however, is still 
wedded to the past in Syria, and could thus emerge as a loser.
If there is regime change in Damascus, Iran would be shut out as a power 
that supported the Assad clan while it was killing the people in the 
streets. If the Assad clan manages to hang on to a semblance of power 
through mass carnage, Tehran would end up saddled with an isolated and 
bankrupt regime In Damascus.
Turkey's prospects are different. A new regime in Damascus would regard 
Turkey as a true friend that supported the Syrian people against a 
regime they rejected. If the Assad clan remains in power, Turkey would 
emerge as the leader of a new wave of reform and change across the 
Greater Middle East.
Under all conceivable configurations, the only way for Iran to avoid 
becoming a loser is to jettison Mr. Assad and reach out to the Syrian 
people.
Whatever one might think about them, Tehran's geo-strategists would not 
be as out of touch with reality not to know all that.
(Published in the London-based Asharq Alawsat on June 17.)
-- 
Namib
"La force ne fait ni raison ni droit ; mais il est peut-ï¿œtre impossible 
de s'en passer, pour faire respecter le droit et la raison" (Saint-Just)

 Why Iran needs to drop Assad
Molto interessante, grazie.
PP