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Iran

Policy Analysis on Iran

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What Else Can Be Done about Iran's Nuclear Program?

On November 18, 2005, Michael Eisenstadt, Patrick Clawson, and Henry Sokolski discussed policy options regarding Iran's nuclear program in light of the November 24 meeting of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and the publication of Getting Ready for a Nuclear Ready Iran (U.S. Army War College Strategic Studies Institute)

Michael Eisenstadt
Patrick Clawson

Tehran's Renewed War on Culture

After a period of some tolerance under former president Mohammad Khatami, Iran is now experiencing a cultural clampdown. President Mahmoud Ahmadinezhad is implementing the hardest of hardline ideological tendencies in the cultural arena, consistent with his belief that his administration should prepare the country for the reappearance of the hidden

Mehdi Khalaji

Countries of Particular Concern:

Religious Freedom and the Middle East

On November 8, the State Department released the International Religious Freedom Report, its annual survey of religious freedom across the world ( read the report online). Several of the designated "countries of particular concern" (CPCs) are in the Middle East: Iran, Sudan, and embarrassingly, in light of longstanding close diplomatic

Simon Henderson

Supreme Leader Khamenei's Responsibility for Iran's Present Situation

Mohsen Sazegara, recently a visiting fellow at The Washington Institute and now at Yale University, posted on several Persian-language websites (including gooya.com) a long open letter to Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Hossein Khamenei. Below are translated extracts from that letter. Dear Mr. Khamenei: Let go of these strange thoughts

Mohsen Sazegara

Articles & Testimony

Slow and Steady, Bush's Mideast Race

The Bush administration has many problems to keep it preoccupied in its remaining three years, including the challenges of post-Katrina reconstruction and a massive budget deficit. Plus the president and the Republicans in Congress have been weighed down by allegations of misconduct. So it is hardly surprising that some worry

Patrick Clawson

In-Depth Reports

Continuity and Chaos

Exploring continuities and changes, this book provides the historical backdrop crucial to understanding how Iranian pride and sense of victimization combine to make its politics contentious and potentially dangerous. From the struggle between the Shah and Ayatollah Khomeini to the current tension between the reformers and traditionalists, a central issue

Patrick Clawson

Creating Effective International Pressure for Human Rights in Iran

On November 2, the UN General Assembly's Third Committee is due to consider a Canadian resolution condemning Iran for human rights violations. A similar resolution was approved by the General Assembly in 2004 by a vote of 71-54 with fifty-five abstentions. Iran's human rights violations have recently worsened, and the

Mehdi Khalaji

A Bedouin on a Camel?

Saudi Foreign Policy and the Insurgency in Iraq

Iraq's interior minister, Bayan Jabr, lashed out at Saudi diplomacy while speaking to journalists in Amman on October 2. Referring to Prince Saud al-Faisal, the Saudi foreign minister, Jabr said Iraq would not be lectured by "some Bedouin riding a camel." Broadening his remarks to the Saudi ruling family, the

Simon Henderson

Articles & Testimony

The Worst Option

"No one can want the Iranian leadership to gain possession of atomic weapons," German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder opined earlier this week. "But let's take the military option off the table. We have seen it doesn't work." Actually, the option least likely to work is the one most actively considered: economic

Iranian Media Reactions to the Nuclear Impasse

Iran's hardline establishment often declares that all Iranian citizens are united in their determination to see Iran exercise its "right" to nuclear power and "self-sufficiency" -- that is, operation of the complete fuel cycle. But are all Iranians really so enthused by the national nuclear program and heedless of international

Challenges Facing Iran's New Government

Iran's bold August 7 decision to resume uranium conversion -- previously frozen under an agreement with Britain, France, and Germany -- came only four days after new president Mahmoud Ahmadinezhad took office. This confrontational step suggests that the new administration may take strong actions to advance its hardline agenda. At

Mehdi Khalaji
Mohsen Sazegara

The Three-Way Game:

Iran, Iraq, and the United States

The July 16–18 visit to Tehran by Iraqi prime minister Ibrahim Jafari and ten other members of his council of ministers has been hailed by some as the beginning of a new era in Iran-Iraq relations. In fact, the pattern of near-term relations was set during Iraqi defense minister Saadoun

Michael Knights

The New Iranian Government:

Resurrecting Past Errors

On June 29, 2005, Iran’s Guardian Council confirmed Mahmoud Ahmadinezhad as winner of the June 24 presidential election, as dictated by Iran’s constitution and in accordance with the wishes of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. He will take office on August 4. The fact that Ahmadinezhad won the election would have

Mohsen Sazegara

Articles & Testimony

Next Generation

Last week, Iranians elected a proto-fascist as president. The rise of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, formerly the mayor of Tehran, was a blow to the vibrant reform movement that swept Mohammed Khatami to the presidency in 1997. Ahmadinejad's extreme social conservatism—which bears plenty of resemblance to the Taliban's—and his economic populism have

The Equation of Fear

Once again the Iranian nation is at a fork in the road: a choice between worse and worst. It is not clear when it will have the possibility of choosing, under a democratic structure, between better and best. A problematic election and the intervention of the armed services in politics

Mohsen Sazegara

Iran’s Presidential Election:

The Candidates Speak

Iranians will head back to the polls on June 24 to decide an unprecedented presidential runoff pitting Mahmoud Ahmadinezhad against Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani. Ahmadinezhad, mayor of Tehran, defied pre-election forecasts by reportedly finishing with 5,710,354 (19.5 percent) of the 29,317,042 ballots cast in the original election on June 17

Articles & Testimony

Today, when Iranians go to the polls to elect a new president, the vote will almost certainly be free, competitive, and fair. It will also be a joke. Always inventive, Iran's ruling mullahs years ago developed a new twist on the old autocratic game of holding sham elections. Whereas the

Articles & Testimony

Making Iran Play Ball

The British, French, And German foreign ministers met last week with the Iranians and afterward declared that a crisis had been averted. Iran's threat to resume uranium enrichment activities has been put on hold for now. But are we out of the woods? Not likely. In the Paris talks, Hassan

Dennis Ross

Toward a Fourth Republic?

Since the 1979 Islamic Revolution, Iran has gone through three distinct political stages. The first stage, which began with the victory of the revolution and ended with the death of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, was a period in which the revolutionary regime was established and consolidated. This stage, which also witnessed

Mohsen Sazegara

'Lawful Crimes' in Iran

As this month's presidential election campaign gets underway in Iran, the Iranian government is emphasizing that the country enjoys the rule of law and elected government. In fact, both statements are false. To understand why the rule of law and representative government are absent in Iran, it is necessary to

Mohsen Sazegara

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Supported by the

Viterbi Program on Iran and U.S. Policy

Today, the Islamic Republic of Iran poses the most serious and urgent set of security challenges to the United States and its allies in the greater Middle East. Since the Khomeini revolution in 1979, Iran has sought to export its radical ideology through the use of terrorism, subversion, and support to ideological fellow-travelers throughout the Muslim world.

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Featured experts

Farzin Nadimi

Farzin Nadimi, a Senior Fellow with The Washington Institute, is a Washington-based analyst specializing in the security and defense affairs of Iran and the Persian Gulf region.

Patrick Clawson

Patrick Clawson

Patrick Clawson is the Morningstar Senior Fellow and Research Counselor at The Washington Institute.

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