American Interests in Iran
Vice President Biden made a reasonable point in his post-Iranian election comment. "Our interests are the same before the election as after the election, and that is we want them to cease and desist from seeking a nuclear weapon and having one in its possession and, secondly, to stop supporting terror."
But, if our interests are the same, our problems are the same as well. Yes, the votes in Iran appear to have been counted fraudulently, if they were counted at all (it seems totals were announced before many of the ballot boxes were opened), but even if they had been counted fairly it wouldn't matter much. The election itself was a fraud. Candidates vetted and chosen by religious authorities - reformers and conservatives relative only to each other - faced off in a vote without a free press, secret ballots or neutral observers.
Mir Hosein Musavi announced himself as a domestic reformer, but he was part of the Supreme National Security Council that restarted Iran's nuclear program in 2005 and calls nuclear development "Iran's right." He said denying the Holocaust had harmed Iran in the public eye, but Holocaust revisionism isn't one of Mr. Biden's declared American interests. [If it was, we would have to stop talking to Abu Mazen, whose thesis, "Relations between Zionism and Nazism, 1933 - 1945," was later published as a book.] As a candidate, Musavi said he opposes corruption and he called for greater "personal freedoms," but those are not part of America's declared interests either.
President Obama knew all of that when he made his overture to Iran and agreed that the United States would accept the Iranian election at face value.
Because, as Mr. Biden said, we have interests that we need to pursue, and our interests are not governed by the President of Iran, but by the unelected Mullahs who hold the real power. They have run the nuclear program since the Revolution, and Iran's support for terrorist organizations appears to be national, not presidential, policy. It is the Mullahs who have to "cease and desist," in Mr. Biden's words; neither Ahmadinejad nor Musavi have, or would ever have the power.
The Iranian people, who clearly came out in great numbers to express their opinion, were probably cheated last Friday, but they were cheated long before.
The problem the Iranian election fraud poses to the United States is that we actually do stand for something - at least we should. Dictators have long been framing their "elections" to get the results they desire, and our government has often put stability over the sometimes-messy outcome of free elections. But watching thousands of Iranian citizens being beaten for demanding that their votes be counted is like watching Tiananmen Square 20 years ago. Sad, but by itself probably not going to overthrow or undermine a regime with wide repressive powers.
And the voter rebellion will be by itself; there is neither ability nor will abroad to do otherwise. The administration and the Europeans will tut-tut, and then will pursue their interests. And so will the Iranian government.
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