Iran’s nuclear dossier a E3 pawn

Trita Parsi of the Quincy Institute has moved the Iran nuclear conundrum into the great power geopolitical sphere. Or rather he is downgrading it’s importance relative to the European need for U.S. commitment and support in the struggle with Russia. He has posted on his Substack and on the Quincy Responsible Statecraft website Europe uses Iran as pawn in transatlantic power play on September 19.

His analysis is a bit complex or better convoluted. The E3 activated the UNSC ‘snapback’ mechanism (on August 28) for two principal reasons: punish Iran for its assistance to Russia in the Ukraine war; and curry favor with the Trump administration for staying with Europe in opposing Russia. The fact that it is about nuclear is just convenient.

Parsi also projects that Israel will ‘finish the job’ with military action against Iran perhaps at the end of this month (when ‘snapback’ goes into force) or by the end of December (before the U.S. midterms campaign starts). I assume Parsi expects that Israel’s objective will be ‘decapitation’ intermingled with more attacks on nuclear facilities. While Netanyahu will pull all the levers to get Trump to join in, Israel will go it alone (with U.S. logistics, intelligence, weapon support).

So, what would you do if you were part of Iranian leadership? Self and family protection will have high priority. Preparing as much air defense and missile capability as possible will also have high priority. And on the nuclear front, moving any uranium stockpiles to greater safety and protecting critical equipment.

What about the calls by many governments at the IAEA General Conference for Iran to facilitate IAEA inspectors’ access for verification especially to the bombed facilities? That is not going to happen this year because of the safety risk to inspectors from expected Israeli attack.

And that’s how the Iran nuclear conundrum looks as of Sunday, September 21.

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