U.S. May Have New Problem in Iran

The surprise victory of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in Iran’s presidential election is likely to exacerbate tensions within the Bush administration over how to deal with Tehran and its possible quest for nuclear weapons, analysts said Saturday.

As the mayor of Tehran, Ahmadinejad is a relative newcomer to the national political scene. Despite his reputation as an ultraconservative, he has virtually no track record with major international issues.

Because of this, Bush administration officials who advocate engagement with Iran as well as administration hard-liners who seek to isolate the Islamic Republic are likely to portray the outcome as buttressing their positions, several U.S.-based experts said.

Despite Bush’s inclusion of Iran as part of an “axis of evil” in early 2002, his administration has been so divided on Iran that it has yet to produce a unified policy directive.

But hard-liners have lost ground, and voices within the administration arguing for some form of engagement have grown stronger. In February, for example, Bush agreed to support a European Union effort to negotiate an agreement in which Iran would give up its quest to enrich uranium in return for economic and security incentives.

U.S. hard-liners may now point to the victory of Ahmadinejad, who has called for Iran to move ahead at full speed with “peaceful nuclear technology,” as evidence that even indirect engagement has failed.

“They will argue that they’ve been vindicated,” predicted Allen Keiswetter, who served both President Clinton and Bush as a deputy assistant secretary of State for Near Eastern affairs before joining the Middle East Institute, a Washington-based think tank. He said advocates of engagement would urge a wait-and-see response to Ahmadinejad’s victory, noting his mainly domestic background and the prominence of domestic issues in the election.

Ahmadinejad used hard-edged rhetoric against Iran’s foes during the campaign, and he strongly endorsed Iran’s right to pursue nuclear technology -- as did all the other candidates. But it was other issues, including tax policies, job creation and corruption, that appear to have influenced the electorate the most.

“It’s difficult to say this is not a referendum on relations with the United States, but I really think it was his domestic platform that appealed to voters,” Keiswetter said.

Ahmadinejad’s opponent in Friday’s runoff, former President Hashemi Rafsanjani, ran as a reformist who was interested in opening a new chapter in relations with the United States.

Although the U.S. and Iran severed diplomatic ties more than a quarter of a century ago and have shared few friendly moments since, opinion polls in Iran suggested support for improving ties with Washington.

The State Department on Saturday offered no formal judgment on Ahmadinejad, instead continuing to focus on what it said was a flawed election process. A spokesman noted that more than 1,000 candidates had been disqualified from running by the powerful but unelected Guardian Council.

“We continue to stand with those who call for greater freedom for the Iranian people,” State Department spokesman Steve Pike said.

During a speech last week in Cairo, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice disparaged “the appearance of elections.”

Joseph Cirincione, author of “Deadly Arsenals,” which focuses in part on Iran’s push to acquire nuclear technology, suggested that a president with conservative credentials might have more leeway to negotiate a nuclear agreement with the EU than someone who openly advocated better relations with the West.

“Just as Nixon went to China, a conservative could make a deal with the European Union [on limiting nuclear development] and minimize the domestic criticism,” he said.

Iran insists that its right to develop nuclear energy is guaranteed under the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty and that it needs to develop nuclear power to supplement its export-oriented oil reserves. The United States and some other Western countries believe Tehran is trying to enrich uranium to make atomic weapons.

Cirincione, who was in Tehran three months ago to learn more about Iran’s nuclear facilities and the country’s position on nuclear energy, said there was little understanding in the West of how deeply committed Ahmadinejad was to keeping his country’s nuclear program.

However, Cirincione and other specialists noted that the election had left unchanged the power of Iran’s ultimate decision-maker on such crucial issues: supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

EU negotiators are expected to be in Washington early next month for consultations with the Bush administration on proposals to present to Tehran by the end of July. So far, the administration has said it would be willing to back Iran’s application for membership in the World Trade Organization and offer commercial aircraft spare parts for the country’s aging, American-built fleet.