[I began the following post several years ago when Trump pulled out of the Iran nuclear deal and never got around to finishing it. Given what’s happened in the past few days, I’ve decided to publish it now as is with a few remarks. As I said, Iran is a deeply divided country. It remains so. I called it a powder keg that could explode at any time. We set the match to it. We have not effected regime change (and are unlikely to do so without “boots on the ground”). What we have likely done is trigger a civil war between the regime and its opponents. Which side, alas, controls the military and the security apparatus and has most of the guns? Thousands more of those we support will die as they are branded traitors and many on the fence “rally around the flag.” This may have been inevitable but we needn’t have been the trigger.]

Back in December 2000, I spent about a week and a half in Tehran (covering the FIDE version of the world chess championship for AP). This was during the administration of President Khatami, a pro-Western reformer. I talked with a number of people and they were uniformly pro-Western and optimistic about the future.* I heard not a single anti-American word (unless you count one person’s puzzlement at how someone could “lose” the election and still be elected–“that’s not democratic, is it?”). They saw change on the horizon and a thawing of relations with the West. Of course it didn’t happen. Iran was (and is) a deeply divided country and the people I talked to were a small, unrepresentative sample (being mostly young and all English speaking except for one conversation in broken French).

In hindsight, it seems obvious that Khatami went as far toward accommodating the West as he could within the relatively closed nature of Iran’s political system (still more open than most in the West give it credit for), i.e., within Iran’s Overton window, only to be rebuffed by both the Clinton and Bush administrations for not going far enough. Since he had nothing to show for his efforts, he was naturally voted out in favor of the hardliner Ahmadinejad, who did nothing to heal Iran’s division. After a disputed election in 2009, the moderates regained the presidency with the election of Rouhani in 2013.

A look at Iran’s demographics reveals a ticking time bomb. Exactly the opposite problem from that faced by the advanced democracies, who have an aging, shrinking population. Iran has a booming, young population and Iran’s stagnant economy can’t absorb them all into the labor force. It’s a powder keg and if it goes off, the effects will not be confined within Iran’s borders. Supreme Leader is a nice title but Ayatollah Khamenei can’t feel very comfortable or very supreme contemplating all of this.

Under the circumstances, it seems likely that the main goal of “Obama’s nuclear deal” was simply to avoid repeating the mistakes of the past. It strengthened the moderates by giving them something (sanctions relief and presumably an improved economy) to show for their moderation at the expense of the hardliners. While not perfect, it seems to be the best deal attainable (i.e., that the hardliners couldn’t block).

With these considerations in mind, I have to ask: who in Iran benefits from Trump’s withdrawal from the nuclear deal and who in Iran is harmed? The answer seems obvious: the hardliners benefit at the expense of the moderates. The sanctions “only benefit the Revolutionary Guards.” The get to boast of their nationalistic patriotism and crow that they were right when they said that the West is not to be trusted.

* Of course, my sample was both small (maybe 12-15) and skewed towards those who spoke English and would engage an American in conversation. Almost all were under 30. I did not encounter any hardliners. I take my experience, not as a representative sample, but as perhaps representative of the pro-Khatami reformers. If nothing else, it proved the existence of those who genuinely wanted an opening to the West and were pro-Western in outlook.

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