Iran -- Looking East
Feb. 22, 2007 — -- When the United States threatened Iraq over its alleged acquisition of weapons of mass destruction, Saddam Hussein, the country's dictator, confined his responses to angry rhetoric and empty threats.
By contrast, Iran's response to U.S. pressure over its nuclear program has been to engage in canny regional diplomacy, looking east for allies and support, wielding access to trade and natural resources as a potent weapon against isolation.
From an Asian standpoint, this makes any looming conflict with Iran as much an Asian crisis as a Middle Eastern one.
Should the United States decide to launch an attack on Iran's nuclear facilities, perhaps the immediate effect will be felt in Afghanistan, where NATO forces are battling a resurgent Taliban.
Iran is a principal trading partner with Afghanistan providing the landlocked state with access overland to the Persian Gulf. Kabul's ties with Tehran have been greatly helped by President Hamid Karzai's anti-Pakistan sentiments.
Karzai visited Tehran in 2005, and Iran's exports to Afghanistan are well in excess of $300 million. Indeed, U.S. military advisers fret that instability in Iran could have a destabilizing effect on Afghanistan.
This, of course, would play nicely into Pakistan's hands, where the long-held fear is of an Afghanistan that can check Islamabad with ties to India and Iran. Let's not forget that Iran, together with India and Russia, helped the largely Shiite Northern Alliance push the Taliban out of Kandahar and eventually Kabul.
Iran and Pakistan have made efforts to get closer, but ties are complicated by a large persecuted Shiite minority in Pakistan, as well as a serious tribal revolt in Balochistan, which Islamabad suspects receives a sympathetic ear in Tehran.
Given this complex entanglement, it's hard to imagine that Iran was not on the agenda when U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates flew unannounced into Islamabad earlier this month.
Being such a close ally of the United States makes it certain that assurances and even backdoor support will be asked for in case of a U.S. attack on Iran. If so, Pakistan's ties with Afghanistan, India, as well as longtime ally China will be tested, and instead of a cakewalk you have the seeds of a broader regional crisis.
Michael Vatikiotis is a member of Asia Society's International Council and is the Southeast Asia Regional representative for the Centre for Humanitarian Dialogue.
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