Now almost eight years later, and under the heavy and humiliating weight of maximum US pressure, the same collective forces that forced Iran to open up to the nuclear deal are stripping it in the opposite direction, thanks to a growing resurgence of territorial nationalism throughout society
Iranian Intelligence Minister Mahmoud Alavi, in an interview on Iranian state television on February XNUMX, made a threat saying that his country's goal is nuclear weapons.
"The Supreme Leader [Ayatullah Ali Khamenei] has clearly said in his fatwa that nuclear weapons are against Sharia law and the Islamic Republic views them as forbidden by religion and does not intend them," Alavi said. "But a cat that is embarrassed can behave differently than one that is free. And if they [Western powers] push Iran in that direction, then it is no longer Iran's fault."
In an analysis about nuclear weapons and Iran, the well-known political magazine "Foreign Policy" has written that the unprecedented public threat has attracted widespread media attention.
"Domestic critics, especially hardliners, criticized President Hassan Rouhani's Intelligence Minister for harming Iranian interests by undermining Khamenei's religious decree against weapons of mass destruction," the magazine wrote. "Middle East observers focused on the fatwa factor, mainly to demonstrate the unreliability of Iranian leaders. Others interpret Alawi's statements as a 'pressure' tactic to push the Biden administration to join the 2015 Iran nuclear deal - formally known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) - or otherwise scrap the sanctions", it is further stated in the analysis of "Foreign Policy".
"Embarrassed Cat"
All these answers misunderstand the true meaning of Alavi's threat with the "embarrassed cat", writes the American magazine. According to her, the whole debate over Khamenei's fatwa banning nuclear weapons has been much ado about nothing; it never mattered to either party in the first place. (The very fact that world powers engaged in marathon talks with Tehran from 2013 to 2015 to verifiably curb its nuclear program in exchange for economic relief confirms as much.) Far more important is what the commentary reflects about a continuing change in Iran's mind about the bomb.
"Broad sections of Iranian society, including the public and lawmakers, seem increasingly to see the weapon not just as a last-ditch deterrent, but as a panacea to Iran's chronic security problems and challenges to its sovereignty by foreign powers", writes "Foreign Policy".
Alawi's statement came against a backdrop of repeated national humiliation in the form of a string of embarrassing security breaches and counterintelligence failures, the US magazine said.
In recent years, Iran has lost Qassem Suleimani, the chief architect of the regional strategy, and has seen several of its key military and infrastructure facilities, including Natanz and Khojir, targeted in a series of mysterious explosions and sabotage operations. The climax came last November, when the architect of Iran's nuclear strategy, Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, was killed near Tehran.
Shortly after Suleimani's assassination by the United States of America in January 2020, Tabnak—a well-known conservative media outlet in Tehran with nationalist leanings—published a rare piece asking its readers about nuclear deterrence and ways to advance Iran's national security interests.
"Some analysts believe that possessing nuclear weapons will check Israel's regional ambitions, while others claim that it can prevent major powers from fueling tensions and starting new wars in the region," the Tabnak article said. A similar story was published in Alef - another conservative news source. This medium claimed that Washington's "destructive policies" against Iran and the "inaction of the Europeans" continued to push Tehran to the brink of making the "big decision".
The counter-effect of sanctions
"Why should Iran commit to international regulations and refrain from creating nuclear weapons, while the enemies are all equipped with these weapons and threaten to destroy Iran every day?", said another analysis published by the Russian newspaper "Sputnik". ” in Persian after the drone strike killing.
These questions and concerns have been a present, still largely marginal part of public debate in Iran since its nuclear scientists were first targeted during Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's presidency (2005-2013), Foreign Policy magazine notes. .
“It is no coincidence that self-proclaimed realist theorists such as John J. Mearsheimer, Stephen M. Walt, and his late mentor Kenneth N. Waltz are among the best-known references and authors whose works and arguments favor prevention. nuclear and balance of power have been widely translated into Persian and made available to Iranian news consumers. But it was only after Fakhrizadeh's assassination by Israel that popular sympathy for Iran's geopolitical vulnerability and support for nuclear weapons as an effective and lasting solution gained much traction among the public and the ruling elite," the American magazine writes. "It seems that our logical response to this assassination should be a scientific response," said Fereydoun Abbasi, chairman of the energy committee in the Iranian Parliament. In an interview in December, Abbasi called for decisive action on nuclear capabilities among Iranian decision-makers.
"So we will take steps to deepen our scientific and technical knowledge of nuclear energy," he said.
Abassi himself survived an assassination attempt in 2010 while heading Iran's Atomic Energy Organization. Another op-ed by Rahborde Moaser, a state-linked strategic media outlet, urged Tehran to withdraw from the Nuclear Weapons Treaty so it could fulfill "sustainable deterrence" against powerful adversaries, a proposal that echoed calls for the production of "weapons of mass destruction" as the "only way" to put national security in their hands.
Dilemmas of the Iranians
The US magazine writes that other observers have gone so far as to defend the bomb as a prerequisite for Iran's economic development, arguing that "nuclear weaponry" is the "only option" that can solve Tehran's "chronic security dilemma" a once and for all and enable him to focus on prosperity. The Intelligence Minister's "embarrassed cat" threat was in fact a clearer expression of these marginal and underground downward temptations and tendencies.
In his groundbreaking work, The Psychology of Nuclear Diffusion: Identity, Emotions, and Foreign Policy (2006), political scientist Jacques EC Hymans analyzes four different conceptions of national identity held by political leaders—their sense of “what the nation stands for naturally and how naturally it stays” compared to others—that ultimately determine their nuclear choices and decisions, from abstinence and restraint to arming the home and outright acquisition. He draws particular attention to "oppositional nationalism," a particular conception of national identity, driven by fear and pride, that functions as an "explosive psychological cocktail" for nuclear policymaking. Nationalist opposition leaders "see their nation as naturally at odds with an external enemy, and so naturally its equal, if not superior," Hymans elaborates, concluding that such leaders "develop a desire for nuclear weapons that it goes beyond calculation and beyond self-expression". According to this definition, Khamenei should be a good example of an opposition nationalist who aspires, in the face of massive international opposition, to elevate his revisionist country to the leading power of the Middle East.
However, Khamenei's nuclear decision-making, including his call for "heroic flexibility" in 2013 to justify nuclear weapons negotiations with world powers, does not fit neatly into Hymans' "conception of national identity" model, and the question remains unresolved: Why is Iran still not armed with a nuclear bomb? The answer does not lie in Khamenei's psychological profile or his fatwa or the nuclear ban.
Unforgivable mistakes
Now almost eight years later, and under the heavy and humiliating weight of maximum US pressure, the same collective forces that forced Iran to open up to the nuclear deal are stripping it in the opposite direction, thanks to a growing resurgence of territorial nationalism throughout society. And Iran's dormant nuclear genie is waking up and dancing its way to that nationalist tune. It's already out of its bottle.
This growing shift in Iranian public opinion regarding the nation's nuclear program is as significant as it is unprecedented, and a major reason why statements like Alawi's "embarrassed cat" carry significant strategic weight. Fueled by a growing sense of injustice and nuclear outrage, pro-bomb sentiments in Iran will gain more ground and legitimacy in light of expanding nuclear ventures in Saudi Arabia and Israel, Tehran's main regional adversaries. Under the de facto rule of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the Saudi nuclear initiative is progressing unhindered, and Israel is expanding its secret atomic infrastructure in the Negev desert in broad daylight.
The potentially explosive shift in Iran's national attitude toward nuclear weapons is a direct consequence of the U.S. campaign of maximum pressure, from economic strangulation to sabotage operations to planned assassinations. Washington's decision to withdraw from the JCPOA has served to remove one of Iran's main political obstacles to securing the bomb.
Iran has reached a dangerous moment, estimates the American magazine "Foreign Policy". What if Iran's next leader proves to be a true confrontational nationalist who does not shy away from making the big decision against all odds? What if a confrontation with a superior military adversary, such as the United States or Israel, convinces the Iranians and their leaders that nuclear deterrence is no longer a matter of choice but a national security necessity? Because foreign punishment is perceived as unjust, Iran's public opposition to nuclear weapons is eroding. If the United States and its regional allies are truly determined to prevent Tehran from acquiring nuclear weapons, they must move beyond conventional reliance on punitive force and consider the unintended strategic consequences of maximum pressure. Otherwise, Alavi's "embarrassed cat" may suddenly jump.