Iran

Iran is one of the oldest nations in the world, and currently has a young and educated population. Iran was a key U.S. ally in central Asia until the Islamic Revolution in 1979 transformed the country into a clerical regime. Iran is a member of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), and its oil-related activities are the backbone of the Iranian economy. In recent years, the Iranian nuclear program has been a controversial subject in the international community.

Most Iranians profess Shi'ism, a brand of Islam. It was brought to ancient Persia during the Arab invasion of the 7th century. Some Sunni Muslim fanatics such as Osama bin Laden consider it to be a form of apostasy and do not consider shi'ites to be truly formed Muslims. An endogenous attempt to realize an Iranian democracy took place after World War II when Iranians supported a visionary leader, Mohammad Mosaddeq. Mosaddeq decided to nationalize the country's oil industry, which had been controlled by a British monopoly, the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company. That action made him a national hero, but it also led to his downfall. In 1953 the British were outraged by the nationalization and, working closely with the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, arranged to overthrow Mosaddeq. Thus, they opened a new era in Iranian history, one dominated by Mohammed Reza Shah Pahlavi. A close ally of the United States, he ruled with increasing repression until he was himself overthrown by the Islamic Revolution of 1979.

The new regime brought a theocratic government into power, which proved to be hostile to the United States. The Islamic regime allowed radical students to take 66 U.S. citizens hostage in the U.S. embassy in Tehran for more than 14 months. That act helped to undermine Jimmy Carter's presidency and turned Washington and Tehran into bitter enemies. Since then, the United States has used various strategies to weaken Iran. It has encouraged Iranian counterrevolutionary groups, imposed economic sanctions, and worked intensely to prevent Iran from building pipelines that could carry its oil and gas to nearby countries. The United States financially supported Saddam Hussein's regime during the Iran-Iraq war (1980–88).

This pressure intensified after President George W. Bush took office in 2001. Bush famously listed Iran, along with Iraq and North Korea, as part of the World's “axis of evil” and claimed in his State of the Union address in 2002 that Iran had become the world's primary state sponsor of terror. Although it is uncertain whether Iran's Islamic regime is still supporting terrorist groups, it clearly did so in the 1990s.

Iran contains about 125 billion barrels of proven oil reserves—roughly one-tenth of the world's total. As a result, the extraction and processing of petroleum are Iran's fundamental economic activities and [Page 944]the most valuable in terms of revenue. Natural gas production is increasingly important. Oil exports account for about 80 percent of Iran's total export earnings and provide revenue for some 40 to 50 percent of the government's budget. This abundance of mineral resources is a cause of suspicion over the Iranian nuclear program. Although the official position of the Iranian government is that the program has only peaceful purposes, this claim is still controversial. Seen from the Iranian perspective, there is a real interest in having the nuclear deterrence: the fear of a possible U.S. invasion. In fact, the United States has troops on both Iran's western border (Iraq) and its eastern border (Afghanistan). Moreover, Israel, India, and Pakistan have nuclear arsenals. Therefore, the Iranian control of a nuclear deterrence is based both on military consideration and on the search for prestige for the theocracy. In this context, the United Nations Security Council issued several resolutions demanding Iran to suspend uranium enrichment.

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