Kurdistan Observer

Kurdistan Iran policy II: Aczmaz
By: Prof Goran Nowicki
June 14, 2006

In the first part of this article [1], I gave a short overview of the Kurdish and Persian relations in its historical context. For shaping a strategy and spelling a set of policies in regards to Iran one needs to analyze the behaviour of the Iranian regime and its game plan in the region. In this article, I also touch upon my past article [2] criticizing US Iraq policy.

THE PERSIAN GAME

"Aczmaz" is a defensive strategy in chess for paralysing your opponent in order to prevent him moving some of his pieces in the chessboard and endangering his king. This is a strategy very often used by the Iranian regime in its regional game.

According to Muhammad Javad Larijani, the influential member of Iran's Security council and member of Foreign affairs committee in Iranian Parliament, Iran follows an "Achmaz" policy in regards to Azerbaijan, by using Armenia as its ally. In other words, Azerbaijan is kept busy with Armenia to prevent any claim to the highly populated of Azeri regions in Iran. By this policy, Iran and Armenia make sure that Turkey is deprived of any contact with Turkic speaking region.
[Garrusi 2000].

This is the same strategy that Iran uses in Iraq now and I warned the US policymakers before their invasion of Iraq. But who is Larijani?

One should not confuse Mohammad Javad Larijani, with the present Iranian envoy Larijani who visited Egypt this month and who was defeated by Ahmanijad in the recent presidential elections in Iran. Mohammad Javad himself failed to become Iranian foreign minister when another cleric Nateq Nuri was defeated by Khatami in Iranian presidential elections.

This Berkeley university drop out, played a key role in normalizing relations with the UK, and after the Nick Brown's scandal and the role that he played in it, he has been forced by the media to shine the spotlight and let his other brother to take the lead. The two Larijani are brothers and part of the right wing conservative ruling clergy network in Iran. In this network, they are closely related to Ayatollah Amoli, a senior cleric in Iran who has ambitions for Iranian leadership after Khamenei.

One should also take into consideration that Larijani brothers lived a good part of their lives in Iraq and are fully versed in Iraq's politics.

THE COUNTERMOVE TO ACZMAZ

For every move there is a countermove and someone should point that countermove to US policymakers. Kurds can help US to open this guardian knot for US if US policymakers appreciate the value of Kurdish players in the balance of the power in the region and stop sending confusing signals to Kurds and acting as unreliable friends.

Kurds risked their lives in Iraq war and after victory had expectations, unfortunately US dragged its feet and failed to fully support their right to expand their territory to include Kirkuk and other Kurdish cities, and as a result US damaged its own credibility and its own interests. For "a carpet seller" it is as if the US cheque bounced back and US lost some credibility. Let us remind US that if someone's cheques bounces back in a carpet Bazaar, people stop dealing with them. Now I hear "US keeps its word" said President Bush this week in Baghdad to the Shiites.

The Aczmaz that US is in Iraq is partly because US decided to put Kurds in Aczmaz of Kirkuk and by doing this created an unstable situation for its number one ally in Iraq. This is why now US is dependent on the good will of the Shiite allies of Iran and caught in the Iran's trap.

Yesterday Iran was the axis of evil and today Miss Rice is dancing with the evil and turning Iran into the dominant power in the region. David Ignatius and Fareed Zakaria asked the following related question on blog of Washingtonpost (http://blog.washingtonpost.com/postgloba l/):

"If Iran becomes the dominant regional power in the Middle East, the region will be safer and more stable. True or false?"

One of the replies in the main page is by S. Magi [4] which argues:

"The US policymakers are taking self defeating moves in the region and are losing whatever they have gained in the cold war by helping Iran to export its revolution in the region. After Iraq, Jordan and Gulf Arab countries will be the target of Iran's revolution and then US and Israel will feel the real heat. The US rational for this is to stabilize Iraq and to prevent Iran from getting closer to the reemerging eastern block (China-Russia). But there is no guarantee that Iran after dominating the region will not join Russian axis since together they can control Caucasus. Russia and Iran in control of oil resources of Persian Gulf and Caucasus can effectively dominate the world. ... "

The Kurdish pre-pivot passway proposed in [4] is the countermove to US Aczmaz by Iran in Iraq. The article concludes that "With the help of Kurds, Tehran will fall in less than one week if US overcomes its fears" [3]. In order to achieve this objective, US needs to remove the Kirkuk Aczmaz first.

REFERENCE

[1] G. Nowicki, Kurdistan Iran Policy, Kurdistan Observer, 14 May 2006.

[2] G. Nowicki, A Critique of US Iraq Policy, Kurdistan Observer, 19 Dec 2005.

[3] S. Magi, Reply to D. Ignatius and F. Zakaria, Washingtonpost Blog,
http://blog.washingtonpost.com/postglobal/2006/06/14/iran_the_stabilizer/comments.html#c435307