Kayhan Barzegar

AP Photo

Fall/Winter 2008

"Iran and the Shiite Crescent: Myths and Realities"

Journal Article, Brown Journal of World Affairs, issue 1, volume XV

By Kayhan Barzegar, Research Fellow, Project on Managing the Atom/International Security Program

"In 2004, King Abdullah of Jordan warned about the emergence of an ideological Shiite crescent from Beirut to the Persian Gulf. Ever since then, the debate on Iran's intentions to create a Shiite crescent has been a significant topic of debate for the panels and conferences held on the region's issues. Three presumptions center on Iran's role and intentions. A Shiite crescent is seen by the Arab Sunni elites as an attempt by Iran firstly to engage the masses in the region; secondly, to build an ideological belt of sympathetic Shiite governments and political factions in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, and the Persian Gulf region; and, thirdly, to expand its regional role and power. These explanations are inadequate and unrealistic; none of them are compatible with Iran's real aims and strategies."

AP Photo

December 8, 2008

"Iran and Obama: The Grand Bargain on Roles"

Op-Ed, Tabnak

By Kayhan Barzegar, Research Fellow, Project on Managing the Atom/International Security Program

Any change in Iran's policy in the Middle East will depend on the Obama administration's policy communicating a fundamental "change" in recognizing Iran's key interests and accepting its role in the Persian Gulf and Iraq. The Bush administration's confrontational policies, especially in post-invasion Iraq, have created a new kind of "political-strategic discrepancy" in Iran-U.S. relations. The two countries now regard the growth of each other's role in the region as contrary to their national interests and security. President Obama should change this new point of strategic difference.

AP Photo

November 6, 2008

"Syria Will Stick with Iran"

Op-Ed, PostGlobal, A Conversation on Global Issues with David Ignatius and Fareed Zakaria

By Kayhan Barzegar, Research Fellow, Project on Managing the Atom/International Security Program

"A possible deal between Syria and Israel will neither change Iran's current posture in the region, nor lead Syria to put aside easily its alliance with Iran. Beyond tackling the U.S. and Israel military threat in this particular time of insecurity, especially in post-invasion Iraq, the Iran-Syria alliance in post-invasion Iraq is aimed at achieving a more strategic goal: making a new coalition of friendly states and political factions, a way out of the current political-security status-quo in the Persian Gulf and the Levant in which the two states can secure their national interests. As long as this need exists, the Iran-Syria alliance will continue...."

August 5, 2008

"Stephen M. Walt on the U.S., Iran, and the New Balance of Power in the Persian Gulf"

Q&A

By Stephen M. Walt, Robert and Renée Belfer Professor of International Affairs; Faculty Chair, International Security Program and Kayhan Barzegar, Research Fellow, Project on Managing the Atom/International Security Program

Walt: “…..by maintaining a (new) balance you don’t get conflict breaking out and you tilt in favour whichever side seems to be falling behind. At the same time, you do try to discourage conflict whenever possible. You certainly don’t try to control the region yourselves and if the balance breaks down as it did in 1991 and you have to intervene you go in, you get out as quickly as possible. But you don’t try to organize these societies. You don’t try to tell them how to live. You don’t try to tell them how their governments should be organized and you don’t try to transform them at the point of a rifle barrel. This is not disengagement, but it is also not trying to control the region or dictate its political evolution.”

“…we are not going to have a stable long-term situation in the Persian Gulf until the United States and other countries in the region—including Iran—do come to some understanding about the various issues that concern them.  Achieving that goal will require genuine diplomacy…The United States will also have to recognize that Iran’s size, potential power, large population, and its geo-strategic location inevitably make it a major player in the security environment in the Persian Gulf, and ignoring that fact is unrealistic…”

AP Photo

Winter 2007-08

"Iran, New Iraq and the Persian Gulf Political-Security Architecture"

Journal Article, Iranian Journal of International Affairs, issue 1, volume XX

By Kayhan Barzegar, Research Fellow, Project on Managing the Atom/International Security Program

This article investigates the necessity of establishing a new political-security arrangement in the Persian Gulf region in the light of new political developments in the region after the 2003 Iraq crisis. The author argues that following the recent political-security changes in the region and with the shift of Iraq's role from its previous threatening position, together with the prospect of building a friendly coalition between Iran and Iraq, the formation of new political-security architecture is inevitable in the Persian Gulf region. The new arrangement has to be based on the new political-security, cultural and economic realities. The author also argues that the nature of security threat in the region has changed. Under the new circumstances, instead of hard inter-states rivalries, the security challenges are more centered in human security and nations' political demands and expectations. Dealing with these new situations requires establishing mutual cooperation in the region.

July 11, 2008

"Joseph Nye on Smart Power in Iran-U.S. Relations"

Q&A

By Joseph S. Nye, Harvard University Distinguished Service Professor and Kayhan Barzegar, Research Fellow, Project on Managing the Atom/International Security Program

This interview elaborates on the applicability of Nye’s theory of “smart power” in the context of the Middle East and particularly Iran. The discussion further pushes the boundaries on how the current U.S policymakers should take into account soft and smart power towards Iran.

Nye: “… if the Americans, in efforts to try to stop the Iranian’s nuclear weapons program, were to bomb nuclear facilities in Iran, they might gain a few years of slowing down the nuclear weapons program but they would lose the whole generation of younger Iranians who would respond in a nationalistic way. So I think that would be a very large cost for a very limited benefit.”

AP Photo

2008

"The Shia Factor"

Journal Article, Heartland: Eurasian Review of Geopolitics, (The Pakistani Boomerang Issue), issue 1

By Kayhan Barzegar, Research Fellow, Project on Managing the Atom/International Security Program

The new rivalry between two main Muslim communities is the result of the political developments in Iraq. The pragmatic relationship between Iran and the Shia factions in other countries. The fears of Sunni regimes of a Shia crescent moon.

AP Photo

February 6, 2008

"Iran Eyes the China Card"

Op-Ed, PostGlobal, A Conversation on Global Issues with David Ignatius and Fareed Zakaria

By Kayhan Barzegar, Research Fellow, Project on Managing the Atom/International Security Program

"...China’s fast-growing economy and its extensive demand for Iran’s energy sources have reinforced Iran’s inclination to advance further economic and political-strategic cooperation with China. Today, one of Iran’s strategic goals is to bind its energy-rich resources to the South-Asia region via the Iran-Pakistan-India Pipeline (IPI), extending the pipeline to China’s markets in future years."

December 28, 2007

"Blame the Unfinished Afghan War"

Op-Ed, PostGlobal, A Conversation on Global Issues with David Ignatius and Fareed Zakaria

By Kayhan Barzegar, Research Fellow, Project on Managing the Atom/International Security Program

"The assassination of Bhutto is the consequence of an unfinished job started in 2001 by the international community in Afghanistan; it is also a blow to the war against global terrorism and to democratization in the region."

AP Photo

December 10, 2007

"The Iran Game, Round Two"

Op-Ed, PostGlobal, A Conversation on Global Issues with David Ignatius and Fareed Zakaria

By Kayhan Barzegar, Research Fellow, Project on Managing the Atom/International Security Program

"Instead of indirect action and communication, and shows of force, Washington should address the Iranians directly, face to face, and advance a win-win game. Iran's concerns in the region are more strategic and pragmatic. The time has come for the Bush administration to accept that installing a Shiite government in Iraq requires Iran's engagement — and that that government's success, as a part of a new American political order, will require that the U.S. address Iran’s concerns simultaneously."