Testimony before the
District of Columbia City Council

October 8, 2008

James S. Robbins
Senior Fellow in National Security Affairs
American Foreign Policy Council

http://www.afpc.org/event_listings/viewCongressionalHearing/386

The Islamic Republic of Iran has long been and remains a threat to international peace and stability. The U.S. Department of State has identified Iran as the world's largest supporter of terrorist groups. Iranian support for terrorism dates back to the Islamic Revolution in 1979 and has continued and expanded in the decades since. According to the State Department's Country Reports on Terrorism for 2007, "Elements of [Iran's] Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps were directly involved in the planning and support of terrorist acts throughout the [Middle East] region and continued to support a variety of groups in their use of terrorism to advance their common regional goals. Iran provides aid to Palestinian terrorist groups, Lebanese Hizballah, Iraq-based militants, and Taliban fighters in Afghanistan."

In Iraq and Afghanistan Iran provides sophisticated weaponry, intelligence support and other expertise to a variety of insurgent groups, particularly those that attack American targets. Iran is responsible for more deaths of American service members than any single country since the Vietnam War.

In addition to its support for violent extremism, Iran seeks to augment its power through acquiring nuclear weapons. Iran has consistently stated that its nuclear program is only for peaceful purposes. However, Iran continues to behave as though it has something to hide. Iran has sought to evade international sanctions by working through companies and agencies affiliated with the Iranian military. Through these and other efforts Iran has increased both the number and efficiency of centrifuges used to highly enrich uranium for weapons purposes, defying demands of the United Nations Security Council that it cease this activity. Iran has shown no willingness to end this provocative behavior, and on September 18, 2008, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad stated, the "era of [uranium enrichment] suspension has ended."

Estimates of the timeline for Iran achieving a nuclear weapons capability vary. The 2007 United States National Intelligence Estimate on Iranian Nuclear Intentions and Capabilities stated that Iran might have the capacity to construct a nuclear weapon by 2010 at the earliest. Former UN weapons inspector David Albright's Institute for Science and International Security estimates the threshold at March 2009. Last June, International Atomic Energy Agency chief Mohamed ElBaradei said it would take Iran only six months to develop the materials necessary to develop a nuclear weapon once Iran ceased to cooperate with his inspectors. And in its September 2008 report the IAEA stated that this point may been reached, declaring that the Agency could no longer answer questions about alleged Iranian nuclear weapons research because Iran has denied access to relevant sites, documents and scientists. But whether the window for Iran achieving nuclear weapons capability is six months or sixteen, every reputable analysis agrees that the time is drawing near.

In addition, the IAEA reported that Iran was seeking to retrofit its Shahab-3 missiles with mounts that could accommodate nuclear warheads. The Shahab-3, based on the North Korean Nodong missile, is capable of hitting targets in Europe, and the three-stage version of the Shahab-6, under development with North Korean and Russian technology, could deliver a nuclear payload to the United States.

Iran's nuclear program and support for terrorism are directly linked to Iran's international ambitions. Iran aspires to be the regional hegemon in the Middle East. It is actively seeking to destabilize Iraq and Afghanistan, and is a mainstay of Syria and major supporter of violent groups creating chaos on Lebanon and Israel. Iran has also openly questioned the right of Saudi Arabia to be the protector of the Muslim holy places at Mecca and Medina. Iran's ambition to dominate the center of the world's energy supply is a threat to the entire global economy. As well, mindful of Iranian nuclear advances, last year thirteen Middle East states declared their intention to pursue some type of nuclear program. This list includes every country in the region except Lebanon and Iraq. Nuclear proliferation on this scale, which is in direct response to the Iranian nuclear program, would surely over time lead to some form of catastrophe, either through design or accident. We cannot afford to have a nuclear arms race in the most volatile region in the world.

And Americans should not believe that this is simply a Middle Eastern problem. The events of September 11, 2001, demonstrated that highly committed, ideologically motivated radicals can bring their violence to our shores. The Iranian-backed Hizballah in particular is, like al Qaeda, a terror group with global reach, active on every continent, including inside the United States. To the Iranian regime the US remains the Great Satan. On September 26, 2008, in Tehran, hundreds of thousands of Iranians denounced the United States during al-Quds Day events. In Tehran mobs chanted "Death to America!" and burned the American flag. The Islamic Republic of Iran, as currently constituted, will never seek peace with the United States.

The strategic threat posed by Iran is only part of the matter at hand. The Islamic Republic's hard-line ideology is a standing challenge to the western liberal worldview. The spirit of the 1979 Islamic revolution of Ayatollah Khomeini is alive and well. Iran remains a repressive society in which the freedoms that liberal western counties take for granted are despised, curtailed, or denied.

There is no First Amendment in Iran. There are restrictions on faith and worship. There are limits on association. There is no free speech. And the political system is rife with corruption and controlled by religious authorities who use elections as a front to give legitimacy to what is in reality a functional theocracy.

Gender inequality is a fact of life and law in Iran. The legal value of a woman's life is half that of a man's. Evidence in court is given half weight if presented by a woman. A woman has the right to half the inheritance of a man. And to get a passport, a driver's license, to obtain medical care or a divorce, a woman needs her husband's permission.

There is no creative freedom in Iran. Dancers, artists, writers, poets and musicians all must harness their creativity to the demands of the regime or be forced underground. Mobile police units in green and white vans prowl the streets of major cities to enforce countless public lifestyle restrictions. They seek out improper clothing - known as "bad hijab" - illegal haircuts, men without beards, or men who have plucked their eyebrows.

The situation would be farcical if it were not literally deadly serious. Offenders against the regime's lifestyle restrictions face bullying, fines, internal exile, imprisonment, lashings, and worse.

The harsh treatment of homosexuals in Iran is of particular note in this regard. In September 2007, in a speech at Columbia University, President Ahmadinejad famously declared, "In Iran, we don't have homosexuals, like in your country... I don't know who's told you that we have it." Yet Iranian law is very graphic and specific on the punishments to be meted out to those who engage in various types of same-sex behavior. Kissing, for example, merits sixty lashes. But most same-sex relations are punished with death. Every year men are hanged, stoned or otherwise executed under the law governing homosexuality. These killings cannot even be described as lynchings since they are conducted with the full sanction of the law and of the regime. Iranian leaders - at least those who acknowledge the existence of gays in Iran - are unapologetic about the severity of their policies. In November 2007, Iranian Member of Parliament Mohsen Yahyavi told a British counterpart, that gays "deserve to be tortured, executed, or both."

Any investment in Iran is a bad investment. Iran is a violent, repressive country seeking to export an ideology that is inimical to western mores and American cultural values. It represents a strategic threat that may soon cross the nuclear threshold. Now is the time to take action, to divest while measures short of force may still have time to be effective. Failure to take action sends a signal to the Iranian regime that it will never have to pay a price for its willful defiance of the international community in pursuing nuclear capabilities, for its support for violent extremist groups, and for the continuing repression of the Iranian people. Failure to employ peaceful means of influencing the behavior of the Iranian regime now will surely make the resort to other means more likely in the future.

Thank you.