Sanctions Isn’t Worthwhile: When Aim Is Too Low

Italian sculptor, painter, architect and poet Michelangelo once said: The greatest danger for most of us is not that our aim is too high and we miss it, but that it is too low and we reach it.
As it turns out, the aim of those behind the anti-Iran sanctions regime was too low and they still missed it! Former British Chancellor of the Exchequer Lord Lamont couldn’t agree more.

Lord Lamont, who is also chairman of the British-Iranian Chamber of Commerce, a UK-based trade group, says sanctions didn’t work and Iran didn’t buckle, as British companies are being hit and losing out to rivals in Asia.

In his words: “Sanctions are not a one-way policy – they affect businesses in the UK as well. The problem with sanctions is that we think we’re imposing a cost on them [Iran] but we’re also imposing a cost on ourselves in terms of lost jobs, lost output and in some cases bankruptcy of the firms involved. Trade between Britain and Iran has declined, while the trade between businesses in Asia and Iran has grown…”

It’s the same sentiment across Europe, where think tanks, lawmakers, traders and government officials admit that sanctions are not the best way to deal with Iran’s nuclear program. They equally admit that the economic warfare has been ineffective, unnecessary and counter-productive – a costly farce right from the beginning.

In the interim, the Capitol Hill warmongers and their duped European allies have been powerless to edge Iran’s rising influence throughout the Middle East. The American think tanks acknowledge that when Barack Obama leaves office, Iran will be a stronger nation than when he took office; Iran will be an undisputed regional power than it was when Obama took office; and Iran will be playing a much more prominent and constructive role in the region and the world than it was before Obama took office.

On the business front, they also admit that Iran’s energy sector is still booming and all those smart Asian oil giants and firms that have had the guts to invest in its oil and gas development projects – amid US pressures and threats – have been making billions of dollars in profits. The irony is that Washington has been putting pressure on the EU firms not to ink deals with Tehran for energy supply, even though it is in their strategic interest to do so!

That said, these oppressive tactics have to some extent altered the modus operandi of finance and commerce in Iran. But that’s all really. They only slowed down the socio-economic and political rise of Iran. They couldn’t stop it – a fact that the West can no longer afford to deny, particularly in places like Iraq, Syria, Lebanon and Yemen.

In light of this, it is pretty much evident that the sanctions regime was and still is short of scientific, technical, legal or justified virtues, and only endorsed by the UN member states under immense pressure/coercion from the White House neocons.

The oppressive tactics have generated a great deal of resentment on the world stage. Given the rotting business situation in Europe and America, it is still in the best interests of all concerned to continue converging on a diplomatic solution. It is the only viable option left, and indeed the only high aim that’s worthwhile.