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Al-Arabia – Iran’s President Hassan Rowhani has been rushing to seal business deals with Asian, European, and even American corporations as quickly as possible.
This week, Iran signed a historic deal with Boeing worth nearly $17 billion. It worth noting that this is the first business deal Tehran finalized with an American aviation corporation since the establishment of the Islamic Republic 1979. Iran is also finalizing its purchase of planes from the European firm Airbus.
In addition, another major deal has been signed with Royal Dutch Shell, the second largest listed oil firm in the world. Shell signed a provisional agreement with National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) “to further explore areas of potential cooperation”. Royal Dutch Shell will be working with Iran on developing some of Tehran’s largest oil fields. Last month, the energy corporation, Total signed a deal with Iran for working on new projects in the oil and gas sectors.
Remarkably, in a short time Iran has increased its oil sales by nearly 3 millions bpd. Iran has risen to be the third largest producer in the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC).
Why is Rowhani rushing to bring more business contracts to Iran?
Political and Financial Leverage Against the “Enemies”
One of the major reasons behind Iran’s rush to reap profits is gaining political leverage against the US and other “enemies”, by signing oil or other business deals with Western and Asian powers. This allows Iran to cement its ties with other countries in case there would be any heightened pressure from the next US administration over Iran, and in case of potential threat to the nuclear agreement under the Trump administration.
When Western and Asian corporations are investing billions of dollars in Iran, they put significant pressure on their governments to prevent political tensions or conflicts with Iran that might lead to political instability and endanger their investments. Iranian leaders are also shrewd enough to sign deals with major corporations, which have critical leverage over their governments and politicians.
One of the major reasons behind Iran’s rush to reap profits is gaining political leverage against the US and other “enemies”
Secondly, by making Europe and Asia more dependent on Iran’s gas and oil industries, Iran ensures its hold on power.
These business deals and economic ties will make it much harder for the US to reinstate pressure on Iran if it chose to. Iran will gain significant leverage against the US. In other words, economic ties are the ruling clerics’ assurance of holding power and achieving their regional hegemonic ambitions.
Third, Tehran is still desperate for additional revenues, not for improving the living standards of Iranians but to continue spending billions of dollars on its staunchest ally, Bashar Al Assad, to support the Shia militias in Syria and Iraq, and to increase the budget of its Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).
Fourth, Iran needs to modernize its military capabilities in order to successfully achieve its regional goals.
This week, Iran signed a historic deal with Boeing worth nearly $17 billion. It worth noting that this is the first business deal Tehran finalized with an American aviation corporation since the establishment of the Islamic Republic 1979. (Reuters)
It worth noting that when we examine the business deals Iran has made with other countries recently, the beneficiaries of these deals are more likely the IRGC and the Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. All of the major deals were conducted on the state level and with the government or state-owned companies rather than with the private sectors in Iran. The profits of these deals will not trickle down to the Iranian people. Iran’s continuing rising unemployment is proof of this.
Khamenei and the senior cadre of the IRGC, on the other hand, will continue to utilize the Machiavellian strategy of criticizing Rowhani’s business deals with the West. For example, the supreme leader has questioned the recent deal of billion-dollar fleets of aircraft, “Suppose we modernize our air fleet. Okay, it’s a very important and necessary move. But is it the priority?”
But the reality is that, if it was not for the blessing of the Supreme Leader, Rowhani would not have been capable of signing such critical deals worth billions of dollars. Behind closed doors Khamenei gives Rowhani the green light to finalize the Boeing deal, but in public he maintains his powerful survival tool and legacy: Opposing Iran’s “Great Satan” and “enemies”.
The ruling clerics of Iran are prioritizing economic deals in order to assure their hold on power, and more fundamentally, advance Tehran’s revolutionary ideals and regional goals and ambitions.
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Dr. Majid Rafizadeh, an Iranian-American political scientist, is president of the International American Council. Harvard-educated, Dr. Rafizadeh serves on the board of Harvard International Review at Harvard University. He is also a member of the Gulf project at Columbia University. Rafizadeh served as a senior fellow at Nonviolence International Organization based in Washington DC. He has been a recipient of several scholarships and fellowship including from Oxford University, Annenberg University, University of California Santa Barbara, and Fulbright Teaching program. He served as ambassador for the National Iranian-American Council based in Washington DC, conducted research at Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, and taught at University of California Santa Barbara through Fulbright Teaching Scholarship. He can be reached at [email protected], @Dr_Rafizadeh.
