Russia, Iran harden against West
In a historic first visit to Iran, Russian President Putin affirmed support for Tehran's nuclear program and rebuffed any militarization in the Caspian region.
from the October 18, 2007 edition
Page 3 of 3
After complaining this summer that the US "overstepped its national borders in every way," last week Putin rebuked both US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, in Moscow: "We may decide someday to put missile defense systems on the moon, but before we get to that we may lose a chance for agreement because of you implementing your own plans."
In Iran, right-leaning newspapers hailed the visit as a breakthrough. "Maybe the most important result of Putin's trip is to show the independence of Russia toward America and the West," wrote Kayhan. Jomhuri Islami highlighted a "deep difference of opinion between Russia on the one side and America and France on the other side in dealing with Iran's nuclear case."
Such a reception is worlds away from Tehran's past ties with Moscow. The last Russian leader to visit Tehran in 1943 was Josef Stalin, in a World War II meeting with fellow Allied leaders Franklin Roosevelt and Winston Churchill. During the cold war, Iran, led by the pro-Western shah, was in the American orbit.
A decade after the 1979 Islamic revolution – when the Soviet Union was excoriated in Iran almost as much as the US and Israel were – Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini wrote his first-ever letter to a head of state, telling Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev that communism was dead and that he should “study Islam earnestly.”
Today, the two countries have much to talk about, but mutual suspicions remain, enough for some analysts to call Moscow-Tehran ties as more business than a close alliance. Speculation in Iran before the visit, that Mr. Ahmadinejad wanted to forge a strategic link between the two nations – as he has done with anti-US leaders like Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez – may prove premature.
"What I know is there is no strategic alliance between Russia and Iran, and that is forever, and for a lot of reasons," says Mr. Malashenko. "The main one is that Iran considers Russia a part of the Western world, of Europe, of Christianity."
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