The Boeing factor

US feels a Northern Alliance regime, with the total exclusion of Taliban forces, suits its interests in the region

A small item hidden in the inner pages of our ever vigilant press covered the news that Iran had disclosed that it had reached an agreement with American aerospace giant Boeing “to purchase 100 aircraft to renew its ageing fleet”. Iran’s civil aviation authority qualified the deal with the caveat that the deal was contingent upon “US Treasury permission”.

Now the discerning reader might well argue that there is hardly anything noteworthy in this announcement. This view is well taken. Except that what makes this announcement of special interest is not the text itself, but the timing. And due to this factor the item of news aforementioned may be of import more far-reaching than would be apparent at first sight.

One will have to hark back quite a few years to point to an analogous news item. A former president of the Peoples’ Republic of China was scheduled to visit the United States. Bilateral relations between the two countries, though on the mend, were not quite out of the woods at that juncture. The visit of the Dalai Lama some time earlier had had a souring effect and most analysts had all but written off the visit as an emollient.

This was when the ‘Boeing factor’ emerged out of nowhere! A few weeks prior to the start of the visit, news traveled out of Beijing that China had placed an order for 100 Boeing aircraft “to renew its ageing fleet”. This bit of news was ignored by outsiders but the effect within the United States was electrifying. The Chinese visit was recognised as one of the smoothest and most productive of that era.

Coming back to the present, as legal eagles would put it, the ‘Boeing factor’ is potent and may be underestimated only at one’s own peril. At this point, it may be of relevance to define what has been termed the ‘Boeing factor’. Each country’s policy decisions are influenced by what is loosely termed as the ‘establishment’. The ‘establishment’ is not a monolith but may be composed of several components. In the United States, the weapons manufacturers and the aerospace industry are two of the major components of its ‘establishment’. With the ‘Boeing factor’ taken care of, half of Iran’s troubles may be over.

At this stage, a word or two about Iran’s relations with the United States in general may be in order. Iran’s nuclear agreement of July with the six world powers was largely influenced by the sole superpower. The latter is in dire need of Iran’s support to prop up the regime in Kabul. The United States feels, rightly or wrongly, that a Northern Alliance regime, with the total exclusion of Taliban forces, suits its interests in the region. Hence the detente with Iran! As things stand, they appear to have lost interest in an intra-Afghan dialogue. This is the state of affairs that our mandarins in the Foreign Office will have to come to terms with, among other things.

The strength of a country’s Foreign Office establishment lies in its ability to foresee and to analyse events, so that when the time comes it is not caught on the wrong foot. We need to pause and ponder whether or not we measure up to this standard. A study of the straws in the wind gives rise to some vital questions that present themselves, begging for answers. Did we anticipate the July nuclear agreement? Did we connect the negotiations leading to this agreement with the US (and Nato) frustrations with the situation in Afghanistan? Did we anticipate betimes that the priorities of US/Nato in relation to the dispensation in Kabul would coincide with those of Iran? Did we even envisage a strategy to thwart Indian interest in an alternative route to Afghanistan via Chabahar? This was evident for years in view of Indian/Iranian collaboration in construction of the land route from that port to the Afghan border. And finally, are we aware of the American/Indian/Iranian plan to lump us together with the Afghan Taliban and thereby isolate us?

If the answers to these questions are in the affirmative, then full marks to the Foreign Office mandarins. But the niggling question that still remains waiting to be answered is: where do we go from here? And please do not talk of CPEC; that is, as they say, another story!

Published in The Express Tribune, July 4^th, 2016.

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