{"id":10085,"date":"2022-02-28T13:36:23","date_gmt":"2022-02-28T10:36:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/rasanah-iiis.org\/english\/?p=10085"},"modified":"2022-03-02T12:59:44","modified_gmt":"2022-03-02T09:59:44","slug":"iranian-hardliners-push-for-hard-revenge-if-a-nuclear-deal-is-not-reached%ef%bf%bc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rasanah-iiis.org\/english\/monitoring-and-translation\/reports\/iranian-hardliners-push-for-hard-revenge-if-a-nuclear-deal-is-not-reached%ef%bf%bc\/","title":{"rendered":"Iranian \u201cHardliners\u201d Push for \u201cHard Revenge\u201d if a Nuclear Deal Is Not Reached"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

As the Iran nuclear talks in Vienna drag on, signs indicate that the country\u2019s \u201chardliners\u201d want to abandon the current indirect talks with Washington that could lead to the revival of the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). The United States left the agreement in 2018, and its military forces killed Iran\u2019s Quds Force Commander Qassem Soleimani in Iraq in early January 2020. Since then, the \u201chardliners\u201d want to take  \u201chard revenge\u201d<\/a>  against the United States.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This so-called \u201chard revenge\u201d seems unlikely to happen  as long as Iran engages in the nuclear talks, especially if Washington insists that the country end its extraterritorial paramilitary operations which Soleimani led in a number of Middle Eastern countries.  Washington hopes that with Soleimani<\/a> gone, Tehran will scale back  the activities of its militias in the region.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Iran\u2019s \u201chardliners\u201d are pushing the country\u2019s nuclear negotiators not to give in to Washington\u2019s pressures. Aligned  with Iran\u2019s Supreme Leader and Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the \u201chardliners\u201d want to keep their options open if the nuclear talks fail. Without a nuclear deal, they hope that Iran\u2019s Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC)  will  execute the  \u201chard revenge\u201d sooner than later.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Conveniently, they also choose to ignore a few obvious facts. Reports  indicate that after Soleimani\u2019s death, fearing heavy retaliation, the IRGC and Quds  Force stood down instead of seeking  \u201chard revenge\u201d  against the United States.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What transpired was that in exchange for pre-announced targeted strikes<\/a> led by Iran on US military bases in Iraq, Washington allowed Tehran to save face if it committed to building a stronger nuclear deal.  However, Iran\u2019s  \u201chardliners\u201d  resisted further attempts by the then  President Hassan Rouhani to craft a new deal with Washington. Iran\u2019s \u201chardline\u201d Parliament took the extra step of passing a three-tier \u201chard revenge emergency bill\u201d to sabotage the nuclear negotiations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since then, things have changed for the worse for Iran.  The country now desperately needs a nuclear deal that will lift US-led sanctions targeting the Iranian economy. Prudently, Tehran promises to deliver its \u201chard revenge\u201d by targeting only  individuals close to the Trump circle who ordered Soleimani\u2019s killing. Soleimani was killed when President Trump<\/a> was in office.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Iran\u2019s new ultra-conservative President Ebrahim Raisi<\/a>  has said that the former US president must face trial; otherwise, he will face revenge. Khamenei\u2019s website<\/a> released an  animated video depicting a drone attack  targeting  Trump. The IRGC Major General Hossein Salami<\/a>  said Iran\u2019s \u201chard revenge\u201d was  partly realized after  it targeted US military bases in Iraq. He insists that  the second part of the country\u2019s \u201chard revenge\u201d is yet to come and involves pushing  US forces out of the region.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But news websites linked to \u201chardline\u201d papers<\/a> state that there is nothing new in  the aforementioned remarks  as they reflect previous Iranian positions. Instead, they insist that  Iran\u2019s \u201chard revenge\u201d should entail the destruction of US power, and revive an \u201cIslamic civilization<\/a>\u201d led by Iran. They condemned government officials for being passive in the nuclear talks, and for putting up with the \u201cGreat Satan<\/a>,\u201d in reference to the United States. Finally, they believe that Ayatollah Khamenei is on their side. The news outlet Fars News Agency<\/em><\/a>, considered close to Khamenei, is openly siding with the \u201chardliners\u201d regarding seeking \u201chard revenge\u201d for Soleimani\u2019s killing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To appease these critics who also strongly oppose a thaw in US-Iran ties, Raisi\u2019s government is promising to push those US leaders involved in Soleimani\u2019s death into hiding. The IRGC is backing the Iranian president for now, and says that its so-called resistance forces<\/a>, in reference to Iranian-funded proxies and paramilitary groups in the region, will certainly deliver  Tehran\u2019s \u201chard revenge.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Washington has warned Tehran of severe consequences if any Americans<\/a> are attacked, after Iran sanctioned 51 individuals for their involvement in Soleimani\u2019s killing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Given these realities, the time and place of Iran\u2019s final \u201chard revenge\u201d  seems to increasingly rest on the progress in the  Vienna talks. Meanwhile, to keep the nuclear talks going, Tehran is trying through public statements to limit its promised \u201chard revenge\u201d against Trump and his inner circle  in order to strike a sanctions-lifting deal in this interim period with the current Biden team. Although the supreme leader continues to talk tough against the United States, he in reality is trying to delay any \u201chard revenge\u201d until the Vienna talks reach some conclusion. It remains to be seen what comes next, if short of a final nuclear deal, Khamenei might decide to unleash the country\u2019s \u201chard revenge\u201d to save face at home. But, given the latest developments, the \u201chard revenge\u201d which Iran has been promoting for has become such a far-fetched possibility.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As the Iran nuclear talks in Vienna drag on, signs indicate that the country\u2019s \u201chardliners\u201d want to abandon the current indirect talks with Washington that could lead to the revival of the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). The United States left the agreement in 2018, and its military forces killed Iran\u2019s Quds Force Commander Qassem Soleimani in Iraq in early January 2020. Since then, the \u201chardliners\u201d want to take\u00a0 \u201chard revenge\u201d\u00a0 against the United States.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":10086,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[708],"class_list":["post-10085","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-reports","tag-nuclear-deal"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rasanah-iiis.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10085","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rasanah-iiis.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rasanah-iiis.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rasanah-iiis.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rasanah-iiis.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10085"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/rasanah-iiis.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10085\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10098,"href":"https:\/\/rasanah-iiis.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10085\/revisions\/10098"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rasanah-iiis.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10086"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rasanah-iiis.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10085"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rasanah-iiis.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10085"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rasanah-iiis.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10085"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}