This page has been archived and commenting is disabled.
The Iran "Talks" - Just Another US vs Russia (And China) Power Game
Update, and just as expected: IRAN NUCLEAR NEGOTIATORS MAY MISS 3RD DEADLINE: U.S. OFFICIAL
In what has been the world's longest negotiation (we are only modestly joking: the Iran P5+1 nuclear "talks" started in 2013 and have yet to achieve anything) one whose "rolling deadline" has been breached time and time again, it appears that with today's latest deadline just hours away, the most likely outcome is another deadline extension even though, as Reuters puts it, "Iran and six world powers ramped up the pace on Tuesday in negotiations over a preliminary deal on Tehran's nuclear program, while officials cautioned that any agreement would likely be fragile and incomplete."
The negotiations, which we have largely ignored covering as the past has abundantly shown that nothing ever actually gets done except for a lot of talking, posturing, gesticulating and pizza-ordering, have seen the United States, Britain, France, Germany, Russia and China trying to break an impasse in the talks, which are aimed at stopping Iran from gaining the capacity to develop a nuclear bomb in exchange for easing international sanctions that are crippling its economy.
As a reminder, it is the "threat" of an amicable resolution and a resumption in Iran oil exports that has been presented as the cause for oil's most recent weakness.
According to the conventional narrative "disagreements on enrichment research and the pace of lifting sanctions threatened to scupper a deal that could end a 12-year standoff between Iran and the West over Tehran's nuclear ambitions and reduce the risk of another Middle East war."
"The two sticking points are the duration and the lifting of sanctions," an Iranian official said. "The two sides are arguing about the content of the text. Generally progress has been made."
They said the main sticking points remain the removal of U.N. sanctions and Iranian demands for the right to unfettered research and development into advanced nuclear centrifuges after the first 10 years of the agreement expires.
Iran said the key issue was lifting sanctions quickly.
"There will be no agreement if the sanctions issue cannot be resolved," Majid Takhteravanchi, an Iranian negotiator, told Iran's Fars news agency. "This issue is very important for us."
The six powers want more than a 10-year suspension of Iran's most sensitive nuclear work. Tehran, which denies it is trying to develop a nuclear weapons capability, demands a swift end to sanctions in exchange for temporary limits on its atomic activities.
Not surprisingly, "officials played down expectations for the talks in the Swiss city of Lausanne."
For days they have been trying to agree on a brief document of several pages outlining key headline numbers to form the basis of a future agreement. Officials said they hoped to be able to announce something, though one Western diplomat said it would be "incomplete and kick some issues down the road".
Negotiations among the parties on sticking points went into the night and continued on Tuesday. They were expected to run late and possibly into Wednesday. Officials said they were hoping to agree on some kind of declaration, while any actual preliminary understanding that is agreed might remain confidential.
It was also possible they would not agree on anything.
And sure enough, with the specter of yet another extension, the talking down of expectations (it snowed in Lausanne) begins:
French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius and his German counterpart Frank-Walter Steinmeier canceled plans to go to Berlin for a French-German summit on Tuesday. "The negotiations are at a critical and difficult phase, making the presence of both ministers in Lausanne essential," a German government source said.
The real deadline in the talks, Western and Iranian officials said, is not Tuesday but June 30.
They said the main sticking points remain the removal of U.N. sanctions and Iranian demands for the right to unfettered research and development into advanced nuclear centrifuges after the first 10 years of the agreement expires.
But is that really the case? After all, if all superpowers press Iran, the middle east country will have no choice. According to Iran's own IRNA news agency there is much more to this story than what the conventional narrative presents, and it once again all boils down to a well-known tension in modern geopolitics: the US and the West vs the rising Russia-China axis.
From IRNA:
The United States and Europe reportedly want the UN Security Council (UNSC) sanctions on Iran to be automatically reversible, meaning that if Iran violates the deal at any point, the UNSC sanctions will automatically be re-imposed on Tehran.
Russia opposes such a scenario, saying in such a case the UNSC should decide what to do. Moscow says automatic imposition of sanctions goes against the mechanism of the Security Council.
China also reportedly shares Russia’s viewpoint and is against the imposition of automatically reversible sanctions on Iran.
The final stage of the ongoing talks between Iran and the P5+1 countries - the United States, Britain, France, Russia and China plus Germany - in Lausanne is expected to continue until Tuesday, which was set as a deadline for reaching mutual understanding in the negotiations.
And there you have it: the reason why the Iran talks have dragged on more than two years, and specifically since the February 2013 "interim agreement", is not because of Iran's intransigence (which could have been resolved overnight with a few Swiss bank accounts opened under strategic Iranian personnel's names or a few NYC duplex apartments), but because this, too, has become one global theater of realpolitik, one in which the fate of Iran's sanctions is no longer in the hands of Iran, but a function of the power play between West and East.
Keep a very close eye on who prevails, assuming there is a deal, because if the US loses the upper hand, that will certainly explain why two weeks ago US Treasury Secretary Jack Lew was heard complaining that "US International Credibility & Influence Is Being Threatened"...
»
- 15286 reads
- Printer-friendly version
- Send to friend
- advertisements -
negotiations are hard. They need 100% of the 100,000 state department directs and the hundreds of thousands of contractors more on this issue. Explains why hillary had to take care of her own IT. Hillary 2016 /sarc.
My first wife was tarded. She's a pilot now.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HUWP_Q2MNS0
Man this is taking long, I need more pop corn, more butter.
Some might call it petty -- but I always look at flag placement.
Again, this is very telling.
Worth looking at, thought goes into ever aspect.
The one aspect that no one gives any thought to: the sanctions imposed on Iran are in violation of the UN charter itself.
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/MH16Ak03.html
http://nationalinterest.org/print/commentary/eight-ways-youre-wrong-abou...
spot on! more important is people placement. Look at the top of the table - center are two women. I bet the I Ran muzzies love that
NoVa
So what's the ZeroHedge alternative? Turn a blind eye and give Iran the opportunity to build an atomic bomb? You guys can't be fucking serious!
It's moments like these that I seriously doubt whether ZH is not so much a website that exposes the economic fraude, but is more a website that is funded by some foreign power in order to undermine the US...
Having a clause in a treaty that automatically reverses the sactions should Iran not stick to it's side of the bargain only makes perfect sense, but of course Russia and China don't give a fuck because they don't give a fuck anyway if Iran has a nuclear bomb or not. Heck, they're probably actively helping Iran build it in the first place, so they're looking for a scapegoat in order to torpedo the treaty that will end some lucrative contracts. And ZeroHedge swallows (or propagates?) this bullshit hook line and sinker!
Funny how Iran has been days away from having a nuke FOR THE LAST 15 YEARS. Get a brain and figure the game out ya dipshit(or troll, whomever i'm talking to).
I still haven't read an alternative yet...
It's really scary how easily you gold and conspiracy nuts are manipulated and brainwashed, and what's even more scary is that you idiots (just like that Nobel Peace Price winning fool, Obama!) believe you'll be able to contain a nuclear Iran.
so why dont you explain why Israel has 400 nuclear warheads or more and Pakistan has them as well and Saudi Arabia is financing for Pak nuclear program and has options on the supply
why should Iran be left out or not be able to buy the weapons from North Korea et al ?
Answer Norwegian . Waiting for your reply .
who lives next to Iran?
Saudi assholes (sunni ) and Porkistan ( sunni ) . 2 sunni ghettos surrounding Shiite .
.
An imaginary bomb program might build imaginary bombs. Might be a threat in Imaginationland, no so much in reality.
imag(inar=iran)y
See, if you look hard enough you can find Iran hiding in the imaginary too
I do find 'gin' lurking in there.
Isn't the next round on you? Hic
Bokkenrijder,
There is always the possibility that you don't don't have a clue.
That there's a reason that all the 'hotspots' in the world today are locations with abundant deposits of crude oil in the ground. From South Sudan to Venezuela to Iran to the islands in the South China Sea to Libya and lately in the Arctic.
Then there are the nations involved in the transit of oil and gas to the US and Europe.The Suez Canal of Egypt. The fabled pipeline route from Qatar to West Europe through Syria.
The enigma of Afghanistan and the conundrum of Kurdistan. No doubt they are both beyond your pay grade.
Unless you are such a nitwit as not to know that Iran's nuclear aspirations are just another version -- a particular form of something differing in certain respects from an earlier form or other forms of the same type of thing -- of Iraq's Weapons of Mass Destruction.
The West wasn't interested in an accommodation with Saddam. It was interested only in putting control of Iraq's petroleum production into hands which it itself controlled. No matter what destruction their military action there resulted in.
Haus:
Ok, so drop the shoe already. What is it telling?
(I so hate people who make a comment that is supposed to be so self-evident everyone gets it without further explanation - I think it is just a technique to appear perceptive while actually being blind . . .)
-30-
"US international credibilty & influence is being threatened."
Lol.... too late. We lost that long ago. To the world we are a giant lumbering retard joke.
I keep wondering if there's anyone out there that still thinks we are credible (who are these naive people?). We've pissed off all our allies and our enemies are only confused by our behavior because they can't believe we'd fuck up so bad, so often.
If I was a world leader and was asked if I'd rather be a US ally or a US enemy, I'd have to go with enemy right now. It wouldn't even be that tough a choice.
I think it's safe to assume that the whole world pretty much views us as a pariah.
There is another interesting opportunity coming soon that might be putting pressure on the West. The C-SWIFT money transfer system out of China. In the future the Chinese may take a very different view to the US on sanctions.
Once that system is operational the US will not be able to track payments and 'punish' transgressors in the same way as they can now with SWIFT.
It could be the beginning of big problems for the US in enforcing its will on the world by financial means, leaving only military options.
With the exception, of course, of canada. You can ALWAYS count on our criminal gov't to disregard the wishes of Canadians and follow the american diktat. They have forfeited our sovereignty. The traitors harper, mackay, blaney, and their former dog, baird, work long and hard to subvert the true values of the Canadian public. Of course, we fell asleep and let it happen. Now we seem prepared to wait for someone else to fix it for us. We too, are sheep. We deserve the very worst that the civilized world chooses to visit upon us. Bill C-51 and the escalation of the murderous canadian bombing in Iraq, and now Syria, are only further testament to the irreversible decay that this formerly great society has allowed. I have NEVER been more ashamed to be a Canadian, and I apologize to the world on behalf of this now pathetic nation.
All too true.
ofcourse donget dishearten . Look at Baltic nations they can jerk anytime for US . rest US can arm twist anyone and they wilp be your ally .
"To the world we are a giant lumbering retard joke."
Not so much a "retard", as a giant, "Exceptional Douchebag of Global Leadership".
The US should aim for Trust & Respect, which are earned. Instead, the US has opted for Bribes, Intimidation, Fear and Violence.
Fear can be 'pounded' in, and Violence tolerated only for so long -- but only for so long, before the "Cup runneth over" and it's Payback time. And... "We were just following orders" won't work this time, Neocon Nazis.
I give you credit for using Hillary and hard in the same sentence; that puts you one up on Bill.
<-- servility to Israel
<-- any other explanation
+1. Israelis tried to have "regime change" at home, but the power of the Dark Side won out again in the Election of a couple of weeks ago, thanks to the MSM they (the Global/Imperialist Zionists) have taken over, and the servile US Con-gress that now reports to them.
We have seen evidence of the latter by the annual speeches to Congress by the Israeli PM (as though HE were the POTUS), and the more recent visit of Mitch McConnell to visit (i.e. "report to") the Israeli PM, 'NuttyNyahoo'.
They will have to deal with the shame and consequences of their Regime, just like we will with ours.
It's not a visit - it's a pilgrimage.
This is a replay of Iraq. The whole idea is to lift the sanctions, then nitpick night and day unitl a good enough excuse is found to go to war with Iran. They will never be happy with anything Iran does or does not do. If it ever gets that far, the U.N. inspector dance will go on for a few years before the U.S. snaps and attacks.
This is all the usual, tired actions of the U.S. appearing 'reasonable' before going to war for Israel. It's unavoidable.
Israel has Nuclear capability. That means it doesn't need anybody to "go to war" for it.
Doesn't matter if Iran gets Nukes as far as Israel is concerned, because since Israel has Nukes nobody can attack it as per Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD). MAD applies unless you believe US/Israel propaganda about "Crazy Mullahs".
It does matter if Iran gets Nukes as far as US is concerened, since it would prevent the US from attacking Iran and turning Iran into Iraq2.0 (destroy the infrastructure and prevent domestic industrial production from consuming valuable oil resource).
Hence Israel support for it's US ally/funder by promoting the "Crazy Mullah" theory of foreign policy that says that the leaders of Iran are willing to let Israel kill their entire population if it means that Iran can destroy the Israelis (and Palestiniansin the process). Sure.
"Israel has Nuclear capability. That means it doesn't need anybody to "go to war" for it."
Of course Israel does not 'need', but why need or want, when you can Have (the Goy) do it for you...?
Moar HATE!
As I've argued a number of times*, "Why should Israel be the only ME power to have the Sampson Option with its ABC weapons?"
Time to stop debating other false arguments, and deal with this one: "SAMPSON OPTION FOR NONE OR FOR ALL!". It is high time for Russia, China, India, Pakistan, Iran and the US Public to make THIS the "Prime Argument", up front & center until it is dealt with.
p.s. If these aforementioned Players cannot insist on making and sticking to this Prime Argument, then they (their leaders) are not nearly as clever or resolved as they pretend to be. If I were Russia, China, India and Pakistan, I'd threaten to "supply collectively" nukes to Iran, if the US and Israel do not negotiate Israel's ABC-Arsenal vs. Iran's "arsenal" on a pure Quid-Pro-Quo basis. Then sit back and watch the Neocons shit their pants.
* References:
1. Mon, 03/09/2015 - 15:52 | 5870597 Kirk2NCC1701
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-03-09/russia-responds-european-army-p...
2. Sat, 03/14/2015 - 00:09 | 5887963 Kirk2NCC1701
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-03-13/catalyst-next-big-leg-down-oil-...
3. Tue, 03/17/2015 - 03:06 | 5897140 Kirk2NCC1701
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-03-16/china-becomes-worlds-third-larg...
4. Thu, 03/19/2015 - 13:54 | 5906731 Kirk2NCC1701
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-03-19/disturbed-us-will-hold-syria-ac...
HATE!
@ PAVEWAY IV . Agreed , it will only finishes when Tel Aviv gets nuked !
There's plenty of Israelis in Tel Aviv that are not genocidal psychopaths and don't support Nettanyahu in the least.
Nuking Tel Aviv would be about as effective as anyone nuking Washington D.C. - you're not going to get rid of the psychopaths, you're just going to open up space for the B-team psychopaths to take over. If the average citizen can't identify a psychopath and craft a constitution and laws barring them from office, then any state will just keep attracting new psychopaths and simply fail again.
And people always overlook the role Russia has played in the destruction of Iraq, Libya and now Syria and Uke.
Russia is not to be trusted either.
New York Times Publishes Call to Bomb IranBy Robert Parry
Global Research, March 30, 2015If two major newspapers in, say, Russia published major articles openly advocating the unprovoked bombing of a country, say, Israel, the U.S. government and news media would be aflame with denunciations about “aggression,” “criminality,” “madness,” and “behavior not fitting the Twenty-first Century.”
But when the newspapers are American – the New York Times and the Washington Post – and the target country is Iran, no one in the U.S. government and media bats an eye. These inflammatory articles – these incitements to murder and violation of international law – are considered just normal discussion in the Land of Exceptionalism.
On Thursday, the New York Times printed an op-ed that urged the bombing of Iran as an alternative to reaching a diplomatic agreement that would sharply curtail Iran’s nuclear program and ensure that it was used only for peaceful purposes. The Post published a similar “we-must-bomb-Iran” op-ed two weeks ago.
The Times’ article by John Bolton, a neocon scholar from the American Enterprise Institute, was entitled “To Stop Iran’s Bomb, Bomb Iran.” It followed the Post’s op-ed by Joshua Muravchik, formerly at AEI and now a fellow at the neocon-dominated School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins
http://www.globalresearch.ca/new-york-times-publishes-call-to-bomb-iran/...
this statement by Woolsley is beyond absurd........
''Iran is trying to expand its empire much like Hitler's Germany before World War II, former CIA Director James Woolsey said Monday, citing Tehran's moves to exert its influence in Syria, Iraq, Lebanon and Yemen.
"They are doing it on a highly ideological basis. They never cease chanting 'Death to Israel' and 'Death to the United States,'" Woolsey said in a CNBC "Squawk Box" interview. "They are an imperial power and trying to become more of an imperial power."''
Woolsley is an arrant fascist. The truth is that the United States federal government is doing all the things of which Iran and Russia are being falsely accused. And it should be treated accordingly. Ie., taken out behind the barn and shot. Enough, already. Fuck the US government. Fuck it in its numb and hollow skull.
Early is his career Wolsey decided to become more Zionist than the Zionists themselves. An excellent career move leading to a stratospheric rise through the intelligence services and lucrative 'consultancy' contracts on retirement.
I think "main sticking point" would be Iranian reluctance to open borders and allow U.S. to take over the country and it's oil reserves.
is it me or are we becoming like Apollo at this juncture?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2c3Y2i-1mD0
Ehh, at least we aren't here yet. https://youtu.be/oWuhdLVSQtY?t=1m50s
Talks ain't talks unless both sides have Nukes!
I will never understand how or why a country and culture as old as Persia would not simply evoke the same nuclear ambiguity policy that Israel claims and holds on to.
Iran could simply enter the moral high ground and say they will forgo nukes as long as Israel's nuke program is fully disclosed to the same international inspection that is leveled on Iran all with the aim to dis-arm all nukes from the region.
In the meantime Iran wants its own Dimona facilities as well as all delivery systems - just like Israel.
'We just want what Israel already has.'
What a joke.
Yur forgettin' one side is supposed to be all bad & the other dudes are all gud!
Iran has probably stated many many times that it will not pursue Nukes if Israel does the same.
They may have said it today.
But we will never read about it because it isn't "News".
Only gud guys git nukes! The gud guys got/took Ukraine's nukes just be4 they went in there and really started helpin' them against the bad guys! Just look how gud Ukraine is now!!! (.)(.)
"I will never understand how or why a country and culture as old as Persia would not simply evoke the same nuclear ambiguity policy that Israel claims and holds on to."
In fact they have done that on a number of occasions. As did Saddam, by the way. And we know what happened to him. Quite simply the unconditional guarantee given Israel by the Ziowhores in America means she's not held to the same levels of accountability.
There is more to this deal than meets the eye, thats one thing i am sure about, how long can a negotiation take when the positions of the countries are so fucking clear. This isnt a complex negotiation, drop the sanctions and we will stop the continued development of nuclear energy, no we wont drop the sanctions....well then we wont drop the development of nuclear energy.....
All a facade, i think Iran have developed a type of energy that the US wants and needs
Possible, http://www.keshefoundation.org/ the founder of the foundation says he has distrubted the information on USB drives to all gov'ts of the world. You can download the USB's contents via this torrent magnetic link magnet:?xt=urn:btih:433EC6805D376B09CAC479E041283026AD9D793E&dn=keshe+foundation+usb+files&tr=udp%3A%2F%2Ftracker.istole.it%3A80%2Fannounce&tr=udp%3A%2F%2Fopen.demonii.com%3A1337 . I have done that and there is a ton of information and design specs. 1.9 Gigs worth. If its a hoax who ever produced it spent A LOT of time puting the hoax together. You can find many interviews with him on youtube. Look into MAGRAV technology.
http://www.everythingselectric.com/forum/index.php?topic=184.msg416#msg416
A book written about the Electric Universe in 1903, "The Universe a Vast Electric Organism By George Woodard Warder". There are more copies of pages available here. The preface is shown fully in images below.
This was the age of electricity, when it changed and literally lit up the world. Chapter One really gets going, not just with the inspirational language but his workings out and forsight.
Did he predict Space Tornadoes and/or Flux Transfer Events in 1903 using simple electrical laws and ideas? One of the Electric Universe Mantra's is that everything is scalable.
...
If it is an Electric Universe then you must have circuits between everything. No circuits = no Electric Universe.
...
The implications of that statement is extremely important....
Air core transformers or near field comunication devices can't function if this is not true which means everything is interconnected that conducts an electrical charge including bioelectronic based systems....
USA is not to be trusted EVER. Iran is making a big mistake trying to make deal . Fuck the West. Join the BRICS
+1. Go DutchBoy!
Kirk is probably not the only ZHer who's civic-minded, and willing to help "seal a Dutch Dike".
"You know you have a good seal, when there's a good squeal." -Kirk.
http://stopputinregime.wordpress.com
Watch this investigation material and share it on social media to help find truth about shot downed passanger airplane MH17 over Ukraine
http://youtu.be/UoxyO-W5dmA
From The Rand Corp (MIC think tank)
''Such a narrative stands in direct contradiction of daily propaganda emanating from Western media monopolies portraying Iran as a global threat to peace and stability, and in particular, "bent on" attacking the US and its allies, particularly Israel, for no other reason but fulfilling fanatical, ideological hatred.''
http://landdestroyer.blogspot.com/2015/03/global-threat-us-policymakers-...
"Truth is singular and all other versions are false."
-Cloud Atlas
Even if it is priced in already, oil will probably collapse if an agreement is reached today. I suppose it will also collapse if no agreement is reached. Oil collapse = strong dollar = gold crushed = CB winning. All is well.
The world NOW knows that America has never been what the world had thought America was....The US is at 36,000 feet and the engines are sputtering...
And there's a crazy co-pilot at the helm.
Is there anywhere on the planet the USSA is not sticking its ZIO-snout?
Yeah ... in Amerika!
ANSWER:
NO.
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION: This is a general status amongst all the 1st world nations. France and Germany are in the same meetings, each with their own agenda. Nations have interests, not friends. This is the meaning of Nuland's "Fuck the EU" statement...because they were all involved then. And they are all involved now.
FWIW... the opposite of this is what is meant by the term "Isolationism".
Avoiding this is why George Washington advised in his farewell address to "avoid foreign entanglements".
Sanctions shpuld be imposed on the criminals in Washington and Tel AVIV . Why should limits on nuclear fuel productions should be imposed on Iran , when the one nation with nuclear weapons and which has not signed the Non Proliferations Treaty is ISRAEL ? It looks like a farce to control Iran and to favor the Apartheit State . Talking about a FARCE what is this BLS of 5 Powers + one ? NATO Countriea all have nuclear weapons acquired as a gift from the USA .
Iran shoudl tell the USA to Fu... OFF . I hope its does !
Nuke up Iran & let the good times roll!
An agreement with Iran will might be just a temporary solution.
Perhaps one solution is to transfer some Iranian research facilities and researchers to China and Russia and bring them back in case Russia/China no longer provide Iran with nuclear fuel. Cutting edge missile defence systems deployed in Iran may also help. But I suspect that the US will not sign any deal if Russia/China say that they will let the Iranians have the latest equipment. I also suppose that Russia/China don´t like to expose themselves to the risk that the US can prove that Russian/Chinese military gear offers very little protection against American military technology.
So I guess that an agreement now is no permanent solution to Iran.
Iran should probably never have portrayed the US and Israel as their official enemy. They should not have supported Hezbollah. They should have pretended to be pro-West. But perhaps the anti-US and anti-Israel propaganda was intended to increase support for the Islamic government domestically. But I still doubt that it was a smart move by Iran to declare that the US and Israel were the official enemies of Iran. It would probably have been smarter to lend money on favourable terms to American investors who didn´t want an interventionist foreign policy so that they could have created an alternative to CNN and other typical American TV-networks. They should probably also have tried to see to that politicians who dared oppose AIPAC got enough campaign donations. TV evangelists who supported traditional replacement theology rather than Dispensationalist/Scofield theology should have been able to buy sufficient airtime and build churches. And so on. People who didn´t like political competition in the US and Europe would probably have found out about Iranian attempts to influence American and European politics and religion. So I guess that the flow of money would might have been cut off after a while. Therefore, they would probably have needed Iranian billionaires with American and European citizenships loyal to Iran in order to exert sustainable influence over American and European politics. But I guess that they could have given the idea to create an alternative power structure in media and business a try. In any case I think that would have been a smarter move than arming Hezbollah.
One problem with Islam is that it is not an intelligent religion from a modern political point of view. An Islamic cleric can probably not find any support in the Koran for peaceful, subversive activities in Western societies like the ones I have outlined above. On the other hand Christianity is not an intelligent religion either in this respect. Instead, the Christian religion is wide open to manipulation by external players. Nor does the Chinese so-called communism have any intelligent aspirations to influence other countries, cultures and religions. On the contrary, Chinese “communism” teaches that all countries should mind their own business. China´s attitude in the immediate surroundings can be rather aggressive. But that´s something very different than having global political ambitions.
So my conclusion is that the American neo-conservatives will probably consolidate their power in the US, and perhaps also gain more influence in Europe, over the next 10-20 years. They don´t have any intelligent and well-funded competitors.
Furthermore, I assume that Iran will be in even more serious trouble if China for some reason will no longer need Iranian oil, or no longer needs Iran as an optional supplier of oil. I also suspect that China´s demand for Iranian oil may not be enough to protect Iran. They won´t protect Iran at any cost.
The current negotiations over Iran´s nuclear program exposes how vulnerable Iran probably is. Iran has a poor bargaining position. The best argument for Iran to refuse sign an agreement is probably not that their bargaining position will be stronger in the future. The best argument against signing is perhaps that it won´t help signing a deal. Some members of the Congress seem to have declared that they will try to revoke the deal which now is being proposed.
2 huge points lacking credibility:
1) no one's produced evidence of any sort that Iran is seeking a nuclear weapon
2) no one's produced evidence of any sort that nuclear weapons should be authorized in any way, shape or form for non-members of the nuclear non-proliferation treaty, such as: Israel, North Korea, Pakistan & India, and there's no sanctions on Israel, Pakistan or India.