Ten Days That Shook Tehran, By Patrick J. Buchanan

And there are not only deep divisions in Iran between modernists

Given its monopoly of guns, bet on the Iranian regime. But, in
the long run, the ayatollahs have to see the handwriting on the wall.

Let us assume what they insist upon -- that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad
won the June 12 election; that, even if fraud occurred, it did not decide
the outcome. As Ayatollah Khamenei said to loud laughter in his Friday
sermon declaring the election valid, "Perhaps 100,000, or 500,000, but how
can anyone tamper with 11 million votes?"

Still, the ayatollah and Ahmadinejad must hear the roar of the
rapids ahead. Millions of Iranians, perhaps a majority of the professional
class and educated young, who shouted, "Death to the Dictatorship," oppose
or detest them. How can the regime maintain its present domestic course or
foreign policy with its people so visibly divided?

Where do the ayatollah and Ahmadinejad go from here?

If they adopt a harder line, defy Barack Obama and refuse to
negotiate their nuclear program, they can continue to enrich uranium, as
harsher sanctions are imposed. But to what end adding 1,000 more kilograms?

If they do not intend to build a bomb, why enrich more? And if
they do intend to build a bomb, what exactly would that achieve?

For an Iranian bomb would trigger a regional arms race with
Turkey, Egypt and Saudi Arabia seeking nuclear weapons. Israel would put its
nuclear arsenal on a hair trigger. America would retarget missiles on
Tehran. And if a terrorist anywhere detonated a nuclear bomb, Iran would
risk annihilation, for everyone would assume Tehran was behind it.

Rather than make Iran more secure, an Iranian bomb would seem to
permanently isolate her and possibly subject her to pre-emptive attack.

And how can the Iranians survive continued isolation?

According to U.S. sources, Iran produced 6 million barrels of
crude a day in 1974 under the shah. She has not been able to match that
since the revolution. War, limited investment, sanctions and a high rate of
natural decline of mature oil fields, estimated at 8 percent onshore and 11
percent offshore, are the causes. A 2007 National Academy of Sciences study
reported that if the decline rates continue, Iran's exports, which in 2007
averaged 2.4 million barrels per day, could decrease to zero by 2015.

You cannot make up for oil and gas exports with carpets and
pistachio nuts.

If Tehran cannot effect a lifting of sanctions and new
investments in oil and gas production, she is headed for an economic crisis
that will cause an exodus of her brightest young and quadrennial reruns of
the 2009 election.

And there are not only deep divisions in Iran between modernists
and religious traditionalists, the affluent and the poor, but among ethnic
groups. Half of Iran's population is Arab, Kurd, Azeri or Baluchi. In the
Kurdish northwest and Baluchi south, secessionists have launched attacks the
ayatollah blames on the United States and Israel.

As they look about the region, how can the ayatollahs be
optimistic?

Syria, their major ally, wants to deal with the Americans to
retrieve the Golan. Saudi Arabia and Egypt are hostile, with the latter
having uncovered a Hezbollah plot against President Hosni Mubarak.

Hamas is laser-focused on Gaza, the West Bank and a Palestinian
state, and showing interest in working with the Obama administration.

Where is the Islamic revolution going? Where is the state in the
Muslim world that has embraced Islamism and created a successful nation?

Sudan? Taliban Afghanistan? Somalia is now in final passage from
warlordism to Islamism. Does anyone believe the Al-Shahab will create a
successful nation?

As for the ayatollahs, after 30 years, they are deep in
crisis -- and what have they produced that the world admires?

Even if the "green revolution" in Iran triggers revolts in the
Gulf states, Saudi Arabia or Egypt, can Iran believe Sunni revolutionary
regimes will follow the lead of a Shia Islamic state? How long did it take
Mao's China to renounce its elder brother in the faith, Khrushchev's Russia?

When one looks at the Asian tigers -- South Korea, Hong Kong,
Taiwan, Singapore, Malaysia -- or at the China or India of recent decades,
one sees nations that impress the world with their progress.

Iran under the mullahs has gone sideways or backward. Now, with
this suspect election and millions having shown their revulsion of the
regime, the legitimacy and integrity of the ayatollahs have been called into
question.

Obama offers the regime a way out.

They may exercise their right to peaceful nuclear power, have
sanctions lifted and receive security guarantees, if they can prove they
have no nuclear weapons program and will cease subverting through their
Hezbollah-Hamas proxies the peace process Obama is pursuing between Israel
and Palestine.

If Iran refuses Obama's offer, she will start down a road at the
end of which are severe sanctions, escalation and a war that Obama does not
want and Iran cannot want -- for the winner will not be Iran.

Patrick Buchanan is the author of the new book "Churchill,
Hitler and 'The Unnecessary War." To find out more about Patrick Buchanan,
and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit
the Creators Syndicate web page at www.creators.com.