After three decades of an Islamic revolution that has neither upheld Islam's virtues nor brought revolutionary change from repression, many Iranians have had enough. But political transformation, if indeed that's what we're seeing the start of, won't necessarily be immediate. For instance, nine years elapsed between the first Solidarity strike at Gdansk and the collapse of communist rule in Poland. So while longer-term hope still exists for a free Iran, Europe and the United States must prepare for a more dangerous Iranian regime over the short- or even medium term. Their legitimacy wounded and their paranoia increased, Iran's leaders now may be more repressive at home and intransigent abroad.
This raises a pressing question: What can be done to stop the regime's march to a nuclear bomb? Leaders in Tehran are more likely to view a successful nuclear program as their best hope of winning back the international influence and domestic legitimacy they lost in the election debacle. For negotiations to succeed, supreme leader Ayatollah Khamenei and his coterie must be made to pay a higher cost for their nuclear weapons pursuit.
To date, words have meant little. The U.N. Security Council has passed five ineffectual resolutions, and will do little more given Russian and Chinese veto power. President Obama has described an alternative path, "tough direct diplomacy," to curb Iran's "unacceptable" nuclear development. This, too, has yet to bear fruit.
So Europe and her allies must be willing to peacefully exploit Iran's economic Achilles heel: the regime's heavy dependence on gasoline imports. Due to limited refining capabilities, Iran imports approximately 40% of its domestic gasoline consumption. Iran is the second-largest importer of gasoline in the world. That gasoline is supplied primarily by five companies: the Swiss-Dutch energy trading giants Vitol and Trafigura, the Indian multinational Reliance Industries, the Swiss trader Glencore and the French energy firm Total.
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