The stalled talks between Iran and the 5+1 nations on the former’s nuclear program have produced an accelerated chorus of calls for action to be taken against the Islamic Republic. Robert Kagan, a leading neoconservative and influential writer, has led calls for stiff sanctions to be applied, and taken President Obama to task for his approach to continuing negotiations. The neocons have been saying for a long time that Iran is not the sort of regime one can negotiate with, that this has been proven over time, that the hardliners will use the negotiations to stall for time, and that the hardliners only understand pressure if not force.

This sort of approach fails in that it is one-sided. It does not open up but closes down opportunities for Iran to change, and therefore becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. The factions in Iran are debating the 5+1 offer on nuclear re-processing, and the hardliners are certainly reluctant to make any compromises. However, Ahmadinejad, Khamenei and those close to them are also susceptible to the siren song of realpolitik, and have exercised it in the past. The cessation of Iran’s nuclear weaponization program in 2003 occurred in the same year as the US invasion of Iraq when Iran feared that the same fate might befall them.

Kagan and co. are of course arguing that this sort of thing proves their point, that force is the only thing that works. Force may or may not work, and the cost of it not working is a big deterrent to its use unless all diplomatic channels have been exhausted. The threat of force, as distinct from its use, is less likely to be successful unless the other side is offered incentives as well as disincentives, and is not made to feel that it is backing down.

Pragmatism is a temptation even for authoritarians if they wish to survive for long on the world scene. In order to exercise the pragmatic option rulers must be given the option to do so (surrender is not the same thing as pragmatism). In Iran the factions are currently debating the deal on offer. The rulers must feel that there are options on offer which will make it possible to survive without losing face, and for this the diplomatic route is undoubtedly the best one to take.

Premature punishment in the form of sanctions will most likely make them defensive, and possibly pre-empt any positive moves which they might be considering. Such actions might therefore bring out their aggressive side un-necessarily. Of course, for diplomacy to work, there must also be a realistic time frame. The other side needs enough time to consider, but not so much time that they might use it to stall.

Ironically, stiff sanctions applied prematurely are less likely to work if this process hasn’t been gone through. Diplomacy is an instrument for finding out whether the other side is willing to compromise. Unless the process has been tried, it will leave many of the parties to the negotiations unsure of what the other sides’ intentions are, hence creating space for waffling and indecision leading to a possible delay of sanctions if and when the time comes for their rightful application.