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Why You Shouldn't Get Too Excited about Rowhani
(Atlantic) Mark Dubowitz - Rowhani lived in Paris in exile with Ayatollah Khomeini and followed him to Iran. He was a political commissar in the regular military, where he purged some of Iran's finest officers, and a member of the Supreme Defense Council responsible for the continuation of the Iran-Iraq War, at a great cost in Iranian lives, even after all Iranian territories were liberated. As Iran's lead negotiator, Rowhani masterfully wielded temperate rhetoric to mask an iron determination to expand Iran's nuclear program. In the face of increasingly crippling sanctions, Iranians appeared to embrace the "anyone-but-Jalili" vote, if only to counter the candidate who appeared to be Khamenei's first choice. Rowhani, after all, promised that his moderate positions could bring the West around to authorize sanctions relief before the Iranian economy collapses. Iran's new president will negotiate to play for time in order to reach an industrial-size nuclear weapons capacity and a nuclear breakout which will allow Iran, without detection, to produce enough weapons-grade uranium or separated plutonium for one or more bombs. The election of Rowhani, a master of nuclear deceit, doesn't get us any closer to stopping Iran's nuclear drive. The writer is executive director of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.