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Sanctions Will Harm Only the Iranian Regime, Not the Iranian People
(National Interest) Patrick Kennedy - When my late father, Sen. Ted Kennedy, led the effort to place sanctions on South Africa, the apartheid government insisted it would only hurt the people. But Nelson Mandela and Bishop Desmond Tutu assured him they wanted the sanctions because they wanted to speed up the end of Apartheid. The Senate, led by Senators Kennedy and Lowell Weicker, overrode a presidential veto to impose the restrictions. The story is much the same with Iran. The protests and strikes in Iran's cities have made it clear that the people recognize their economic hardships are rooted in the self-serving priorities of the mullahs. "The enemy is right here," protesters are chanting. "They lie when they say it is America." The experience of sanctions relief has left Iranians with no doubt that foreign wealth is not about to reach their homes, meaning that international pressure affects only the regime. Only intense pressure, from at home and abroad, can compel the regime to accept comprehensive change or be driven out of power. The Trump administration has accordingly set meaningful change as its goal, which is clearly what the Iranian public also wants, though it is more likely they will demand, and achieve, regime change. The Iranian resistance has no expectation of, or desire for, direct outside intervention in the conflict between the regime and its people. However, the resistance would clearly like Western policymakers to agree that sanctions and diplomatic pressure will harm the regime alone, not ordinary Iranians. As they did in South Africa, sanctions will impede an unwanted regime's ability to stave off an uprising by a long-suffering people desiring freedom and democracy. Former Rep. Patrick Kennedy (D-R.I.) served in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1995 to 2011.