By Fred Kaplan
Why the Russian leader’s offer to sell missiles to Iran just made the nuclear deal more attractive.
Russian President Vladimir Putin at a meeting outside Moscow on July 30, 2014.
Russia’s offer to sell advanced air-defense missiles to Iran is regrettable and craven, but far from undermining the nuclear talks with Iran, as some Republican senators claim, the move bolsters the case for completing and signing a deal as soon as possible.
Iran contracted to buy these missiles, known as S-300s, back in 2010, but on the eve of delivery, then–Russian President Dmitry Medvedev canceled the contract and refunded the money ($800 million worth), which Iran had paid up front. Medvedev took this step, at financial sacrifice and political risk, as part of the “reset” in Russian-American relations (which reaped great benefits, briefly, until Vladimir Putin returned to the helm).
Had the sale gone through, it would have altered the balance of power between Iran and the U.S.-Israeli alliance. The ability to launch a massive airstrike on Iran’s nuclear facilities, if it seemed on the verge of producing an A-bomb, was one way that the alliance held the country’s nuclear ambitions in check. The S-300 missiles had therange, speed, and power to shoot down almost any airplane. Possessing the missiles might have encouraged the Iranians to go ahead and build a small nuclear arsenal, on the assumption that they could stave off any aerial attacks.
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