Mei Xinyu: US Sanctions Only to “Hoist Itself by Its Own Petard”

The U.S., the only superpower in the world, has taken for granted that it is eligible enough to impose its will upon other nations, which, nevertheless, is quite unrealistic.

To strengthen its economic sanctions against Iran, the U.S. has adopted a number of measures: Obama signed a new bill aimed at further sanctions against Iran which he had previously objected to. American senior officials are trying to persuade other nations to join U.S. sanctions by ceasing to buy oil from Iran. However, these nations are not obliged to do so; oil storage in the U.S. is far larger than that of the market’s prediction. As an effect, if Iran is out of the world oil market, it has much stronger negative impact upon Europe and countries in East Asia and South Asia than the U.S. The fact has been proven that sanctions launched by the U.S. do not serve their purpose and usually generate humanistic disasters. And with regard to economic and political interests of the U.S., sanctions have failed to harm their punished objects, only to smash the U.S.’ own interests.

In late 1981, the U.S. government launched sanctions against the former Soviet Union for its construction of natural gas export pipelines. But the sanctions failed not only to curb the construction, but also to prevent Western Europe and Japan from joining the project, which frustrated American corporations, at a price of bills worth 2.2 billion U.S. dollars. It also reduced the ratio of American exports to the former Soviet Union from 25 percent (1975-1978) to 0.4 percent (1984). Then, the U.S. government had to cancel the sanctions. From then on, American corporations were seen as “unreliable suppliers,” and could hardly win contracts from the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, which continued until the disintegration of the former Soviet Union. Ridiculously, the constructed natural gas pipelines turn out to be the most important energy supply arteries reaching Eastern, Central and Western Europe and have maintained their significant status until now.

If Western Europe and Japan had given up under the pressure of the Reagan administration, the energy supply and citizens’ life in Western Europe would have suffered serious conditions.

As the only superpower in the world, the U.S. has taken for granted that it is eligible to impose its will upon other nations, which, nevertheless, is unrealistic. And sanctions against others in turn weakened its influence upon others.

According to the new bill aimed at further sanctions against Iran signed by Obama, the U.S. will prohibit any foreign financial institutions in touch with the Central Bank of Iran from entering the U.S. financial market. But the Central Bank of Iran plays a very important role in assisting Iranian foreign trade. And if other economies are to be exempted from the bill, they have to cut down their oil imports from Iran. So it is believed that the bill will exert greater pressure on Chinese financial institutions providing capital for Sino-Iranian trade. However, it is obvious that due to long-time restrictions by U.S. financial administrations, Chinese financial institutions have had little chance of entering the American financial market and opening branch offices in the U.S. They will suffer few losses in the U.S. financial market resulting from the new bill. If so, will the bill be effective enough for China to give up its important interests from the trade with Iran?

On January 12, the U.S. Department of State announced its sanctions on three foreign companies for their oil trade with Iran, including China’s state-owned Zhuhai Zhen Rong Corp. The sanction bars all three companies from receiving U.S. export licenses, U.S. Export-Import Bank financing or loans over $10 million from U.S. financial institutions. Nevertheless, Zhen Rong Corp. has not been in cooperation with any U.S. companies or institutions. So, the sanctions are meaningless enough to be ridiculed by the Zhen Rong spokesperson as one that “God knows its significance.”

As a Chinese saying goes, “harmony is cherished.” In fact, except for its religious beliefs, Iran, in comparison with other Middle East nations except Israel, has shared the most similar political system with the U.S. So couldn’t the White House be generous enough in the normalization of relations with Iran, since it has been getting on well with a number of monarchies in the Middle East?