Actually, most of the Persian Gulf is international waters, while seven countries in addition to Iran legitimately claim parts of the Persian Gulf as territorial waters that belong exclusively to those countries.
Gen. Hassan Firuzabadi who has been Iran’s highest-ranking military officer for decades as chairman of the Joint Staff, denounced the Arab states on the other side of the waterway Saturday and proclaimed “The Persian Gulf has belonged to Iran forever.”
His claim is likely to further inflame anti-Iranian passions across the Persian Gulf where many Arabs are already suspicious of Iranian intentions. It isn’t clear why Firuzabadi made such an inflammatory claim. But many Iranian political figures seem to think that whatever they say in Farsi stays in Iran and is unheard by foreign audiences.
Firuzabadi is a very powerful figure in the Islamic Republic, though not as well known as other military officers who speak in public more often. But Firuzabadi does stand out among other public figures for his immense girth!
An indication of Firuz-abadi’s standing is the fact that he is the sole military officer who sits on Expediency Council, the body chaired by former President Ali-Akbar Hashemi-Rafsanjani and which makes broad policy recommendations to the Supreme Leader.
In a speech Saturday on Persian Gulf Day, Firuzabadi said, “The Arab dictatorships in the Persian Gulf are unable to contain the popular uprisings.” Actually only one of the seven Arab states around the Persian Gulf has seen extensive protests this year, Bahrain. Two others, Oman and Saudi Arabia, have seen modest protests. But Firuzabadi lumped all seven together.
He said, “Instead of trying and failing to open an unworkable front against Iran, these dictators should relinquish power, end their savage crimes and let the people determine their own future.”
Such language plays directly into the hands of Arabs who describe Iran as a “threat” and undermines the Islamic Republic’s long-term policy of trying to befriend the Arab states. However, that policy may be in tatters now—if it ever really amounted to anything—as a result of the regime’s very vocal advocacy of Shiite protests in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia.
Across the Persian Gulf in Riyadh, the secretary general of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), a grouping of six Arab states, Abdul-Latif az-Az-Zayani, called Firuzabadi’s remarks “unacceptable, blatant interference in the internal affairs of the GCC countries.” He said, “The Gulf belongs to all states on its shores, and Iran has no right to claim otherwise as it owns nothing in the Gulf but its territorial waters.”
Firuzabadi further threatened to exacerbate ethnic tensions by accusing the Arab states of “plots to carve out an identity for themselves by rejecting the identity of others,” a clear reference to Iran.
The focus of “Persian Gulf Day” is on the proper name of the waterway. Firuzabadi denounced the Arabs for refusing to use the “historical name” and resorting for the last half-century to the neologism “Arabian Gulf.”
However, Firuzabadi went further and blamed the West for that term. “With the arrival of the British and later the Americans in the region, plots were hatched to try to change the name,… to distort the history and identity of the Persian Gulf.” But neither the United States nor the United Kingdom has embraced any term other than Persian Gulf.
But the real inflammatory language wasn’t Firuzabadi’s refrain about the name of the waterway, but his stark claim: “The Persian Gulf has always, is and shall always belong to Iran.”
Firuzabadi added to the political skewering by asserting that Saudi Arabia’s decision to send troops into Bahrain would spark unrest within Saudi Arabia. “Unfair and un-Islamic moves will harm the honor of Muslims in Saudi Arabia and will threaten the security of Saudi Arabia,” he said.
Coming from a military officer who is Shia, that could easily be interpreted as a threat by Iran to foment unrest in Saudi Arabia. While the remark may well have been intended only for the domestic audience, it could easily be used within the Arab world to foment anger at Iran.
Firuzabadi went on to portray Saudi Arabia as an American lackey. “Washington ordered Saudi Arabia as its mercenary to thwart the Bahraini popular revolution so that the United States can maintain its base there.” Bahrain is the homeport of the US Navy’s Fifth Fleet.
Actually, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton publicly criticized the movement of Saudi troops into Bahrain hours after it happened. US officials said the Arabs only told Washington of the deployment as it was starting.
Persian Gulf Day is always a day for florid rhetoric, but no one else was heard to go to the extreme of Firuzabadi.
More common was the speech of First Vice President Mohammad-Reza Rahimi, who said, “More than 3,000 years ago, the nations of Pars … established the land of Persia. Since then, the name of the Persian Gulf has been regarded as one of the supreme symbols of Iranian civilization.”
Vice President Rahimi echoed Firuzabadi in one sense. Rahimi also blamed the hated term “Arabian Gulf” on Britain. “Wherever Britain has set foot, it has produced sedition. The dispute over [the name of] the Persian Gulf is one of the plots of that country,” he said.
The regime has adopted the issue of the name of the Persian Gulf as one with considerable nationalist appeal. Although the revolution began as an anti-nationalist movement that emphasized the international role of Islam and excoriated Persian nationalism, once the war with Iraq began in 1980, the regime changed its tune. For the last three decades, the Islamic Republic has pursued both routes—Islamic internationalism to show its leadership role in the world, and Persian nationalism to appeal to that strong feeling among many Persians. And under President Ahmadi-nejad, the regime has actually expanded its rhetoric to promote Persian internationalism and insist that Iran deserves a place at the table discussing even African economies and Latin American development policies.
The US government officially uses the term “Persian Gulf,” although the Navy’s Fifth Fleet, which is based in Bahrain, just a few weeks ago bowed to local usage and told its journalists to write “Arabian Gulf” in their news releases.
There is no law on names in the United States. But in 1890, the federal government created the US Board on Geographic Names at a time when many sites, especially in the West, had multiple names, leading to much confusion in giving directions and delivering mail. The board is assigned the task of “standardizing, not regulating” geographic names. The names it publishes are for “the use of the Federal government and the information of the general public.” But no one gets punished for using an unlisted name.
The board is primarily concerned with the names of locations within the United States itself.
The board cites “Persian Gulf” as the “conventional” name for that body of water, but also lists 14 “variants,” including “Arabian Gulf” and “Khalij-e Fars,” which is the transliteration of the Farsi name. “Conventional” is defined as the “English name in widespread usage for a feature located in an area where English is not the official language.”
Meanwhile, back at Persian Gulf Day, the Iranian Students News Agency quoted musician Shahrdad Rohani as saying he will compose a symphony to immortalize the term “Persian Gulf.” Rohani, a violinist and pianist who was visiting in Bandar Abbas on the Persian Gulf shore, lives in Los Angeles where he is the conductor of the COTA Symphony Orchestra. “Although I live in the United States, I am always proud of being Iranian,” he was quoted as saying.
Some years back Iran designated the 10th of Ordibehesht (April 30) as Persian Gulf Day to combat what the regime sees as a conspiracy to rename the waterway. The date chosen marks the anniversary of the expulsion of Portuguese military forces from the Strait of Hormuz in 1622 during the reign of the Safavid Shah Abbas (1587-1629).
The day is one for much overwrought rhetoric; Firuzabadi and Rahimi were not unique in their approach. Majlis Deputy Heshmatollah Falahat-pisheh went further in writing his own supposed laws. He said that if anyone puts a “false name” on the Persian Gulf, “he has flouted international conventions and the issue can be pursued through legal channels. Therefore, our diplomats are obliged to pursue the issue of false names.”
However, geographic names are not the subject of international agreements, so there is no legal route.
In one of numerous naming conflicts, the English-speaking world uniformly uses the term Germany, despite the fact that the country is only known as Deutschland to the people who live there. Meanwhile, the country of Ellada is called Yunan by Persian-speakers and Greece by English-speakers.