“WE HAVE the right to develop nuclear technology.” This is the surprising answer that many Iranians, secular or religious, give to western journalists asking about their country’s plan to expand its nuclear capabilities. The west should not be too surprised by this: the Iranian regime has been carefully and systematically shaping public opinion on the issue.
Indeed, the regime has never before managed to sell its people an idea so successfully. It failed, for example, to rally public support for its campaign to cut ties with the US – in 2003 it imprisoned pollsters whose research showed that two-thirds of…
