By Najmedin Meshkati, Los Angeles (http://www-bcf.usc.edu/~meshkati/)

On December 26, 2005 Los Angeles Times published an opinion piece titled "Reigning in Iran" written by Senate majority leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.). The following piece by Dr. Meshkati was written in response and was published by Los Angeles Times on December 28, 2005.

Sen. Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) should be reminded that the resurgence of radicalism of the Iranian regime is the direct effect of the ineptitude of the eight years of former Iranian President Mohammad Khatami's administration, to which U.S. foreign policy based on sanctions and isolation contributed handsomely.

Policies of containment through economic sanctions in a porous world do not work. Former Secretary of State Dean Acheson's methods for containing communism pushed Mao Tse-tung's movement in China to greater extremes. Imposing further restrictions and isolating Iran would result in further radicalization and fan the fire of hard-liners.

Instead of blindly following the bankrupt policy of more sanctions, we need to find a way to support the Iranian private sector, which is the engine of economic growth and social change. Let's hope that we have learned from the past; otherwise, as George Santayana said in 1905, "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it."