(Yes, he is Christopher Hitchens' brother. His politics are generally right wing, but in some ways 'religious libertarian' - he opposed the Iraq war. The paper this is in, the Mail on Sunday, is also right wing - but that might be a good place for pieces like this to appear, because its readers would be the typical targets of anti-Iranian propaganda).
When I told my friends and family I was going to Tehran, they looked at me as if I were taking a short break in Mordor, and expected that the next time they saw me I would be being paraded by Revolutionary Guards after confessing to espionage, and then publicly hanged from a large crane at a busy traffic intersection.
Well, not quite. The people of Iran are probably the most pro-Western in the world, though that will not stop them fighting like hell if we are foolish enough to attack them. Not that they will do so with nuclear weapons any time soon. Iran is rather bad at grand projects. Its sole nuclear power station has never produced a watt of electricity in more than three decades, the capital's TV tower is unfinished after 20 years of work and Tehran's airport took 30 years to build.
By bringing this information back to you I expect to annoy the frowning mullahs, who want their people to fear us as much as George W. Bush and Anthony Blair want us to fear Iran. That is why they constantly tease us about their inadequate nuclear programme. They long for our rage and threats.
Again and again, Iranians told me Western hostility was the main force that could push them into the arms of a regime they did not much like. The last thing the ayatollahs need is for the peoples of Europe and America to know much about their country and its people, or to realise the truth - that Iran is our natural ally in the Middle East, a European civilisation trapped by history and geography in the midst of Arabia. It does not belong there, culturally or religiously.
...
http://www.mailonsunday.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=449880&in_page_id=1770&in_a_source=There's a lot more in the article - views from many different Iranians. The overwhelming impression is of a country that isn't a danger to anyone, apart from when some of its reactionary leaders try to stir up some nationalism to divert attention from their failures.
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