As the cycle of United Nations Security Council conclaves begins, Iran's nuclear ambitions seem to be surging without restraint - no longer subject to either diplomatic mediation or coercive resolution. And a unique confluence of events ensures that Iran will sustain its defiant posture.

The calls from Washington and European capitals for suspension of Tehran's nuclear activities may seem reasonable but miss the remarkable changes in Iran in the past year. A combination of bitter experience and Islamist ideology animates the country's new regime. More than any other factor, it is Iran's own war with Iraq that continues to condition the strategic assumptions of Mahmoud Ahmadi-Nejad, Iran's president, and his allies. A pronounced suspicion of the US and the international community that tolerated Saddam Hussein's war crimes against Iran characterises the perspective of those who fought on the frontlines of that war. The lesson for these veterans was that Iran's independence and territorial integrity could not be safeguarded by international legal compacts and western benevolence.