The hard-line regime of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran has been frightening neighbors with its meddling in Iraq, Lebanon, and Gaza. The regime’s apparent pursuit of nuclear weapons has also prompted unusual solidarity among the United States, Europe, and Russia; together they have been ratcheting up UN Security Council sanctions on Iran, demanding that it suspend uranium enrichment and comply with its obligations to the International Atomic Energy Agency. But the most telling signs of trouble for the regime in Tehran are currently on display in domestic turmoil.

The reaction to gas rationing casts light on public discontent with Ahmadinejad’s failure to keep his promises to improve economic conditions. Iranians set fire to gas stations after the announcement of rationing. Amid long lines of cars waiting to fill up in Tehran, men threw stones at police and chanted "Ahmadinejad should be killed!"

The need to ration gas in OPEC’s second largest exporter of crude oil reveals a major vulnerability of Iran’s theocratic regime.

Government policy is clearly to blame for the rationing. The problem begins with subsidies for consumers, which acts as a powerful stimulant for consumption. Yet Iran suffers from an acute shortage of refining capacity, forcing it to import 40 percent of the gasoline supplied to the public. And Iran’s inability to rectify the refinery deficit can be attributed to Ahmadinejad’s truculence on the nuclear issue and regional conflicts.

A salient conclusion for policy makers in Washington is that the current reliance on UN sanctions and Treasury warnings against international banking transactions with Tehran is having the desired effect. This is a policy that entails a much lower level of risk than threats to bomb Iran’s nuclear installations. And it is much easier to exploit Iran’s dependence on imported gasoline than to take out underground nuclear facilities.

Living conditions for most Iranians outside the corrupt clerical elites are deteriorating. Ahmadinejad has been arresting reformists and censoring the press, but his blatant domestic failures are becoming the best antidote to the threat from Tehran.

The Boston Globe