During last week’s Presidential debate, one of the clear differences between the candidates was their approach to Iran. Senator McCain was a forceful advocate of continuing the policy of confrontation that was the policy in place during President Bush’s first term. Senator Obama, on the other hand, advocated for a policy of engagement to help resolve the disputes between the countries.
A policy of engagement has begun to emerge during Bush’s second term as the neo-conservatives in the Defense Department and Vice President Cheney’s office have begun to lose influence. This change has manifested itself in such things as the direct participation of senior diplomat Nicholas Burns in nuclear talks with Iran and the floating of an initiative to establish a US Interest Section in Tehran.
The Interest Section is a small, but important, step as it will bring American diplomats to Iran to begin to better understand the complex dynamics of Iran and will make it easier for Iranians and Americans to get visas and encourage interaction among ordinary citizens.
This week, in an extended interview with Iranian English language paper, Iran Daily (The article is here.), Gary Sick, a member of the Security Council under President Clinton and currently Professor of International Affairs at Columbia, raised the possibility that President Bush would take advantage of the window of opportunity between the elections and the inauguration of the new president to open the Interest Section.
This time period is a “window of opportunity” for three reasons.
Number one, the elections are over (unless we are still counting ballots in Florida) and therefore campaign politics will not come into play. Doing it before the elections would give Obama a chance to say; “I told you so. Even President Bush agrees that we should engage Iran”.
Number two, Congress will most likely be out of town for the holidays. This is important because the MEK (Mujahedin e’ Khalq), the violent Iranian opposition group advocating for a hard-line policy of regime change in Iran, has the best Congressmen money can buy on their side. They would try to prevent engagement.
Number three, doing it before the new President takes office would create “facts on the ground” which would be hard for a new President to reverse even if he wanted to.
It will be interesting to see what happens.
Monday, September 29, 2008
Saturday, September 20, 2008
Spinning the news
This week the United Nations International Atomic Energy Agency released its report on the “Implementation of NPT Safeguards in The Islamic Republic of Iran”. When I read about this report in the news media, I thought that there must have been two reports. The western and Israeli news media articles had headlines such as “IAEA Report: Iran blocks weapons probe”. (An example is here.) The Iranian media articles were headlined “Verifications on track”. (The article is here)
It turns out that they were both right. If one takes the time to read the actual report (If you want it, it is here.) the IAEA is talking about two different issues. With respect to Iranian nuclear enrichment activities the IAEA says such things as “All nuclear material at FEP (Fuel Enrichment Plant) … remain under Agency containment and surveillance” and all records “indicate that the plants have been operating as declared (i.e. less than 5.0% U-235 enrichment)”. (The level needed for peaceful uses of nuclear energy.)
The issue of the “weapons probe” relates to an intelligence report supplied by the US to the IAEA which alleges that Iran has a program to modify missile warheads to accommodate nuclear warheads. Iran has said that this report is a fabrication and if the IAEA will provide them with a copy of the documentation they will be able to prove that it is false. As indicated in the IAEA report the US has refused to allow that to happen.
In the run up to the invasion of Iraq the US media was criticized for taking the intelligence claims of the US government at face value and contributing to the government effort to mobilize public support for the invasion. Are we headed down the same road again?
It turns out that they were both right. If one takes the time to read the actual report (If you want it, it is here.) the IAEA is talking about two different issues. With respect to Iranian nuclear enrichment activities the IAEA says such things as “All nuclear material at FEP (Fuel Enrichment Plant) … remain under Agency containment and surveillance” and all records “indicate that the plants have been operating as declared (i.e. less than 5.0% U-235 enrichment)”. (The level needed for peaceful uses of nuclear energy.)
The issue of the “weapons probe” relates to an intelligence report supplied by the US to the IAEA which alleges that Iran has a program to modify missile warheads to accommodate nuclear warheads. Iran has said that this report is a fabrication and if the IAEA will provide them with a copy of the documentation they will be able to prove that it is false. As indicated in the IAEA report the US has refused to allow that to happen.
In the run up to the invasion of Iraq the US media was criticized for taking the intelligence claims of the US government at face value and contributing to the government effort to mobilize public support for the invasion. Are we headed down the same road again?
Tuesday, September 09, 2008
Watch out for the elephants
Since the end of the brief war between Russia and Georgia there has been a worrying escalation in confrontation between the US and Russia.
This whole mess occurred because Georgian President Mikeil Saakashvili did not understand his role in big power geopolitics. He made the mistake of believing the public rhetoric coming from Washington and thought that he was an ally of the US. He didn’t realize that Georgia was a client state of the US and he did not understand the role of a client state.
In the client - patron relationship, the patron provides political, diplomatic and economic support to the client and in return the client is supportive of the patron’s interests in the region. However, the client has the obligation not to embarrass or put the patron in a difficult position. His ill conceived and impulsive attack on the breakaway province of South Ossetia which triggered a disproportionate response by Russia certainly put the US in an embarrassing and difficult position. The US had few if any realistic options for response and the most economically and militarily powerful nation in the world was exposed as a “paper tiger”.
Since the cease fire there have been a series of “tit for tat” verbal and military escalations. The escalations began following the refusal by Russia to immediately remove all of its troops from Georgia proper as agreed to under the ceasefire agreement negotiated by France. This led to an increase in belligerent rhetoric from Washington and the delivery of “humanitarian aid” to Georgia using US Navy warships. This generated belligerent rhetoric from Moscow and a threat about their ability to destroy the NATO ships in the Black Sea. Following the entry of US warships into the Black Sea, Venezuela has invited the Russian fleet to visit and Russia has said that it will send warships to the Caribbean before the end of the year.
These increasing confrontations between two nuclear armed powers with the risk of miscalculation are very dangerous. Rational leaders (if there are any) need to “cool it”. The little guys, (Georgia, Ukraine, and Venezuela) need to remember that when elephants start stomping around it is usually the mouse that gets squashed.
This whole mess occurred because Georgian President Mikeil Saakashvili did not understand his role in big power geopolitics. He made the mistake of believing the public rhetoric coming from Washington and thought that he was an ally of the US. He didn’t realize that Georgia was a client state of the US and he did not understand the role of a client state.
In the client - patron relationship, the patron provides political, diplomatic and economic support to the client and in return the client is supportive of the patron’s interests in the region. However, the client has the obligation not to embarrass or put the patron in a difficult position. His ill conceived and impulsive attack on the breakaway province of South Ossetia which triggered a disproportionate response by Russia certainly put the US in an embarrassing and difficult position. The US had few if any realistic options for response and the most economically and militarily powerful nation in the world was exposed as a “paper tiger”.
Since the cease fire there have been a series of “tit for tat” verbal and military escalations. The escalations began following the refusal by Russia to immediately remove all of its troops from Georgia proper as agreed to under the ceasefire agreement negotiated by France. This led to an increase in belligerent rhetoric from Washington and the delivery of “humanitarian aid” to Georgia using US Navy warships. This generated belligerent rhetoric from Moscow and a threat about their ability to destroy the NATO ships in the Black Sea. Following the entry of US warships into the Black Sea, Venezuela has invited the Russian fleet to visit and Russia has said that it will send warships to the Caribbean before the end of the year.
These increasing confrontations between two nuclear armed powers with the risk of miscalculation are very dangerous. Rational leaders (if there are any) need to “cool it”. The little guys, (Georgia, Ukraine, and Venezuela) need to remember that when elephants start stomping around it is usually the mouse that gets squashed.
Friday, September 05, 2008
A bi-national state in Israel/Palestine
One of the recent developments in the seemingly protracted and endless conflict between Israelis and Palestinians is the movement of the concept of a bi-national state in Israel/Palestine from the realm of intellectuals, like the late Edward Said, and fringe groups, like The Association for One Democratic State in Israel/Palestine, to the political mainstream. Two years ago, when I first started to write about my view that facts on the ground had made the idea of a two state solution impossible, I felt the need to title the articles “A completely absurd idea”. (For more than you wanted to know about the issue, click here, here and here.)
At that time those of us proposing a single democratic state in Israel/Palestine were generally attacked as “anti-Semitic” and advocating a second Jewish Holocaust. Today the discussion is becoming a mainstream dialogue.
Leading Palestinian Authority negotiators Saeb Erekat and Ahmed Qurei have said that the PA is considering changing their negotiating position from insisting on a Palestinian state based on the 1967 borders and with East Jerusalem as its capital to a single democratic state for all its citizens. This was the original PLO position prior to the Oslo agreements.
An in depth article appeared this week in the NY Times (The article is here.) describing the debate going on among Palestinians about how to deal with the fact that expanding Israeli settlements, construction of bypass roads and construction of the separation barrier have made as agreement on a separate viable Palestinian state nearly impossible.
Even the Israeli media has weighed in. The chief US correspondent for the Israeli newspaper Haaretz wrote an article entitled “One state solution? Let the debate begin” (This article is here.) The major points of debate will be “Should there be a single state?” and “What will be the nature of that state?” Unfortunately most of those commenting on this article advocated for a single state for Jews only and ethnically cleansed of Arab Palestinians. Some would say that this has already started. (See this article in The Guardian: “Ethnic cleansing by stealth”.) Human rights groups will have their work cut out for them.
At that time those of us proposing a single democratic state in Israel/Palestine were generally attacked as “anti-Semitic” and advocating a second Jewish Holocaust. Today the discussion is becoming a mainstream dialogue.
Leading Palestinian Authority negotiators Saeb Erekat and Ahmed Qurei have said that the PA is considering changing their negotiating position from insisting on a Palestinian state based on the 1967 borders and with East Jerusalem as its capital to a single democratic state for all its citizens. This was the original PLO position prior to the Oslo agreements.
An in depth article appeared this week in the NY Times (The article is here.) describing the debate going on among Palestinians about how to deal with the fact that expanding Israeli settlements, construction of bypass roads and construction of the separation barrier have made as agreement on a separate viable Palestinian state nearly impossible.
Even the Israeli media has weighed in. The chief US correspondent for the Israeli newspaper Haaretz wrote an article entitled “One state solution? Let the debate begin” (This article is here.) The major points of debate will be “Should there be a single state?” and “What will be the nature of that state?” Unfortunately most of those commenting on this article advocated for a single state for Jews only and ethnically cleansed of Arab Palestinians. Some would say that this has already started. (See this article in The Guardian: “Ethnic cleansing by stealth”.) Human rights groups will have their work cut out for them.
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