Obama’s Self Inflicted Pain

When candidate Barack Obama was running for president against Hilary Clinton and John McCain, he made a strong case for engagement and dialogue with Iran. However, once he was elected he quickly reverted to the Bush administration policy of confrontation and conflict. He never made an effective public case for engagement; never used the bully pulpit to advocate for a grand bargain with the Islamic Republic. This stance has left him in a deep policy and political hole.

This week a delegation of IAEA officials met with Iranian officials in Tehran in order to discuss renewed negotiations concerning Iran’s nuclear program. During the discussion, the IAEA officials requested a visit to the Parchin military base. The Iranians refused to allow the requested visit. The reaction of U.S. and western media and governments to this refusal can be summed up by the statement by White House spokesperson Jay Carney in which he said, "This particular action by Iran suggest that they have not changed their behavior when it comes to abiding by their international obligations.” He expressed regret that the IAEA mission had ended in failure.

Carney neglected to acknowledge that, under its 1974 Safeguards Agreement with the IAEA, Iran is under no obligation to allow inspections of non-nuclear sites such as Parchin. Iran believes that the IAEA has shared confidential information from inspections with the U.S. and Israel and that this information has led to attacks on facilities and assassinations of Iranian nuclear scientists. It is not surprising, therefore, that Iran would be very careful about unnecessary sharing of information with the IAEA. The U.S. portrayal of a perfectly rational Iranian position as a “failure to abide by its international obligations” only fans the flames of war, already burning brightly.

It is this kind of fact free reporting and posturing that leads to polling results which show that 60% of Americans favor U.S. military action to prevent an Iranian nuclear weapons program and only 5% would oppose an Israeli attack which would assuredly draw the U.S. into war with Iran. (The complete poll results are here.) I will admit that it is relatively easy to get Americans to support a war, since recent history has shown that they neither have to participate in nor pay for military adventures.

The risk of war in the Persian Gulf has driven oil prices well north of $100 a barrel and gas prices are headed above $4 per gallon. The resulting drag on the still fragile U.S. and global economies will not help Obama’s reelection bid. If Obama wants to get himself out of this policy and political hole, the first step would be to stop digging.

Technorati Tags: Iran,Barack Obama

War Hysteria over Iran

Over the past month hysteria over a possible war with Iran has reached a new crescendo. Pundits, government officials and presidential candidates have been debating ad nauseam about issues such as whether Iran is an existential threat to Israel, whether deterrence will work, whether air strikes would be effective, whether Iran is entering a “zone of immunity”, the effect of Iranian nuclear weapons on the Middle East balance of power, the nature of an Iranian response, etc. Washington Post columnist David Ignatius ignited a fire storm when he said that Defense Secretary Panetta “ believes there is a strong likelihood that Israel will strike Iran in April, May or June — before Iran enters what Israelis described as a “zone of immunity” to commence building a nuclear bomb.” (See here)

The Obama administration has weighed into the fray with a series of statements which have sent mixed signals about U.S. policy and only served to increase the rhetoric. In a series of speeches and interviews Secretary Panetta stressed his belief that Iran is not building a nuclear weapon and that a military strike would at best delay any future production of a nuclear weapon. Secretary of State Clinton on the other hand took a more hawkish tone saying in discussing Iran’s expansion of its enrichment site near Qom, "The circumstances surrounding this latest action are especially troubling. There is no plausible justification for this production. Such enrichment brings Iran a significant step closer to having the capability to produce weapons-grade highly enriched uranium." (See here) James Clapper, U.S. director of national intelligence raised the stakes by claiming, during Congressional testimony. that Iran is now more willing to carry out attacks inside the U.S. and that intelligence agencies were worried about attacks on U.S. interests around the world. President Obama, on the other hand, said that he did not believe that Iran had the “intentions or capabilities” to attack inside the United States.

I am persuaded that the Obama administration has decided that it does not want war with Iran. If it wanted war, it could have attacked any time in the past three years, rather than waiting until just before the elections. Ignatius reports that Israel believes that it would be a short war. “‘You stay to the side, and let us do it,’ one Israeli official is said to have advised the United States. A short-war scenario assumes five days or so of limited Israeli strikes, followed by a U.N.-brokered cease-fire.” Make no mistake; a military strike is an act of war. As the U.S. found to its pain in Iraq and Afghanistan, the enemy has a say in how long the war lasts.

If Obama doesn’t want another major Middle East war right before the elections, he had better say to Israel, not only no, but hell no! To do this he will need to make the case for diplomacy and defy the Israel Lobby. Is this likely in an election year? Probably not.

Technorati Tags: Iran,Barack Obama