An all to familiar path

It has been two years since I have been in Iran, but I still recall a moving meeting with a young Iranian woman in Persepolis, the ancient capital of the Persian Empire in the time of Cyrus and Xerxes. Her tears accented her words and exposed her patriotism. “Our country used to be so strong and now we are nothing.” I often wonder how she feels today as we watch the US and its allies walk down the same path to war as we traveled in Iraq.

Once again we are seeing accusations followed by escalating rhetoric and increasing confrontation. The Obama administration began its Iran “engagement” with a brief meeting with Iranian officials which resulted in a proposal for an exchange of nuclear material. When Iran rejected some of the terms, the engagement was over. In recent weeks Secretary of State Clinton has been in the Middle East to rally support for “crippling sanctions” on Iran and for Saudi Arabian oil supply increases in event that supplies are disrupted by a regional conflict.

Movement down this path is not surprising since a number of Obama advisors, particularly Dennis Ross, have advocated these steps for some time. Ross outlined his recommendations in a policy paper issued by the Bipartisan Policy Center in October 2008. (The whole report is here) Among the findings of the study group were:

• Iran is the “most significant strategic threat to the United States”.
• Iran could be “nuclear weapons capable within four weeks”.
• Any US-Iranian talks should be limited to a “predetermined period of time”.
• Should diplomatic engagement not achieve its objectives the “…President must turn to more intensive sanctions”.
• Sanctions would be “difficult to enforce fully without a blockade”.
• “The Islamic Republic would most certainly claim such blockades were acts of war and would likely respond…” (Blockades are acts of war under International Law)
• These actions would “significantly impact the supply and price of oil”
• “Any military action would run the risk of significant US and allied losses, triggering wide scale Hezbollah and Hamas rocket attacks on Israel and producing unrest in a number of Persian Gulf states”.
• “We believe that a military strike is a feasible option”.

This report was endorsed by Independent Democrat Senator Joe Lieberman and Republican John Kyl. There is little evidence of bipartisanship in Washington these days. About the only thing that Republicans and Democrats seem to be able to agree on is war.

Light on Iran

In the past two weeks events have occurred that have helped shed some light on the state of politics in the Islamic Republic of Iran. Observers such as myself have felt that events on February 11, the anniversary of the 1979 Islamic Revolution, would demonstrate the breadth and depth of the opposition (green) movement as well as the level of confidence that the regime has in dealing with the opposition and its level of concern about the threatening language and actions of the US, Europe and Israel.

The relatively low key response to the Feb 11 demonstrations and the ability of the security forces to control the demonstrations without “tanks in the street” revealed that the regime does not, at this time, see the opposition as an existential threat and it can now turn its attention to the larger issues that it faces such as a collapsing economy and military threats from US/Israel.

Last week a report was released by WorldPublicOpinion.org (The whole report is here) which analyzed multiple polls conducted by both Iranian and western polling organizations. The poll results indicate that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad may have legitimately won the election. The reaction of the regime to the election, by manipulating poll results and fiercely resisting all calls for a recount, may have been unnecessary and needlessly inflamed opposition parties. The regime acted as though it had rigged the vote. Recognition that Ahmadinejad actually have won may account for the fact that opposition leaders have turned their attention from the election to civil rights.

There are other interesting outcomes from the polls in addition to the fact that 60% of respondents said that they voted for Ahmadinejad.

1. 83% believe the election was free and fair
2. 81% believe Ahmadinejad is the legitimate President
3. 85% are very or somewhat satisfied with the current Islamic Republic system of government
4. 77% have an unfavorable view of the US government
5. Over 60% believe that there should be unconditional negotiations with the US and restoration of diplomatic ties. (Not currently Iranian government policy)
6. 97% are in favor of Iran’s nuclear program including 38% who favor the development of nuclear weapons.

These results are relatively uniform over regime and opposition supporters.

The Obama administration would be wise to take these facts into consideration as they pursue their Iran policies. Refusing to deal with Ahmadinejad government and expecting that the regime will fall any time soon is wishful thinking. Any expectation that an opposition government will come to power (an extremely unlikely event at best) and accede to western demands is a complete fantasy. As Henry Kissinger once said, “Diplomacy is a game that is played with the pieces that are on the table.” The US needs to forget the saber rattling and seriously engage with the Islamic Republic.

Technorati Tags: Iran Election,Iran

Changing Landscape

When I was at a conference on US – Arab relations last fall in Washington, DC, one of the panel members reminded me that when thinking about the Middle East, one should wake up every morning and question everything that you think you know. For several years, when people have asked me whether I thought that the US/Israel would attack Iran, I always answered “No”. My rational was that the Iranian strategy of “asymmetrical deterrence” by arming Hezbollah and Hamas as a deterrent to an Israeli attack had worked pretty well and at a minimum we would have advance warning as Israel would have to attack Lebanon in order to neutralize Hezbollah before attacking Iran.

I woke up this week to news that the US was installing Ballistic Missile Defense (BMD) systems in Qatar, Bahrain, Kuwait and the UAE, upgrading the current systems in Israel and Saudi Arabia and deploying BMD equipped warships in the Persian Gulf. If effectively deployed, these systems change the balance of power landscape in the region and free up Israel to attack Iran. While spun by the US as defensive deployment, when combined with Obama’s “axis of evil lite” State of the Union speech (Iran and North Korea face “severe consequences” if they fail to meet western demands) and Hilary Clinton’s threat that China faces “diplomatic isolation” if it fails to support sanctions on Iran (How this would be accomplished is unclear. Perhaps we could refuse to sell them our trillions of dollars of debt.), the deployments must have the Iranian regime rethinking their strategic posture.

The initial Iranian reaction has been muted, calling the US missile shield a “puppet show”. (There may be truth in this conjecture as this week’s test of the upgraded BMD system failed.) On the other hand the Iranian leadership, controlled by hardliners associated with the Revolutionary Guard, must be asking themselves, is war with the US/Israel inevitable and if so how do we respond.

We will get a clue to their thinking on February 11, the anniversary of the Iranian Revolution. The opposition (green) movement is planning further demonstrations against the regime and how the regime reacts may tell us whether they think war is inevitable. Up until now the regime has intimidated demonstrators with beatings, arrests, torture and executions. If the regime fears outside aggression, they will move to crush the opposition and that will mean tanks in the street.

If the Iranian regime concludes that war is inevitable, they may also conclude that the most viable strategy is a preemptive strike before the systems are operational. In any war, if you going to throw the first stone, it had better be a big one.

Technorati Tags: Iran,Israel

I Quit

It appears as though President Obama has largely given up on making any progress towards resolving the difficult issues in Israel/Palestine. After a much publicized start which included the appointment of George Mitchell as special envoy and Obama’s Cairo speech to the Arab and Muslim worlds, the whole situation has deteriorated into a stalemate.

In a recent Time magazine interview Obama acknowledged that he had overestimated his ability to get the Israelis and Palestinians to move the peace process forward. He should have realized that to achieve any results, he was going to have to spend a lot of political capital to take on the Israel lobby in the US.

Once Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu realized that he had the upper hand, he stonewalled Obama on every initiative. When it was rumored that Obama would send a letter to the parties outlining a framework for a settlement, Netanyahu immediately preempted it by declaring that Jerusalem would eternally be part of Israel and that Israel would retain control over the border between any Palestinian state and Jordan. Last week’s last ditch effort by George Mitchell to rescue the situation was rebuffed by all parties.

It has long been clear to many observers, this one included, that a two state solution is no longer possible and a single state in Palestine for all its citizens will be the only way out. As Israeli activist Jeff Halper recently pointed out to me, “You and I can say a single state is the best solution, but only the Palestinians can decide that it is what they want”. Until they decide, there is little that the international community can do to help.

Israel is more being seen, not as the only democracy in the Middle East, but as the only apartheid state in the world. In response to this, the “Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions” (BDS) movement to pressure Israel to change is growing, particularly in Europe. The US, as it was in South Africa, will be late to the party. The fact that only 9 minutes of a 70 minute State of the Union address was devoted to foreign relations shows that the US is turning inward. Someone else will have to take the lead.

An Inconvenient Question

Helen Thomas, the 90 year old dean of the Washington press corps, has been a thorn in the side of US administrations for the 50 years since the administration of John F. Kennedy. Her penetrating questions and aggressive follow-up have been something that officials have wished that they could avoid. Avoiding her is just not possible. As the “Dean”, she sits in the front row and by protocol officials must call on her.

Her latest confrontation was with Deputy National Security Advisor John Brennan at a press briefing about the Christmas attack on a Detroit bound airliner. (A clip is here.) Ms Thomas wanted to know, “What is the administration’s conclusion about the motivation of those who want to attack us?” Mr. Brennan tried twice to answer a different question and then ignored the question altogether.

One doesn’t have to speculate about the answer. Those have been involved in the attacks have been very public about their motivation. Everyone from Nidal Hassan, the Fort Hood attacker, to Human al Balawi, the attacker of the CIA in Afghanistan, to the young Virginian men apprehended in Pakistan on their way to fight NATO in Afghanistan, to the young Minnesota men fighting the Ethiopian occupation of Somalia have said the same thing.

They have said that they were motivated by western occupation of Muslim countries in Iraq, Afghanistan and Palestine, by the torture and degradation of Muslims in Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay and by western attacks on Muslims in Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia and Gaza. They heard George Bush say that this a “Crusade” and Bernard Lewis say that this is a “clash of civilizations” and they believe them.

When John Brennan was in the private sector, he likened terrorism to pollution with the terrorists being “particles in the air”. When you want to stop pollution you don’t deal with the “particles in the air”, you deal with the smoke stack. If the administration were to answer Helen Thomas’ question honestly, the answer would raise at lot of inconvenient issues concerning US policies in the Middle East and around the world that would be politically difficult to deal with. Better for them to chase the particles, but not better for American security.

A Deadly Friendship

News coverage of the failed attempt by a Nigerian born man to detonate an explosive device on a Detroit bound aircraft has overshadowed a perhaps more significant event in Afghanistan. On December 30^th a Jordanian al Qaeda operative, who was recruited by Jordanian intelligence to penetrate al Qaeda, detonated a bomb at a CIA base in Khost, Afghanistan. This attack killed 7 CIA officers and the Jordanian intelligence officer assigned to the case, the deadliest single attack in CIA history.

The Pakistani Taliban, the Afghan Taliban and al Qaeda all took credit for this attack. It is possible that the claims of joint responsibility are a result of the fact that the attack was successful. Success has many fathers, but failure is an orphan. It, however, is also possible that these three organizations are now beginning to cooperate.

Ever since 2002 when NATO forces with the assistance of Iran and the non-Pashtun Northern Alliance overthrew the Taliban Pashtun led government and drove al Qaeda and Taliban leadership into Pakistan, the three groups have largely operated separately with different agendas. Until the US persuaded the Pakistani government to confront the Pakistani Taliban, this group had an agenda of establishing a Islamic mini-state within the tribal areas bordering Afghanistan. They now have more aggressively challenged the weak Pakistan government. The Afghan Taliban was conducting an insurgency against the NATO occupation and the Karzai government. Al Qaeda is focused on attacking “western imperialists” and their allied Arab governments.

If these three groups begin to see the “enemy of my enemy as my friend” it will greatly complicate the regional situation. Not only will it expand the recruiting pool of militant fighters, but it will also facilitate the exchange of tactical information and intelligence resources. US Arab allies, such as Jordan and Saudi Arabia will be more exposed as their own Islamist populations become more militant and oppose their governments’ policies.

The most exposed is Jordan. The direct involvement of Jordanian forces in Afghanistan fighting other Muslims has been vehemently attacked by the Jordanian Muslim Brotherhood. (A story on this is here) King Abdullah is no where near as politically astute as his father or as adept at balancing competing forces. His government will be under increased stress. In this region it is dangerous to be an enemy of the US, but to be a friend can be deadly.

Middle East war number three?

Following the Christmas Day attempted attack on Northwest Airlines Flight 253 which appears to have been orchestrated by al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula based in Yemen, the Obama administration’s response has come under attack by hardliners in the Republican Party. Former Vice President Dick Cheney said that Obama’s reaction was “low key” and that he did not “want to admit we’re at war”. Always sensitive to the charge that he is soft on security issues, Obama responded by announcing a “partnership with the Yemeni government – training and equipping their security forces, sharing intelligence and working with them to strike al Qaeda terrorists”.

This expansion of the “war on terror” more deeply involves the US in a long standing, complicated and intractable conflict. The $67 million spent last year in Yemen to assist the corrupt and unpopular government in confronting a number of insurgencies is sure to be increased next year.

The biggest threat to the central government is the al Houthi rebellion in the North. The Houthi complaints range from government corruption to the influence of the Saudi influenced Wahabi Sunni Muslims. The Houthis are Zaydi Shias who would like to return the caliphate which ruled Yemen for 1000 years. This will involve the US in a civil war which has the potential to become a Saudi – Iranian proxy war. Signs of this have already appeared with the recent Saudi attack on Houthi positions near the Yemen border and the appearance of Iranian sourced weapons in Yemen.

While a priority for the Yemen government, the Houthi rebellion has little to do with the al Qaeda threat to the US. Al Qaeda’s bases are in the south where sympathetic tribes such as al Fadhli are also fighting an insurgency against the central government. Al Fadhli fighters are veterans of the war against the Soviet Union in Afghanistan and have been funded by Osama bin Laden.

Increasing US involvement in a complicated civil conflict in which most of the funding will go to fight groups other than those threatening the US, will be siphoned off to line the pockets of corrupt politicians or will help smuggle weapons to rebel groups in neighboring Somalia, seems like a recipe for a quagmire that will do little to make the US safer while risking escalating sectarian conflict in the region.

Happy Holidays

At this time of year, the Christian world observes the birth of an itinerate Jewish prophet 2000 years ago. According to legend, he was born in Bethlehem, a small village outside of Jerusalem, after his family made the  journey from Nazareth in the Galilee to Bethlehem. This is a journey that they could not have made today since the Israeli separation  barrier cuts Bethlehem off from Jerusalem. The Israeli Ministry of Tourism, with a wonderful sense of irony, reminds us of the meaning of Bethlehem for Christians by posting a sign saying “Peace be with you” on the barrier.

Jesus was born into a region that was experiencing a brutal occupation, not all that different from what is happening today. One wonders if his mother felt the same sense of doubt about the wisdom of bringing another human life into the world in that environment that was expressed to me by young Palestinian women.

There were numerous other Jewish Messiahs in Palestine 2000 years ago who advocated overthrow of the Roman occupation and liberation of the Jews by force of arms. Interestingly, the only one who is remembered today is Jesus of Nazareth.

Jesus advocated for a different approach to confronting the occupation. The Roman model was “peace through victory”. Jesus proposed a model based on loving God and your neighbor as yourself. He reminded his followers to do good to those that hate you and to turn the other cheek. After seeing the threat that this approach posed for the Roman Empire and what   it resulted in for Jesus, most of us have decided to abandon it.

President Obama seemed to be taking us back to the Roman times when he said in his Nobel Prize acceptance speech “Instruments of war do have a role in preserving peace”. During this holiday time Christians and their Jewish and Muslim cousins pray for “peace on earth and good will toward men”. The problem is that after the New Year, we pack up this concept along with the holiday decorations and go back to shooting at each other. We haven’t learned much in 2000 years.

Merry Christmas

What now Iran?

Over the past six months, the “green” protest movement in Iran has morphed from a protest against the disputed election of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to a movement calling for the overthrow of the Islamic regime. The chants have changed from “Down with Russia and China” to “Down with the dictator Khamenei”. Beginning with the Student Day (December 7 on the western calendar) protests, the protesters have seemed to become more radical and the green color of Mir Hussein Mousavi’s campaign is less in evidence.

When I was in Iran two years ago, most people that I talked to wanted to see the regime change, but did not want another revolution. While there was no agreement about what the best form of government would be, most people would have been comfortable with a reformed Islamic republic. This may no longer be possible.

Iran is a country with over 70 ethnic, tribal and religious groups. In terms of diversity it makes Iraq look like a cohesive state. The binding glue of the state is its Persian history and its overwhelming majority of Shia Muslims. If “regime change” occurs, without a government emerging that reflects at least one of these factors, chaos that makes Iraq look like a “cake walk” is possible.

The opposition is beginning to believe that overthrow of the regime is possible. More and more I am seeing “this regime is history”. The riot police are beginning to show the “V” sign of the opposition. A quote from Iran’s revered poet Ferdosi “When a person’s (regime’s) end comes, the things they do will do them no good” is everywhere on Twitter.

The opposition movement is a leaderless movement and so no one will naturally appear to assume power. Mousavi was originally anointed as the leader, primarily because his wife motivated the women. The movement now seems to have gone by him. A similar phenomenon occurred during the 1979 revolution when only an invasion by Sadaam Hussein’s Iraq rallied the people around the government and solidified the position of Khomeini and the Islamists.

Israel and the US appear to be positioning themselves to fulfill Sadaam Hussein’s role of uniting the Iranians. In 1979, the US began a policy of engagement with Iran, but this was torpedoed by the Israel Lobby and their Congressional allies. We seem to be on the same path. (This story is here) Obama had better start thinking about what sort of outcome he would like to see and what policies make the most sense.

The Afghanistan Dilemma

Last week President Obama outlined his so called “surge and exit” strategy for turning around the deteriorating situation in the 8 year war in Afghanistan. The surge side of the equation is being promptly implemented by the US and its European allies. The exit side is a little more problematic. Faced with criticism from Republican hawks, Secretary of Defense Gates and Secretary of State Clinton attempted to frame the July 2011 “exit” date as decision point rather that a hard date for withdrawal. The major accomplishment of the “new” is to kick the can down the road.

Given the fact that the Army/Marine Corp counter insurgency manual, authored by current CentCom commander General David Petraus, calls for troop levels somewhere north of 600,000 and a 7-10 year time frame, one might be forgiven for being skeptical of a significant 18 month turnaround with 150,000 troops.

The strategy outlined by the administration is reminiscent of the Soviet Union strategy during their ill fated Afghanistan adventure in the 1980’s; control and stabilize the population centers and the highways connecting them and rely on a puppet government in Kabul to take over. While there are similarities to the failed Soviet campaign, there are also differences. The US is not faced with an insurgent force armed and equipped by a major power providing them with Stinger missiles and thus is able to control the air. The US is also attempting to rebuild the country and not destroy it. On the other side, the Soviets were relying on a much more competent government in Kabul.

On balance, the US will probably succeed in stabilizing some population centers and forcing the insurgency into Pakistan and the Afghan countryside where they can be harassed from the air. The major risk to this plan is that in 18 months we will see some progress and the military will come back to Obama and say “See, we are making progress. Just give us another 50,000 troops and another two years and we can “win”. It will be hard for Obama to say no!

I am old enough to remember Vietnam where steady escalation of troops, casualties, and financial commitment finally lead to the conclusion that the war was un-winnable. Obama had only bad choices, but he picked the wrong one.

Jihad 2.0

Over the last few weeks, President Obama has been both Commander in Chief and Consoler in Chief. As Commander in Chief, he has grappled with the thorny questions of what does victory in Afghanistan look like, what is a proper strategy and what are appropriate troop levels. As Consoler in Chief he has tried to help the nation deal with the murder of 13 people by Major Nidal Hasan at Fort Hood, Texas. The media has covered these two events in depth, but has not addressed the linkage between them.

Obama is taking his time considering the proper goals and strategy. In February he said that his goal was to “make sure that it (Afghanistan) is not a safe haven for al Qaida”. If this is the definition of victory, then we “won” in 2002 when the Taliban was overthrown and al Qaida was driven into Pakistan. Since then drone attacks in Pakistan have devastated their leadership and destroyed their ability to organize and implement major attacks such as 9/11. Even if the Taliban returned to power, it is unlikely that they would make themselves a target again by inviting al Qaida back.

In response al Qaida has changed from a strategy of training fighters for a conventional battle to a media and internet based strategy targeted at angry and disaffected Muslims in western countries. Sophisticated websites (Examples are here and here.) call on Muslims around the world to conduct a “holy war” against the “Western Zionist crusaders”. The message resonates with some Muslims who watch innocent Muslims killed and wounded by “Western Zionist crusaders” in Iraq, Afghanistan and Gaza. The strategy has proven successful in motivating attacks from the sophisticated bombings in London and Madrid to the free lance shootings at Fort Hood.

As long as the US continues to be seen as part of the “Western Zionist crusade”, we will continue to face this type of attack. For democracies these are extremely difficult to prevent. Sending 40,000 more troops to Afghanistan is, in my opinion, fighting the “last war”. It will only give credibility to the al Qaida message that the US is waging a war on Islam.

The realm of self help

During most of the 20th century international law was the “realm self help”. The most powerful nations in the world decided what international law was and then imposed it on weaker nations. No where was this more evident that the “victor’s justice” that was imposed on Germany and Japan following WW II. The victorious allies decided that the military and civilian leaders were responsible for war crimes and crimes against humanity, tried them, convicted them and imprisoned or executed them.

Following the founding of the UN, international law has become more codified through a series of treaties and judicial decisions, but it is clearly an evolving process. Under a UN Human Rights Committee mandate South African judge Richard Goldstone issued a report that found that there was credible evidence that Israel and Hamas committed war crimes and crimes against humanity during the 2008 Gaza war. He called upon the parties to conduct credible investigations within six months and, if they did not, that the cases be referred to the International Criminal Court (ICC).

The response of the US and other western countries indicates that we are returning to the “realm of self” where the powerful nations, the guys with the biggest guns, get to decide who is called to account.

When a case was brought in the UK against Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak, a UK court found that he could not be arrested since the alleged crimes were perpetrated in his role as a government minister. When I called my Congressman to request that he not support a House of Representatives resolution which demanded that the Obama administration oppose the Goldstone Report and any referral to the ICC, I was advised by his staff that prevailing opinion in Washington was that the behavior alleged by Goldstone was not the business of the international community and that Israel and Hamas were responsible for conducting their own investigations. (It certainly was the prevailing opinion as the resolution passed 336 – 34)

If this is the state of international law, western powers should have insisted that Slobodan Milosevic and Radavan Karadcic be investigated by Serbia and Republika Srpska and be given immunity from their crimes committed during the Balkan conflict based on their positions as government officials. Is it any wonder that emerging and third world countries accuse the US and other western powers of a double standard?

Make me do it

Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu’s stonewalling of US demands that he freeze all settlement activity, loosen the blockade of Gaza and improve conditions on the ground in the West Bank has shown that the US has few options for applying pressure on Israel.

The release of the Goldstone Report which outlined allegations of war crimes committed by Hamas and Israel during the 2008 war in Gaza was an opportunity for the US to exert pressure in a way that did not require Congressional action. The US could have signaled its displeasure by abstaining or voting for UN Human Rights Committee approval of the report. Instead, the US intensely lobbied its European allies and the Palestinian Authority to prevent approval. Predictably, Israel and what Rabbi Michael Lerner calls its “ethical cretin” allies attacked the report on all fronts.

Many who support a just solution to the Israel/Palestine problem have called this just another example US political leaders caving in to the Israel Lobby. There may, however, be another explanation.

The Obama administration is engaged in a major political battle over healthcare reform. In this battle every Democratic vote counts. Congressmen and Senators, such as Steny Hoyer, Howard Berman, Evan Bayh and Chris Dodd, who take their marching orders from AIPAC, would not hesitate to torpedo healthcare reform to punish Obama for pressuring Israel. Obama may have been trying to buy time until after the healthcare reform issue is settled.

During the campaign, then candidate, Obama was asked during a small fundraising event in NJ if it were possible to resolve the Israel/Palestine issue without pressuring Israel by reducing or cutting off financial aid. In a manner reminiscent of the parable style of Jesus, Obama answered the question by telling this story.

At the beginning of WW II A. Philip Randolph, President of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, lobbied FDR to promote equal employment opportunities. At the end of the meeting, FDR said “You have persuaded me; I agree with you. Now make me do it”. Randolph responded by organizing a march on Washington and FDR issued Executive Order 8802 which banned discrimination in defense industries and established the Fair Employment Practices Committee.

When the issue of pressure on Israel resurfaces in the spring there may be an opportunity to “Make Obama do it”.

Blow up in Iran

On Sunday a coordinated suicide bombing in the restive Iranian province of Sistan-Baluchistan killed 42 people including several senior Revolutionary Guard commanders. The radical Sunni opposition group Jundallah (Army of God) claimed responsibility. Iranian authorities have accused Pakistan, Britain and the US of being complicit in the attack; a charge that the US has vehemently denied. This denial, however, is suspect.
Last year New Yorker magazine’s senior national security correspondent Seymour Hersh wrote an article in which he detailed the Bush administration’ s $400mm covert operations program in Iran. (The entire article is here) The program functions by providing funding, weapons and training to Iranian opposition groups such as Jundallah, MEK and PJAK in an effort to undermine the regime in the Islamic Republic. Hersh describes the US relationship with Jundallah in these words:
“The Administration may have been willing to rely on dissident organizations in Iran even when there was reason to believe that the groups had operated against American interests in the past. The use of Baluchi elements, for example, is problematic, Robert Baer, a former C.I.A. clandestine officer who worked for nearly two decades in South Asia and the Middle East, told me. “The Baluchis are Sunni fundamentalists who hate the regime in Tehran, but you can also describe them as Al Qaeda,” Baer told me. “These are guys who cut off the heads of nonbelievers—in this case, it’s Shiite Iranians. The irony is that we’re once again working with Sunni fundamentalists, just as we did in Afghanistan in the nineteen-eighties.” Ramzi Yousef, who was convicted for his role in the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center, and Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who is considered one of the leading planners of the September 11th attacks, are Baluchi Sunni fundamentalists.
One of the most active and violent anti-regime groups in Iran today is the Jundallah, also known as the Iranian People’s Resistance Movement, which describes itself as a resistance force fighting for the rights of Sunnis in Iran. “This is a vicious Salafi organization whose followers attended the same madrassas as the Taliban and Pakistani extremists,” Nasr told me. “They are suspected of having links to Al Qaeda and they are also thought to be tied to the drug culture.” The Jundallah took responsibility for the bombing of a busload of Revolutionary Guard soldiers in February, 2007. At least eleven Guard members were killed. According to Baer and to press reports, the Jundallah is among the groups in Iran that are benefitting from U.S. support.”
These types of highly classified covert programs take a long time to unwind and have a long tail that even their CIA program officers can’t control. They also can be the spark that ignites a conflagration. We can only hope that this is not one of those.

Confrontation with Iran

This week the Iranian nuclear enrichment program was once again front and center on the world stage. On Monday Iranian officials notified the IAEA that they had begun construction of a second nuclear enrichment facility outside the city of Qom. This announcement prompted a flurry of diplomatic activities by the US and its European allies which culminated in a hastily called press conference featuring President Obama, French President Sarkozy and British Prime Minister Gordon Brown. Each in turn roundly condemned Iran for their “direct challenge” to the NPT regime, “serial deception” and challenge to the entire international community. The western media flashed headlines such as “US and allies warn Iran over nuclear deception” and British “Foreign Secretary David Miliband refuses to rule out military action against Iran nuclear plant”.
Iranian President Ahmadinejad responded that the plant was never a secret and that Iran had lived up to its NPT obligations.
The reality of all this is much more nuanced. The US has been aware of this facility for some time and has elected ignore it. The plant, therefore, is hardly a secret. Iran’s case that has lived up to its obligations has some validity. The treaty as ratified by Iran requires that the IAEA be notified 180 days before the introduction of nuclear material. The 2003 protocol, which Iran never ratified, introduced the requirement to notify the IAEA immediately upon the decision to construct a nuclear facility.
The Iranians may have felt that they were doing something positive ahead of the 5+1 talks scheduled for Oct. 1, since they are probably a year away from introducing nuclear material and may have been surprised by the reaction. They did not, however, count American domestic politics.
Having been stonewalled by Israel and the Arab countries on his Israel/Palestine policy, Obama could not afford to appear weak on another Middle East issue. This allowed the administration hardliners on Iran, such as Hilary Clinton and Dennis Ross, to carry the day and raise the specter of “crippling sanctions” and military action.
With their harsh aggressive rhetoric, the western leaders may have put themselves in a corner from which there may be no easy exit. Since any sanctions regime is not likely to be either effective or “crippling” and the unstable hard-line government in Tehran may welcome the conflict as a way of uniting their divided country, the western leaders may, once again, have to choose between backing down in the face of intransigence or taking military action. Will the Iranians sit idly by awaiting an attack which could destroy their retaliatory capability or will they chose a preemptive first strike?
It seems to me that that I have seen this movie before in Iraq. I didn’t like the ending.

War crimes in Gaza

This week the investigative report on the Gaza War requested by the United Nations Human Rights Council was released. The investigating commission, chaired by South African judge and prosecutor Richard Goldstone, found that there were violations of Human Rights Law and war crimes perpetrated by both Israel and Hamas. The report recommended that the case be submitted to the International Criminal Court for possible prosecution.
Since neither Hamas nor Israel are signatories to the ICC treaty, the referral would need to be made by the UN Security Council. Israel is counting on the US with its veto power to prevent this from happening. With this in mind, Israel has begun a diplomatic and public relations blitz.
They have accused Goldstone of being biased against Israel and complained that the commission only interviewed Palestinians and selected Israelis. This is a little disingenuous as Goldstone is a Jew and Israel refused to neither cooperate with the investigation nor allow the commission to interview Israeli officials.
Israel has also complained that the report contains more criticism of Israel than of Hamas. This might be expected on the ground of proportionality. During the three week war 1450 Palestinians, mostly civilians were killed while 13 Israelis, including 3 civilians, were killed. The claim that Hamas rocket fire threatened Israeli civilians and thus justified the war raises the larger question, unaddressed in any forum, of what rights to resist are available to a weak people faced with a brutal occupation and overwhelming military capability.
Israel’s diplomatic case with the US is raising two issues. One is that if Israel is held to account for its behavior is Gaza, the US might be held to account for its behavior in Iraq and Afghanistan. The other issue is that any limitations on military action would adversely affect the so called “war on terror”. Both of these issues might have resonated more with the Bush administration that the Obama administration.
If the report ends up in the Security Council, a likely outcome, the US will face a difficult dilemma. Do they support Israel and veto any referral to the ICC and send the message that it is business as usual? Does international law only apply to weak third world countries in Africa and the Middle East such as Sudan? Do western, first world, colonial powers get a pass? Or do they allow the complaint to go forward and risk a further split with Israel and the anger of the Israel lobby in Washington?.

Freezing a Conflict in August

Once the uprising in Iran, following the disputed elections, was brutally repressed by the conservative regime, the situation in the Middle East has become reasonably quiet. With respect to the efforts to resolve the intractable Israeli/Arab conflict over Palestine not much seems to be happening. Given Special Envoy George Mitchell’s penchant for quiet diplomacy, something may be happening behind the scenes. More likely nothing seems to be happening because nothing is happening.
Senator Mitchell has met numerous times with Israelis regarding the US demand for a settlement freeze and with Palestinian and other Arab leaders regarding possible steps toward a normalization of relations with Israel. Neither of these tracks is going anywhere. Israel has no interest in stopping its colonization of the West Bank and East Jerusalem and doesn’t particularly care about normalized relations as they don’t see themselves as part of the Middle East. The Arabs feel as though they bought the settlement freeze in Oslo and have no interest in buying it again.
In my opinion the Obama administration has finally realized that there is no room for a two state solution in which Israeli Jews and Palestinians live alongside each other in peace. The maximum that Israel will give is less than the minimum than the Palestinians can accept.
Israel has no incentive to compromise further. Their overwhelming military power supported by the US and their demonstrated willingness to use it to crush resistance has consolidated the occupation and made Israel largely secure. Netanyahu’s vision of a “Palestinian state” that consists of isolated self governing enclaves in which the PA manages day to day issues and Israel controls borders, air space, security, water, infrastructure and access is largely in place. As Netanyahu says “Call it a state if you will.”
This situation not only serves Israel’s desire for space for settlement growth, but also the need for the Fatah led PA for a continued flow of US/European aid flowing through the PA that can be skimmed for personnel gain.
The inability of the Obama administration to get Israel to accede to their demand for a settlement freeze has demonstrated that there is no political will in the US to constrain Netanyahu from implementing his vision. We are moving into a “frozen conflict” mode. The danger of frozen conflicts is that they have a tendency to thaw periodically.

Shifting Sands

The political landscape in the Middle East has shifted dramatically in the past few months. This shift has had an impact not only in the region, but also in the West. Part of the change is a result of the “Obama Effect” which culminated in his Cairo speech to the Arab and Muslim world.

Over this period there have been a number of changes in regional governments. Israel has elected a hard right Likud led government whose policies on settlements and a Palestinian state have led to a confrontation with the US. The disputed Iranian election has caused the Islamic regime to focus more on internal divisions than on foreign affairs.

All this has caused Syria, Hezbollah and Hamas to see Iran as a less reliable ally and to reach out to the US. Authoritarian Arab countries, such as Saudi Arabia and Egypt, whose policies are at odds with the views of their citizens, are happy to see Iran, their regional rival, distracted. On the other hand, they are concerned that their citizens may follow the lead of the Iranians and demand regime change.

Israel’s hard line position on settlements has opened it up to strong pressure from the West. Britain has cancelled several military contracts with Israel citing the use of these weapons in the Gaza war as a violation of UK law.

The US, particularly, is struggling to decide how to navigate this shifting landscape. There seems to be agreement within the administration to engage with Syria. However, with respect to Hamas the divisions within the administration are exposed. Obama’s conciliatory words toward Hamas in Cairo and former UN Ambassador Thomas Pickering’s meeting in Geneva with Hamas leaders prompted a denial by Hilary Clinton that the administration had changed the Bush era policy of isolation or that the administration had anything to do with the Geneva meeting.

The US and Israel have reached a stand off on settlements and there appears to be little room for compromise. One side will have to cave in. How to deal with this situation has divided the Obama administration. This reality prompted a reporter to ask State Department spokesman Robert Wood if the US was considering sanctions against Israel. (The fact that this question would even be asked shows how much the landscape has changed.) Wood’s response was “It’s premature to talk about that.” The next day a different spokesperson felt it necessary to deny that the US would exert economic pressure on Israel.

Anyone who claims to know how this will play out is smarter than I. One thing is certain. The world is a different place.

The gift that keeps on giving

Following the brutal crackdown by the Iranian government on pro-reform demonstrators, an air of relative calm and melancholy appears to have settled over Iranian cities. (Some thoughts on this from an Iranian are here.) What the ultimate outcome of the events of the past month will be, only time will tell. “Victorious” President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has returned to the public stage although with a somewhat more subdued message.
Israel’s hard-line politicians and their neo-conservative and neo-liberal supporters in the US, who advocate for a policy of economic and military confrontation with Iran, must be breathing a sigh of relief. For them Ahmadinejad is the gift that keeps on giving. Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu has been trying to persuade the Obama administration that Iran is the highest priority in the Middle East and the Israeli/Palestinian issue should be put on the back burner. Just when American pressure on freezing Israeli settlements was becoming intense, along comes Ahmadinejad to save the day.
For those advocating confrontation with Iran, it is important to have a public foil in power in Iran. Just as George W. Bush was an easy target for the hardliners in Iran, Ahmadinejad also provides an easy target. Bellicose rhetoric in the west helps provide support for hard-liners in Iran and undercuts the reformists who want dialogue with the west. Neo-conservatives and neo-liberals in the US have stepped up to help Netanyahu change the subject.
John “bomb, bomb, bomb, Iran” McCain criticized Obama for not using more confrontational rhetoric regarding the suppression of peaceful demonstrators. Neo-con spokesperson William Kristol has criticized Obama for being “resolutely irresolute” with respect to confrontation with Iran. Reverting to the Bush administration’s “carrot and stick” approach, Hilary “I will obliterate Iran” Clinton has called for “even stricter sanctions on Iran to try to change the behavior of the regime". Former Iran special envoy, now in the White House, Dennis Ross has called for a brief 90 day diplomatic effort followed by force, arguing that “the use of force against Iran will look dramatically different should good faith, direct negotiations be tried and fail.”
All of this was modest compared to “loose lips” Joe “I am a Zionist” Biden’s statement that the US would not stop Israel from attacking Iran. This may have been a case of opening his mouth without engaging his brain so typical of Biden. The next day Obama said that the US has “absolutely not” given Israel a green light to attack Iran.
The denial, however, was lost in Iran as Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei used Biden’s statement to rally his divided people against “meddling” western leaders. Since the vast majority of Iranians support a peaceful nuclear program, the only way to prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons capability is to persuade them that they don’t need nuclear weapons and that such development is not in their national interest. This will require engagement, compromise and sustained diplomacy. The rhetoric of confrontation will not get the job done.

What now for Iran?

The events of the last couple of weeks in Iran, in which millions of courageous Iranians from all walks of life have taken to the streets in the face violent repression to protest a stolen election, have produced riveting real time theater around the world. These events have also drastically changed the political landscape not only in Iran, but also in the US and in the Middle East. As the Iranian conflict moves from the streets to the back rooms of the Iranian political elite, political leaders of all stripes will need to figure out how to navigate this changed landscape.

In the space of two weeks the Islamic Republic has changed from what Mohsen Milani calls “a stable institutionalized system of governance with both authoritarian and democratic features, with domestic constituencies …” (What I call a pseudo-democracy.) to a brutal, repressive military dictatorship. As the street protests fade, the Iranian political elite, hardliners, moderates and reformists, are working behind the scenes to understand how to deal with this new reality. It will take time for their decisions to emerge.

In the US, the searing images of young Iranian women in headscarves facing down riot police and being shot down for their efforts will take a long time to fade from the American consciousness. No longer will the American vision of Iranians be that of radical fanatics and quiescent, repressed, powerless women. They will be able to get by these stereotypes and see them as people like themselves, struggling to make a better life for themselves and their families. Their perspective on American Iranian policy will certainly be different.

In the larger Middle East, groups like Hamas, Hezbollah and Syria who have counted on support from the Iranian regime may begin to question the stability of this support base. Whatever the face of the Iranian regime that emerges from the current conflict, it will be different from that of the past. A reformist or moderate government will be more open to engagement with the west. A hard-line regime will be distracted by the complex question of how to deal with a majority of the population, including almost all of the educated elite who are the backbone of the economy, who do not support them. Hamas, Hezbollah and Syria may find it expedient to hedge their bets and improve their relations with the west.

Faced with this changing landscape US policy makers will be faced with difficult short and medium term policy choices. In the short term, the Obama administration, in my opinion, should maintain its low profile and allow the Iranian people to sort this out. In the medium term, a policy of public, full engagement seems to be the best choice. We can only deal with the government we have, not the government we wish we had. With a hard-line regime, engagement is not likely to bring about much immediate change, but the internal and external pressure will be on the Iranian regime.

As Dr. Martin Luther King said in 1965 on the steps of the Alabama state capital:

"I know you are asking today, "How long will it take?"....
"I come to say to you this afternoon, however difficult the moment, however frustrating the hour, it will not be long, because truth crushed to earth will rise again.”
"How long? Not long, because no lie can live forever.”
"How long? Not long, because you shall reap what you sow....”
"How long? Not long, because the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice."