3:10AM
The set-up on Iran, by Iran?
Tuesday, July 29, 2008 at 3:10AM ARTICLE: “Dangerous games: Some scary noises, but maybe also some progress on the nuclear front,” The Economist, 5 July 2008, p. 60.
Some say Iran just stalls, others say the sanctions really hurt.
What do actual Iranian experts say?
Iranian analysts prefer the view that their leaders, reckoning that dangers may ease following America’s presidential election, simply wish to keep things calm until November.
This is my gut instinct too.
Reader Comments (9)
Why would that be, do you imagine? Could it be that Iran's leaders think they can get a better deal out of Obama than they can out of Bush? That's my gut instinct. I'd like to know if you agree or not. If so, then the opposite would be true: if Obama had a national security outlook in line Bush's, then the Iranians would have an incentive to make a deal now rather than wait. True or not? I assume that a deal will be struck by Obama and that it will probably look a lot like Bush's would have in the end. My problem is with the ethics of this: how many people will have to die while the Iranians wait Bush out and Obama engages them? Couldn't these deaths be prevented? I wonder if you'd care to comment.
are you suggesting Obama change his foreign policy to force Iran to deal with Bush? that seems backwards to me, not least of all b/c the Obama camp can easily argue that their foreign policy will save lives over time. given Bush's record, that's impossible to argue against.
also seems like a strange time to trot out the ethics of foreign policy measured in deaths. Bush's record on this is horrific, especially considering the botched Iraq occupation. let's start there with deaths that could have been prevented, both Iraqi and US military personnel.
If the whole world expects a better deal out of Obama than Bush/McCain, this means that they think they'll advance their interests better. Or not? And why is it a good thing for us to help other countries advance their interests at our expense?
What do you imagine the deal with Iran will look like? I say that it will be about the same in either case, Bush or Obama. That's because countries do not compromise their interests. The interest we have in common with Iran today is in a neutralized Iraq, given that each country can prevent the other's best-case scenario. Obama will not abandon Iraq to Iranian hegemony any more than Bush will. And Iran will not abandon Iraq to US hegemony to Bush rather than to Obama. Geopolitics will not change simply because Obama is president.
If this is true, then some of the deaths that would happen between now and the final Obama-sponsored deal could be prevented. Also the uncertainty that Iraq generates would also be reduced, which can only help reconstruction and development. This is a lot different than speculating on the past, isn't it? Hindsight can always prevent a lot of deaths but that's not relevant to discussion of future policy. Obama would not be required to change his foreign policy (whatever that may be). All he would be required to do is to change the "symbolism", which he's very good at. Instead of talking about "ending" the war, he should talk about "winning" the war. Then the Iranians (and the jihadists) would have an incentive to make a deal now rather than later, thereby preventing death and destruction for all sides.
what will the deal look like? with Bush, it's been 8 years of no deal, Axis of Evil, (but thanks for the help after 9/11). he's softened a little lately, but Obama could certainly do better than that. there's a lot of room for maneuver outside of 'is Iraq ours or theirs?'.
i don't personally think the symbolism of 'ending' or 'winning' is the major point, but i could be wrong.
My answers are, "yes"; "there can be no Win-Win negotiations without both parties seeking such an outcome"; "No"; "if the attitude is not known, the rational response is to assume a Zero-Sum attitude"; "Yes".
This reflects my own opinions but I'm eager to hear yours, since you probably know more about this stuff than I do.
The situation I've outlined describes any negotiation between states. States are not businessmen who each have the goal of maximizing profits. States have other interests, most notably expansion at the expense of other states. If a state is not able to expand on its own, then it will form alliances with other states so as to expand. Both Iran and the US are expansionists. This is why I said that states will not compromise their interests. Their interests are in themselves Zero-Sum.
In the case of Iran and the US, neither state's interests can be fulfilled. That is, neither state can expand (in Iraq) at the expense of the other. The Zero-Sum outcome has been foreclosed. This is why I said that both states have an interest in a neutral Iraq, which is the reason I said that the outcome of these negotiations will be the same no matter who is president. This thought led me to wonder if Obama is being entirely ethical about his position here. Either I'm wrong or he knows this as much as I do. I assume the latter. Therefore I suspect him of using the situation to further his own interests, specifically winning the elections. After that, either he arrives at the same outcome Bush would have some months before or he gives in to Iran. I can't imagine him doing the latter. These months between his election as president and the conclusion will be full of uncertainty and more importantly death and destruction. All of this could be avoided simply by forcing the Iranians' hand right now. The way to do that is making it clear to them that they have no incentive to wait any longer or by giving them a disincentive for waiting any more. The Iranians will be sensitive to this since they blew it waiting Carter out in 1980 only to get Reagan as an interlocutor. They're fully aware of this error and they will not be eager to repeat it.
As for your idea that it has been eight years of no deal and that Bush has softened up lately: I say we don't know that any of this is true although it is certainly the conventional wisdom. We don't know that it's true because we don't even know when the negotiations started. We don't know if he has softened up or if the Iranians have or if both have. These things are unknown simply because the process of foreign relations is not public and transparent. It's usually held in secret until the time is right to make it public. Therefore, since it's public now, we can assume that it has been going on for some time before now and that it has been productive--otherwise it wouldn't be public now. Remember that the Axis of Evil is mirrored by the Great Satan in Iran. Remember that for every bellicose move by Bush against Iran, there has been another bellicose move by Iran. I think that all this is part of the negotiations in the first place--they establish credibility. Diplomacy must always be backed up by force or the threat of force if it is to have any credibility whatsoever.
the example i'm keeping firmly in mind is the US-China detente that Tom often references. win-win without both parties necessarily seeking the good of the other.
i don't claim to know more about this stuff than you, but i do claim to be an expert on what Tom has written ;-)
again, maybe i'm naive, but i believe states can seek win-win situations, especially if they see that it can produce a bigger 'win' for them than an ostensibly win-lose situation. our world is becoming so interdependent through globalization that vested interests exist in both countries to pull for win-win (thinking of China-US again).
truly this is a case where a better solution can be reached by increasing the size of the problem (Rumsfeld?). Iran wants more than influence in Iraq. Tom says they want to be accepted as a regional player. they have influence in Iraq, period, and the first rule of the grand strategist is 'don't fight the inevitable'.
if you won't argue Bush's morality in the past, why debate Obama's ethics now? besides, this is politics. Obama has to distinguish himself from Bush to win. further, i don't grant that your suggestion really would save lives.
true: we can't know all of the details of negotiations. but when the outworking (eg, Lebanon summer of '06) matches up with the data we have, we can feel pretty confident there aren't some secret, worthwhile talks going on.
i get your logic on Axis of Evil v. Great Satan but regard it as sinking to their level. distasteful. everyone knows we have the world's biggest gun and are more than willing to use it. good thing for Iran that we're tied down in Afghanistan and totally burned out from Iraq. no, as Tom always says, we need to woo the people of Iran away from the theocracy of Iran. putting them on the Axis of Evil list was a bad move.
This is why I said that both Iran and the US have an interest in a neutral Iraq. Iran can make Iraq hellish for us again if they want to and we can certainly make things hellish for them in a lot of ways. It's a win-win solution or a next-best-case scenario. Or not?
One of my points is that this "making things hellish" is properly understood as being part of the negotiations: the part where each party must establish credibility. Since the process of foreign relations is of necesity secret then I insist that we just don't know when they started and how they proceeded. That's because they were secret. Whatever data we have is not secret so it just adds to the mystery, in my mind. I say we'll have to wait 50 years to find out what really happened, when most people who would be interested are dead. That's how these things have played out in the past, for example the German involvement in the origins of the First World War has only recently been revealed by historians; the Venona files from the early Cold War were published some five years ago, which, among other things confirmed the Rosenberg's guilt as atomic spies. And so forth. These negotiations with Iran have no reason to be any different.
One reason I don't want to debate Bush's morality with respect to past actions is that I'm just tired of doing so. I'm really not trying to imply that this kind of debate is irrelevant. It is relevent. But another reason is that we can't change the past. The moral implications of a future action takes on much more urgency, don't they? Here we haven't actually done anything wrong and we could change course if we decide that there are compelling reasons to do so. Morality is one such compelling reason. You're right that "this is politics" but who says that politics is completely divorced from morality? Who besides Machiavelli, that it? Politicians must at least give lip-service to morality and we want to think that they really do hold certain moral principles up as non negotiable. This is one reason we vote for one rather than another. If by "this is politics" you mean "politics is all lies anyway so why bother" then this truly undermines Obama's message. He's presenting himself as the "symbol" of a renovation in morality in public affairs. Thus it's completely legitimate to debate the moral implications of his policy proposals.
You can regard the Axis of Evil talk as sinking to their level if you want to and I agree. But my point is that all this is how states negotiate because they must establish credibility. This kind of propaganda is one way to do so. It's going to backfire now, though. How do we convice the public that a charter member of the Axis of Evil is trustworthy enough to make deals with? How do they convince the public that the Great Satan is not dragging them down to Hell? This is where Orwell comes in very handy. Think about he years 1945-47. How to convince the public the "Uncle Joe", a brave and stallworth ally is now the embodiment of evil? In hindsight, it seems natural that if there are two against one and then there's two, then the two will fight it out until there's only one man left standing. But this is not high-minded enough for the American people to vote their tax dollars on.
Therefore I try to see beyond the political rhetoric as much as I can. I see Iran, as evil as they may be (and I have no illusions about that) as having legitimate interests in Iraq--after all, they have been on Iraq's border forever and they have cultural and religious links going back a thoustand years at least. I can't imagine how the US could obviate any of this and thus at some point we must make a deal with them over Iraq if we want to salvage anything over there.
This is why I say that any deal the Obama administration makes with Iran will resemble the deal Bush could have gotten. It's not because Bush is "right" and Obama is a "flipflopper". It's because they both recognize the geopolitical reality of the situation and they can both see beyond the political rhetoric--indeed, they both generate such rhetoric, so it's natural to assume that they can see beyond it.
This is where the ethics of Obama's rhetoric comes in: if the deal will be the same in any case and any time wasted before the deal is struck will be fraught with uncertainty and worse, then it appears clear to me that ethically the politician's interest should be in making the deal sooner rather than later. Besides, we really can't count on conditions remaining static until Obam gets around to making the deal with Iran. It could be that by then the deal is off the table for reasons unknown right now, which is another reason to question Obama's ethical judgement. If he's truly more interested in resolving the situation, he'll support the negotiations today. This wouldn't be as hard as it may sound for someone with Obama's verbal gifts (again taking Orwell into account). When he refuses to do so, it makes me agree with McCain when he says that Obama would rather lose a war than an election. Obama's (and his surrogates) exaggeerated response to this only confirms its truth for me. As for the elections, I cannot vote for someone who demonstrates this attitude because as cynical as I'd like to be, I still believe that ethics has a place in politics. If and when Obama "flipflops" on this, I will vote for him because then, and only then, will he show political courage.
I want to clarify that I'm no Republican. I'm no "Bush supporter". I'm trying to apply my limited analytic powers to a confusing situation, just like you are.
i still doubt there's much secret back-channel going on.
i admire your insistence on politics in morality and basically agree. however, i don't agree with your basic premise (Obama aligning with Bush on Iran would save lives and be morally good), so i remain uncompelled.
i still disagree that 'The Axis of Evil' is necessary to establish cred.
i guess the crux for me is: i give Bush/Cheney almost no credit on Iran. so, in my view, Obama has nothing useful to align himself too. i don't think i have Bush Derangement Syndrome, but i freely confess i'm far from objective.
Your identifying me with Nixon is not called for and I find it insulting, although I recognize that your were being facetious.