Global Policy Memo
Commentary and Counterpoint on World Affairs
Posted by Josh Goodman on March 23, 2009 at 8:13 pm
filed under Middle East
Tagged Engagement, Iran, Israel, Nuclear Weapons, Obama
Have you ever had a friend who went on a trip, and for a few months afterwards you had to listen to nothing but how incredible Australia or wherever was? That’s how I’m starting to feel about New York Times columnist Roger Cohen.
In case you missed it — here, here, and here — Cohen recently visited Iran. All in all, Iran was a lot less scary than Cohen had expected. They even have Jews there. Cohen sees Iran as a pragmatic state, looking out for its own security interests, which can be dissuaded from building nuclear weapons if only the U.S. would also be more “pragmatic” (i.e., accomodating). “Reining in Israeli bellicosity” will also be a necessary part of this strategy.
Cohen sees President Obama’s recent video message to Iran as a wonderful first step:
He abandoned regime change as an American goal. He shelved the so-called military option. He buried a carrot-and-sticks approach viewed with contempt by Iranians as fit only for donkeys. And he placed Iran’s nuclear program within “the full range of issues before us.”
I argue (and hope) that Cohen is misunderstanding Obama’s policy — and therein lies the ambiguous genius of that policy. Cohen confuses pragmatism with abandoning U.S. policy goals. I doubt that the U.S. is really abandoning the goals of regime change in Iran or stopping the Iranian nuclear program. Instead, Obama’s pursuit of engagement is merely a more subtle and prudent attempt to achieve those goals.
Engagement makes Iran appear aggressive and unreasonable by continuing to pursue nuclear weapons in the face of friendly overtures. At the same time, Washington’s measured, non-confrontational approach also makes it easier to get Europe united in team effort to pressure and sanction Iran to abandon its nuclear program. Cohen, whose attitudes represent conventional wisdom in many European circles, is perfect evidence of that.
But there are real reasons why we have had tense relations with Iran, and these are unlikely to disappear. First, Iran’s pursuit of nuclear weapons creates immediate threats to U.S. and international security. By acquiring a nuclear weapon, Iran is likely to inspire its Arab rivals to seek one too, sparking a nuclear arms race in one of the world’s most volatile regions. If that happens, the U.S. may have to decide whether to set up a NATO-style nuclear umbrella in the region (which will check proliferation, but at the risk of getting dragged into conflicts and alliances that are unpopular both in the U.S. and the Middle East), or to continue tackling proliferation on a country-by-country basis, which may become much harder than it already is now. And, of course, the dangers of a nuclear weapon falling into the hands of a terrorist group are obvious.
Our disagreements with Iran go deeper still. Like the Soviet Union, Iran advances a radical, revolutionary model for governing the modern state, and it attempts to export that system to other countries. That system — government based on an interpretation of Islam administered by an autocratic council of religious authorities — is a threat to the type of world order that the U.S. is interested in. Unless and until Iran stops promoting the export of Islamic revolution — for example, to Lebanon and Palestine — the U.S. and Iran are going to have less than cozy relations.
As for “reining in Israeli bellicosity,” Cohen is right that Obama will (and should) put more pressure on Israel, but I see this as part of a strategy not to accommodate Iran, but to undermine its influence (by consolidating Arab support against Iran and undermining the militant agenda that feeds off of Israeli-Arab tension). The very existence of hostility between Iran and Israel speaks to the problematic nature of the Iranian regime, not Israel. Israel is a fraction of the size of Iran and has a fraction of its population and natural resources. Unlike with the Arab states, Israel has no borders with (or anywhere near) Iran, has no history of conflict with it, and the two countries were allies until 1979. The only reason they find themselves in a belligerent posture today is that post-revolutionary Iran has made a mission out of continually threatening Israel and sponsoring terrorist groups that operate against it.
With oil prices low, the Iranian government facing domestic discontent, Iraq increasingly stable, and the U.S. boosting its deployments in Afghanistan, a united American-European policy encouraging Iran to give up its nucelar program will have the greatest chance of success. If there’s anything that can persuade Iran to give up its weapons quest, that is.
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Jeffrey Kessler
I definitely agree with the way you see things here. (I guess that’s not surprising, since we write on the same blog.) The idea that Obama has taken regime change or military action off the table is so unbearably naive.
By the way, since you single out NYT columnists, you might enjoy checking out this hilarious polemic against them.
Nick
I don’t really read Roger Cohen, and I guess I won’t start anytime soon. Everything you wrote here Josh makes complete sense.
I’m really enjoying reading the site.
-Nick
Jeffrey Kessler
Also, there’s this…
Josh Goodman
Thanks for reading, Nick. And Macheesmo.com looks great!
Global Policy Memo » Reporting from Iran
on June 20, 2009 at 6:09 pm
[...] security forces to join with the demonstrators, is worth reading. I, along with many others, have criticized Cohen’s previous work on Iran for being a bit too accommodating and accepting of the clerical regime. Upon experiencing this [...]