According to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice in an article in the July/August issue of Foreign Affairs, China’s reluctant and belated concession to allow a skeleton UN-AU peacekeeping force in Sudan represents a newly “cooperative approach on a range of problems.” But the reality is that some newfound sense of Chinese responsibility on the world stage had nothing to do with Beijing’s decision to “cooperate.” The concession on Darfur (if you want to call it that) was entirely about the Beijing Olympics. Given that it took a threatened boycott by Western leaders for China to stop arms sales to Sudan and drop its veto of the peacekeeping resolution, I am dubious that we’ll see any further “responsible” behavior after the Olympic Games have come and gone. At this point, the Games are going ahead—with or without protesting Western leaders—and the leverage a coordinated boycott might have provided will be a mere memory.

But I’m not writing this to bemoan a missed opportunity or cast aspersions on Rice’s diplomatic optimism. I’m writing this to call some attention to the next opportunity down the road: Sochi 2014.

China and Russia are both rising powers, economically, militarily and diplomatically. Secretary Rice referred to both as carrying “special responsibility and weight as fellow permanent members of the UN Security Council.” Translation: they both have lots of nuclear weapons, so our military power doesn’t really scare them. China is also not the only rising power we’d love to see adopt a more cooperative stance as it claims (or reclaims) “full membership in the international community.”

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Well, as regular as the return of cliff swallows to the San Juaan Capistrano mission in California, the International Atomic Energy Agency has issued its latest quarterly report on Iran’s nuclear program. 

Predictably, administration officials try to see the worst. “”I think right now the Iranians have a lot of explaining to do about the IAEA report, which essentially sees them as not cooperating on some very important dark questions that the international community has about their programmes,” said  Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. 

It is true that the report states (in paragraph 23, page 4) that “Iran has not provided the agency with all the information, access to documents and access to individuals necessary to supports Iran’s statements and access to individuals necessary to support Iran’s statements.” But that is hardly a smoking gun. 

Remember that the IAEA’s investigative mandate means that every issue it looks into, which has not been settled one way or the other, must be regarded as un unresolved. But the absence of conclusive evidence does not mean that Iran is proceeding with a nuclear weapons program. It means exactly what it says; that there are issues yet to be resolved. 

In the meantime Iran is, to some substantial degree, continuing to cooperate with the IAEA, which is no small thing, considering the sheer amount of misreporting and deliberate distortion on its nuclear program. As the IAEA report states, “The Agency has been able to continue to verify the non-diversion of declared nuclear material in Iran.  Iran  has  provided  the Agency with  access  to  declared  nuclear material  and  has  provided  the required  nuclear  material  accountancy  reports  in  connection  with  declared  nuclear  material  and activities.” 

One might recall that it was exactly this perverse logic, i.e., we haven’t conclusively proved the absence of a negative, that allowed the Bush administration to short circuit UN inspections of Iraq in 2002, allowing the United States to invade Iraq on a spurious weapons of mass destruction pretext in 2003.

And just as predictably the major media huffs and puffs about the alleged threat Iran presents to world peace and security. (more…)

I’m going to do something not a lot of people outside the Clinton campaign have been willing to do: I’m going to defend Hillary Clinton’s threat to “obliterate” Iran if it should attack Israel. I’d take issue with Senator Obama’s dismissive response, too: Hillary’s clear, tough message is exactly the language that’s needed right now, and as for sounding like George W. Bush, who cares? The Bush Iran policy is defunct and dysfunctional, and what matters now is what the next President is going to do about it.

Here’s what Hillary actually said:

“Well, the question was, if Iran were to launch a nuclear attack on Israel, what would our response be. And I want the Iranians to know that if I’m the president, we will attack Iran. And I want them to understand that, because it does mean that they have to look very carefully at their society, because at whatever stage of development they might be in their nuclear weapons program, in the next 10 years during which they might foolishly consider launching an attack on Israel we would be able to totally obliterate them. That’s a terrible thing to say, but those people who run Iran need to understand that, because that perhaps will deter them from doing something that would be reckless, foolish and tragic.” (more…)

Admiral Fallon’s resignation as CENTCOM commander is pretty fresh news, and I’m sure we’ll learn more with time. For now, Fallon apparently resigned because of the appearance of disagreement with the president over the appropriate level of belligerence in U.S. policy towards Iran — or at least in his statement issued at CENTCOM headquarters in Tampa, he blamed it on the appearance rather than an actual conflict over Iran policy (reported widely, including here).

The appearance of policy conflict is nothing new for ADM Fallon. Rumors have been flying more or less since the admiral moved from his billet as commander of Pacific Command (where his policy views were controversial, too, but perhaps more quietly controversial because they were over longer-range China policy rather than an ongoing war). When Fallon took his current position at the head of U.S. Central Command, people began to talk about his sharp disagreements with Gen. David Petraeus, the U.S. Commander in Iraq, over both substance (on the surge) and style (Gen. Petraeus’ high-profile comments that sometimes seem to defend the Bush administration in political battles). Of course, Gen. Petraeus is extremely popular with ADM Fallon’s boss and with many other politicians. And that disagreement has been compounded, in the rumors, with an ongoing disagreement over Iran policy (perhaps principally with Vice President Chenney, if the rumors are to be believed). The Iran disagreement perhaps came to a head with the publication of a story in last week’s Esquire.

On Iran, ADM Fallon’s statement says, “I don’t believe there have ever been any differences about the objectives of our policy in the Central Command area of responsibility….” It’s easy to see through this comment: even people who think “we can live with an Iranian nuclear bomb” agree that the U.S. should prefer a non-nuclear Iran to a nuclear-armed one. So we all agree on the objectives of our policy. That statement, though, can certainly cover up intense disagreement about the means of trying to achieve that objective and about whether we’re likely to succeed.

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Yesterday the Bush administration formally announced the proposed $120 million sale of 900 Joint Direct Attack Munitions (JDAM) to Saudi Arabia. It was formally notified to Congress on January 14.

This is the latest in a series of arms sales by the United States to various Persian Gulf countries that was first announced at the end of July 2007 and worth at least $20 billion to Saudi Arabia and five other Persian Gulf states, as well as new 10-year military and economic aid packages to Israel and Egypt. The other Gulf states receiving weapons are Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Bahrain and Oman; all six Gulf States make up the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC).

This is all part of what the Bush Administration calls the Gulf Security Dialog (GSD), which is supposed to be the principal security coordination mechanism between the United States and the GCC.  Part of the rationale for the sale is to reassure GCC nations that the United States stands by their side ready to face common threats.

I suppose I can see it. After all, nothing says I love you quite like sending hundreds of GPS satellite-aided inertial guidance kits to help upgrade your pokey, frumpy MK-82 or BLU-109 conventional bombs. No doubt Martha Stewart heartily approves. (more…)

NPR’s “On the Media” had an interesting interview with Bill Arkin this morning about the conflicting videotapes released by the U.S. and Iran that showed different perspectives on the interaction between three U.S. Navy ships transiting the Strait of Hormuz and a set of five speedboats from the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps that “buzzed” the Americans early on the morning of January 6 (Gulf time). To review, the U.S. issued a press release followed by some commentary at an off-the-record briefing early on the morning of Jan. 7 (Washington time, 10 hours behind the Strait of Hormuz, meaning that some 31 hours had passed to consider what to say in Washington) explaining that Iranian speedboats had menaced the American warships by charging, pushing boxes with unknown contents overboard near the path of the American ships, and making the threatening statement that the American ships would soon “explode” over an open radio channel (see initial coverage, for example, here). The incident set the backdrop for some of President Bush’s comments about Iran — specifically, how dangerous Iran might be — during his trip to the Middle East, which immediately followed the indicent. When the tapes turned out to have been modified, and when people began to learn that Iranian boats had interacted with American warships before, talk of a conspiracy — or at least biased spinning for political ends — swept the policy world and blogosphere (see, for example, often astute and interesting analysts like Gareth Porter, here and here, and Justin Raimundo, here). Arkin’s NPR interview baldly stated that the Pentagon created the dust-up to prepare the ground for President Bush’s trip, to make it easier for him to build an anti-Iranian coalition among the Gulf States.

Arkin is an expert on technical aspects of military affairs who currently writes an online column for the Washington Post, but he has also been a well-known guy in the security studies community for a long time. What he has to say has a certain credibility, and his explanation of the controversy over “doctoring” of the videos was very clear: both the Americans and the Iranians released video of a real incident, and the audio that accompanied both tapes was real and from the morning of Jan. 6, too, but neither the American tape’s audio nor the Iranian tape’s audio matched the video — that is, on each tape, two events were mashed together for political effect. It is unlikely that the threatening audio on the American tape was a broadcast from the Iranian speedboats (it probably came from a prankster), but the peaceful radio interchange on the Iranian tape actually came from a separate interaction between the Iranian Navy and the American warships that had taken place two hours before the speedboat incident. Note that the Iranian Navy is a different organization, with different commanders and different interests, from the highly ideological and zealous Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps, which commanded the speedboats.

So what should we make of the incident? I was actually on a trip to the Gulf from January 4-11 precisely to do research about how to assess the potential that military conflict in the Strait of Hormuz might disrupt oil tanker traffic — a nightmare scenario often discussed in the press (including in the aftermath of the Jan. 6 incident, for example, here). Of course, I don’t have a complete picture: I didn’t see the incident, and I only met with relatively few people, but at least they were informed people interested in exactly the kind of questions bandied about in the discussion of the incident.

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Dash it all! One goes away for a quick business trip to Geneva and returns to find that holy geopolitical heck has broken lose in one’s absence, what with the publication of the latest National Intelligence Estimate on Iran’s nuclear program.

Doubtlessly interested PSA readers have been inundated with commentary, including excellent posts by Chris Preble and Brian Vogt.

But at the risk of appearing self-serving I think there are still some useful things to be said. Namely, that it is premature to rejoice.  Let’s remember that there are still many unanswered questions. As the NIE itself stated:

This Estimate focuses on the following key questions:

What are Iran’s intentions toward developing nuclear weapons?

What domestic factors affect Iran’s decisionmaking on whether to develop nuclear weapons?

What external factors affect Iran’s decisionmaking on whether to develop nuclear weapons?

What is the range of potential Iranian actions concerning the development of nuclear weapons, and the decisive factors that would lead Iran to choose one course of action over another?

What is Iran’s current and projected capability to develop nuclear weapons? What are our key assumptions, and Iran’s key chokepoints/vulnerabilities?

The truth is that the NIE did not answer those questions. As Anthony Cordesman, the Mr. Net Assessment of the Center for Strategic and International Studies, wrote, “it is very important for anyone using or making judgments about the document to actually read the full text of the judgments the NIE makes about Iran’s nuclear program. Press summaries and outside commentary are not a substitute for responsible literacy and attentions to details.”  Or as George Orwelll once wrote, “sloppy language breeds sloppy thinking.”

Cordesman notes that the “summary does not address what the US intelligence community does and does not know about Iran’s efforts in each of the five areas the NIE addressed.” (more…)

The release several days ago of the new National Intelligence Estimate has been received with predictable responses by both Democrats and Republicans.  The Democrats argue that this NIE repudiates Bush’s hard line stance against Iran.  There are plenty of hardline commentators who just dismiss the report entirely.  Yesterday Chris Preble took Michael Ledeen to task for this approach. 

The hardliners are stuck between a rock a hard place.  If they concede that the report is accurate it harms their rationale for forceful action against Iran.  However, if they dismiss the report they must concede that if the intelligence agencies were wrong this time, who is to say that they weren’t wrong last time?  The hardliners’ justifications for military action could just as easily be dismissed since a fault in this current estimate calls into question the accuracy of previous estimates that are more dire.  I’ve yet to hear a good argument about why this one was simply a screw up and the other ones were the “the truth”. 

The Bush administration has chosen another tactic.  They argue that in fact this result justifies its hard line stance against Iran.  In speaking about the release of the NIE, National Security Advisor Stephen Hadley said,

And it suggests that the President has the right strategy: intensified international pressure along with a willingness to negotiate a solution that serves Iranian interests while ensuring that the world will never have to face a nuclear armed Iran. The bottom line is this: for that strategy to succeed, the international community has to turn up the pressure on Iran - with diplomatic isolation, United Nations sanctions, and with other financial pressure - and Iran has to decide it wants to negotiate a solution.

The problem here is a common mistake of mistaking correlation with causality.  Is assumes that simply because the U.S. chose not talk with Iran and chose instead to follow a strategy of diplomatic isolation reinforced by a sabre rattling campaign, that Iran actually got the message and decided to halt its nuclear weapons program.  It’s possible, I suppose.  However, there are other possible explanations that many might consider a bit more plausible.  (more…)

While the news from the Annapolis conference has been mixed, there was one positive development for American foreign policy in the region. The attendance of Syria (even though it was at the deputy foreign minister level) signals a willingness on behalf of the Assad regime to perhaps work its way out of the Iranian orbit in the region (Iran wanted them to stay at home). This is welcome news for those who seek to reduce the influence of Iran and a more peaceful Middle East. Rapprochement with Syria would yield significant dividends in various arenas in the Middle East, and, if this opening is real, it is an opportunity to pry an ally away from Iran and make strategic inroads into Damascus.

The recent news from Beirut is also promising. The Syrians and Americans have apparently agreed on a presidential candidate for Lebanon, army commander Michael Suleiman. Apparently there has been serious cooperation on this front for some time and hopefully it can continue into other areas. The overlap between American policy and Syrian influence is considerable. Syria shares a large border with Iraq and has accepted a large number of Iraqi refugees. Unfortunately, refugees are not the only things crossing the Syrian border. Weapons and insurgents have been coming into Iraq from Syria since 2003, sometimes with tacit support with Syrian regime. (more…)

The Bush administration is seeking a breakthrough in Israel-Palestinian negotiations during their conference in Annapolis later this month. Secretary Rice is shuttling back and forth to the Middle East in order to get all the relevant parties involved and moving towards a final peace negotiation. President Bush and Secretary Rice have gambled that this last-ditch, all out effort will result in an agreement that they can both leave as a legacy after their term expires in fourteen months. However, it is becoming plain that the other parties involved may not be ready to move at the quickened pace that the Bush administration is looking for.

Recent fighting between Hamas and Fatah in the Gaza strip shows that they are still not ready to cooperate in dealing with Israel. Because of this, the United States is going to have to perform an elaborate juggling act involving all of the players at the Annapolis conference. In order to accomplish the goals that Secretary Rice has set for this meeting, US diplomats will have to mediate a peace between Hamas and Fatah, between Israel and the Palestinians, and between Israel and the Arab/Muslim world. The conflict between Hamas and Fatah could ruin any agreement between the Palestinian Authority and the Israelis. If Hamas feels sidelined by the process, they could relish the role of spoiler and truly test the patience of the Israeli leadership. Indeed, the same perspective could be attributed to Iran. Should Iran feel marginalized by what they feel is a Saudi-led process towards normalization with Israel, they too could work to unleash violence in the Palestinian territories and Israel through one of their proxy groups. Therefore it is necessary to include Hamas and Iran in the strategic calculus during the Annapolis process and beyond. However, this may be beyond the capabilities and sensibilities of the United States, the Sunni Arab countries, and Israel. Getting all these moving part working in the same direction while preventing spoilers may be a task of Sysiphisian proportions.

Even if it were possible, this high-wire diplomatic act will be too tough to accomplish in the next two months. Indeed it will probably be too much for the Bush administration to accomplish in its last fourteen months in office. It is therefore vital that the United States, the Palestinian Authority, and everyone else involved reduce the expectations for the Annapolis conference. Should the expected progress be slow in materializing, there could be violent repercussions, similar to the second intifada which followed President Clinton’s failed attempt in 2000. However, with a longer-term view, the victories may be easier to imagine. A continued diplomatic initiative may be able to unravel these problems over time and present a more reasonable environment for a two-state solution. It is looking more likely that immediate answers to the Middle East will be impossible to grasp. I know it’s difficult to preach patience to those who live in a cycle of fear and violence (on both sides), but the quick fix will prove elusive, even with the renewed commitment of the Bush administration.