YOU CAN BLEED THEM WHILE YOU NEGOTIATE WITH THEM
When Robert Gates, the current Secretary of Defense, retired from government service after the end of the first Bush administration, he wrote a memoir , From the Shadows, in which he described the no-nonsense, George Schultz as ” the toughest Secretary of State I ever knew” who ” saw no contradiction” in bleeding the Soviets in one part of the world while negotiating with them in another. Secretary Schultz, whose opinion of the CIA on a 1 to 10 scale hovered in the negative integers, was not nearly as complimentary to Robert Gates in his own, ponderously unreadable, memoirs, but that is a story for another day.
I bring this anecdote of a less complex era up because of the furor over the Bush administration classifying the Pasdaran ( the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps) as a terrorist organization in order to take action against those business enterprises that are connected to the Pasdaran. The objections to this move appear to be two-fold: first, that it hypothetically puts American military personnel at risk of maltreatment and, secondly, that it could disrupt negotiations with Iran on a range of bilateral and international issues, most importantly, Iraq.
The critics are incorrect. It is a move a quarter-century overdue.
In the first instance, correctly identifying the Pasdaran as a state sponsor of international terrorism, which as a matter of historical record, it clearly is, does not prevent treating it’s uniformed personnel as POWs in case of an armed conflict between Iran and the United States. The Pasdaran, by contrast, has already tortured two Americans to death – Beirut CIA station chief William Buckley and USMC Colonel William Higgins – at a time of peace between Iran and the United States.
Cry me no river of tears for Pasdaran agents in Iraq being held captive by the U.S. military or who are being whacked in some alleyway by Sunni tribals in our employ. The Iranians knew the risks, from the inception, of the rules they chose to operate under, violating the most basic precepts of international law. It did not have to be that way – even the CIA and the KGB came to a rough modus vivendi during the Cold War that prevented most escalatory incidents – Teheran though has chosen to play rough. Let them enjoy the bed they have made for themselves.
Secondly, until we have an agreement with Iran we do not have any agreement and the regime should be squeezed at every point until we do. I’m all for negotiating in earnest, making the realistic, even generous, concessions that we can easily afford, finding areas of common interest and ( eventually) normalizing relations. We should scrupulously keep our word and demonstrate to the Iranians through actions that we will deliver exactly what we promise. But until that point in time, Teheran should get no favors, no breathing space, no economic freebies of any kind until we come to an arrangement.
The leadership of Iran is a nasty and brutal group. Within that circle, Ahmadinejad represents some of the regime’s worst elements but, as a whole, the Iranians do not seem irrational, simply adversarial. We can cut a deal with them but we should proceed without any illusions.
IRGC STORY LINKS:
August 17th, 2007 at 9:35 am
“Teheran though has chosen to play rough”
They chose to play rough because they have been constantly harassed since the overthrow of their government by the CIA in the interest of British oil (but under the guise of communism). The western world started it first. It’s historically inaccurate to pretend we are morally virtuous when it comes to our interactions with Iran.
oh, and this paragraph you wrote:
“Secondly, until we have an agreement with Iran we do not have any agreement and the regime should be squeezed at every point until we do. I’m all for negotiating in earnest, making the realistic, even generous, concessions that we can easily afford, finding areas of common interest and ( eventually) normalizing relations. We should scrupulously keep our word and demonstrate to the Iranians through actions that we will deliver exactly what we promise. But until that point in time, Teheran should get no favors, no breathing space, no economic freebies of any kind until we come to an arrangement.”
Biggest load of garbage I’ve ever seen. Have you even been following U.S.-Iranian diplomatic events? In May 2003the Iranians said it would no longer support terrorist groups and would help the U.S. in exchange for the U.S. to stop its hostilities. Even the State department supported it. Yet, we turned it down because of the arrogant theocratic dipshits in the current administration. Most amazingly it’s the same thing we are asking for today, yet we rejected it. There is also
total silence about this hypocracy from the White House.
This isn’t some rare behavior from the Iranians either. They have consistently offered to help us, yet we continued to disregard them. Most arrogantly we have DEMANDED that they do help us after we not only ignore them, but also continue to support terrorist organisations ourselves, like the the MEK and Jundallah, that have conducted terrorist operations, and covert actions respectively, within Iran (the MEK have also killed American citizens and were also involved in the embassy takeover in 1979, but we shouldn’t talk about that should we?). Talk about fucking hypocritical. We have definitely not learned the lessons of blowback (which is why we are in this mess).
I think you’ve drunk the neo-con kool aid marc. You say we should proceed without any illusions yet you are playing the overrated and emotive “OMG terrorism is gonna get us”. Don’t kid yourself, terrorism and WMD’s are the illusion. THe primary reasons we are going to overthrow the Iranians is because of middle eastern/central asian Oil and Gas, Israeli-influenced geopolitical interests and a Iranian-led petroeuro bourse which would destabilize the US dollar.
August 17th, 2007 at 4:27 pm
Hi 123kid,
I enjoy a vigorous dissent.
However, your opener shows me you really don’t know that much about Iran or the history of the period if you think Eisenhower and Dulles, running a superpower that was a net oil exporter and controlloed KSA’s Aramco to boot, toppled Mossadegh primarily out of Anglophilia and lust for oil ( Ike’s “Anglophilia” is best demonstrated by his stern reaction to the Suez crisis, something vastly more important to British strategic interests than Anglo-Persian oil companies).
Mossadegh is now an iconic figure but with iconic martyrs like Mossadegh or JFK, the reality often differs substantially from the popular myth. Documentary evidence tells a different tale about Eisenhower’s concerns or Mossadegh’s oscillating popularity inside Iranian politics as he tried to centralize power in his hands.
We overthrew Mossadegh not because he was too strong but because he was weak and the most logical successor to him would have been a Tudeh coup and Soviet divisions on the Straits of Hormuz. The Shah was a lousy client and Khomeini was an even worse alternative but at the time it was preferable to Iran as a Soviet satellite.
Fast forwarding to today, I am NOT in favor of attacking Iran or refusing to negotiate in good faith. Yes, you are correct that Cheney helped rebuff Iran’s offers, which I think was strategically unwise on our part. However, Iran ( actually Khameini personally) rebuffed several very high level overtures to mend relations from the Clinton administrion. This dance has been going on for some time beacause each side has factions who prefer a status quo of hostility to normalization of relations.
Moreover, the Iranian offer though, did not come from the Pasdaran faction of Iran’s leadership but from the regular government and a more moderate part of the clerical hierarchy. We need to engage the latter and ratchet up the pressure on the former since we have in Iran’s regime, a leadership that is both opaque and decentralized.
August 18th, 2007 at 9:16 pm
Sounds like 123kid needs a nap. I came across a documentary a few months ago that offered some good insight into Iranian society. Look for Execution in Iran on YouTube. Its about a girl that is executed for crimes against chastity, but there is more to the film. (Who knew the age of consent for females in Iran is 9?) The film added to an idea I’ve had for some time: I can’t find any evidence that Iran is a country that wants to live in peace. Even if the political issues were rendered mute tomorrow how much discourse would we want with a country that sanctions the rape and execution of children? (Can’t wait to see what sort of apoplectic sputtering this sends 123kid into.)
Ares
August 19th, 2007 at 1:03 pm
I’m not surprised you like this move. You’re quite gullible in these areas.
Well, as none of the commentators knows fuck all about Iran (including the idiot mentioning a movie), I will merely observe the sanctions are going to be as useful as most unilateral sanctions are, not very.
Whankery. Pointless whankery, other than the rather bad positioning since the US seems so wedded to really foolish gestures such as this.
August 19th, 2007 at 3:31 pm
Hi Col,
“I will merely observe the sanctions are going to be as useful as most unilateral sanctions are, not very.”
Against the Iranian state as a whole, you’re correct.
That however isn’t really the point. Iran’s government does more harm to Iran’s economic growth with corruption or bad policies than we could ever do. I think these fine-tuned economic mechanisms – as when we penalized Serbian backers of Milosevic in 1999, or managed to get specific North Korean bank accounts in Macau frozen – are to inconvenience particular elements or individuals, which it does fairly well.
“Pointless whankery, other than the rather bad positioning since the US seems so wedded to really foolish gestures such as this.”
Doing this in such a noisy way was for domestic political consumption, true. It may have even been the primary motivation for some ppl in the administration.
It would have been a more effective diplomatic signal to Teheran if done quietly rather than juicing up their hardliners for a public chest beating display of fury.
However, the Bush administration is what it is – you’re not going to get Nixonian subtelty this late in the game. Nixon & Kissinger threw their share of very tough unilateral darts at other countries but most of the time they did it deftly. They also knew when to hand out the carrots.