An enemy is an enemy is an enemy

Ahead of the looming deadline for a final framework accord with Iran, has the White House's strategy eroded the West's influence?

By CHARLES BYBELEZER
Iranian flag (photo credit: REUTERS)
Iranian flag
(photo credit: REUTERS)
For the first time since the November 2013 signing of an interim nuclear deal with Iran, a member of the P5+1 group of negotiating countries publicly broke with the Obama administration. Ahead of the looming deadline for a final framework accord, French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius expressed his concern, saying, “as regards the numbers, controls and the length of the agreement, the situation is still not sufficient.”
Significantly, Fabius’ comments came a day before the arrival in Paris of U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry.
Prior to their meeting, Fabius suggested that “these are multilateral negotiations and we are making sure our position is known.”
Over the past eighteen months, however, Washington has increasingly taken control of the Iran nuclear file, and, in parallel to their unilateralism, the West’s bargaining position has steadily eroded.
Whereas the goal was once to eliminate Iran’s nuclear infrastructure, any final deal will now undoubtedly leave the country with its capabilities intact, including thousands of centrifuges to enrich uranium.
In this context, Fabius’ statements raise serious questions as to whether the White House has sidelined its partners because of strategic or conceptual differences. After all, Kerry’s trip to France followed three days of essentially bilateral talks with his Iranian counterpart in Montreux, preceded the week before by two days of similar negotiations in Geneva. Conspicuously absent from both sessions were high-level ministers from other P5+1 countries, who may finally be pushing back against Washington’s prospective legitimization of Tehran as a nuclear threshold state.
Nor is dissent over Obama’s dealings with Iran limited to the nuclear issue. As Fabius was voicing opposition in Europe, Sunni Arab countries were expressing unease over a major operation to retake the Iraqi city of Tirkrit—captured by the Islamic State (IS) in June 2014—specifically as regards the “Shi’ite militiamen who were among some thirty thousand troops mobilized for such purpose.
While the media initially incorporated these Shi’ites under the banner of “Iraqi soldiers,” they neither comprise a complimentary unit, nor are they even being directed by, or loyal to, Baghdad. As the New York Times exposed on March 5, “militia leaders said that their fighters made up more than two-thirds of the [total manpower].… They also said that General Suleimani, the Iranian spymaster [and head of the notorious Quds Force], was helping to lead from near the front line.”
While the Obama administration has denied cooperating with Tehran in the battle against the IS, multiple previous reports claimed that White House was eager to secure Iranian backing, possibly in exchange for American concessions on the nuclear front. The belief is that a confluence of interests in Iraq can provide a foundation for a rapprochement with the Mullahs, an idea reiterated by top U.S. general Martin Dempsey, who earlier this month asserted that Iranian involvement in the Tikrit mission could be “a positive thing.”
This rationale, which underpins U.S. policy vis-à-vis Iran, is gravely flawed, as the Islamic Republic is not working with, but rather against, Washington.
As regards Iraq, Tehran is not merely fighting to “degrade and destroy the IS,” but rather to consolidate its political influence over Baghdad by gaining a military foothold in the country; this, under the cover of American air power. On the nuclear issue, Tehran is being permitted to talk, stall, divert and enrich its way to the bomb.
Sitting with Iran at a negotiating table, or fighting alongside it, does not make the Ayatollahs allies-inwaiting.
During WWII, the Americans cooperated with the Soviets because both had an immediate interest in stopping the spread Nazism; but doing so did not make Communism compatible with Democracy, just as expansionary Islamism does not mesh with Western liberalism. As soon as the war was over, the Soviets set their sights on the U.S., as will be the case with a nuclear Iran.
Too many people have, for too long, discounted this inevitability; overlooking, or whitewashing entirely the Islamic Republic’s true nature, even while erroneously putting their faith in Obama to stop a regime he does not understand.
Although the list is long, Alan Dershowitz— despite his staunch support for Israel in the past—provides a high-profile example of the widespread error in judgment that has left Tehran on the brink of nuclearization, a reality he seems to have belatedly acknowledged.
Previously, Dershowitz wrote numerous articles in support of Obama’s tactics, most notably in the lead-up to the 2012 U.S. presidential election. In September of that year, Dershowitz published in these pages “No ‘buyer’s remorse’ for voting for Obama,” in which he recounted a personal experience: “Several months ago, President Obama invited me to the Oval Office to discuss his Iran strategy.
He looked me in the eye and said, ‘I don’t bluff.…’ I believe [it] when he says that Iran will not be allowed to develop nuclear weapons on his watch.” Two weeks before the vote, in “The case for President Obama’s reelection,” Dershowitz again argued in this paper that Obama “is not bluffing when he says that his administration will never allow Iran to develop nuclear weapons.” The White House, he contended, has been “crystal clear” in its policy of having “taken containment off the table and kept the military option on the table.”
Dershowitz’s position, however, was never defensible. In fact, from the moment Obama was elected, he made reshaping the Middle East through the incorporation of Tehran into the so-called “family of nations” the central tenet of his foreign policy. To achieve this, the U.S. administration has ignored not only Iran’s nuclear transgressions but also its meddling in Syria, Lebanon, Yemen, Gaza, and, as discussed, Iraq. All the while, Obama has vehemently opposed Congress’ efforts to levy sanctions against Iran, and continues to scuttle a bill that would enact penalties on the Islamic Republic only if negotiations were to fail. Overall, Obama’s outreach to the Mullahs should have made “crystal clear” to everyone that the administration was willing to make dangerous concessions in order to secure a nuclear deal.
Like numerous others now being blindsided by this reality, Dershowitz has pulled an about-face, authoring a flurry of articles appearing in the Jerusalem Post this month. The first, entitled “The Appalling Talk of Boycotting Netanyahu,” urged U.S. legislators to attend the Israeli premier’s recent speech to Congress out of a constitutional duty to “check and balance the policies of the administration.” In it, Dershowitz highlighted the urgency of the matter, as “the president’s promise… that Iran will never be allowed to develop nuclear weapons…seems to be in the process of being broken.”
He went so far as to suggest that Iran “has already become such a [nuclear] power for practical purposes.”
Dershowitz followed up a few days later with “The White House must respond to Netanyahu’s important new proposal,” which praised the prime minister’s “logical and compelling critique of the deal now on the table…that has shifted the burden of persuasion to [Obama].”
The trifecta was completed this week with “Supporters of deal are strengthening Iran’s negotiating position,” in which Dershowitz criticized those “attacking Netanyahu without responding to his proposal on their merits,” a technique “characterize[ ing] the approach of the administration and its supporters.”
Sadly, Dershowitz’s eleventh-hour appeal may be a case of too little too late, as prior unconditional support given to Obama, including from many within the Jewish community, effectively granted the U.S. president free reign over an issue of existential importance to the world at large; this, a “courtesy” that should never have been afforded in the first place given Obama’s questionable record on Israel—which Iran continues to threaten with annihilation— coupled with his ongoing embrace of radical Islamists.
What little hope remains with those who have always viewed Iran in an objectively realistic light, a status perfectly encapsulated by Netanyahu in a memorable line to Congress: “The enemy of my enemy is still my enemy.” While this reality is lost on the Obama administration, a growing chorus of naysayers— perhaps now including the French as well as prominent American Democrats—is finally crystallizing.
The question is whether this bloc’s vocal resistance can be translated into concrete results, or if Obama, now on the defensive, will somehow manipulate his way into forging a “bad deal,” thereby granting the Mullahs the means of achieving an end-game to which he is oblivious.