Among the spin-off benefits of a US-Iran hotline, as suggested by R.K. Ramazani in the previous entry, is the possibility that it “could help restore Iran-U.S. diplomatic relations….” As he explained,
“Contrary to widely held myths, Iran has never closed its door to diplomatic relations with the United States. Khomeini left the door ajar “if America behaves itself,” that is, if the United States refrains from imposing its will on Iran. His successor, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, subscribes to the Khomeini line, saying that Iran’s lack of contacts with the United States “does not mean that we will not have relations indefinitely.”
Yet just this past week, the hawkishly neoconservative “Committee on the Present Danger” (CPD) repeats the myth. In an essay proclaiming that “It takes two to tango,” to have a diplomatic relations, to have a “grand bargain,” the Iranians are portrayed as not being willing to dance. To the contrary, CPD invokes segments from a recent speech by Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenehi:
“Cutting ties with the United States is one of our basic policies,” Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ali Khamenei, told students in the central city of Yazd just days ago. And while “[w]e have never said that they will be cut for ever,” Khamenei explained, “[t]he conditions of the U.S. government are such now that it is harmful for us to resume relations… Despite some talkative people’s claims, it has no benefit for the Iranian nation.”
CPD concludes that this “pours more than a little cold water on the suggestion that Washington should push for an immediate rapprochement with Tehran… (as) the ruling ayatollahs don’t seem interested in mending fences.”
This is selective and disingenuous cherry picking for a negative spin. Here’s the full passage of the January 3rd speech in question, without ellipses, as made available via BBC World Service.** (see note below) This is from a translation of a long report provided by Tehran Radio (Voice of the Islamic Republic). Emphasis added and my comments follow:
The leader of the Islamic revolution [Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamene’i] referred to relations with America and said: The cutting of relations with the US is one of our principle policies. However, we have never said that these relations will be suspended indefinitely. On the contrary, the US government’s present state is such that the establishment of such relations is currently to our detriment. So we should not pursue such relations.
The leader outlined the harm of establishing relations with the US and reiterated: First, the establishment of such relations will not lessen the danger posed by the US because that country had political relations with Iraq when it attacked it. Secondly, the establishment of these relations will prepare the ground for the growth of Americans’ influence in the country and the travel of their intelligence officers and spies to and from Iran. As a result, this is why contrary to the claims made by some talkative people [inside the country] these relations have no benefit for the Iranian nation. Undoubtedly, when the day comes that relations with America will benefit the Iranian nation, I will be the first person to endorse these relations.
The leader added: Some accuse us of promoting enmity with America. However, that country’s enmity towards the Iranian nation is not based on the [Iranian] president and other people’s harsh interpretations. On the contrary, they are against the principles of the Iranian nation and such a thing has existed since the beginning of the Islamic revolution.
I have been reading Khamenehi speeches and Friday Prayer Sermons for 24 years, dating to when he became President amid the Iran-Iraq War. Khamenehi has long been more adaptable in his “open door foreign policy” pronouncements than commonly understood in the west. (I may prepare a full article just on this narrow, yet critical question about Iran’s “dance” with the question of if and under what circumstances it can renew ties to America.)
Yet to be brief on just this speech, consider:
1. Quite in line with Professor Ramazani’s analysis, Khamenehi yet again emphasizes that there’s no automatic bar to improving ties to the US. Characteristically, he cites the revolutionary hallmark, the cutting of the old ties to America, what became the signature “neither East nor West” revolutionary dictum, so that Iran might be independent and “self-confident,” that it might be free from the relations between “the lion and the lamb.” All that not forgotten, “we have never said that these relations will be suspended indefinitely.”
2. The standard objections and grievances to current US policy are noted. Talks and relations in themselves can bring dangers to Iran, despite the hopes of “talkative people” (e.g., Iranian reformists and pragmatists in Iran).
3. Khamenehi also delivers a back-handed lame defense of Iran’s lightning-rod President when he notes that America’s enmity towards Iran predated Ahmadinejad’s “harsh interpretations.” The fact that Khamenehi is even referencing Iranian criticisms of Ahmadinejad for “promoting enmity with America” startled many observers, and was interpreted as quite a slap.
4. Totally left out of the CPD report is the not so subtle message to America: “The US government’s present state is such that the establishment of such relations is currently to our detriment.” Hint, hint America: it doesn’t have to be this way. The US government might change, and it logically then follows that better relations might not be to Iran’s detriment.
5. As a friend suggested in a closed forum, it may also be that Khamenehi is signaling Iranian contenders in the pending Parliamentary and Presidential elections that they may campaign more creatively on foreign policy, to shield them from ideological “heat.”
6. Shamelessly omitted from the CPD essay is Khamenehi’s kicker: “Undoubtedly, when the day comes that relations with America will benefit the Iranian nation, I will be the first person to endorse these relations.”
That day may be sooner that the CPD and neocon naysayers think – say, if somebody reminds Bush Jr. of Bush Sr.’s inaugural Address (the one about “goodwill begetting goodwill”) or, by this time next year, when two new Presidents are in the wings.
(**Footnote: Curiously, the US government’s parallel translation service – the Open Source Center (formerly FBIS) data base available to the public via World News Connection – does not include the report on this speech. I’ve seen this happen before — somebody at OSC and WNC owes us an explanation)
It appears unrealistic that the current US Administration is capable of any creative diplomacy with Iran. I agree that Khamenei’s speech hints at a possible change in the future, as you point out, with the change of both Presidents making this goal a little bit more likely than before. Unfortunately, though, if we are to believe the present stances by the front running US Presidential candidates, which are quite hawkish towards Iran, that increase in likelihood remains scant. As Rasfanjani pointed out after the last US Congressional election, democrats are only a wee bit weaker then republicans on Iran (paraphrasing). Considering the passage of Kyl-Lieberman Amendment, his observation may indeed be correct.
The demonization of Iran is a complex issue in contemporary American politics. It involves powerful forces such as the Israel lobby and the Media. It even involves the energetic influence of a foreign country related to the two previously mentioned forces at play. And there are additional powerful forces to take into account, such as the interests of US arms makers and, last but not least by a long shot, the World Oil market and industry. An independent Iran continues to represent both a nuisance and dark sided opportunity to these forces.
Given these circumstances, what would compel the US to seek levers of war prevention? Recent disclosures of the “incident” in the Gulf suggest this would not suit current US intentions. Wouldn’t you agree? And as for Iran and Khamenei’s speech, he is merely stating the obvious. Isn’t he?
Perhaps a chance for a US rapprochement with Iran might involve the Central Asian energy game, now underway. All of the major players have been jostling lately. If the US can somehow find its way into a scheme that produces enough economic gain for one or two of its major world interests, than the other forces at play may have to take a back seat and a breakthrough emerged with Iran. Maybe, but similar opportunities in the past have been squashed. Meanwhile certain partisan elements of Iranian politics actually benefit from this condition which, from their perspective, they proudly refer to as resistance. Those of us seeking peace and a restoration of normal relations between the the United States and Iran can merely watch and hope for the best. It’s what we’ve been doing for nearly 30 years now.
With external “heat” off of Iran (post-NIE), Iranians, including the Leader himself, are stepping up the “heat” on Ahmadinejad.
http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5js7SCpi6WBv78O-b_MzvsUDaXvjw
Iran leader backs parliament in dispute with Ahmadinejad
TEHRAN (AFP) — Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has backed parliament in a dispute with hardline President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who had objected to several measures adopted by MPs, the ISNA news agency said on Monday.
Ahmadinejad had criticised parliament, which is dominated by fellow conservatives, for overturning his decision to dissolve several institutions — including the Monetary and Credit Council, a key financial policy maker — as well as his abolition of summer time in Iran.
“Laws adopted through the process defined by the constitution must be respected by all organs,” Khamenei said in a letter to parliament speaker Gholam Ali Hadad Adel.
Hadad Adel had sought the opinion of the supreme leader, who has the final say on all key policy issues, after receiving Ahmadinejad’s complaint.
“I was surprised by the president writing to parliament to say a bill was against the constitution. This is unprecedented,” Hadad Adel said, noting that it was the prerogative of the Guardians’ Council to decide whether legislation was in accordance with the constitution.
Since he came to power in 2005, Ahmadinejad has sought more control over the economy to allow him to fulfil his campaign promise to distribute oil income more evenly.
But he has come under fire from both reformists and some fellow conservatives who charge that his expansionist economic policies have fuelled inflation.
The president also drew widespread criticism by abolishing daylight saving after he took power on the grounds that the measure, which had been in force for 16 years, went against the teachings of Islam.
More details via Guardian:
5.30pm GMTIran’s supreme leader rebuffs Ahmadinejad in gas row
Robert Tait
Monday January 21, 2008
Guardian Unlimited
The political authority of the Iranian president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, suffered a serious blow today after the country’s most powerful figure sided with MPs by ordering him to supply cheap gas to villages undergoing power cuts amid an unexpectedly harsh winter.
In a humiliating rebuff, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader who has the final say over all state matters, ordered the enactment of a law requiring the government to provide £500m of gas supplies from emergency reserve funds.
Ahmadinejad had refused to implement the measure, accusing parliament of exceeding its powers in passing the bill in response to plummeting temperatures and gas cuts, which have left many areas without heating during the country’s coldest winter in years.
At least 64 people are reported to have died after gas supplies were turned off in sub-zero temperatures. The cuts, belying Iran’s status as possessor of the world’s second biggest natural gas reserves, have provoked public outrage and threaten to turn a mood of rumbling unhappiness into a winter of discontent for Ahmadinejad.
The president, who was elected on a platform of economic justice for the poor, rejected parliament’s measure on budgetary grounds and blamed the gas cuts on neighbouring Turkmenistan, which has stopped supplies to Iran over a payment dispute.
But in a letter to the parliament’s speaker, Gholamali Hadad-Adel, Khamenei unceremoniously overruled Ahmadinejad, writing: “All legal legislation that has gone through [the required] procedures stipulated in the constitution is binding for all branches of power.”
Khamenei’s intervention is the latest in a series of recent signals that he is losing patience with a president to whom he once showed staunch loyalty, defending him whenever he came under fire from political opponents.
The supreme leader once described Ahmadinejad’s government as Iran’s best since the 1979 Islamic revolution, but in a speech this month in the central city of Yazd, he conspicuously refrained from praising it.
Instead, he put it on a par with previous administration, saying that “the government has certain unique characteristics, but like any other government there are mistakes and shortcomings”.
Reports from inside Iran suggest Khamenei has grown increasingly disenchanted with Ahmadinejad’s economic record, which has been marked by surging inflation and dramatic rises in basic food and housing costs.
Such misgivings have been given added piquancy by a report last month from 16 US intelligence agencies concluding that Iran abandoned its nuclear weapons programme in 2003. The report appeared to ease the threat of American military strikes against Iran’s uranium enrichment activities, which Ahmadinejad had used to silence opponents and clamp down on domestic dissent.
The diminishing external threat appears to have emboldened the president’s opponents in the run up to parliamentary elections on March 14. It may also have removed the need for Khamenei to keep his displeasure quiet.
Previously the supreme leader had condemned criticism of Ahmadinejad as undermining national unity in the face of “enemy” threats.
But in a possible sign of his changing attitude, Khamenei recently appointed Mohammad Zolghadr as deputy head of the armed forces for Basij just weeks after Ahmadinejad sacked him as deputy interior minister.