Category: Iran

Good news on US Iran policy

According to David Ignatius yesterday,

    The administration official who oversees the Iran file is William Burns, the undersecretary of state for political affairs. Although Dennis Ross will take a broad strategic look at the region in his new post of State Department adviser, senior officials stress that Burns is the address for Iran policy.

So it looks as if the strongly pro-Israeli, anti-Iranian, and professionally unsuccessful Ross has not been given the extremely powerful mandate he had evidently hoped for.
Ignatius’s piece is mainly a description of a discussion he had about Iran policy with Lee Hamilton, an extremely wise elder statesman who’s had two private meetings with Obama since the inauguration.
He wrote:

    Administration officials echo [the need Hamilton described] for a careful, low-key approach to Iran. The administration has begun an interagency strategic review of Iran policy (they love “reviews,” this Obama team). Until this is done, says a White House official, “it’s premature to talk about talks, or pre-talks, or emissaries.” (Point taken. I wrote recently that former national security advisers Brent Scowcroft and Zbigniew Brzezinski would be good emissaries if talks ripened. Add Hamilton to that list.) The starting points for U.S.-Iran discussions, Hamilton said, would be to “state our respect for the Iranian people, renounce regime change as an instrument of U.S. policy, seek opportunities for a range of dialogue across a range of issues, and acknowledge Iran’s security concerns and its right to civilian nuclear power.” He said Obama has already signaled that he wants such a conversation, without preconditions.

This point about taking externally driven campaigns for “regime change” off the table is extremely important, and is evidently an essential precondition for any serious diplomacy at all.
I think it’s important to keep the discussion of possible future emissaries, as Ignatius does, at the level of extremely weighty former statesmen like Scowcroft, Brzezinski, or Hamilton. The idea that a highly ideological and professionally unsuccessful lightweight like Dennis Ross could do the serious job of de-escalation of tensions that’s required in the case of US-Iran relations appears more and more risible. (Or, actually, dangerous.)
A final note here, too, as to why de-escalation of tensions with Iran is absolutely necessary for this US president.
In case anyone hadn’t noticed, the US is now entering an extremely serious economic crisis, and the president has pledged to reduce the federal government’s budget deficit considerably even during his first term in office.
Yesterday, Obama submitted to Congress an outline (“topline”) of his defense spending request for FY2010.spending request. Here’s a portion of the bottom line there:

    The topline request provides $534 billion in FY 2010 funding for the Department of Defense’s “base” budget, which excludes funding for Iraq, Afghanistan, and nuclear weapons activities…
    President Obama’s topline thus requests $664 billion in total DOD and war funding for FY 2010. This figure does not include funding for nuclear weapons or miscellaneous non-DOD defense costs, which were approximately $23 billion in FY 2009… After adjusting for inflation, the $534 billion topline request is $9 billion, or 1.7 percent, greater than the $525 billion (FY 2010 dollars) appropriated by Congress in FY 2009 for DOD’s base budget.

The major engine of growth in this defense budget request is doubtless the president’s Quixotic (and tragically doomed) attempt to try to “win” in Afghanistan by very expensively deploying more US troops to that landlocked distant land. But if he is going to have any chance of meeting his goal of deficit reduction, the budget for all these military adventures the US has been sustaining around the world will have to be part of the reduction.
Launching yet another war, against Iran, would be sheer lunacy– from every point of view. Especially since there are so very many alternatives to war, as a way of resolving the US’s tensions with Iran, that haven’t even been tried yet.

Panetta vs. the Intelligence Community?

(Hat tip to Eric H) CIA Director nominee Leon Panetta, the self-described “creature of congress,” appears to have brushed aside the collective findings of the intelligence community regarding Iran’s nuclear weapons program. At his Senate confirmation hearings yesterday, fellow democrat, Senator Evan Bayh asked: “Is it your belief that Iran is seeking a nuclear military capability? Or are their interests solely limited to the civilian sphere?”
Panetta then replied, “From all the information that I’ve seen, I think there is no question that they are seeking that capability.”
By contrast, the 2007 National Intelligence Estimate on Iran, issuing the collective view of 16 different US intelligence agencies, found that,

“We judge with high confidence that in fall 2003, Tehran halted its nuclear weapons program…. We assess with moderate confidence Tehran had not restarted its nuclear weapons program as of mid-2007.”

For all of the problems of the intelligence community, a veteran insider wisely warned me 20 years ago that, “the worst thing that can happen to the intelligence process is if analysts tailor their reports to please perceived wishes of their political masters. Former DIA chief Pat Lang famously called it, “drinking the koolaid.”
If I were a Senator in follow-up hearings, I’d want to press Congressman Panetta to see what he really meant. Does he know something about Iran’s nuclear programs since 2007? Was he misunderstanding a leading question? Does he come into office disagreeing with the considered understanding not just of the CIA, but of the entire intelligence community? Does he intend to require those he would supervise to re-write their reports to match pre-formed conclusions?

Iran Revolution at 30: Beyond Paradox

Washington’s venerable Middle East Institute has released a stunning collection of essays entitled, The Iranian Revolution at 30. Featuring diverse contributions from 53 international scholars and policy participants, the collection is dedicated to my own mentor, R.K. Ramazani. (the reputed “Dean of Iran Foreign Policy Studies”)
Andrew Parasiliti’s dedication essay to Ramazani appears on page 10, and the Professor’s extraordinary essay on “Understanding Iranian foreign policy” is featured at page. 12. My own essay on former President Khatami as a bridge “beyond paradox” appears on page 115.
Topics covered among the 53 essays range from foreign policy to societal trends, internal politics, the status of women, economy, and regional dynamics. Editor John Calabrese has brought together a nice mix of familiar and newer voices, providing a splendid array of insights and facts to consider.
Among the sub-themes that recur frequently is that of “paradox.” As I note in my essay, observers

“often emphasize apparent Iranian paradoxes to alert outsiders to Iran’s vibrant and dynamic society, beyond the static, enigmatic “black” clichés so commonly clung to in popular Western discourse.
In the same country where current President Mahmud Ahmadinejad trivialized the Holocaust, a very popular television program sympathetically portrayed an Iranian diplomat who rescued Jews from the Nazis during World War II.”

Yet the emphasis on “paradox” can be used to conceal more than reveal. Abbas Milani’s essay (26), among several, contends that Iran’s core paradoxes are so unresolvable that they inevitably (in Milani’s view) will “bring about its end.”
I take a rather different approach:

“Paradox as a metaphor for Iran becomes less than helpful if it leaves the impression of a ‘hidden Iran’ being incomprehensively mired in its own contradictions. Bewildered perhaps by such analytical frameworks, top Western officials, beginning with former Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice, commonly admit that “they do not understand Iran” or that they “do not know” if negotiating with Iran will work.”

I illustrate how paradoxes can be transcended via remarks given by former Iranian President Muhammad Khatami at a Monticello luncheon, on September 11th, 2006. Other than Helena’s blog entry at the time, this is the first time that Khatami’s comments at Thomas Jefferson’s home have been published.
Painfully aware of the past problems, Khatami optimistically sees no contradiction between the requirements of democracy and “a progressive reading of Islam.” Curious? Read my essay (p. 115). It’s also been republished (here.)
Bonus Observations:

Continue reading “Iran Revolution at 30: Beyond Paradox”

Happy Yalda

Happy Yalda! Many Iranian friends make a fun festival out of this longest of nights, the winter solstice. While the traditions are ancient, the term “Yalda” or “new birth” ironically came to Sassanian Persia via Christians fleeing Roman persecution.
In recent years in America, as I pondered how we abandoned our core values, I would send private “Yalda greetings,” with an unusual night photo of Monticello, Thomas Jefferson’s home. (see extension) On such metaphorically dark political nights, I took comfort with John Adams, who on the very day that both he and Jefferson died, July 4th, 1826, remarked:

“Jefferson lives.”

This year, I have a sense of hope, that the latest “reign of witches” in America might soon be over.
So I’ll give a different emphasis in my Yalda greetings this year, borrowing a line from this IRNA description of the Yalda traditions:

Because Yalda is the longest and darkest night, it has happened to symbolize many things in Persian poetry; separation from a loved one, loneliness and waiting.

After Yalda a transformation takes place — the waiting is over, light shines and goodness prevails.

Sounds like a plan.

Continue reading “Happy Yalda”

A new mediator for Tehran & Washington: Iraq!

So now, the ever-mercurial Ali Dabbagh, spokesman for Iraqi PM Nuri al-Maliki, says he’s been urging Barack Obama to initiate a serious, sustained dialogue with Iran.
Reuters reports that Dabbagh,

    also called for dialogue to improve relations between Iran and Arab countries. “The time has come for a new, serious, and calm policy with an open-minded vision,” Dabbagh said.

(HT: Bill the spouse).
So now the Iraqi government, joint foster-child of Washington and Tehran, wants “mommy” and “daddy” to start talking nicely with each other. Good for Maliki.
It’s important that he takes– and hopefully sticks to– this position. Remember back when the US was trying to gin up anti-Iranian feeling in the US on the grounds that Iran was undertaking various heinous efforts to attack and undermine the Baghdad government? Now the foster-child is putting his own voice directly into the discussion.
Reuters adds this:

    Without specifying whether he was addressing Iran or the United States, Dabbagh called for respect for international law, alternatives to military solutions to conflict, and for regional answers to regional problems.
    “Solutions (must not be) forced from outside,” he said.

By the way, I don’t speak Farsi but there are some reports (e.g. here) that “Obama” can be understood by Farsi speakers as meaning “he is with us.” That, along with the president-elect’s other two names, could connect powerfully with the millennialism that seems to rumble around in the hearts of many of Iran’s theocrats. Can any readers here shed more light on the linguistic, sociological, or political aspects of this question?

Rafsanjani: Embassy “should not have been taken.”

In reviewing Iranian reactions to the Obama election and emerging team, I came across a recently translated report of comments made by Iran’s still influential Ali Akbar Hashemi-Rafsanjani on November 4th — on the anniversary of takeover of the US Embassy by Iranian students in 1979. Ordinarily, such days are filled with chants of “Marg Bar Amrika” (death to America).
Yet on this occasion, 29 years later, Rafsanjani, son of the revolution, flatly questions the taking of the Embassy as a mistake.

Continue reading “Rafsanjani: Embassy “should not have been taken.””

Specter, Tierney spearheading diplomatic engagement with Iran

Sen. Arlen Specter (R-PA) and Rep. John Tierney (D-MA) are at the forefront of a bold new effort to pull US policy away from its belligerent stance towards Iran and to rally strong congressional support for President-elect Obama’s long-maintained preference for real diplomatic engagement with the Islamic Republic.
Yesterday, these two Congressional leaders and Sen. Thomas Carper (D-DE) all appeared at an event held on Capitol Hill to launch a new Experts’ Statement that spells out in broad terms how a new policy of diplomatic engagement could be pursued and that– equally importantly– dispells some of the key “myths” that, being widespread especially on Capitol Hill, have served until now to blunt congressional support for engagement with Iran.
These are the five steps the Experts’ Statement urges:

    1. Replace calls for regime change with a long-term strategy [that includes meaningful dialogue]
    2. Support human rights through effective, international means [as opposed to unilateral, US-only means that seem to aim at regime change]
    3. Allow Iran a place at the table – alongside other key states – in shaping the future of Iraq, Afghanistan and the region.
    4. Address the nuclear issue within the context of a broader U.S.-Iran opening [rather than by maintaining “peremptory preconditions on dialogue.”]
    5. Re-energize the Arab-Israeli peace process and act as an honest broker in that process [including, quite possibly, through “dealing, directly or indirectly, with Hamas and Hezbollah.”]

Among the 20 experts who issued the statement are veteran high-level diplomats Thomas Pickering and Jim Dobbins.*
At yesterday’s session, Dobbins appeared and talked very eloquently about the many helpful things the Iranian government did that enabled the early phases of the US war against the Taliban in 2001 to succeed. He knew– because he’d been completely involved in leading those efforts, including at the Bonn conference in December 2001.
Tierney and Specter also gave very effective and courageous presentations in support of the Experts’ Statement. Specter recalled that he has been a supporter of dialogue with Iran for a long time (“since long before Barack Obama became a U.S. Senator.”) Tierney stated outright that the policy of isolation and exclusion that the Bush administration has pursued toward Iran in recent years “has not worked,” and he quoted almost directly from the Experts’ Statement in several parts of his speech, expressing its sentiments as his own.
Carper was less impressive and courageous, doing much more to couch his words in terms that “all options must stay on the table”, etc etc. Still, he had agreed to host the gathering there in the Hart Senate Office Building, not far from his own office. And having it there did, of course, give the event and the Experts’ Statement additional standing among lawmakers.
This initiative has been extremely well timed. Though Obama has held fundamentally true to his insistence that, as President, he intends to undertake serious exploration of the possibilities for real diplomatic engagement with Iran, he will still require strong backing from Capitol Hill for this policy. And AIPAC, which has made the ratcheting up the level of threat, hysteria, and war-readiness against Iran the centerpiece of its advocacy for several years now, remains a very powerful player on Capitol Hill. Including, as we know, among the Democrats there…
So having Specter and Tierney so strongly on board the new “engage diplomatically with Iran” effort is extremely important. This is a movement that needs to continue to grow.
—
* Of course, it would be easier for this movement to grow if the “experts” whose names appeared on the statement were more gender-inclusive. Why only two women among the 20 people named as “validators” there? Why this ridiculous devaluing of the kind of contribution that a Nikki Keddie or a Farzaneh Milani– or a host of other distinguished women experts on Iran– could have brought to the project?

The struggle for Baghdad’s soul?

The WaPo’s Mary Beth Sheridan has a piece in today’s paper describing the US-Iraqi negotiations over a SOFA as having an important backstory of a US-Iranian struggle for influence over the Iraqi government’s decisionmaking. She writes:

    A deal to authorize the presence of American forces in Iraq beyond 2008 is forcing Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki to choose between two influential powers in this country: the United States and Iran.
    U.S. officials had hoped Iraq would quickly approve the accord put before the cabinet this month, which would give 150,000 American troops legal authority to remain in Iraq after Dec. 31. But Iraqi political leaders have balked. Maliki has not openly supported the agreement forged by his negotiating team.
    As the U.S. ponders withdrawal, it is clear that American political capital in Iraq is waning as Iran’s grows…

She then describes Ghassan al-Attiyah, an Iraqi political analyst at London’s Iraq Foundation for Development and Democracy in London as describing the Maliki government as being torn equally between both foreign powers.
For my part, I wrote back in early June that I thought Washington had lost the battle for influence over Baghdad’s decisionmaking, and I see no reason to change that judgment now.
Let’s review a couple of facts:

    1. The US has been extremely eager to “persuade” the Baghdad government to conclude a long-term security agreement it. Baghdad has thus far resisted these entreaties– though it has signed a security agreement with Iran.
    2. The US has also been extremely eager to “persuade” the Baghdad parliament to pass oil legislation that would thereafter allow western oil firms to conclude legally sound contracts with the Baghdad government. The Iraqi government and parliament have been playing a prolonged game of “pass the parcel” regarding that oil legislation, so western oil firms have not yet been able to sign contracts with the Baghdad government. Meantime, back in June, Baghdad concluded a significant ($3 billion) oilfield development/rehab contract with China.

Why do the MSM in the US not report these things, and not take them into adequate account when they’re assessing the present state of play inside Iraq? Why do they connive so deeply in perpetuating the myth maintained by the Bush administration that, (a) the recent history of the US intervention in Iraq has been one of some strategic success; (b) if we can’t yet exactly see the success, still, it is just around the corner; and (c) that Washington is still, definitely, in a position to be able to impose its “conditions” on Baghdad?
However, what is happening in and over Iraq right now is not a purely bilateral, zero-sum game between the influence of Washington and that of Tehran. This, because there are significant actors within Tehran that see the continued deployment of some US troops in Iraq as helpful to their own security (by providing a self-deterrent against any US or US-enabled attack against Iran.)
I think this is the best context in which to understand the otherwise bizarre “threat” that Gen. Ray Odierno delivered to the Baghdad government last week, namely that if the Baghdad government didn’t hurry up and sign the SOFA on the terms Washington wants, why then the US forces might all just have to pack up and go home.
From the point of view of Iraqi PM Nuri al-Maliki and a strong majority of both the Iraqi population and the Iraqi parliament, that outcome would be just fine. In poll after poll after poll, a strong majority of Arab Iraqis (though not of members of the Kurdish community that makes up around 17% of the national population) say that that is just what they want to happen.
So as a political “threat” against Maliki it doesn’t make any sense. And one has to assume that even Ray Odierno is smart enough to understand that at this point?
But Odierno was presumably calculating that the US message (blackmail threat?) to Maliki would also be heard in Tehran… And there, by contrast, it might indeed have some political traction and relevance?
If this is the case, as I suspect, then we could conclude that Tehran might currently be exerting quiet pressure on the Maliki government to make some of the concessions in the SOFA negotiations that Odierno and his masters seek?
Interesting, if so.

Iraqi, Iranian dimensions of the Sukkariyeh raid

Well, as was quite predictable Iraqi government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh has now trotted out new lines condemning Sunday’s raid in which US ground forces took off from (presumably) Iraqi territory on their heliborne extra-judicial execution mission in Sukkariyeh, in neighboring Syria.
The BBC tells us (link above) that after an Iraqi cabinet meeting today,

    government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh explicitly criticised the US over the reported helicopter strike.
    “The Iraqi government rejects the US helicopter strike on Syrian territory, considering that Iraq’s constitution does not allow its land to be a base for launching attacks on neighbouring countries,” he said.
    “We call upon American forces not to repeat such activities and Baghdad has launched an investigation into the strike.”

Yesterday, after Dabbagh was quoted as expressing some support for the extra-judicial execution raid, I noted that, “it is sometimes a little unclear who Dabbagh works for. In the past he has sometimes seemed to be a loyal mouth-piece for his Iraqi political bosses, and sometimes to be a bit of a cat’s-paw for the Americans.” Today, his Iraqi government masters have evidently jerked his chain.
Of more consequence than Dabbagh’s vacillations, however, is the fact that at that same cabinet meeting Iraq’s ministers were discussing the latest draft of the SOFA agreement sent along by the US: In the negotiation over this agreement the Iraqi side is still strongly insisting that any US forces on their territory should not be used to launch any operations against other countries that are not explicitly authorized by Baghdad.
The BBC report of the cabinet meeting said,

    Iraq’s cabinet authorised PM Nouri al-Maliki to put forward proposed changes to a security pact with the US.
    A government spokesman said the suggested amendments, agreed at a cabinet meeting, addressed both the wording and the content of the Status of Forces Agreement.
    … The US and Iraqi governments had previously said the pact, which would authorise the presence of US troops in Iraq until 2011, was final and could not be amended – only accepted or rejected by the Iraqi parliament.

Actually, I’m not sure the Iraqi government had previously said that. And evidently, if they– or perhaps the ever-dodgy Dabbagh claiming to speak in their name– did so, then now they have changed their mind.
Take that, Washington.
Also of note: Syria is no longer the international pariah it was earlier on this decade. Foreign Minister Walid Moallem has been in London, which wouldn’t have happened earlier on in the decade. Also, Syria has international allies who are weightier and more inclined to protect its interests than they were back then. (Russia is just one of these.)
Meanwhile, the Sukkariyeh raid has also attracted some notice in Iran, where some analysts have wondered whether the new US doctrine of “alleged hot pursuit” from inside Iraq could be applied across their border with Iraq, as easily as across Syria’s. Asia Times’s Kaveh Afrasiabi, writing from Tehran today, quotes an unnamed “political scientist” there as saying,

    “The chances are that the US incursion into Syria is a dress rehearsal for action against Iran and the [Iranian] Revolutionary Guards [Corps], just as they often portray Israel’s aerial attack on Syrian territory last year as a prelude for an attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities.” … [He/she added] that since the US had already branded Iran’s Guards as terrorists, it had the necessary rationale to do so.

Afrasiabi also writes,

    In light of the incursion on Sunday by US forces inside Syrian territory, ostensibly to pursue al-Qaeda terrorists, there is suddenly concern on the part of many analysts in Tehran that the security agreement between Baghdad and Washington is not simply an internal matter for Iraqis to decide, but rather a regional issue that calls for direct input by Iraq’s neighbors.

I would say, strictly speaking, that there must have always been a degree of such concern; but maybe the recent raid increased it. Anyway, the Sukkariyeh raid is clearly very relevant to those clauses of the draft Iraqi-US SOFA that deal with who exercises effective authority over the use of any US troops that remain in Iraq: Washington or Baghdad?
Afrasiabi’s piece is interesting and apparently well reported.
He writes:

    “Iraq’s neighbors have been asked by the international community to participate in Iraq’s reconstruction and therefore by definition they should also be involved in security matters as well,” another analyst at a Tehran think-tank told the author.
    This is not altogether an unreasonable request. Iran and the US have participated in three rounds of dialogue on Iraq’s security, and that, according to Tehran analysts, is as good a reminder as any that Washington’s decision to ignore Iran’s viewpoints on the security agreement is a bad error.
    Simultaneously, there is a feeling that not all is lost and that the architects of this agreement have indeed taken into consideration some of Iran’s vocal objections, such as the initial agreement’s provisions for extraterritoriality whereby US personnel in Iraq would be immune from the Iraqi laws. That aspect has been modified, and the agreement also sets a time table for the withdrawal of US forces by no later than December 31, 2011, again something favored by Iran.

The bottom line I take from that is that there is a politically significant trend in Iran that is not wholly opposed to some US troops remaining in Iraq for a while longer— at least, so long as the actual mission and use of those troops is subject to some pretty severe constraints.
Iranian contentment with the continued deployment of some (or perhaps even a substantial number) of US troops inside Iraq– provided they are not a precursor force for a US attack on Iran– makes some strategic sense. All the US forces deployed throughout Iraq, at the end of very long and vulnerable international supply lines, act as, in effect, Iran’s first line of deterrence against any serious attack on its territory by either the US or Israel. They are sitting ducks for Iranian counter-attacks that, in the event of a US or US-enabled attack on Iran would be quite justified under international law.

‘Bipartisan’ group urges US escalation vs. Iran

I think it is too late now for the ‘bomb Iran’ networks that are deeply dug into various portions of the US political elite to launch an ‘October surprise,’ i.e. a military action against Iran designed to escalate tensions in the Gulf region– and also, crucially, toincrease the climate of fear within the US in a way that would push voters to rally round John McCain.
However, it is not too late for an ‘inter-regnum surprise’, that is, a military attack against Iran designed to escalate tensions in the Gulf region to the point that that region and the whole world system become a chaotic stew of catastrophe that would then be handed to President-elect Barack Obama to deal with, come January..
I am relying mainly on Defense Secretary Bob Gates to prevent that from occurring, even if some of the dark forces in the Vice-President’s office– or their close friends in Israel– might be tempted to push toward it. But at this point I’d have to say that the ‘inter-regnum surprise’ looks unlikely, too.
But the pathologically Iranophobic forces in the US elite remain busy looking for ever-new ways to whip up tensions against Iran and to prepare US opinion for the launching of a war against it. Last May, Patrick Clawson and Michael Eisenstadt of WINEP published their little study trying to claim– quite counter-factually– that a war against Iran would not after all be terribly damaging to the US forces so widely deployed in the region.
And today, a new group called the Bipartisan Policy Center has come out with a report urging the new administration to step up all forms of pressure on Iran, including preparations for a military attack against it (pp.xiii and xiv):

    There are two aspects to the military option: boosting our diplomatic leverage leading up to and during negotiations, and preparing for kinetic action [the fancy new term for ‘combat’]. For either objective, the United States will need to augment its military presence in the region. This should commence the first day the new President enters office, especially as the Islamic Republic and its proxies might seek to test the new administration…
    While current deployments are placing a strain on U.S. military assets, the presence of U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan offers distinct advantages in any possible confrontation with Iran…
    If all other approaches—diplomatic, economic, financial, non-kinetic—fail to produce the desired objective, the new President will have to weigh the risks of failure to set back Iran’s nuclear program sufficiently against the risks of a military strike. We believe a military strike is a feasible option and must remain a last resort to retard Iran’s nuclear development, even if it is unlikely to solve all our challenges and will certainly create new ones… No matter how much the next president may wish a military strike not be necessary, it is prudent that he begin augmenting the military lever, including continuing the contingency planning that we have to assume is already happening, from his first day in office.

The new study is significant as much for the line-up of people standing behind it as for its bullying, hawkish content. The study is issued “in the name of” a task force whose eleven members include Dennis Ross, the perennially pro-Israeli eminence grise in US politics who notably succeeded during eight years as Pres. Clinton’s chief adviser on Arab-Israeli affairs in winning eight more years for Israel’s pro-settlement activists to continue their work. (He did this by systematically blocking all signs of movement on the Palestinian-Israeli negotiating track.)
Dennis has greasily been positioning himself for high office in a future Democratic administration. After being a strong Hillary backer, as soon as her campaign folded he signed on with Obama’s campaign, where he’s been hard at work elbowing aside anyone else who might compete with him for the candidate’s ear.
The “task force” was co-chaired by former Senators Chuck Robb (Dem) and Dan Coats (GOP), who also published this linked op-ed in the WaPo today. Another member was Steve Rademaker, spouse of the ardently pro-Likud Danielle Pletka.
So what kind of bird, you might ask, is this new “Bipartisan Policy Center”? It seems to have been cobbled together earlier this year. Its founder and president is listed as Jason S. Grumet, who must surely be the same Jason Grumet who’s been a leading adviser to Obama on climate and energy matters for some time now. Since 2002, Grumet has been the Executive Director of the non-governmental and determinedly bipartisan “National Commission on Energy Policy”, whose office is right next to that of the BPC on Washington’s I Street. Actually, the two organizations seem incestuously linked in a number of ways.
To me, it looks as though Grumet, who may or may not understand a whole lot about Middle east policy and strategic affairs, may have gotten bamboozled by Dennis Ross or others into running this “task force” with its determinedly alarmist and hawkish findings. The “findings” of the task force were, in fact, most likely determined not by the eleven former high-level officials who were task force “members”, but by the people put in to staff and support the task force in its work. These included “consultants” Kenneth Katzmann and Michael Rubin (who actually wrote the whole report) and “project director” Michael Makovsky. Jim Lobe gives us some background about these individuals here.
I hope that despite the involvement of Grumet and Ross in the work of this task force, Barack Obama is also listening to a much broader spectrum of views on what to do about Iran. Just going along with these bullying and escalatory recommendations would rapidly lead him to a dangerous dead end.