Edward Luttwak: Why U.S. Diplomacy Will Fail With Iran
[Edward Luttwak, a senior associate at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, is the author of the forthcoming "The Grand Strategy of the Byzantine Empire" (Harvard).]
Long before his inauguration, Barack Obama lucidly explained how he would deal with Iran. During the campaign he said he would "engage" its leaders by offering talks without preconditions—without even asking them to stop chanting "death to America" when concluding their speeches.
His premise was that President George W. Bush's policy had been incoherent and unsuccessful in stopping Tehran's drive to acquire nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles. Both charges are true. It was certainly illogical of Mr. Bush to denounce the Iranian regime as part of the "axis of evil" and then to seek its support in Afghanistan when forming the first, provisional Karzai government, and then again in Iraq to calm down the truculent preacher Moqtada al-Sadr and his violent Mahdi militia.
But Mr. Obama's critique failed to acknowledge that Bush's incoherence paid off. Iran helped consolidate the post-invasion governments created by the U.S. in Afghanistan and Iraq, even while supplying weapons to whoever would attack Americans. (For example, it lobbied for U.S. candidate Hamid Karzai to become chairman of the governing committee when Afghan leaders gathered in Germany in Dec. 2001.)
Still, the Bush administration's failure to stop Iran's nuclear and missile programs stands out. Nothing worked—not the occasional muted threats of bombing the nuclear installations, nor the diplomacy delegated to the British, French and Germans. The "E-3" talks started very well with the Tehran Agreed Statement of Oct. 21, 2003—under which Iran temporarily promised to stop enriching uranium. They ended in ridicule in 2006 when chief negotiator Hassan Rowhani boasted that they'd kept the Europeans talking while building up their nuclear plants.
In retrospect, it is obvious why the E-3 negotiators seemed so successful in 2003. Iran's leaders had just witnessed the U.S. invasion of Iraq and the swift, almost effortless destruction of Saddam Hussein's regime. Fearing they might be next, they stopped the nuclear weapons program they have always denied and the nuclear enrichment program they finally acknowledged in 2002—after its disclosure by dissidents.
Later, when Iran's leaders saw the U.S. bogged down in Iraq and no longer feared a march on Tehran, they publicly resumed uranium enrichment, and also, no doubt, the secret weapons program as well. So Mr. Bush had failed, just as Mr. Obama said...
Read entire article at The Wall Steet Journal
Long before his inauguration, Barack Obama lucidly explained how he would deal with Iran. During the campaign he said he would "engage" its leaders by offering talks without preconditions—without even asking them to stop chanting "death to America" when concluding their speeches.
His premise was that President George W. Bush's policy had been incoherent and unsuccessful in stopping Tehran's drive to acquire nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles. Both charges are true. It was certainly illogical of Mr. Bush to denounce the Iranian regime as part of the "axis of evil" and then to seek its support in Afghanistan when forming the first, provisional Karzai government, and then again in Iraq to calm down the truculent preacher Moqtada al-Sadr and his violent Mahdi militia.
But Mr. Obama's critique failed to acknowledge that Bush's incoherence paid off. Iran helped consolidate the post-invasion governments created by the U.S. in Afghanistan and Iraq, even while supplying weapons to whoever would attack Americans. (For example, it lobbied for U.S. candidate Hamid Karzai to become chairman of the governing committee when Afghan leaders gathered in Germany in Dec. 2001.)
Still, the Bush administration's failure to stop Iran's nuclear and missile programs stands out. Nothing worked—not the occasional muted threats of bombing the nuclear installations, nor the diplomacy delegated to the British, French and Germans. The "E-3" talks started very well with the Tehran Agreed Statement of Oct. 21, 2003—under which Iran temporarily promised to stop enriching uranium. They ended in ridicule in 2006 when chief negotiator Hassan Rowhani boasted that they'd kept the Europeans talking while building up their nuclear plants.
In retrospect, it is obvious why the E-3 negotiators seemed so successful in 2003. Iran's leaders had just witnessed the U.S. invasion of Iraq and the swift, almost effortless destruction of Saddam Hussein's regime. Fearing they might be next, they stopped the nuclear weapons program they have always denied and the nuclear enrichment program they finally acknowledged in 2002—after its disclosure by dissidents.
Later, when Iran's leaders saw the U.S. bogged down in Iraq and no longer feared a march on Tehran, they publicly resumed uranium enrichment, and also, no doubt, the secret weapons program as well. So Mr. Bush had failed, just as Mr. Obama said...