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| Syria-Lebanon-Iran |
| Realism isn't, when it comes to Iran |
| 2006-12-05 |
| Wall Street Journal house editorial Realism is an academic theory that holds that nations should, and typically do, conduct foreign policy with greater regard for their interests than their values. But realism is also an ordinary word that tells us that good sense and experience are better practical guides to action than theory. That's a distinction worth bearing in mind as the Baker-Hamilton Iraq Study Group releases its report this week and we debate whether the U.S. should engage diplomatically with Iran. To hear the so-called realists tell it, engaging Tehran is a matter of necessity and ought to be one of choice. Necessity, they say, because there will be no good outcome in Iraq--or Lebanon and Palestine--without Iranian acquiescence, which can only be achieved through face-to-face talks and confidence-building measures. Necessity, too, because they think that neither the U.S. nor Israel can stop Iran's nuclear ambitions militarily and so they must be dealt with as part of a broader negotiation. Yet the same people who now call for engagement also believed in it long before the invasion of Iraq or the recent revelations about Iran's nuclear advances. They argue that Iran's pressing political and economic problems--the country's huge youth cohort, cleavages within the regime and its loss of popular legitimacy, ethnic and labor unrest and growing unemployment--mean the Islamic Republic has reasons of its own to come to the table. The same logic also suggests that the real purpose of its nuclear program is to serve as a bargaining chip to obtain bigger concessions from the West rather than as an end in itself. But here's where realism of the common sense kind should intrude. Iran's domestic problems are hardly new and in some ways have been eased by the high oil prices of recent years. In 1997, Iranians "elected" a supposedly moderate president, Mohammed Khatami, on a reformist platform. As Iranian journalist Amir Taheri notes in the November Commentary magazine, the Clinton Administration sought to establish openings with the Khatami government by lifting some sanctions and apologizing for U.S. political meddling. President Clinton even planned an "accidental" encounter with Mr. Khatami during the U.N.'s millennium summit, but Iran's Supreme Guide Ali Khamenei canceled it at the last minute. The stood-up President "was left pacing the corridors of the U.N.," writes Mr. Taheri. . . . Finally, there is the matter of values. One has to wonder about "engaging" a regime whose recent domestic practices include taking a razor to the tongue of labor leader Mansour Ossanloo, whose crime was to have organized an independent union for bus drivers. Realists would have us believe that a country that indulges such barbarism can still be expected to act as a predictable and, under certain conditions, reliable partner in diplomacy. It's true that we also "engaged" the Soviet Union during the Cold War, but most successfully when Ronald Reagan also spoke candidly about Soviet reality and on behalf of Russian freedom and the U.S. resisted the Kremlin's global designs. We suppose in that sense the Gipper was an idealistic realist. President Bush has spoken repeatedly, in his major speeches and in interviews, about American support for Iranians who aspire to more freedom, which is one reason the U.S. is popular among the Iranian people. What message would it now send those Iranians if the U.S. turned around and embraced the rule of Tehran's mullahs? We think it's simple realism to believe the fate of people like Mr. Ossanloo explains Iran's past behavior, and well predicts its future. |
| Posted by:Mike |
| #2 And "Jihad for Allah" is just what their mullah taught them. The mullocracy is calling the shots and their jihad has larger personal meanings, conflicting with each other, in their race to global (and so, so individual) global conquest. All their mullahs wear army boots. |
| Posted by: Thinemp Whimble2412 2006-12-05 19:48 |
| #1 One thing completely left out of this "realism" analysis is the impending collapse of oil production in Iran (within the next 10 years, see Spengler as quoted today in Rantburg) and the Achilles' Heel of the West (oil again). For the mullocracy to survive, they are obliged to seize control of their neighbors' oil resources, and the West is obliged to block them. When Iran goes nuclear, the only thing to "engage" them with is how much tribute the West will pay them for the oil they will then control. That is the real purpose of the Iranian nuclear program, to ensure the mullocracy's survival and perhaps dominance of the Muslim oil resource. There's more going on here than the jihad. |
| Posted by: Anguper Hupomosing9418 2006-12-05 11:16 |