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More things Obama should be saying and doing about Iran
President Obama has finally broken his long silence about the events in Iran. He said many of the right things and hit many of the right notes in his remarks last night, and echoed them again today in comments with the South Korean president. Obama is correctly not saying anything that the Iranian regime could use to discredit the opposition. And his expressions of support for Iran's sovereignty, respect for its people, and resolve that it is Iranians, not America and not anyone else, who should determine the outcome of Iran's election are absolutely right. We can't say all of this enough, as I suggested yesterday.
The problem is, the force that is currently preventing Iranians from determining their own future is not America or any other international actor. It's Iran's government. It did so when the Guardian Council hand-picked who could run in the election in the first place. It did so when the official results of that voting were, to say the least, deeply suspicious. It is doing so now through truly horrific state-sponsored violence and intimidation against peaceful Iranian dissidents. And in all likelihood, it will continue to do so when the Guardian Council, the same unaccountable institution that stage-managed the election on the front end, will now "investigate" charges of voter fraud and make a final ruling on the back end.
It is important for all Americans, especially we of the loyal opposition, to realize that the greatest force of leverage that exists to prevent the Iranian government from quashing the will of Iran's dissidents to endure in their quest for justice is not the U.S. government. It is not President Obama or Congress. And it is certainly not some mysterious "Obama effect." It is the Iranian people themselves. For this reason, the U.S. goal must be to shape international conditions that bolster the willingness of Iran's people to put peaceful pressure on their government, while also deterring that government from resolving this stand-off through continued violence, intimidation, or duplicity. Unfortunately, Obama's statement last night gave the impression that, though he is "deeply troubled" by events in Iran, he is more eager to get the whole matter resolved so he can get on with his plans to engage with Iran's rulers.
I am whole-heartedly in favor of America playing the supporting role. I'm all for doing things like getting Twitter to keep its website up and available to Iranian users. But let's not mistake passivity for support.
Let's demand that foreign journalists in Iran be free to report on events, not confined to their bureaus or have their press credentials revoked. Let's put some of our new cyber-warfare capabilities to the test, quietly and covertly of course, to disrupt Tehran's ability to shut off the flow of information to Iranians and between them. Let's start trying to rally and unify the community of nations -- the democratic ones, if nothing else -- to start speaking with one voice: to condemn the violence against peaceful Iranians, to call on Iran's government to address allegations of voter fraud, and to state that supportive nations will continue to support Iran's dissidents in this internal Iranian matter as long as they feel that justice has not been done. Let's start defining some broad international expectations for Iran's government -- how it should and should not treat its people. The only person in the world who can orchestrate this kind of diplomatic effort to build international consensus in support of Iran's dissidents is the President of the United States, and it's high time that he start.
In fact, if Obama is unwilling to state that Iran's treatment of its people during this incident will have a bearing on his desire to engage with Iran's government, then why not say that one of the issues he now plans to raise when they do finally talk is the fate of the many, many peaceful Iranian protestors who the world has watched savagely clubbed in the streets and then hauled away to God knows where?
I'm under no illusions that the United States has a lot of levers of influence in this situation. Nor do I think that Ahmadinejad couldn't actually win a free and fair vote if one were held, albeit with a smaller majority. But that is beside the point. Ayatollah Khamenei's concession yesterday in committing to a recount was important, and who knows how much further the Iranian regime could be made to back-peddle if the Iranian people continue to pressure it.
If you had said several weeks ago that hundreds of thousands of Iranians would take to the streets and stay there, despite violent repression and intimidation, few would have thought that possible either. Could further pressure compel Iran's leaders to call a new election altogether? To invite international monitors into the country to observe it? Who knows? And if Ahmadinejad wins that election anyway, so be it. That would nonetheless be an unprecedented victory for the democratic aspirations of Iran's people, and that is very much in our national interest.
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More things Obama should be saying and doing about Iran
How about this:
"People of Iran! I, the Leader of the Great Satan, am overjoyed that you have at least seen the True Evil of the Islamic Government which has deceived you and enslaved you!
"The USA will do everything in our power to free you from Islam! We will make sure your new government never has nuclear weapons and that it becomes best buddies with Israel! We will make sure that your schools teach your children to hate Islam and to love Israel! We will bring you Jewish bankers to run your economy!
"Fight each other as hard as you can! Soon the US Air Force will come with cluster bombs to protect you! Then the US Marines will come with flamethrowers and phosphorus to protect you! Kill as many of your iranian enemies as you can before we arrive!"
Or maybe he might say something else, that sounds like this to iranians.
Or maybe he should just stay out of the spotlight for the moment....
funny
Actually, Jewish bankers would make the country rich. So although you think your sarcastic, the contribution would be real.
As for cluster bombs - yes, that is funny.
What's not funny, is what happens after the opposition is destroyed, because Hussein failed to act.
The ball will be in your court, and everyone else who argued that we need to see no evil, hear no evil, and do only that which dictators ask us to.
Actually, Jewish bankers
Actually, Jewish bankers would make the country rich.
My point is not what would happen in reality after a US invasion, but how the proposal would sound to iranians.
Of course in reality we all know that jewish bankers are only a fantasy invented by antisemites. Of course jewish bankers have never had any effect on any nation's economy. If the iranian economy was controlled by jewish bankers then of course iran would become immensely wealthy and the wealth would be shared among the whole population. Similarly if the iranian economy was controlled by Santa Claus.
But try to persuade iranians that....
What's not funny, is what happens after the opposition is destroyed, because Hussein failed to act.
You figure the government is going to kill off the majority of their own population which happens to disagree with them?
How undemocratic!
But no, the Shah didn't do that and these guys won't either. Not even Pinochet did that, though the USA gave him our full support and aid and encouraged him to.
If the public is really opposed to them, they'll back down. The problem is that a whole lot of the public might be supporting them, maybe a majority, maybe a strong majority.
Say what?
"If the public is really opposed to them, they'll back down."
Just like Tiananmen Square, right?
The mass of the chinese
The mass of the chinese population supported the chinese government and supported the actions at Tiananmen Square.
They'd lived through the Cultural Revolution and they didn't want anything like it again. And that's what it looked like to them, it looked like another Cultural Revolution starting up.
If the public had opposed the chinese government, the government would have backed down or it would over a period of months have been forced to back down. The army would have split, and then the larger part of it would have joined the side of the public.
AMEN
Right on Laura.
Your list of should/could is great.
That's precisely what Obama needed to articulate, in a speech - because there is no other way to mobilize on the issue.
Of course, Obama lacks the leadership skills.
Thanks to his lapse, the Revolution in Iran, will be crushed.
Not So
The only person in the world who can orchestrate this kind of diplomatic effort to build international consensus in support of Iran's dissidents is the President of the United States
This is ridiculous. Why is Obama the only one who can initiate this rallying effort? In fact, as recognized by Bush's former point person on Iran, Nicholas Burns, the US is uniquely compromised in taking this role.
Mr. Brose's recommendations are rash and would likely be counterproductive.
Next moves
President Obama may actually have given the best guidance for how to respond officially to developments in Iran in statements he has made in various fora, including the Cairo speech, to the effect that we should say openly things that have usually be said only behind closed doors.
What things, in this case? Well, the first thing is acknowledgement that Ahmadinejad's hostility to the United States is not the main reason so many Iranians are in the streets now. If the Iranian economy were in good shape, Iran's president would have been reelected without the need for any government manipulation of the electoral process (something that is true in most countries, including ours, at most times). Iran's economy is in bad shape, something many Iranians ascribe to their president's personal incompetence.
The second thing is acknowledgement of the fact that Mousavi is not our guy. He's never had a reputation as a friend of the United States; incidentally, by all accounts he is personally about as conservative as Ahmadinejad is with respect to religious observance. He has complained about Ahmadinejad making enemies for Iran foolishly and for no good reason, which is not exactly a new charge, and has spoken somewhat vaguely about opening Iran to the rest of the world. This relates to the economic issues mentioned above.
The third thing is that clerics in Iran, including some of the senior ones, appear divided. Some support Khamenei and Ahmadinejad no matter what; others have protested what they say has been flagrant electoral fraud. Even if Ahmadinejad would have won a fair election, Iranian government actions since the vote appear to be alienating some of the most respected figures within the country. The security services, of course, have a strong vested interest in sustaining Ahmadinejad, quite apart from what religious figures think.
The fourth thing is that Ahmadinejad will ascribe any difficulties he or his country face to American interference and general malevolence no matter what Washington does. Hostility to the United States has been the Iranian regime's reason for being since 1979, and that is not about to change. While it is prudent for President Obama to withhold a hasty or intemperate response to developments in Iran, we could easily overdo the walking on eggshells approach. If Washington said nothing for two weeks and protests in Iran continued throughout that time, Ahmadinejad would be saying that Mousavi is an American spy.
The fifth and final thing follows. The Obama administration can't very well have exerted itself to free one Iranian American journalist from a Tehran prison after a bogus espionage chage, and urged North Korea to release two kidnapped journalists, and then go silent when foreign journalists in Iran are kept under house arrest. Violence by semi-official militias allied with Ahmadinejad shouldn't pass without comment either, nor should government-imposed restrictions on the Internet and social networking media.
All of these things suggest a government trying to cover something up. Of course American officials who say that will be attacked by Ahmadinejad and his supporters for "meddling." Fine; they're going to be attacked anyway. They will be expected by everyone to say something in the coming days and weeks about developments in Iran, and the Iranian government has given them an opening to speak to issues many Iranians care about. There is more opportunity than danger in the past week's developments from the American point of view.
44's Cold Blooded Realpolitik
44's policy now requires getting past the election controversies quickly so that he can soon begin negotiations with the reelected Ahmadinejad government.
As long as the opposition's rowdy protests continue and the government appears to be either unsettled or too brutal to do business with - it creates tons of issue laden probs.
44 needs a rapid return to peace and quiet in Iran, not an impatient nation full of young ppl fixing to bust out of a closed control freak society. 44 has to deflate the opposition, not to encourage it. And that is what he has been doing.
The worst thing is that this approach will probably not prevent the Iranians from getting a nuclear weapon.
But this is what "realpolitik" is all about.
It is what sent Brent Scowcroft to raise a champagne toast to China's leaders in the wake of Tiananmen Square. It is what convinced Gerald Ford not to meet with Alexander Solzhenitsyn at the height of detente.
GOP has traditionally been better at it than Donkies -- though they have rarely been rewarded by the American people at the ballot box, as 38 and 41 can attest.
Let's see if 44 can be just as cold-blooded in pursuit of better relations with an ugly regime, without suffering the same political fate.
Realpolitik
I take it commenter courtneyme109 read Robert Kagan's absurd piece in the Post today, which made the same ridiculous claims.
They're getting easier and easier to recognize...
...these proponents of American intervention and "remaking of the world in our American image."
We can lead by example, we can help when the situation calls for it, but in the end, it's up to the people themselves to create their own governments of by and for their own people. They have to want it first, and they have to be willing to keep and defend it, with or without our help. We cannot create little "mini-we Americas" at the business end of a gun.
Bad Idea
Given the CIA's infamous history with regard to Iranian elections, I think this would neither help the opposition in Iran or relations between the US and Iran; even with the democratic opposition in power.
I am definitely a Liberal but even I can recognize Obama's cautious response as incredibly shrewd statesmanship. He has not abandoned the Iranian people, he has merely refused to raise the stakes this turn, to wait for Khamenei and Ahmadinejad to make the first move.
Initially they tried to crack down on the protesters but seemed to have backed off from this strategy. As others have already noted here, an intervention now by the US would only give credence to any response Ahmadinejad makes. Obama needs to play the waiting game in the "hold" position to see what Ahmadinejad does next, and then respond based on the severity of Ahmadinejad's actions.
Christ, more of this?
What, are you crazy? It's already more or less common knowledge that the US subsidized a violent anti-Iranian government insurgency group for years - say this, and Moussavi is as good as gone.
Hell, the Iranian government is already decrying the US for "meddling" and trying to cast the opposition as agents of foreign powers, just for Obama's statement!
Again, I know it's unnatural to you, but the US just needs to stay quiet on this one until it's all over.
You suggested, in that prior post, that we put pressure on foreign governments to withdraw recognition of an Ahmadinejad government. You don't think that reeks of meddling?
Don't make me laugh. Put further pressure on the regime, and they'll simply turn around and accuse the US of trying to meddle in their affairs, and the opposition as agents of "foreign powers". That would be the deathknell for any chance that Moussavi has of getting a recount.
Indeed. Brose seems to live in this fantasy world where the US has enormous diplomatic pressure it can bring to bear on a country that it doesn't have recognition with, and that actively uses the spectre of US power as a source of legitimacy on the basis of "resistance".
Notice the key words - the Iranian people pressured it. Not the US, not the EU, not the Arab League, not the UN - the Iranians. This is an Iranian problem, and if we want any chance of Moussavi emerging stronger from this, we need to resist any temptation to meddle.