An Endorsement of American Greatness Liberalism Posted by Michael Cohen

Steve Benen, besides being one of the nicest people on the liberal blogosphere is a pretty insightful guy - and he has a very smart post up today on what he calls American Greatness Liberalism:

It's reasonable to think just about every policy dispute on the American landscape can, and probably should, be reframed to answer the question: how does this position the United States for global competition in the 21st century?

Every major power on the planet offers universal health care to its citizens -- except us. This puts America at a competitive disadvantage, undermines wages, creates job lock, and stunts entrepreneurship. Republicans are satisfied with this, because their goal is to prevent "big government," not position the United States for a competitive future. Are Americans OK with that?

Countries like China intend to create the world strongest system of higher education. Are Americans prepared to let that happen? A variety of rivals are preparing to dominate the next phase of the energy revolution. Will the United States deliberately skip the race and fall behind?

To keep America on top, the government is going to have to make real investments and establish a new foundation for growth. Republicans are staunchly opposed to making those investments and don't see the need for such a foundation.

So, let's have the debate, and take it out of the left-right dynamic and put it the global-competition dynamic. Why not make it the centerpiece of the 2010 elections?

I've long believed it creates an opportunity for American Greatness Liberalism -- progressive ideas, investments, and priorities needed to keep the U.S. on top for the long haul.

It's basically taken for granted in our national debates on American foreign and national security policy that the United States is a global leader, with global interests and even global suasion. Indeed this is one of the key rationales for maintaining such a robust military force. Strength and American power projection capabilities expands American power and influence . . . or so the argument goes.

That same exceptionalist view of American power is completely missing from our debates on domestic policy. In health care; in improving broadband access, in reforming our educational system; in fixing our crumbling infrastructure; in developing a 21st century economy we are falling behind the rest of the world. Yet, we seem more that content to be number 17 in health care; to trail other nations in broadband adoption or simply trumpet pablum like "we have the greatest health care system in the world" - a statement so manifestly untrue, it's laughable. Very rarely it seems is the connection made between our glaring domestic problems and our exceptionalist assumptions of global influence and power.

Sure we have global power projection capabilities, but it we lack an education system that can train workers to compete with Chinese scientists or Indian engineers it's not going to mean a great deal. If millions of Americans are stuck in jobs they can't escape, or are one illness away from bankruptcy or are having their entrepreneurial impulses stifled by a dysfunctional and prohibitively expensive health care system than American power and influence suffers. At worse we become a paper tiger; with a robust military presence in every corner of the globe and an ossifying economy at home.

If America aspires for greatness abroad then it really must begin with greatness at home; but as Steve points out we have a political system that is distorted by one party that believes the only good government is no government and another party that doesn't have the guts to push for the sorts of investments that will spur growth and modernize our economy. Pretty soon the issue will not be about keeping America on top for the long haul; it will be about keeping America competitive in a globalized economy. So far on that account we're failing.

But on the bright side, we've gotten really good at doing counter-insurgency.

John Bolton Offers His Advice on Iran and North Korea Posted by David Shorr

In a piece in the Weekly Standard, John Bolton tells us how he really feels about the administration's nonproliferation policy. As always, the argument doesn't offer much more than the self-gratification of ostentatious toughness. Certainly no practical plan that shows any plausible pathway to deal with the proliferators -- a complaint with hardliners that was expressed brilliantly (with exasperation and profanity) in 2005 by Robert Gallucci in The Atlantic Monthly's gaming exercise on North Korea. As Amb. Gallucci said, the right wing is really big on slamming diplomacy and arms control. When it comes to offering plausible policy alternatives? Not so much.

In fact, reducing our nuclear -arsenal will not somehow persuade Iran and North Korea to alter their behavior or encourage others to apply more pressure on them to do so.

And how, exactly, did bluster and refusal to negotiate affect Iranian and North Korean behavior? I suppose there's a small victory contained within the above passage. Bolton at least acknowledged the current policy's aim to build a unified international front of pressure on the proliferators, tacking it onto the straw man idea of pure moral suasion.

Then there's this tidbit, which is more revealing with regard to Bolton's position, than the administration's:

Obama’s insistence that the evil-doers are “violating international agreements” is also startling, as if this were of equal importance with the proliferation itself. 

For a guy who complains about "disdain for the decades of strategic thinking," Amb. Bolton is awfully cavalier about the NPT's 40-year old norm against proliferation. At any rate, this may be one of the clearest expressions ever that the far-right believes internationally agreed norms have no value in preventing the spread of nuclear weapons to more nations and regions.

Cantor's Faulty Terror Trial Arguments in Politico Posted by Adam Blickstein

Rep. Eric Cantor and the GOP are waging a war on America's legal system and the constitution. Their tools of attack are lies, bellicose rhetoric, and putting politics ahead of national security. But as hard as they try, reality and the facts continue to rebuke them.  Case in point, while arguing that terrorists should not be tried in American courts--something President Bush successfully did nearly 200 times--Rep. Cantor makes the following argument in Politico:

A clever defense lawyer will be ethically bound to take advantage of strong legal precedent from the Second Circuit under a doctrine called “Outrageous Government Conduct.” In the Second Circuit, a court finding of outrageous conduct by the government – after the arrest of a defendant – can lead to the outright dismissal of the charges. In this nightmare scenario, the defendant is freed and the case is over. Why would a lawyer think he could win that legal motion in these cases?

...It would be naive to assume that aggressive lawyers, backed by liberal support groups, won’t argue that a higher principal warrants dismissal based on alleged torture and abusive conduct. According to government documents made public by the administration, 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohamed was waterboarded 183 times. Certainly an argument of Outrageous Government Conduct will be made and the Second Circuit is the only circuit court that has adopted this dramatic remedy of acquittal. In light of this, one has to wonder why the attorney general and president were almost boastful in their prediction of easy victory in court. Was this a sign of confidence or legal naivety?

Cantor uses this rationale, that torture-based Outrageous Government Conduct might set Khalid Sheikh Mohammed free (something that would be entirely prevented by other national security imperatives) to support his claim that military commissions are the only option available to prevent KSM from falling prey to such legal gamesmanship. But it is Cantor that is naive and simply failed to do his homework. 

Last year during military commission proceedings, charges were dropped against Mohammed al-Qahtani because Susan Crawford, the top Bush administration official in charge of deciding whether to bring Guantanamo Bay detainees to trial, deemed he was tortured and therefore she could not refer the case for prosecution, the same thing Cantor claims would be impossible in a military court:

"We tortured [Mohammed al-]Qahtani," said Susan J. Crawford, in her first interview since being named convening authority of military commissions by Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates in February 2007. "His treatment met the legal definition of torture. And that's why I did not refer the case" for prosecution.

Crawford, a retired judge who served as general counsel for the Army during the Reagan administration and as Pentagon inspector general when Dick Cheney was secretary of defense, is the first senior Bush administration official responsible for reviewing practices at Guantanamo to publicly state that a detainee was tortured.

Crawford, 61, said the combination of the interrogation techniques, their duration and the impact on Qahtani's health led to her conclusion. "The techniques they used were all authorized, but the manner in which they applied them was overly aggressive and too persistent...You think of torture, you think of some horrendous physical act done to an individual. This was not any one particular act; this was just a combination of things that had a medical impact on him, that hurt his health. It was abusive and uncalled for. And coercive. Clearly coercive. It was that medical impact that pushed me over the edge" to call it torture, she said.

Crawford used the same rational in a military commission that Cantor cites would set KSM free in a civilian court. There is no question that Cantor is wrong, that military commissions are not some sacrosanct panacea to the potential problems we may face while trying to prosecute terrorists in civilian courts. The same motion he describes could be (and in Qahtani's case was) filed in a military commission and there is no reason to assume that a military commission panel will treat it any differently than a criminal court.

In fact, it may be easier for such roadblocks to be overcome in civilian courts since there is far more precedent and structure in our judicial system than there is in the extremely flimsy and rarely used military commission system. And in a previous terror trial, a Federal judge actually denied the same motion Cantor flails his arms about. 

Even though there were clear indications he was tortured, Jose Padilla was in the end convicted in a civilian court. And this is after the Bush administration failed to prosecute him in a military commission years after being held as an enemy combatant.The judge in the case explicitly rejected the same premise Cantor says would let terrorists flee prosecution:

A federal judge refused to dismiss terrorism charges against Jose Padilla over claims that the alleged Al Qaeda operative was tortured in U.S. military custody, removing one of the last major obstacles to the start of his trial next week.

U.S. District Judge Marcia Cooke stressed in a 12-page order filed late Monday that she was not passing judgment on the torture allegations. Rather, she said the effort to dismiss the case for "outrageous government conduct" was faulty on legal grounds.

Padilla's lawyers claim that during the 3 1/2 years Padilla was held as an "enemy combatant" at a Navy brig he was routinely subjected to harsh treatment and

Faulty on legal grounds. Just like Cantor's and the GOP's attacks on civilian trials and the judicial system are faulty on the grounds of reality.

Helmand, Oh Helmand Posted by Michael Cohen

Today in the LA Times we have an example of finer moments in journalistic gullibility. Consider this story on the impending Marine offensive into Marja, a key population center in Helmand Province (why the US military is going out of its way to preview its tactical plans for the Taliban is for a whole other conversation).

The U.S. Marines and Afghan army plan a massive assault on Taliban fighters in Marja, the last community under Taliban control in a sprawling, lawless region once dominated by the insurgency, a top Marine said Wednesday.

"We are going to gain control," Col. George "Slam" Amland told reporters. "We are going to alter the ecosystem considerably."

Ok, but then I read this:

"This is a big leap for the government of Afghanistan," he said.

Marine and NATO leaders want Helmand province to be a showpiece of the "clear, hold, build and transition" counterinsurgency strategy, in which Taliban fighters are forced out of a region and then a "civilian surge" begins to rebuild war-ravaged communities and bolster confidence of Afghan villagers in their provincial and national governments.

While the military part of the operation is the most dramatic, the actions of U.S. civilian employees, including from the U.S. Agency for International Development and Agriculture Department, will be even more significant, he said. The Afghan government is ready to install local officials to begin reopening schools and clinics and polling residents about what they want their government to do.

The goal, Amland said, is to spread to Marja the "kinds of success" seen in other communities once the Taliban were ousted. In the Nawa district of the province, for example, the marketplace reopened, irrigation canal clearing projects started, and a local community council was established once the Taliban fled.

By ousting Taliban from control of Marja, U.S. , NATO and Afghan officials hope to persuade rank-and-file, non-jihadist fighters -- what Amland called "lunch-bucket $5 a-day Taliban" -- to quit fighting and decide to see if the Afghan government can provide a better life for its citizens.

In the interim, the U.S. plans a "cash for work" plan to give jobs to the unemployed of Helmand province, including young men who may have joined the Taliban as an economic necessity.

It's almost like reading a DoD press release. Look, I'm quite sure that folks "want" this operation to prove the success of a "clear, hold and build" strategy but then again I want to play starting shortstop for the Boston Red Sox - doesn't mean it's going to happen.

As Josh Foust points out, we've seen 5 previous "surges" into Helmand with little to no success - what reason is there to believe that things have changed now? Is it because every US soldier and officer has memorized FM 3-24? And even if they did, the very idea that the Afghan government is "ready to install local officials to begin reopening schools and clinics" and will do this effectively just seems ludicrous. Last summer, when the Marines last went into Helmand, they were accompanied by what can best be described as trifling support from the Afghan Army - and pretty much no Afghan government support or a US civilian surge. What has changed in the past 6 months for people to believe that this surge will be different?

This is not to mention the fact the Taliban seem to be doing a very effective job at what the New York Times describes as "mixing modern weapons with ancient signaling techniques," and "have developed the habits and tactics to evade capture and to disrupt American and Afghan operations, all while containing risks to their ranks." Of course it also helps when you have that unpatrolled Pakistani border to slip over when need be.

Even if it made strategic sense to try and pacify Helmand - and I continue to believe that it does not - why are we doing this now? Why aren't we waiting until more of the US surge capacity is in country; why don't we wait until the Afghan military is better able to accompany the US on missions like this one?

What is perhaps so frustrating about this fixation with Helmand is that it appears to directly contradict President Obama's guidance to General McChrystal that he shouldn't send troops to places that can't potentially be handed over to the Afghan security services in 18 months. 

Foust thinks this has something to do with opium, which makes sense, but whatever the reason, trying to clear, hold and build in a region that is inhospitable to ISAF and Karzai government - when you have a civilian leadership that has made clear there is a timeline for withdrawal in place -- just makes very little sense.

That 4 Week Gap Posted by Adam Blickstein

As GOP lines of attack dwindle in the face of overwhelming evidence that President Obama's approach to terrorism, especially the successful interrogation of Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, is working effectively to keep America safe, it seems they are now focusing on the supposed "4 week gap" between the time Abdulmutallab stopped talking and when he again started providing intelligence. First, it's clear that the GOP's preferred method, military confinement and enhanced interrogation, would have been ineffective:

Those who had access to Abdulmuttalab concluded that "putting him in front of somebody with a military uniform would have made him even more opposed to any type of cooperation," the official said. "The way to get to him is to use family members who are going to be supportive of what we’re trying to do”

Further, we never would have gotten his family to assist had we gone down the GOP's ineffective interrogation road:

“One of the principal reasons why his family came back is because they had complete trust in the US system of justice and believed that Umar Farouq would be treated fairly and appropriately," the senior official said. "And that they would be as well.”

But driving down that political dead end has allowed the GOP to turn around and now bemoan the apparent 4 week gap in intelligence collection as a threat to American security. As Susan Collins ineptly explained today:

Second, the fact is that there was a long gap between Christmas day and late last week when the terrorists started answering questions again. We will never know how much information we lost, we could have acted on during that time. It is not like al Qaeda in Yemen did nothing during that six-week gap.

The key point the GOP focuses on is not that we have garnered useful intelligence from the lawful interrogation Abdulmutallab that is protecting American lives (including leading to the arrests of 10 terrorists in Malaysia), something that should be celebrated across party lines, but the fact that there was an apparent gap in intelligence gathering that could have been mitigated by military interrogation or "other means." Not that they ever elucidate on what those other means entail or point to any evidence that proves whatever it is they advocate has been effective in the past. Yet we do, in fact have evidence that the very system of interrogation and detention the GOP seems to desire has been extremely ineffective before.

In fact, 7 months in military custody as an "enemy combatant," Jose Padilla provided little or no useful intelligence to thwart any potential attacks or uncover any further terrorist activity. From the Director of  Defense Intelligence Vice Admiral Lowell E. Jacoby's own affidavit from January 2003, 7 months after Padilla was transferred to military custody:

The information that Padilla may be able to provide is time-sensitive and perishable. As noted above, any information obtained from Padilla must be assessed in connection with other intelligence sources; similarly, Padilla is a potential source to help assess information obtained from other sources. Any delay in obtaining information from Padilla could have the severest consequences for national security and public safety.

By Jacoby's own account, it is clear that Padilla provided little to no useful intelligence 7 months in. They acknowledge the urgency involved, and that each passing day is another day Padilla becomes a less valuable intelligence asset. But they don't describe any actionable intelligence gained, just that he should not be given a lawyer:

I assess Padilla's potential intelligence value as very high.

Providing him access to counsel now would create expectations by Padilla that his ultimate release may be obtained through an adversarial civil litigation process...Any such delay in Padilla's case risks that plans for future attacks will go undetected during that period, and that whatever information Padilla may eventually provide will be outdated and more difficult to corroborate.

Padilla may hold extremely valuable information for the short-term and long-term security of the United States. Providing Padilla access to counsel risks the loss of a critical intelligence resource, and could affect our ability to detain other high value terrorist targets and to disrupt and prevent additional terrorist attacks.

Jacoby starkly demonstrates the U.S. really had no clue what kind of intelligence Padilla may or may not have because it's not clear we got any useful intelligence from him. Padilla was silent for 7 months, but ironically they used that as an argument for not providing Padilla with any counsel or rights, even though Jacoby also admits that any delay in  intelligence gathering would have grave consequences for American security. Future Attorney General Mike Mukasey actually refuted the Bush administration's assertions that providing Padilla with counsel would inhibit interrogations (which up till now were obviously not working) saying "the interference with interrogation would be minimal or non-existant."

A 7 month gap versus a 4 week gap, which is more egregious? The GOP's "enemy combatant" approach they continue to advocate left America dangerously vulnerable and exposed for at least 7 months in 2002. And it's very telling that we got more out of Abdulmutallab in 4 weeks by following the the rule of law and working within the criminal justice system than we apparently got out of Padilla in 7 months under enemy combatant designation in military custody.

But the GOP would never acknowledge that, because it undercuts their underlying motives: that to them, partisan politics are more important than keeping America safe.

An End to the De-Ba'athification Circus? Posted by Michael Wahid Hanna

Welcome news today out of Baghdad—Iraq’s Higher Judicial Council announced that the electoral disqualifications by the controversial Accountability and Justice Commission (AJC) had been overturned by an appellate panel. While details are sparse, it appears that this legal ruling did not reach evidentiary issues, but rather threw out the decisions based on the lack of due process afforded those caught up in the AJC’s decisions. The silver lining to this entire affair is that an Iraqi legal body appears to have stepped in to stem a political crisis and that its decision is being accorded respect by the contending actors within a highly contentious, chaotic and politicized environment.

There are valid legal arguments to be made as to the legal fitness of the AJC to undertake vetting, but the process has been ad hoc and marked by opacity and lack of clear legal guidelines. Most problematic is the fact that the AJC attempted to game the system by using shaky evidence and timing its announcement for maximum political effect, leaving no possibility for a full and fair appellate process.

Details are still sketchy, but it appears that reinstated candidates will have their de-Ba’athification files reviewed more fully following the elections. Candidates who were stricken from electoral lists and replaced with substitutes prior to this decision, however, will not be reinstated.

In an interesting twist, ‘Ali al-Lami, the head of the Commission (a former U.S. detainee tied to a radical, breakaway Shi’a militia), has attempted to downplay the decision and has declared that while his commission is bound by this ruling, the Iraqi High Electoral commission is not. Although he does not state clearly his basis for this argument, it would appear that al-Lami has come to this conclusion based on the fact that the panel did not review the evidence at hand and his expansive reading of IHEC’s power to make final decisions regarding questions of vetting.

There is also a bit of dissonance from within IHEC with seemingly conflicting quotes from top officials, although this could be an issue of timing. Hamdia al-Husseini, an IHEC official, appeared on state television and announced that the ban had been reversed and that disqualified candidates would now have the opportunity to run. However, the head of IHEC, Faraj al-Haydari, indicated that IHEC’s final decision would only be announced following receipt of the appellate panel’s written decision and legal consultation regarding the decision’s implications for IHEC. At this juncture, though, it would be shocking if IHEC interpreted its authorities so expansively, but it does not appear that they have made a definitive decision yet.

For obvious reasons, Iraq’s fledgling institutions are immature and lack any sort of institutional memory to fall back upon. This has knock-on effects on the political process because there are no real precedents as to how the various branches of government interact with each other and fewer still legal markers governing political behavior. While undoubtedly necessary for constitutional governance, the power of independent judicial review is not always self-evident. The ability of the courts to have the final say in this matter should be encouraging in that the establishment of constitutional benchmarks indicates the possibility for the emergence of the judiciary as a credible, neutral arbiter of intense political disputes. Of course, the downside to this is that within the highly charged political climate, stoked by the incessant and inflammatory anti-Ba’athist rhetoric and propaganda that accompanied the disqualifications, many of the country’s leading parliamentarians were cowed into acquiescing to the AJC’s decisions based upon fear of alienating popular support or desire to capitalize on the issue as an electoral opening. As such, many political actors evinced little regard for the impact of their behavior on the credibility and legitimacy of the Iraqi political process.

Finally, with respect to the role of the United States, I was critical previously of the high-profile nature of Vice President Biden's trip to Baghdad after the vetting crisis had appeared to get out of control. One point that I left unmentioned at the time was how unprepared we appeared to be for the whole mess as it unfolded, necessitating Biden's trip in the first place. While we should not aim to micromanage internal Iraqi affairs, our lack of preparedness is still troubling. As we must move to normalize the U.S.-Iraqi bilateral relationship on a diplomatic basis, our ability to play a constructive and unobtrusive role will depend on a nuanced understanding of Iraqi political dynamics. At the very least, our in-country intelligence gathering at this point should be robust and better attuned to evolving developments on the ground. 

John McCain: Hypocritical . . . And Confused Posted by Michael Cohen

Adam below referenced John McCain's pretty glaring hypocrisy on DADT, but the Washington Post really nails it:

Three years ago, Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) was pretty clear about his stand on the military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy. A former war hero, McCain said he would support ending the ban once the military's top brass told him that they agreed with the change.

"The day that the leadership of the military comes to me and says, 'Senator, we ought to change the policy,' then I think we ought to consider seriously changing it," McCain said in October 2006 to an audience of Iowa State University students.

That day arrived Tuesday, with Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates and Joint Chiefs Chairman Mike Mullen testifying to senatorsafter President Obama's announcement that he would seek a congressional repeal of the 15-year-old policy. Mullen called repealing the policy, which bans openly gay men and lesbians from serving, "the right thing to do" and said he was personally troubled by effectively forcing service members to "lie about who they are in order to defend their fellow citizens." Gates told the Armed Services Committee, "I fully support the president's decision."

In response, McCain declared himself "disappointed" in the testimony. "At this moment of immense hardship for our armed services, we should not be seeking to overturn the 'don't ask, don't tell' policy," he said bluntly, before describing it as "imperfect but effective."

As odious and obvious as McCain's hypocrisy clearly is, what is even more troubling - and less commented on - is McCain's back-assward understanding of chain of command. Check out this quote from his spokeswoman:

"There has to be a determination from our military leaders that they think it is a good idea to change the policy; then, of course, Senator McCain will listen to them."

I have made this point before but John McCain seems to be really confused about the chain of command in the United States military. A determination on whether gays should be allowed to serve in the armed force is not made by generals . . . it's made by the civilian leadership (in consultation with the military). And if the President, the Secretary of Defense and the Joint Chiefs of Staff all say they want to change the policy - the policy gets changed. End of story. Our military is not a democracy; it's a dictatorship (ish). 

Look, if John McCain thinks changing DADT is wrong, fine. That's certainly his right as a US Senator to say so. But the notion that somehow a decision made by the civilian leadership is invalid if the uniformed brass don't sign off . . . well not only is it ridiculous, it undermines the very notion of civilian control of the military. 

If I Ever Come to Doubt that Politicians Act Rationally, It Will Probably Be Because of Congressional Democrats Posted by Shadi Hamid

I spend a good chunk of my time studying, researching, contemplating, wondering about, and talking to Islamists (the nonviolent kind). They usually don’t really surprise me (that much), though they certainly do their share of stupid things. And when they do something I find objectionable (like this), I can usually understand why they do it. They are, in the end, thoroughly rational actors, sometimes surprisingly so. They operate according to a discernible strategic logic. Congressional Democrats on the other hand…

Congressional Democrats – perhaps Democrats in general – surprise me, baffle me, enrage me – and, well, a lot of other things. Most baffling of all is their penchant for self-destructive acts, for a kind of all-encompassing, and rather impressive, political self-immolation. If I ever come to doubt – I mean, really doubt – my fundamental belief that most political actors act in more or less rational ways, it will be because of Democrats.

If Democrats give up on health reform, then I suspect it will be the dumbest political act in the recent history of American politics. I’ve read endless accounts of what Democrats think or should think and I still can’t find any even mildly convincing rationale for surrendering on what would otherwise be the most extensive and far-reaching enactment of social policy in a generation. Are Democrats punishing themselves? Is this an act of penance? They’ve all already voted for it. They’re all already intimately associated with it in the eyes of the public. They’ve spend God knows how many decades months working on it. Obama’s first year is seen as a failure without it and would have been at least a mild success with it. Republicans will be emboldened by its failure. And its failure will confirm what many Americans have long suspected – that Democrats might be nice people. They might be competent. They might have their hearts in the right place. But, they lack the courage of their convictions. They don't believe in anything strongly enough to really fight for it. Instead, they apologize for who they are and what they believe, as if being liberal was something to be ashamed of rather than a coherent, and defensible, set of political beliefs.

I don’t get it.

What’s weird too is that the calculus isn’t as distorted as it might be in, say, Egypt. America is a democracy, so, presumably, political actors are operating with a good amount of political information. In other words, Democrats can easily find out what Republicans are thinking strategically, and they can also get a sense of what the public is thinking through public opinion polling. This would seem to suggest that Democrats would be better able to take in and understand their political environment and make smart decisions accordingly (independent of whether you agree with those decisions or not).

If someone can shed some light on what appears to the great political mystery of 2010, I’d be really grateful. Because it’s really, really frustrating me.

Herzliya Dispatch #4: Iran - Split between American Neocons and Israelis? Posted by Joel Rubin

When Israeli President Shimon Peres called on February 2nd at the Herzliya conference for the use of "moral pressure" against Iran (in addition to economic sanctions), he may have been signaling a new, nuanced way to deal with this politically charged issue.

Little noticed but powerful in its significance, this position contrasts sharply with the rising chorus of neoconservative voices in Washington calling for Iranian regime change.

No one can accuse Peres of being soft on Iran, and in both public panel debates and side conversations here in Herzliya on the issue of how to deal with Iran, the hesitance to promote regime change and use military power against Iran has been a recurring theme.

Here’s a quick summary of my impressions about the Iran debate taking place at Herzliya:

Talk about Iran focuses almost exclusively on the nuclear issue. Interest in the changing internal Iranian political dynamics is minimal, as the general opinion is that the Iranians will still pursue a weapon even if they have a new government. This is largely because of the view that the Greens are either the sons/daughters of ’79 revolutionaries, or are being led by revolutionaries instead.

There's also a deep skepticism about Americas' previous failed nation building efforts in the region. As a result, there’s trepidation about the idea of regime change and the unknowns that could come with such a scenario.

Interestingly, there's little talk about military action being taken against Iran, and instead a general view that intensive sanctions and the isolation of Iran are the best near term path.

In addition, there's a grudging acknowledgement that President Obama’s engagement has had some value (certainly in shaking the regime), but that it can only continue (if at all) if it’s coupled with tough measures.

There has also been an intriguing recognition that Israel has made this issue too much of an Israeli problem, and that it needs to shift to making it a global concern. And there's little hope that Russia and China will help on sanctions, leading to a view that some other type of hard pressure must be pursued.

Lastly, there’s a common view that the Arab states also have something to fear from Iran, with an interesting judgment that Israel and the moderate Arab states are closer today because of this common adversary. Yet while Israeli political leaders at this conference have called for a two state solution with the Palestinians in order to help solidify the growing closeness with the Arab states, that view has been met with deep skepticism by the audience, largely because of doubts about Palestinian capacity to deliver on their end.

It will be interesting to hear what Prime Minister Netanyahu says about this tonight.

Iran Back to the Negotiating Table? Posted by Patrick Barry

Major news out of Iran this afternoon.  According to the Associated Press, President Ahmadinejad announced that Iran "will have 'no problem' giving the West its low-enriched uranium and taking it back several months later when it is enriched by 20 percent."  The announcement, if it turns out to have the full backing of the Iranian regime, would be a sizable shift, as it had appeared that Iran had essentially rejected the original IAEA proposal, which would have moved around 70% of Iran's uranium out of the country for off-site enrichment for medical purposes (although there have been signs of persistent back-channel negotiations).

As with most issues pertaining to Iran, there are some significant caveats.  For one, Ahmadinejad's response apparently doesn’t address how the uranium will be shipped out of Iran, a major sticking point for the West.  Under the IAEA proposal, Iran would ship most of its supply of uranium out at once, which would hypothetically set back their nuclear break-out ability by about a year.  Iran's original counter-offer would have shipped out the uranium in batches, which would not have given the international community the same assurances.  The AP story also notes that according to Ahmadinejad, Iran's uranium would only he held for four or five months, and not the full year that "Western officials say it would take for Iran's enriched fuel to be turned into fuel rods for the reactor," further confirming that the timing disagreements have not been resolved.

In addition, it still isn't clear that Ahmadinejad has the full blessing of the rest of the Iranian regime. The Iranian President was said to be supportive of the IAEA proposal before, but as the latter part of the year wore on, Iran's intransigence grew.  Some speculated that this meant that Ahmadinejad had been unable to cobble support from the various factions within the Iranian government, which was also still reeling from the turmoil that unfolded after the June Presidential elections.  This announcement might indicate a new degree of unanimity within the Iranian regime, Ahmadinejad feeling emboldened, or some other dynamic.

So what are the next steps? It's probably too early to tell.  On the one hand, this is a dramatic shift for the simple reason that Iran has not shown public approval of the IAEA plan to such an extent.  However, skeptics will point to factors like the ones detailed above as a sign that Iran is continuing to stall.

Whatever the case, we will be following this closely in the days ahead.