Obama's Approach To Iran: How Should He Proceed?

National Security panel of experts, here

Hillary Mann Leverett, CEO, STRATEGA

Think big; thinking small about U.S.-Iranian relations won’t work and could make things worse. From my own experience as a U.S. official negotiating with Iranian officials over Afghanistan and al-Qaeda for almost two years during 2001-2003, it is clear to me that trying to proceed incrementally
with Tehran—by picking one or two issues on which U.S. and Iranian interests seem to overlap, hoping that productive interaction on those issues will build “confidence” enabling the parties to deal with more contentious issues later on—is doomed to fail. Our talks over Afghanistan were productive but structurally flawed. Because there was no comprehensive, strategic framework for dealing with the Iranians, unrelated issues could and did undermine otherwise productive negotiations at any time.

If President Obama is serious about diplomatic engagement with Iran, he needs to establish a comprehensive strategic framework for U.S.-Iranian diplomacy at the outset, rather than waiting in vain for some measure of “trust” to be established. Moreover, that comprehensive strategic framework needs to posit strategic realignment between Washington and Tehran as engagement’s end goal. Without this, the Iranians will never believe that the United States is truly prepared to live with the Islamic Republic as Iran’s legitimate government. Under these conditions, the Iranians will continue to act in ways that they believe are critical to defending their vital interests, but that we see as unacceptably provocative. Unless we break this vicious cycle, already bad U.S.-Iranian relations will continue to deteriorate, and the United States and the Islamic Republic will be drawn ever closer to the point of conflict, even with the Obama Administration’s professed interest in diplomatic engagement.

President Obama should start formulating his Administration’s policy toward the Islamic Republic by recognizing an important set of facts: Iran’s geo-strategic location at the crossroads of the Middle East and Central Asia and in the heart of the Persian Gulf, its enormous hydrocarbon resources, and its influence and standing in key arenas and on important issues for the United States make it a truly critical country.

Given these facts about Iran, President Obama also needs to recognize an important set of facts about the United States: For almost 30 years, U.S. policy toward the Islamic Republic has emphasized diplomatic isolation, economic pressure, and thinly veiled support for regime change in Tehran. At the same time, successive U.S. administrations have periodically sought to elicit Iranian cooperation on specific tactical issues. This two-track approach has not worked to advance U.S. interests; indeed, it has damaged the interests of the United States and its allies in the Middle East and undermined regional stability.

These two sets of facts lead inexorably to my argument about the imperative to “think big”: it is time for the United States to reorient its policy toward the Islamic Republic of Iran as fundamentally as President Nixon reoriented American policy toward the People’s Republic of China in the early 1970s. I have argued elsewhere that this kind of fundamental reorientation would be most effectively embodied in the negotiation of a U.S.-Iranian “grand bargain”, or at least a “grand agenda”, in which all of the principal bilateral differences between the United States and Iran would be put on the table to be resolved in a “package”.

Col. W Patrick Lang, US Army, retired

The structure of the question implies a situation in which the United States has more or less complete freedom of action in which to pick and choose among options. That is not the case. As Paul Krugman has pointed out, America stands on the brink of disaster economically. The shape and condition of our social contract a year from now is debatable if the economic crisis can not be mitigated. In that context it is doubtful if we can afford the two wars we are now fighting much less the costs that would inevitably derive from yet a further war against Iran. This overriding economic restraint makes a mockery of loose talk of an American war with Iran. In purely military terms, are there serious people who can not see how much the position of our forces in Iraq would be damaged by regional reactions to an American attack on Iranian nuclear facilities or the mere perception of American complicity in an analogous Israeli attack? What has happened in the Khyber Pass recently speaks volumes of the kinds of additional dangers that a rash use of military force would bring on.

David Ignatius wrote last week of his belief that elder statesmen of truly global stature should be delegated to negotiate with the Iranians. I heartily concur. Such negotiations should begin very soon and should be conducted without preconditions. The United States should seek an understanding with Iran in which the Iranians insure that the IAEA has such complete access to its nuclear facilities that there can be no credible claims that they are building nuclear weapons. The Iranians should also give up their support for violent groups that are not willing to transform themselves into democratic political parties. In return the Iranians must be accepted as a major power in the Islamic World. This implies a major change in US policy from regime change to engagement in a wide variety of fields. The Obama Administration has already signaled its serious intent with regard to the Palestine issue. There must be a great deal of “follow through” on early promise. The United States must advance a workable plan of its own for solution of the Muslim-Israeli issue.

Changes of this kind would revolutionize the situation in the greater Middle East. Such changes would be beneficial to Iran as well as the United States. The products of the genius of the Iranian peoples could be a great benefit to the United States and to the world if the barrier of hostility and fear between the two countries could be lowered. A failure to reach such an understanding will inevitably lead to a further deterioration of relations tending towards war, a war that the United States would surely win, but, at what cost?

Vice President Biden said during the late campaign that some foreign power or event would test President Obama severely in the first months of his term. I doubt if he expected the test to come from Israel, but, that is likely. Next week’s Israeli election will probably produce a government of the nationalist and religious Right. The Israeli press is full of the expectation that the new government will visit Mr. Obama in Washington to demand quick and decisive action against Iran. Israel fears Iran’s putative nuclear weapons program and dislikes the thought of an Islamic state that would be a serious rival for power in the Middle East. The expectation is strong in Israel that President Obama will be told to “fish or cut bait.” He will be told that if the United States does not deal with Iran to Israel’s satisfaction, then Israel will deal with the problem. Iraq under American occupation is situated geographically between Israel and Iran. The United States is responsible for the integrity of Iraq’s airspace. The entire world knows that. Certainly all the Islamic World knows that.One wonders what Joe Biden’s advice would be in this situation.

Ron Marks, Senior Vice President for Government Relations, Oxford-Analytica

Washington forgets sometimes that Iran is a sovereign nation with over 70 million people occupying some 600,000 square miles of land. Like it or not, it has an elected, reasonably popular (not loved)
government and a history with America that is checkered to say the least. And, like it or not, we are unlikely to engage in any substantial military action against Tehran.

At risk of going back to the Cold War and the Soviet regime, you need to engage it in a form of comprehensive linkage. And I mean comprehensive.Washington always seems to be involved in some form of limited actions against Iran-- carrot and stick at different times over different issues. For instance, financial and other economic sanctions are helpful. But, frankly, "economics" causes chronic problems for a nation -- rarely fatal. Following up with some form of direct political engagement, regional political engagement and economic engagement at the same time makes more sense to me.

The best we can hope for (as with the old Soviet regime, in its heyday) is to change behavior -- not regime. If Tehran can be made to understand it is in its best interests to behave, they will. Otherwise, we are in for a continued storm of their tantrums and our never ending list of "new proposals."