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US takes a new tack
By M K Bhadrakumar
The past weekend
has few parallels for its extraordinary spectacle
of public diplomacy. In a series of calibrated
statements, numbering over a dozen within the
space of 72 hours or so, senior officials in key
positions in the US administration toned down
their rhetoric against Iran.
US Vice President
Dick Cheney, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld,
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and, not
to be underestimated by any means, Deputy
Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz contributed to
this.
It all
began on Thursday at the testimony in
Washington by Wolfowitz to the US Senate Armed
Services Committee, which was largely devoted to
a US "exit strategy" for Iraq. During the
entire testimony lasting several hours, Wolfowitz
did not point an accusing finger at Tehran - an
unusual feat for someone so closely identified
with neo-conservatism. He summed up the Iraqi
"enemy" as "an unholy alliance of old terrorists
and new terrorists" - Ba'athists allied with new
al-Qaeda terrorists. Wolfowitz targeted Syria and
"other neighboring countries" for allowing the
"flow of foreign fighters" and even spoke of "some
of Iraq's neighbors" who fear the phenomenon of
majority rule in Iraq.
But
Wolfowitz found it "encouraging" that the Iraqi
Shi'ite leadership was showing signs of sagacity,
wisdom and political accommodation. He paid
compliments to Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim, leader of the
Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq
(a close follower of Grand Ayatollah Ali
al-Sistani), and quoted him to justify optimism in
an admittedly grim scenario.
Cheney took his cue in an interview with Fox
television on Sunday, and spoke of "a lot of evidence"
that the Shi'ite coalition in Iraq was
displaying political accommodation. He pointed out that
the Shi'ite slate did not set any deadline
for US troop withdrawal. Cheney reciprocated
that "this is not going to be an Iraqi version of
America. This is going to be an Iraqi
[constitution], written by the Iraqis, for the
Iraqis, implemented and executed by them, and it
is absolutely essential that we preserve the
integrity of that process."
Cheney
touched on Iran's nuclear program, calling on Tehran to
do the "right thing" and agree to "transparency"
as the US could still not say with
"absolute certainty" that its nuclear-enrichment program had
been stopped. Cheney repeated the assurance held
out by Rice over and over again in a series of
statements during her tour of European capitals
over the weekend, that the US is supportive of the
efforts of the European Union's Britain, France
and Germany (EU-3) to solve the nuclear issue.
Distancing himself from recent Israeli
statements on an imminent specter of a nuclear
Iran emerging within the year, Cheney elaborated
that if EU-3 efforts did not prove fruitful, the
probable next step would be to approach the United
Nations' watchdog, the International Atomic Energy
Agency. And if that too failed, it would be for
the UN Security Council to decide on whether or
not to impose sanctions against Iran. "We have not
eliminated any alternatives," Cheney said, but "at
this point we obviously are seriously pursuing a
diplomatic resolution" to persuade Iran.
Rumsfeld went a step ahead to deny
that any covert US military operations were under
way in Iran. In his view, Iran did not possess any
nuclear weapon and it could be years before it
could actually have one. Meanwhile, he said, "The
president has talked about Tehran and indicated
that we're on a diplomatic path with them, and is
hopeful that that will be successful." Rumsfeld
also acknowledged the importance of Iran's
cooperation in Iraq: "My concern in Iraq is that
to the extent a neighboring country is unhelpful,
it makes our task that much more difficult."
On the sensitive issue of "regime
change" in Iran, Rice in several interviews over
the weekend doggedly refused to be drawn
into discussions - except to amplify that all
Washington was saying was "just telling the
Iranian people that they are not forgotten in the
great reform movement that is going to sweep
through the Middle East". In fact, Rice invited
Tehran to partake in the so-called "Forum for the
Future" (the current variant of the United States'
four-year-old "Broader Middle East" initiative).
Cheney on his part acknowledged that
elections had been held in Iran in the past but,
"unfortunately, the most recent elections have
been tainted by the ruling power". Alluding to the
Iranian Guardian Council's role, Cheney regretted
that "they've kept a lot of serious reformers off
the ballot to put a crimp" on the potential for
the younger generation in Iran to express itself
freely.
The downsizing of the strident
US calls for regime change in Iran becomes
obvious when the weekend statements are juxtaposed
with what Iranian President Mohammad Khatami said
in Tehran on Sunday.
Khatami said that
the pillars of democracy needed to be strengthened
in Iran. He regretted that there were people in
the Islamic world and in Iran whose religious
thinking was rooted in outdated convictions of the
most backward layers of the society. "They try, in
vain, to give philosophical or religious
justifications to their obsolete beliefs. The
religion they offer is not only at odds with
democratic values, but goes so far as to disregard
even the most basic rights of the people. In doing
so, they lie, defame their rivals and order
murders." Khatami, with supreme irony, went on to
lament that the ideology behind the formation of
the Taliban and al-Qaeda was "embedded in the same
convictions".
The summary abandonment of
the stick in US rhetoric and the weekend's handout
of carrots can be viewed in perspective. The huge
imperatives of the Middle East peace process are
self-evident. It is absolutely critical that Iran
should not associate with the "rejectionists" (to
quote Rice) in the region who are bound to try to
torpedo the peace process. (Iran has extended an
invitation to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas
to visit Tehran.)
Second, as the
election results in Iraq are trickling in, the
full import of a commanding victory by the Shi'ite
alliance is dawning. Any realistic US "exit
strategy" in Iraq will have to factor in Iran's
cooperation, no matter the dialectics within the
Shi'ite world or between Najaf and Qom, two key
spiritual Shi'ite cities in Iraq and Iran,
respectively. It is hardball ahead.
Third, after a heavy-duty thrust
to evolve a "unity of purpose" (to quote Rice
again) between the US and European powers over
Iran's nuclear issue, it is apparent that
the cherry-picking days of the trans-Atlantic
alliance are over. The EU-3 would rather
constructively engage Iran. As the EU's foreign-policy chief
Javier Solana put it, "I don't think that the
United States has at this point of time the wish
or the will or the capability" to attack Iran, and
any unilateral US action would be "very difficult
to conceive" and would be "counter-productive".
Another important consideration in the US
calculus will be Tehran's own overtures. True,
Tehran has not been slow in matching Washington's
rhetoric. Be it in belligerence or in sound bites,
Tehran gave back to Washington every bit what it
received. Equally so, Tehran remained conscious of
its innate strength - be it the legitimacy of
state power in Iran, the national consolidation
over the nuclear issue, the non-viability of a US
attack on its nuclear facilities, US imperial
overreach in the region and its consequent
vulnerability to Iranian retaliation. But that has
not kept Tehran from estimating its national
interests or from reaching out to signal that it
is open to a reasonable deal - if only the
Americans would listen.
An
authoritative presentation of what
motivates Iranian thinking becomes available from
a speech delivered by one of Iran's influential
diplomats, its ambassador to the United Kingdom,
Syed Mohammad Hossein Adeli, at the prestigious
Chatham House on Friday - just ahead of
Rice's arrival in London. In his speech titled "Pragmatism
in Iran's Foreign Policy", Adeli spelled
out without any sophistry the ABCs of what Iran
is seeking at this juncture. He admitted that
Iran understands perfectly well the "realities of
the world order" (warts and all) and does not
harbor notions of strategic defiance. Iran just as
always gives primacy to its "self-interests". Any
"fanatic theocratic picture" of Iran
by ill-informed quarters would be overlooking the
moorings of Iranian conduct. Pragmatism, characterized
by caution and prudence - that
is what Iranian policies are about, he said.
The ambassador defined the elements of
Iran's national interests: its geopolitical
location, the national (Persian) identity of the
Iranian people (pride, sense of independence and
an "enthusiasm for modernity and advancement") and
economic development that translated into keenness
to integrate with the world economy.
Adeli
singled out four "empirical evidences" of Iranian
pragmatism: (a) its readiness to offer "objective
guarantees" for its nuclear program in return for
"firm guarantees" for the security of the country,
as well as cooperation in different fields; (b)
Iran's commitment to the stability of Afghanistan
and Iraq where "thanks to American adventurism, we
have gotten rid of both the Taliban and Saddam
[Hussein]" - where Iran offers "effective
cooperation" in establishing stability and a
democratic process despite the "affinities of
Shi'ism"; (c) openness to a Persian Gulf security
system where Iran plays a "positive role" in the
unhindered transportation of oil to the world
market; and (d) Iran's readiness to regard Europe as a
"post-modern state".
The ambassador
concluded that Iranian foreign policy would
address the developments in its region solely from
self-interest - "prudent, expedient and cautious",
"flexible" with a readiness to "reconcile where
necessary" and striving to play its role in "a
responsible way" in the world order. Tehran, he
stressed, would act out of its national interests,
the "ideological color" of its regime
notwithstanding.
From the fashion in which
four top figures in the Bush administration chose
to respond, it must be assumed that Washington has
in hand much food for thought.
M K
Bhadrakumar is a former Indian career diplomat
who has served in Islamabad, Kabul, Tashkent and
Moscow.
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