BOOK REVIEW Cutting through the talk Negotiating With Iran by John W Limbert
Reviewed by Kaveh L Afrasiabi
John Limbert is the Barack Obama administration's newly-appointed point man on
Iran at the US Department of State, picked for his intimate knowledge of
Iranian politics, culture and history. Nearly all Iran watchers praised the
appointment of Limbert, who replaced the Iran-phobic Dennis Ross, as a good
omen that the administration was on the right track when it came to Iran.
But they were only half right. Despite his chest full of personal insights (as
a former political officer in the US Embassy-turned-hostage), as well as his
recent intellectual output on Iran, focusing less on the post-1979
revolutionary state-building in Iran and more on literary and cultural aspects,
Limbert is neither an original thinker nor a strategic diplomat who can be
expected to
make a significant contribution to moving the tectonics of the complex US-Iran
relationship forward.
Instead, if the book under review is any guide to an objective prognostication
of the limits of the Obama administration's Iran policy, Limbert's influence in
shaping this policy is bound to be limited, given the absence of strategic
depth or vision observable beyond the pale of this political handbook intended
primarily as a resource tool for "American negotiators".
"In negotiating with the Islamic Republic of Iran, the traps are many," writes
Limbert, who throughout the book plays up the importance of culture and history
in the cognitive map of Iranian negotiators, repeatedly reminding his American
audience to never lose sight of the "background".
That is, Iran's tortuous history replete with "tragedies" and setbacks, as well
as occasional successes, such as when a weak post-World War II government in
Iran outplayed the Russians, who were eyeing Iran's oil as well as a parcel of
Iranian territory in northern Iran. Another success was during the 1980s
Iran-Contra secret dealings, when "skillful, double-dealing Iranian negotiators
had outfoxed the simple Americans". (pg 137).
Divided in seven chapters, Negotiating With Iran delves into four
historical case studies - the 1945-1947 Azerbaijan crisis, the 1951-1953 oil
nationalization crisis, the 1979-1981 US hostage crisis, the 1980s Lebanon
hostages - followed by the author's "fourteen steps to success" that draws on
the lessons learnt from those case studies.
Mindful of the need to stay bereft of stereotypes or labeling Iranians as
"irrational", "emotional" or even "xenophobic" as some authors in the West have
done, Limbert probes the issues of Iranian "national character" and historical
and cultural "constants". These come into play in any negotiations with Iran,
eg, the interplay of nationalism and Islam. Yet, the book occasionally slips
toward suspect generalizations, such as by claiming that Iranians consider
themselves "superior" to their Arab neighbors, or are apt to "self-destructive"
policies (pg 167).
The various problems in bureaucratic decision-making that result in sub-optimal
decisions are insufficiently covered here. Limbert's point about Iranian
negotiators' failure to "negotiate seriously with foreign partners on oil and
natural gas contracts" is simply false. This in light of Iran's multiple deals
with China, Pakistan, Turkey, etc. Nor does it take into consideration the
negative role of extraneous forces, such as US sanction laws prohibiting
foreign investment in Iran's energy sector, that have contributed to that
sector's problems.
To open a caveat here that reflects the complexity of decision-making in Iran,
several years ago, this author spoke with Iran's deputy oil minister, Hadi
Nejadhosseinian, who was then Iran's point man in negotiations with India and
Pakistan for the so-called "peace gas pipeline". Complaining that India was
offering too low a price for Iran's gas shipment, Nejadhosseinian was
nonetheless amenable to show greater flexibility on the terms if he received
instructions from higher ups regarding the political and strategic priorities
attached to that pipeline - that is opposed by the US and Western governments.
This author's impression from that episode was that there is a level of
disconnect between and among the various branches of the Iranian government
when it comes to such crucial foreign policy decisions.
Another problem with Limbert's book is that despite his keen insight about the
past hegemonic role and influence of the US in Iran, the author has a tendency
to depict Americans as "simple" or rather straightforward, confronted with a
rogue Iranian regime that is unlikely to "change its behavior and stop all its
misbehavior in the areas of terrorism, Middle East peace, human rights, and
nuclear development" (pg 181).
This leads the book to the pessimistic conclusion that the US should not expect
any "positive outcomes" in the short term. However, a more balanced view would
have tuned in on the post September 11, 2001, US intervention in Iran's
vicinity, seriously augmenting Iran's national security considerations and even
complicating any discussions of US-Iran "shared interests".
Conspicuously absent in Limbert's otherwise valuable book is any theoretical
framework or hypotheses to conceptualize what may be aptly described as a
"structural conflict" between an assertive, post-revolutionary system and an
intrusive superpower. As a result, Limbert fails to take into account the
importance of lessons from the Cold War that are applicable in the current
rounds of US-Iran dialogue. That is, confidence-building measures, detente,
zones of influence, and the like.
In turn, this is related to Limbert's inadequate understanding of Iran's
globalist ambition - his "Iran is not a world power" requires some
qualification in light of Iran's trans-regional alliances and foreign policy
behavior. This is reflected in part through such groupings as the Developing-8,
the Non-Aligned Movement (that will be headed by Iran in the near future), etc.
The book devotes precious little to discussing Iran's national security
interests and concerns, as a result of which a major lacunae of its discourse
appears in the form of a vacuum of understanding of Iran's own strategic
outlook.
Unfortunately, the book is replete with other shortcomings that chip away at
its value. In the chapter on the Lebanon crisis, the author's decision to
subsume the Iran-Contra story under that rubric is somewhat problematic; he
overrates the role of an Iranian intermediary and, worse, adopts at face value
the conclusion of the then secretary of state, George Schultz, who was
adamantly opposed to the arms-for-hostages deals and ended up testifying that
the US "was taken to the cleaners" by the duplicitous Iranians.
Indeed, the whole section on the Iran-Contra affair is largely unsatisfactory
and should be read with caution. Readers would have certainly benefited from a
discussion of Iran-US negotiations on Afghanistan, after 9/11, which had an
important bilateral security dimension, albeit on a temporary basis, that
nevertheless formed the backdrop for the subsequent US-Iran security dialogue
on Iran in the more recent past. Or, similarly, had the author bothered to
delve into the nuclear negotiations with Iran from 2003 until now, he may have
revised some of his conclusions about how to negotiate with Iran.
Regarding the latter, suffice it to say that whereas Iran today has a legalist
approach in the nuclear talks, insisting that they transpire within the
framework of the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and International Atomic
Energy Agency standards, Limbert overlooks this. He not only accuses the
Iranian negotiators of being habitually averse toward legal discourse, but also
advises American negotiators to jettison any references to legal jargon. This
is simply bad advise and distorts the positions and posture of Iranian
negotiators, not just now but also occasionally in the past, such as in the oil
nationalization crisis when the premier, Mohammad Mossadegh, couched his battle
in the language of international law.
In the end, Negotiating With Iran merits attention for its wealth of
insights and recommendations, such as having "realistic expectations", avoiding
demonization or reductionism, etc, but in light of its descriptive nature,
multiple truisms (eg, the Iranian regime's first priority is survival, but
isn't it for all states?), and numerous flaws cited above, its utility as a
primary reference on the subject of US-Iran negotiations is limited.
Negotiating With Iran: Wrestling the Ghosts of History by John W
Limbert. US Institute of Peace Press, 2009. ISBN-10: 1601270437. Price
US$14.95, 217 pages.
Kaveh L Afrasiabi, PhD, is the author of After Khomeini: New
Directions in Iran's Foreign Policy (Westview Press) . For his Wikipedia entry,
click here. His
latest book,
Reading In Iran Foreign Policy After September 11 (BookSurge Publishing
, October 23, 2008) is now available.
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