FDD

Mission Accomplished? (CM)

Eli Lake reports that top spy Michael McConnell has had second thoughts about the National Intelligence Estimate concluding that Iran had stopped its nuclear weapons program. If the goal of the NIE was to tie Bush’s hands, it succeeded marvelously. Eli writes:

The director of national intelligence is backing away from his agency's assessment late last year that Iran had halted its nuclear program, saying he wishes he had written the unclassified version of the document in a different manner. …

The release of the December 2007 estimate at best delayed American diplomatic efforts to pass a third U.N. Security Council resolution sanctioning Iran's uranium enrichment, an activity the mullahs have continued for two years despite warnings from all five permanent members of the security council. The estimate also drew rare rebukes from American allies, including Israel, France, and the United Kingdom who said their intelligence agencies did not concur with the American assessment that Iran had frozen its plan to produce an A-bomb.

More here.

NIE Fallout (CM)

Rafael L. Bardaji, who directs one of the best think tanks in Europe, writes:   

By considering Iran’s nuclear programme to have been halted, the NIE has called an end to a great number of things. First and foremost is George W. Bush’s policy of suffocating the Teheran regime by exercising greater political pressure and imposing stricter sanctions. ….   

Second, the NIE has stripped the White House of its main reason for pushing for further sanctions on the UN Security Council. If securing these sanctions was always going to be a tricky matter, now the balance has clearly swung in favour of those who advocate a more conciliatory approach to Teheran. Very soon the Russians will authorise the delivery of fissionable material for the Busher reactor and nobody will be able to firmly oppose them.   

Third, the NIE has blown away the incipient intra-European consensus regarding policy towards Iran. Whilst London and Paris had remained united in their belief that it was necessary to continue punishing the Ayatollah regime in economic, financial and technological terms, Germany, the European country that has the strongest trade links with the Islamic Republic, has never been that enthusiastic about imposing further sanctions.   

More here.

Neo-Churchillian (CM)

The Guardian reports:

Tony Blair has accused Iran of backing and financing terrorist attacks, and warned that the threat of militant Islam is similar to that posed by fascism in the early 20th century.

In his first major speech since leaving office, Mr Blair said that Iran was prepared to destabilise peaceful countries in support of the "deadly ideology" driving Muslim extremism. …

He said: "This ideology now has a state, Iran, that is prepared to back and finance terror in the pursuit of destabilising countries whose people wish to live in peace."  …

"There is a tendency even now, even in some of our own circles, to believe that they are as they are because we have provoked them and if we left them alone they would leave us alone," he said. "I fear this is mistaken. They have no intention of leaving us alone."

More here.

Challenging Ahmadinejad & Associates (CM)

The Wall Street Journal editorializes today:

The Bush Presidency is running out of time to act if it wants to stop Iran from gaining a bomb. With GIs fighting and dying in Iraq, Mr. Bush also owes it to them not to allow enemy sanctuaries or weapons pipelines from Iran. If the President believes half of what he and his Administration have said about Iran's behavior, he has an obligation to do whatever it takes to stop it.

More here.

Hitler at Columbia? (CM)

Bret Stephens writes:

John Coatsworth, acting dean of Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs, made the remark that "if Hitler were in the United States and . . . if he were willing to engage in a debate and a discussion to be challenged by Columbia students and faculty, we would certainly invite him." This was by way of defending the university's decision to host a speech yesterday by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad….

[I]n hosting and perhaps debating Hitler, Columbia's faculty and students would not have been "confronting" him, much as they might have gulled themselves into believing they were. Hitler at Columbia would merely have been a man at a podium, offering his "ideas" on this or that, and not the master of a huge terror apparatus bearing down on you. To suggest that such an event amounts to a confrontation, or offers a perspective on reality, is a bit like suggesting that one "confronts" a wild animal by staring at it through its cage at a zoo.

There is also the question of just what ideas would be presented by Hitler at Mr. Coatsworth's hypothetical conference, and whether they would be an accurate reflection of his beliefs and intentions. In his 1933 speech, [German] Ambassador [Hans] Luther made the case for Hitler's "peaceful intentions" in Europe, according to historian Rafael Medoff. Millions of Europeans believed this right up to September 1939, just as millions of Americans did right up to December 1941.

Let's assume, however, that Hitler had used the occasion of his speech not just to dissimulate but to really air his mind, to give vent not just to Germany's historical grievances but to his own apocalyptic ambitions. In "Terror and Liberalism" (2003), Columbia alumnus Paul Berman observes the way in which prewar French socialists--keenly aware and totally opposed to Hitler's platform--nonetheless took the view that Germany had to be accommodated and that the real threat to peace came from their own "warmongers and arms manufacturers." This notion, Mr. Berman writes, rested in turn on a philosophical belief that "even the enemies of reason cannot be the enemies of reason. Even the unreasonable must be, in some fashion, reasonable."

So there is Adolf Hitler on our imagined stage, ranting about the soon-to-be-fulfilled destiny of the Aryan race. And his audience of outstanding Columbia men are mostly appalled, as they should be. But they are also engrossed, and curious, and if it occurs to some of them that the man should be arrested on the spot they don't say it. Nor do they ask, "How will we come to terms with his world?" Instead, they wonder how to make him see "reason," as reasonable people do.

In just a few years, some of these men will be rushing a beach at Normandy or caught in a firefight in the Ardennes. And the fact that their ideas were finer and better than Hitler's will have done nothing to keep them and millions of their countrymen from harm, and nothing to get them out of its way.

More here.

Administration Officials: Tehran's Influence in Iraq Is Called Surprisingly Deep (AM)

The Washington Post reports: "The Bush administration has begun mobilizing support for a third U.N. resolution that would impose tougher sanctions against Iran, as the top U.S. military and diplomatic officials in Baghdad said yesterday that one of the biggest and still unfolding surprises in Iraq has been the depth of Iran's intervention."  (Emphasis added.)

Other big, unfolding surprises include that night may follow day, Ahmadinejad may not be looking to play the "stabilizing ... neighborly" role Secretary Rice was hoping for, and this Peyton Manning guy may turn out to be pretty good after all.

Oh, and remember how the State Department explained last year that multi-lateral negotiations with the mullahs were the way to go because we had now gotten Russia, China and the Europeans on board for a list of specific punitive measures if Iran did not desist on its nuclear weapons program?  (Some among us were skeptical — see, e.g., here, here and here.) The Post today also reports that 

the United States has met resistance from China, Russia and Germany to sweeping new measures against Iran, said diplomats familiar with the debate. A meeting in Berlin of Iran experts from the six governments last week was described by Western envoys as "chilly" and "a disaster" because Germany balked. As a result, they now expect any new U.N. resolution to be only slightly tougher than the ones passed in December and March.

We sure seem to get surprised a lot on Iran.

It’s A Start (CM)

Thee United States has decided to designate Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps, the country's 125,000-strong elite military branch, as a "specially designated global terrorist," according to U.S. officials, a move that allows Washington to target the group's business operations and finances

More here.

Al-Qaeda in Iran (CM)

Eli Lake writes in the NY Sun:

One of two known Al Qaeda leadership councils meets regularly in eastern Iran, where the American intelligence community believes dozens of senior Al Qaeda leaders have reconstituted a good part of the terror conglomerate's senior leadership structure.

That is a consensus judgment from a final working draft of a new National Intelligence Estimate, titled "The Terrorist Threat to the U.S. Homeland," on the organization that attacked the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001. The estimate, which represents the opinion of America's intelligence agencies, is now finished, and unclassified conclusions will be shared today with the public. …

The judgment that Iran has hosted Al Qaeda's senior leadership council is likely to draw some criticism from those outside the government who doubt Iran plays a significant role in bolstering Sunni jihadist terrorism. Iran's Shiite Muslims are considered infidels by the Salafi sect of Sunnis that comprise Al Qaeda.

While there is little disagreement that a branch of Al Qaeda's leadership operates in Iran, the intelligence community diverges on the extent to which the hosting of the senior leaders represents a policy of the regime in Tehran or the rogue actions of Iran's Quds Force, the terrorist support units that report directly to Iran's supreme leader. …

An intelligence official sympathetic to the view that it is a matter of Iranian policy to cooperate with Al Qaeda disputed the CIA and State Department view that the Quds Force is operating as a rogue force. "It is just impossible to believe that what the Quds Force does with Al Qaeda does not represent a decision of the government," the official, who asked not to be identified, said. "It's a bit like saying the directorate of operations for the CIA is not really carrying out U.S. policy."

Some intelligence reporting suggests, the source said, that the current chief of the Quds Force, General Qassem Sulamani, has met with Saad bin Laden, Mr. Adel, and Mr. Abu Ghaith.

The link between Iran and Al Qaeda is not new, in some cases. The bipartisan September 11 commission report, for example, concluded: "There is strong evidence that Iran facilitated the transit of Al Qaeda members into and out of Afghanistan before 9/11, and that some of these were future 9/11 hijackers."

According to the commission, a senior Al Qaeda coordinator, Ramzi bin al-Shibh, said eight of the September 11 hijackers went through Iran on their way to and from Afghanistan.

In 2005, both Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns and the then ambassador at large for counterterrorism, Cofer Black, disclosed that America believes that senior Al Qaeda leaders reside in Iran.

More here.

Loyola on Iran's Nuclear Program

In yesterday’s Wall Street Journal Europe, FDD Visiting Fellow Mario Loyola argued that

(1) The U.S. and its allies must be prepared to respond with military action if Iran withdraws from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

(2) The U.N. Security Council’s sanctions against Iran have failed — and will continue to fail — unless the West makes it clear that withdrawal from the IAEA will be considered a hostile act.

Silence on Iran Perhaps Not So Strange (ML)

Before December 2006, when the gloves apparently came off at least a little for the Bush administration, they appear to have decided not to retaliate overtly against the Iranians for the support we knew they were lending to anti-coalition operations in Iraq. So the administration used the "might be rogue elements operating outside Tehran's control" subterfuge to throw the press off the scent of what it knew perfectly well was Tehran's complicity, passive or active, in the attacks against American soldiers in Iraq. Since December, the U.S. has been a lot more aggressive towards Iran, cruising huge naval armadas just a few dozen miles from Iranian naval bases without prior notice; detaining hundreds of Iranians and Iranian proxies in Iraq; hammering Iranian-backed militias in Iraq, etc., etc.

In a sense, we may have been storing Iran's transgressions in the bank until the day we could cash them in to justify overt action against Iran. This only makes sense from a strategic point of view. I am all for deterrence, but deterrence presumes two conditions that do not obtain in the case of Iran: (1) that the adversary wants to avoid conflict, and (2) that the adversary is under unified control. Then there is the question of containment theory. If you retaliate automatically for every transgression at the moment the transgression is committed, you let the enemy control the timing of conflict, and you thereby concede to him the initiative. This is the criticism that John Lewis Gaddis levels against several postwar administrations — most of all Kennedy's — in his classic Strategies of Containment. Much better to wait until the moment of our own choosing to take the action most appropriate to achieve our lasting strategic aims.

Moreover, just because we haven't retaliated overtly doesn't mean we haven't retaliated covertly. We may well be fighting fire with fire — and in fact, Iran openly accuses the U.S. of doing precisely that. And let's not forget that the administration is not looking at Iran's terrorist activities in Iraq in isolation from the other things going on — including Iran's shifting political strategy in Iraq, and the diplomacy of the nuclear issue.

This is a complex web, much of which lies in the shadows of classified information and covert operations. U.S. policy is likely to make more sense in hindsight than it does now.

Iran Behind Latest Taking of British Hostages (AM)

Here's more indication, from the Times of London, of how well the new diplomatic engagement approach is going:

A group funded, trained and armed by Iran was responsible for kidnapping five British civilians in Baghdad last month, according to the commander of US forces in Iraq.

General David Petraeus told The Times yesterday that he believed that the men, four security guards and a consultant, were alive and added that there had been repeated attempts to free them. No demands have been made for their release.

Commandos searching for the hostages have staged a series of raids on suspected terrorist hide-outs. “There have been several operations to try to rescue them, we just have not had the right intelligence,” General Petraeus said. “There is a very intensive effort ongoing to try to locate and rescue them.”

The remarks are the first official acknowledgement of secret hostage rescue efforts that the British authorities refuse to comment on. They are also likely to inflame relations with Iran further. The general said that the terrorist cell responsible had very close ties to the Iranian authorities, but he fell short of accusing Tehran of complicity. ...

Joe Lieberman's Offense (CM)

National Review editorializes:

Our politics is at an extraordinary pass when a senator who suggests we should be prepared to take military action to protect American troops from hostilities undertaken by a sworn enemy of the United States is roundly denounced. No Republicans have spoken out in Lieberman’s defense. Nearly everyone wants to take a “see no evil” posture toward Iran’s involvement in Iraq, even though Gen. Petraeus has spoken forthrightly about its murderous handiwork. Lieberman’s offense was merely to speak the truth.

More here.

Negotiating with Iran (AM)

While the State Department engages in direct negotiations and joins the EU in pleading with the mullahs to stop enriching uranium, all of which the chuckling Iranian regime takes as a sign of weakness because it is, of course, a sign of weakness, Iran not only indicts Americans for death penalty offenses but now arms the Taliban against NATO, just as it has been arming Iraqi terrorists against U.S. and coalition forces in Iraq (that is, when not engaging in direct strikes against U.S. forces). See Bill Roggio here.

Tiger Hawk has the run-down here. As he says: "Make no mistake about it, Iran is waging war against the United States and its allies."

As I've mentioned before (see, e.g. here and here), throughout the 1990s, we pretended that we were not at war while a determined, implacable enemy was clearly at war with us. We saw the results. Iran was part of that enemy then, and it has never stopped. If killing Americans is not enough, just what exactly do they have to do before we do something meaningful in response?

James Woolsey Testifies on Iran Divestment Bill

On Thursday, May 3, James Woolsey, co-chair of the Committee on the Present Danger and an FDD Distinguished Advisor, testified before the Ohio House of Representatives in favor of a new bill that would prohibit the state's public investment funds from investing in foreign companies that have business ties or operations in Iran. Similar terror-free investing bills have gained momentum in Florida, Maryland, Texas and Colorado. Mr. Woolsey’s prepared testimony is available at www.fightingterror.org.

Captured British Soldier on Iranian TV (ML)

I think the Iranians gravely miscalculated by making that female British soldier appear on TV dressed in a Shiite black headscarf and white robe to deliver an apology that was obviously dictated and almost certainly coerced. The British are going to go ballistic over this.

Anyone remember that video of Saddam visiting the western hostages in the run-up to Desert Storm?  Saddam made the bad mistake of sitting a British child on his knee; the child looked terrified, and the British public woke up the next morning ready for war.

Tehran Seizure

On March 23, fifteen British naval personnel were seized by Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps in the northern Persian Gulf. In a symposium today on National Review Online, FDD Senior Fellow Walid Phares explains why this incident has the potential for global military, political, and economic fallout:

The Iranian abduction of 15 British soldiers in the Shatt al Arab area was intended to trigger a regional crisis. Iran’s strategic objectives are clear: First, to precipitate a British action ending in a projected political disaster. Second, to get Britain out of Iraq, thus isolating the U.S. in the region. Coupled with U.S. domestic pressures, Iran intends this event to trigger a swift U.S. withdrawal from Iraq.

The looming economic sanctions, the capture of Iranian agents in Iraq, defections, and internal discontent with Ahmedinejad moved the mullahs make this bold move in their game of chess with the U.S., the U.K, and their regional allies; but it is only their latest move in the ongoing war they are waging.

In response, a multidimensional campaign should be launched, systematically yet gradually, instead of a single retaliation. Along with vigorous diplomatic pressures, the Coalition should formally condemn the regime and call for its isolation. It must create an unbalance of power with Iran via regional deployment while extending an emergency program of support to democracy forces within Iran, including a serious opposition broadcast.

Iran Starts Abandoning the Nonproliferation Treaty (ML)

Right on schedule, the Iranian government announced today that it will stop cooperating with the International Atomic Energy Agency on certain critical disclosure safeguards. On Sunday night, the Iranian government spokesman explained:

"After this illegal resolution was passed against Iran last night, it forced the government to act based on parliament's decision regarding the cooperation level with the agency and suspend parts of its activities with the agency," Elham told Iranian state television. 

"The government in a cabinet meeting today decided to suspend code 1-3 of minor arrangements of the safeguards." He was referring to the part of the International Atomic Energy Agency's code which specifies that countries should inform the agency of any new steps and decisions made in its nuclear programme.

He said Iran would only reconsider this decision if its nuclear case was returned to the IAEA from the UN Security Council where the file is now being handled. "This will continue until Iran's nuclear case is referred back to the IAEA from the UN Security Council," he said.

FDD Expert Reacts to British-Iranian Confrontation

Fifteen British sailors carrying out a routine inspection in the Persian Gulf were captured at gunpoint and taken into custody by Iranian naval vessels on Friday morning. Reacting to this incident, FDD Fellow Mario Loyola wrote on National Review Online that Iranian forces were likely “responding…to a carefully-planned provocation of our own”:

Recall the context: the Security Council route for dealing with Iran's nuclear program has clearly failed. The U.S. and its partners now have few options for responding to Iran's continued belligerence besides the current, fairly massive, naval and airpower buildup in the Gulf. Iran now has a western armada cruising just miles from its coasts, in waters well within its Economic Exploitation Zone — which means that U.S. Navy destroyers are probably waltzing around within Frisbee range of Iranian offshore drilling platforms. The gloves are coming off. And the risk-calculation here is as follows: If someone gets nervous and starts shooting, the timing would be more auspicious now for us than for the Iranians. Therefore, it only makes sense that American and British naval units operating in the Gulf would be in a more forward-leaning and aggressive posture than the Iranians.

Mario is a former consultant to the Defense Department who writes frequently on Iran and national security. His bio and recent writings are here.

British Forces Held by Iran Crisis (WP)

Walid Phares on Glenn Beck - Iranian naval vessels seized 15 British sailors and marines. Today March 23rd, 2007 [ LISTEN .mp3 ]

Iran's Nuclear Program: Diplomacy Has Almost Run Its Course (ML)

Late yesterday, envoys of the five permanent members of the Security Council plus Germany (the "P5+1" — which has led the effort to halt Iran's nuclear breakout) reached agreement on the second sanctions resolution, which imposes a few additional sanctions. According to one report:

The new draft resolution gives Iran another 60 days to comply or face the threat of further sanctions...Under the package, all conventional weapons exports from Iran will be banned and the assets of more Iranian groups and companies will be frozen...The text also calls on countries to "exercise vigilance and restraint" on selling heavy weapons to Iran. The package discourages nations and international financial institutions from entering into new deals for grants, financial assistance and loans except "for humanitarian and developmental purposes". No mandatory travel embargo has been proposed for Iran's nuclear officials but governments are required to notify a council sanctions committee if any named people were passing through.

But China was hesitant over the draft deal saying the text should not go beyond the main objective. "The main objective is our concern about Iranian nuclear and missile activities," Wang Guangya, China's ambassador to the UN, said. "So there is no need to expand beyond that area." 

China worked to shorten the list of companies on the sanctions list, because its state-owned enterprises have so many transactions with so many of them.  And indeed, China is not wrong to object that it is being forced to pay a higher price than the United States in order to solve a problem that is of interest most of all to the United States.  The administration has downplayed this objection, taking the position that the Iran crisis represents a test of China's intentions and of the strategic relationship being forged between it and the United States. I have always disagreed with this position. As Churchill said, it is those states most directly concerned with a problem that can be expected to apply themselves vigorously to its solution. China is right. It is the U.N. Charter that is wrong, by forcing states to concern themselves with problems that are no concern of theirs, and limiting the options of the states which are the most worried to those approved by the states which are the least worried. 

At any rate, diplomatic options have now virtually run dry.  It is clear that the P5+1 have now gone as far as they are willing to go together in imposing sanctions. The great lesson in all this for the diplomatic option in future crises, has been not simply the non-surprising weakness of the Security Council, but the surprising strength of the U.S. Treasury Department, which in recent months has quietly and methodically enveloped Iran's demand for international finance in a hornet's nest of political risk.

The ball now is in Iran's court. In violation of its obligations under the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, Iran has started curtailing access to International Atomic Energy Agency inspections and threatens more if further sanctions are imposed. Worse, Iran has made it clear that it will reject all Security Council resolutions, thus declaring that it will not be bound by its obligations under the U.N. Charter. 

Fine. Then as to Iran, the United States will not be bound by its obligations under the U.N. Charter either, including the Charter prohibition on the use of force.

The "diplomatic option" (modern euphemism for a carrots-but-no-sticks approach) has almost run its course. It has succeeded only in emboldening the Iranians and making them more belligerent. The time for talking to them in a language that they will find more convincing, and that is more likely to gentle their disposition, is now approaching fast. 

Time Out for Iran? (CM)

According to an AFP dispatch:

Russia warned Iran Monday to expect delays in launching the country's first atomic power station, adding to mounting pressure on Tehran to compromise with the international community over its controversial nuclear programme.

Amid signs of frustration in Moscow over Iran's combative stance, state contractor Atomstroiexport announced that Iranian financial problems mean a probable set-back in completing the power station at Bushehr in southern Iran.  …

Russian engineers are close to finishing Bushehr, jewel in the crown of Iran's nuclear programme, but have repeatedly postponed delivery of atomic fuel and the start-up of the reactor.  …

Under the latest timetable, fuel had been expected this month, with the reactor launch in September. ...

The three main Russian news agencies quoted an unnamed source close to the authorities accusing Iran of "abusing our constructive relations."

"We absolutely do not need Iran getting a nuclear bomb or the potential to make one," the "informed source" was quoted as saying. "We will not play any kind of anti-American games with them."

Let me add this: If the U.S. has skillful diplomats on the payroll, now is the time to send them into the game. The focus should be on Russia: Whatever Putin’s faults (and they are many and they are serious) surely he can be made to see that Russia’s future should not be as the junior, infidel partner to an aggressive, expansionist, radical Islamist, nuclear-armed Iran.

And Europeans need to be persuaded that if they want to prevent America and/or Israel from resorting to military measures against Iran later, the best thing they can do is ratchet up sanctions on Iran now, rather than take the view -- reminiscent of Chamberlain at Munich -- that a nuclear jihad would be no problem for them. Could Iran go nuclear without Russian aid? Yes, almost certainly. But anything that can be done to slow their progress toward the end zone is useful.

Phares on the Iranian Defector

FDD Senior Fellow Walid Phares told The New York Post that Iranian defector General Ali Reza Asghari would be able to provide intimate details about Iran's role in backing terror groups like Hezbollah, as well as provide some fresh details about Iran's nuclear program.

"It's not a surprise that they are concerned. My contacts tell me the Iranian regime would regard his defection as a very big intelligence loss," Phares said. Read More.

Lantos on Iran

Rep. Tom Lantos, chairman of the U.S. House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee, on Tuesday proposed new legislation that would sanction oil companies and countries that strike deals with Iran:

Iran’s theocracy must understand that it cannot pursue a nuclear weapons program without sacrificing the political and economic future of the Iranian people.

That is why this week I am introducing the Iran Counter-Proliferation Act of 2007. The objective of my legislation is two-fold: To prevent Iran from securing nuclear arms and the means to produce them. And to ensure that we achieve this goal in a peaceful manner.

My legislation will increase exponentially the economic pressure on Iran, and empower our diplomatic efforts by strengthening the Iran Sanctions Act. It will put an end to the Administration’s ability to waive sanctions against foreign companies that invest in Iran’s energy industry.

Until now, abusing its waiver authority and other flexibility in the law, the Executive Branch has never sanctioned any foreign oil company which invested in Iran. Those halcyon days for the oil industry are over.

Sistani the Moderate (AM)

Over the last couple of years, there has been some spirited debate about whether Iraq's Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani is an authentic Muslim moderate who is a huge plus for the Bush administration's democracy project, or, as I have maintained (see, e.g., here and here), an Islamic fundamentalist of the familiar anti-Semitic, anti-infidel, anti-gay variety who embraced "democracy" (i.e., not real democracy but popular elections) because it was the easiest route to Shiite rule...the first step on the road to a Shiite Sharia state.

Now, former Reagan administration official John Agresto is weighing in.  Agresto, who appeared on Hugh Hewitt's show yesterday, has a new book out, Mugged by Reality, which is a memoir of his recent nine months of service in Iraq as an adviser to the education ministry.  Here is some of what he has to say about Sistani:

We insisted that the Ayatollah Sistani was surely a "moderate" and a friend to civil and religious liberty despite all the hard evidence to the contrary. Let me repeat my previous observations and predictions: The Ayatollah Sistani is an Islamist bent on establishing a theocracy not far removed from that found in Iran. He is an open anti-Semite and a not-too-subtle anti-Christian. He threw his support behind democratic elections because they were the handy vehicles for imposing religious authority all over Iraq. Nor is he the only one, or even the worst, only the most prominent. Yet while I believe the evidence is as clear here as it is in the case of [Ahmad] Chalabi, we only see what we want to see, not what's visible. In our religious lives, hope may well be a virtue — but in foreign policy it is more often a sin, a temptation to willful blindness.

CIA: Maybe It's Not Really Iran But Rogues Inside of Iran Killing Americans (AM)

Eli Lake has this in his New York Sun report this morning on the long-awaited Defense briefing about Iran's war-making in Iraq (italics mine):

[W]hile the specific intelligence on the explosive formed projectiles is no longer disputed in the intelligence community, the CIA is questioning whether their export from Iran represents a strategy of the regime or the rogue actions of one of its security services, known as the Quds Force. According to reports from the briefing in Baghdad yesterday, American commanders said Iran's export of the bombs to Iraqi Shiite militias was a deliberate strategy of the regime, noting that the Quds Force reports directly to Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Sure. Khamenei has reaffirmed that "Death to America" is Iran's motto, Ahmadinejad says a world without America is achievable, we have 30 years of evidence of the Iranian regime acting on those assumptions, and we know the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps and its Quds (Jerusalem) Force have long been the mullahs' arms for exporting their revolution. But when we catch the Iranians red-handed killing American troops in Iraq, the CIA figures it may not really be the regime but rogue elements. One can easily see why Doug Feith is getting grief for not taking everything the CIA says to the bank.

Iran and the U.S. "Parallel Universe" (AM)

A great post by Steve Schippert at ThreatsWatch.org regarding the administration's shrinking from its promise to release a dossier on Iran's activities in Iraq (I wrote about it earlier this week, here). Steve imagines a scenario in which, rather than the U.S. finding Iran making trouble for the U.S. in Iraq, the Russians find the U.S. making trouble for Russia in Iran — Russia, in the analogy, having invaded Iran to overthrow the regime for fomenting terror in Chechnya. As he suspects, things would be handled a bit differently.

Also worth noting: the killing of five U.S. soldiers on January 20 in Karbala.  It begins to look more and more like an Iranian operation — far too sophisticated to have been carried out by Sadr's goons, and not in an area where al Qaeda could conduct such an operation.  Did Iran use the IRGC's Qods forces to kill American troops in retaliation for U.S. raids and captures of Iranian personnel in Baghdad (December) and Irbil (January)?  (Bill Roggio's take, here, also worth reading.)

Iran Policy

FDD's Andy McCarthy asks tough questions about our Iran policy in today's National Review Online.

On Iran (ML)

Iran has done absolutely nothing in recent weeks or months that it wasn't doing last year and two years ago. We have known for a long time that cross-border attacks against American forces are being conducted by fighters from the sanctuary of Revolutionary Guards bases in Iran; that Iran is training anti-American fighters directly and through proxies; and that it is supplying them with weapons, including the sophisticated IEDs now causing a preponderance of American casualties. 

Iran, Implied Threats, and the Balance of Power (ML)

In today's Jerusalem Post, Barry Rubin makes a point that should be elementary in the strategic analysis of the Iran nuclear crisis:

Do you think that anyone will make peace in the Arab-Israeli conflict if they assume -- no matter how wrong they turn out to be -- that Israel is going to be either erased by Iran's nuclear weapons, or intimidated into massive unilateral concessions? Do you believe the West will dare act effectively on any regional crisis in the face of Iranian opposition? Will Turkey protest firmly about Iranian involvement in Kurdish or Islamist subversion at home?

This is only the beginning of the problems arising from Iranian possession of nuclear weapons: a bolder, extremist Iran; coercion of the local, relatively more moderate states; a boost for terrorist and revolutionary groups with an upsurge of violence, and intimidation of the West.

And that's the optimistic scenario, without anyone actually using weapons of mass destruction.

It's the implied threat of nuclear weapons as counter-deterrent -- the menace that Iran might use them if we respond militarily to any conventional Iranian  aggression -- which will ruin the strategic balance in the Middle East. Those experts who think a nuclear Iran can be contained are looking at the wrong threat -- and they are conspicuously silent on how to contain Iran now.

Iran's move to acquire nuclear breakout capabilities is itself a kind of strategic aggression--because it will leave regional security gravely degraded.  This is why the administration's decision to surge a second U.S. aircraft carrier strike group to the Gulf is such a relief.  It shows that the administration is serious about maintaining the current balance-of-power in the Gulf, even as it continues playing Model U.N. at the Security Council. As Vice President Cheney explains in a Newsweek interview:

When we—as the president did, for example, recently—deploy another aircraft carrier task force to the gulf, that sends a very strong signal to everybody in the region that the United States is here to stay, that we clearly have significant capabilities, and that we are working with friends and allies as well as the international organizations to deal with the Iranian threat.  I'm not going to speculate about security action...But the fact is we are doing what we can to try to resolve issues such as the nuclear question diplomatically through the United Nations, but we've also made it clear that we haven't taken any options off the table.

Those who warn that a military confrontation with Iran would be a disaster should deliver that warning to the state which seems bent on seeking a confrontation -- Iran. 

Terror-Free Fuel?

FDD President Clifford May asks why we're funding our enemy's war-effort in his column this week:

In his State of the Union Speech this week, President Bush sounded serious about “diversifying” American’s energy supply, about developing an energy policy that does not leave Americans interminably at the mercy of such regimes as those in Tehran and Caracas. And in Congress, legislation is being introduced that could at least begin to reduce the economic, political and military power of Middle Eastern oil.

Venezuela and Iran RWC)

As I keep saying, in Venezuela, Hugo Chavez is moving to socialist authoritarianism and his cozying up to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran is becoming more and more threatening to our national security interests.

This past week the Iranian president went to Latin America to meet with the leftist governments. His first stop was in Caracas to embrace Chavez, Cindy Sheehan’s favorite Latin president.(If you heard Sheehan being interviewed by a friendly and polite Sean Hannity recently you had to walk away believing she was not given a full deck of playing cards.  I had never heard her speak more than a few practiced polemical lines in the past.  Her performance on Hannity’s radio show was pathetic. She came over as dull-normal in brainpower, at best.) 

The next day the President of Iran was hugging the old communist boss, and newly elected Jefe, Daniel Ortega in Nicaragua. Then he was off to the swearing-in of the new Ecuadorian president, a disciple of Chavez named Rafael Correa.

The visit to Chavez in Venezuela was the second time Ahmadinejad has been in Caracas in the last few months.

Chavez called the Iranian president “My brother” and he announced a joint $2 billion dollar program for unspecified “development and projects”.

Chavez is working to minimize and then eliminate any political opposition.

He began a second six-year term saying he plans to forget about another presidential election, and just continue on at the helm, perhaps for the rest of his life.

Chavez’ hero and mentor is Cuban dictator and “President for Life” himself, Fidel Castro, who is 80 years old, and now seems to be dying, as his brother Raoul scrambles to maintain control through the military, over the country and its economy. The fact that Raoul is a notorious transvestite is interfering with his credibility in what is still a sexually rigid society. (Not that there is anything wrong with running around in high heels and a dress as a man!)

Fidel Castro is reportedly dying not from cancer, but from infections related to diverticulitus.  He has had three serious operations, and all of them have failed.

With all the propaganda over the years about Cuba’s “free, excellent medical care” you should note that they had to send a doctor from Spain to take care of Castro –the Cuban doctors were all “free” but apparently not “excellent” enough.  The great irony is that micromanager Castro who runs the country by whatever whim comes to him may have made a grievous error.  The doctors told him they had to perform a colostomy and could cure him with that.  He refused and ordered them to sew up his colon. He didn’t want the bag. Big mistake. Fecal material has permeated his abdomen and is killing him with an infection they can’t stop.

Castro’s boy Chavez has been in office since 1999 and was just re-elected, now maybe for life. 

Venezuela is the fourth-largest oil exporter to the US.

Funny, you’ll remember there was a recall referendum against Chavez a few years ago that was marred by deep irregularities.  But it was “cleared” by the relentlessly meddlesome Jimmy Carter –(one of our worst failed presidents) who “certified” the effort as fair even though the European Union, of all outfits, refused to be an observer because Chavez’ efforts against the referendum were so “anti-democratic.” Now look what we have got staring at us from the South, and I don’t mean Alabama.

Iran in Iraq (CM)

The New York Sun reported today that Iran is supporting both Sunni and Shiite terrorists in the Iraqi civil war, according to secret Iranian documents captured by Americans in Iraq. Eli Lake writes:

An American intelligence official said the new material, which has been authenticated within the intelligence community, confirms "that Iran is working closely with both the Shiite militias and Sunni Jihadist groups." The source was careful to stress that the Iranian plans do not extend to cooperation with Baathist groups fighting the government in Baghdad, and said the documents rather show how the Quds Force — the arm of Iran's revolutionary guard that supports Shiite Hezbollah, Sunni Hamas, and Shiite death squads — is working with individuals affiliated with Al Qaeda in Iraq and Ansar al-Sunna.

One of the documents captured in the raids, according to two American officials and one Iraqi official, is an assessment of the Iraq civil war and new strategy from the Quds Force…The document concludes, according to these sources, that Iraq's Sunni neighbors will step up their efforts to aid insurgent groups and that it is imperative for Iran to redouble efforts to retain influence with them, as well as with Shiite militias...

A former Iran analyst for the Pentagon who also worked as an adviser to the Coalition Provisional Authority, Michael Rubin, said yesterday: "There has been lots of information suggesting that Iran has not limited its outreach just to the Shiites, but this has been disputed."

Walid Phares in Spain's GEES: "Lahoud must go, UN Chapter 7 to apply "

Walid Phares Op Ed in GEES, Strategic and Defense Journal in Spain: Pro-Syrian Lebanese President must go and UN Chapter 7 should be implemented."

The New York Times on Iran in Iraq (AM)

On Christmas Day, a New York Times dispatch described the apprehension by the U.S. military of Iranian military officials who are supporting the terrorist insurgency in Iraq. The following caught my attention (italics mine):

The two raids, in central Baghdad, have deeply upset Iraqi government officials, who have been making strenuous efforts to engage Iran on matters of security.... It was particularly awkward for the Iraqis that one of the raids took place in the Baghdad compound of Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, one of Iraq’s most powerful Shiite leaders, who traveled to Washington three weeks ago to meet President Bush...A spokesman for Mr. Hakim, who heads a Shiite political party called Sciri, which began as an exile group in Iran that opposed Saddam Hussein, declined to comment.

ME:  Hakim's party is not "called Sciri."  It is, instead, often referred to by the acronym SCIRI. It is actually called the "Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq."  It is an Islamic fundamentalist party which subscribes (like Hezbollah subscribes) to the Iranian model of Ayatollah Khoemeini that government should be controlled by Islamic clerics. Why would the Times not tell its readers that?

Murder of U.S. Airmen at Khobar Towers: Iran Did it (AM)

This is old news to those who followed the 9/11 Commission report and Iran's historic record as the world's number one state sponsor of terrorism — particularly, anti-U.S. terrorism.  (I recently detailed it, here.)  But now, a federal judge has ruled that Iran was responsible for the 1996 Khobar Towers bombing in which 19 American Air Force personnel were killed and 372 wounded. The AP reports:

The Iranian government is partly to blame for a 1996 terrorist attack that killed 19 Americans in Saudi Arabia, a federal judge ruled Friday.  The ruling by U.S. District Judge Royce C. Lamberth allows the families of the victims of the Khobar Towers bombing to seek $254 million in compensation from the conservative Islamic regime in Tehran. 

Though intelligence officials have suspected a link between the Tehran government and the Saudi wing of Hezbollah, which the FBI has accused of carrying out the bombing, Friday's ruling is the first time a branch of the U.S. government has officially blamed Iran for the deaths of Americans in the bombings.  "This court takes note of plaintiffs' courage and steadfastness in pursuing this litigation and their efforts to take action to deter more tragic suffering of innocent Americans at the hands of terrorists," Lamberth wrote. "Their efforts are to be commended."   

Lamberth relied heavily on testimony by former FBI Director Louis Freeh, who investigated the bombings.  Two Iranian government security agencies and senior members of the Iranian government itself provided funding, training and logistical help to terrorists who carried out the attack on a dormitory that housed U.S. Air Force pilots and staff in Saudi Arabia, Freeh testified. 

Lamberth had previously ruled that a survivor of the blast could seek compensation from Iran but Friday's ruling is the first time a court has said Iran was to blame for the deaths. The lawsuit was brought by the families of 17 of the 19 people killed in the attack.

The AP's assertion that this marks the "first time a branch of the U.S. government has officially blamed Iran for the deaths of Americans" at Khobar is not accurate.  The indictment filed by the Justice Department in 2001, though it does not name specific Iranian officials, alleges Iranian direction of, and logistical support for, the attack — and notes that conspirators stated that the purpose of the attack was to strike the United States on behalf of Iran.

Furthermore, just this May, in a speech at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, Under Secretary of State R. Nicholas Burns said (italics mine):

I would also like to say that we as a country cannot forget one of the other major grievances that we have with Iran, and that is the terrorism issue. We do not forget what happened in Beirut to our embassy and to our Marine barracks in 1983, or to Colonel Higgins, who was serving with the UN forces in southern Lebanon in 1985. And we certainly do not forget, and I believe [Ambassador] Dennis [Ross] and I were together that day, what happened at Khobar Towers outside of Dhahran, because we were there just several hours after the blast with Secretary [Warreb] Christopher and saw what happened to over 30 Americans who were killed and to 300 American military officers who ended up in the hospital.

This echoed what State Department Counselor Philip Zelikow had said more forcefully only the week before:

During the 1990s, Iran aided terrorist groups that were targeting Americans, Israelis, and Saudis. Agents of the Iranian government were involved in the attack on the U.S. Air Force barracks at Khobar Towers, in Saudi Arabia, in 1996.

Yet, in the civil litigation brought by bombing victims against Iran, the State Department has actually intervened on Iran's behalf, filing an amicus brief in support of the Islamic Republic's position.

In point of fact, the Iranian role has been known to our government since the 1990s.  The Clinton administration suppressed it because, right after the Khobar bombing, President Clinton threatened to retaliate with a military attack against any nation found to be complicit.  Acknowledging proof of an Iranian role would have required doing something about it. 

By autumn 1999, evidence had emerged that was reliable enough for State Department spokesman James Rubin to state publicly:  "We do have specific information with respect to the involvement of Iranian government officials."  Yet, Clinton contented himself with firing off...a letter, pleading with the mullahs — who, mind you had already spurned a similar request — for help bringing those responsible to justice. 

Reminiscent of the Bush administraton's approach to Iran's nuclear provocations, the Clinton administration, despite its prior rhetoric about dealing fiercely with state sponsorship of terrorism, offered all carrots (normalization of relations and an end to economic sanctions) and no sticks.  Then, as now, the mullahs laughed.

The Iranian Elections (CM)

Michael Ledeen writes that the "Iranian electoral ritual doesn’t tell us what the people want; it tells us what the tyrants have decided."

More here.

Time's Man of the Year

This weekend, Time magazine announced that you are it's Man of the Year. In other words, they didn't come up with one. National Review Online asked FDD President Clifford May: “Did Time’s editors cop out? If you were to pick a man or woman of the year who would it be and why?” Here's Cliff's reply:

Naming “Everyone” Man of the Year is not just copping out: It’s jumping the shark. It’s the sort of muddy thinking that impels teachers to say all students are “special.” It’s the basis for what may be Garrison Keillor’s only funny joke: In Lake Woebegone all the children are above average.

As for who should be Man of the Year, I say it’s Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Remember: The designation does not necessarily go to someone admirable. It goes to the individual who “for better or worse, has most influenced events in the preceding year” and, one presumes, may influence events in the years ahead.

Read the full article here.

A tribute to Jeane Kirkpatrick (AV)

I was awakened this morning by a call from a friend informing me that Jeane Kirkpatrick had died. Ambassador Kirkpatrick, until fairly recently, was a scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, where I interned last year, and her office was only a few steps away from my bay on the 11^th floor. She later went on to help found the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies.

Jeane would make a point of stopping for a chat every time she passed my bay at AEI, and we had many fascinating conversations about foreign policy, and I was constantly struck by her powerful mind, on which, mercifully, age was not taking its toll.

Being a somewhat bumptious sort, I would try to tease out her views on the issues facing us today—at the time, it was the floundering Iraq mission—and it was clear that her contributions deserved a more public airing. Fortunately, prior to her death, Jeane had finished writing a new book on foreign policy. Though I have not yet had the pleasure to read it (it will be published shortly), I am told by those whose judgment I trust that it is excellent.

I remember one particular conversation with Jeane during which, and this was the Tory in me speaking, I quizzed her about her role in the Falklands crisis, which had received unfavorable reviews in Margaret Thatcher's memoirs Downing Street Years. Jeane displayed her characteristic graciousness, explaining the basis for her skepticism at being too supportive of Britain's pursuit of its territorial claim, while conceding that hindsight showed her fears were too severe.

Jeane explained that she was worried that an embarrassment of the Argentinean government over the Falklands might lead to its replacement by a communist one. Jeane's thinking flowed from the powerful, and powerfully American traditions of the Monroe Doctrine, as well as her own thesis in Dictatorships and Double Standards, which foreign policy thinkers today, especially those specializing in the Middle East, are I think admonished to read. (A link to the original essay is here, and its book form here).

In vivid detail, Jeane explained that hindsight had vindicated Lady Thatcher's decision, not her own. Yet, in this concession, Jeane's graciousness and honor came through, and I came to see that any sensible policymaker in her place would have had the same fears as her, and would probably have come to the same decision: I, with all my sympathies for the Anglosphere and the old order, certainly would have.

Jeane then spoke to me about the profound ambiguity of foreign policy idealism that animated her Dictatorships and Double Standards thesis, subtly calling attention to a particular weakness in my own foreign policy thinking. I would say that if there is one essay that those who are called neoconservatives should read, it is Dictatorships and Double Standards.

Ultimately, difficult policy decisions cannot be entirely based on ex ante normative ideals, but prudential concerns, animated by history. Fortunately, this underscores the need for powerfully smart, and idealistic, statesmen, of which Jeane Kirkpatrick surely was one. Withal, Jeane's contribution to U.S. foreign policy was very significant, and her death is serious and in many ways sad, but she leaves behind many friends, a goodly number of acolytes, and a very, very significant legacy. May she rest in peace.

Walid Phares Media Roundup

In the Front Page Magazine Walid Phares writes about the terrorist assassination of Pierre Gemayel. "The assassination of Lebanese Christian politician Pierre Gemayel this Tuesday has revealed that the Tehran-Damascus axis remains busy with terror activities across the Fertile Crescent." In Washington Times he states:  "Al Qaeda and its advisers around the world want to provoke an "American Madrid." Portraying the United States as a bleeding bull in disarray, the war room projects its wish to see America's will crippled." In HS Today November Issue Walid Phares has a cover story "Education Versus Jihad". In the San Francisco Chronicle Phares was quoted on U.N. investigation of the last year murder of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri and Bashar al-Assad regime in Damascus ."Any indictment of any Syrian official ... any implication of any Syrian intelligence officer will basically lead to indicting morally and politically the regime," Phares said".

Iran, Hizballah Making Moves to Topple Lebanon, Expert Says

Recent quotation from CNSNews article by Julie Stahl reads:

The recent Democratic takeover of the U.S. Congress emboldened Syria, Iran and Hizballah (Iran's proxy) because they view it as the defeat of President Bush, said Walid Phares, a senior fellow at the Washington-based Foundation for the Defense of Democracies. The rest is here

Crazy Mahmoud? (CM)

The Wall Street Journal editorializes:

[T]he Iranian President issued the following public warning to Europe last Friday: "We have advised the Europeans that the Americans are far away, but you are the neighbors of the nations in this region. We inform you that the nations are like an ocean that is welling up, and if a storm begins, the dimensions will not stay limited to Palestine, and you may get hurt. It is in your own interest to distance yourself from these criminals (Israel). . . . This is an ultimatum." …

[T]he Iranian must be thinking he can also shake the resolve of European leaders with a little fear of the Mahdi. Short of that, he might be hoping he can begin to intimidate European public opinion. Iran's ballistic missiles can already reach much of Europe, and his threat will be very real once those missiles can be armed with nuclear warheads.

The temptation in many quarters in the West is to assume that Crazy Mahmoud can't really mean what he says; he must be acting out for "domestic" political reasons. And even if he does mean what he says about wiping Israel off the map, well, Europeans and Americans don't need to worry about that. Call us conservative, or even neoconservative, but when a leader relentlessly seeking weapons of mass destruction starts issuing apocalyptic ultimatums, our instinct is to believe him.

More here.

Walid Phares in War Stories with Oliver North

War Stories with Oliver North, Fox News Sun., October 15, 2006

FDD Senior Fellow Walid Phares joins Vice President Cheney, Former Director of the CIA and FDD Distinguished Advisor James Woolsey, Bernard Lewis and other experts in the field. In this special report Oliver North explores what every person should know about jihad. In proven "War Stories" tradition, this episode brings historical context to today's events.

To watch the video click on: Part one, Part two, Part three, Part four.

Walid Phares Media Roundup (WP)

Walid Phares on VOA about the worldwide hunt for terrorists. In New York Post comments on Iran and Syria; Ahmadinejad in United Nations; State of affairs in Iraq and other issues.  In Family Security Matters, on U.S. homeland security:is it penetrated and threatened? In the American Chronicle Phares is quoted on the conflict in Darfur. On CTV Canada Phares, talks about the video obtained by Britain's Sunday Times newspaper showing two of the terrorists responsible for the Sept. 11 terror attack laughing and joking together more than 18 months before the attacks. For video click here

Iran Freedom Support Act close to passage? (AV)

The Iran Freedom Support Act is, according to the New York Sun, before the Senate today and has a very good chance of passage - it having been scuttled the last time it was considered by White House pressure.

I wrote a backgrounder on the contents of the bill here and an op/ed in The Hill explaining the positive effect the bill will have here.

Zakaria on Iran (AV)

Newsweek's Fareed Zakaria offers a subtle, cogent case for why the United States should not fear a nuclear Iran. He makes two arguments: first, as the example of China shows, messianic states that acquire nuclear weapons do not always fulfill their genocidal rhetoric, and second, that Arab countries will continue to balance against a rising Iranian power.

Both of these are carefully made arguments. Unfortunately, neither are particularly reassuring, or persuasive.

I have never been too enamored with historical analogies, and Zakaria fails to make the case as to why Iran will become pacified like China, but his subtle point is a good one -- that countries that adopt the most alarmist interpretations of their enemies' conduct tend to implement bad foreign policy.

Zakaria's second argument is more underwhelming. He writes that, "Arab regimes will get more assertive in responding to the rise of Iranian power." What does he mean by "more assertive"? Egypt is musing about developing a nuclear capability of its own – is that what he means by "assertive"? Also, among Sunni states, Egypt is probably the least worried about the rise of a Shia power. How will other Middle East states react?

Also, since the United States wields more influence over most Arab states than it does over Iran, should it encourage the nuclearization of the region in response to an Iranian threat? And how would more militarily assertive Arab states affect the Arab-Israeli imbroglio? And might this ossify political reform in the Middle East, with Arab states and Iran using their possession of nuclear technology to deter U.S. support for democratic reforms?

Ultimately, those who seek to make more palatable the idea of a nuclear Iran need to reckon with the massive imbalances this will cause both to the Middle East, the United States' ability to be the dominant actor in the region, and the future of Middle East political reform.

Both of these are carefully made arguments. Unfortunately, neither are particularly reassuring, or persuasive.

I have never been too enamored with historical analogies, and Zakaria fails to make the case as to why Iran will become pacified like China, but his subtle point is a good one -- that countries that adopt the most alarmist interpretations of their enemies' conduct tend to implement bad foreign policy.

Zakaria's second argument is more underwhelming. He writes that, "Arab regimes will get more assertive in responding to the rise of Iranian power." What does he mean by "more assertive"? Egypt is musing about developing a nuclear capability of its own – is that what he means by "assertive"? Also, among Sunni states, Egypt is probably the least worried about the rise of a Shia power. How will other Middle East states react?

Also, since the United States wields more influence over most Arab states than it does over Iran, should it encourage the nuclearization of the region in response to an Iranian threat? And how would more militarily assertive Arab states affect the Arab-Israeli imbroglio? And might this ossify political reform in the Middle East, with Arab states and Iran using their possession of nuclear technology to deter U.S. support for democratic reforms?

Ultimately, those who seek to make more palatable the idea of a nuclear Iran need to reckon with the massive imbalances this will cause both to the Middle East, the United States' ability to be the dominant actor in the region, and the future of Middle East political reform.

Bolton's international illegitimacy? (AV)

Mark Leon Goldberg, from the United Nations Foundation, writes in the American Prospect that UN Ambassador John Bolton faces an uphill struggle in his bid to win Senate confirmation.

Goldberg recycles the tired meme that, "Should Bolton fail to secure the requisite votes to overcome closure [sic, cloture], he could still accept a second recess appointment. But ... his credibility as U.S. ambassador would be genuinely crippled."

This is silliness. The argument was nonsense when it was made during Bolton's initial confirmation hearings, and it is no more correct now. Whether Bolton receives Senate confirmation is irrelevant to his "legitimacy" at the UN.

Think about it: Most UN member states don't believe in such quaint things as elected legislatures, and so aren't about to treat Bolton as least among equals because he was filibustered in the Senate. Furthermore, even those countries which are liberal democracies (such as the United Kingdom, Canada and Australia) don't subject international diplomats to parliamentary veto.