Laura Rozen’s recent interview with former Mossad director Efraim Halevy focuses heavily on diplomatic options for the US, Israel and Iran in the impasse over the Iranian nuclear program. Halevy, like former Mossad director Meir Dagan and a number of past and present US and Israeli national security officials, opposes preventive [...]]]>
Laura Rozen’s recent interview with former Mossad director Efraim Halevy focuses heavily on diplomatic options for the US, Israel and Iran in the impasse over the Iranian nuclear program. Halevy, like former Mossad director Meir Dagan and a number of past and present US and Israeli national security officials, opposes preventive military action against Iran because he fears it will lead to the collapse of the international sanctions regime, a regional war and only embolden Iran to build and deploy nuclear weapons as a deterrent in the years following the attack.
Particularly interesting is Halevy’s description of Obama and Romney’s approach to the Iran issue.
Obama has placed emphasis on negotiations. In this current election for the US presidency, his hands are tied. He cannot proceed, because he cannot appear soft on Israel’s security.
Negotiating with Iran is perceived as a sign of beginning to forsake Israel. That is where I think the basic difference is between Romney and Obama. What Romney is doing is mortally destroying any chance of a resolution without war. Therefore when [he recently] said, he doesn’t think there should be a war with Iran, this does not ring true. It is not consistent with other things he has said. […]
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Lobe Log publishes Hawks on Iran every Friday. Our posts highlight militaristic commentary and confrontational policy recommendations about Iran from a variety of sources including news articles, think tanks and pundits.
John Bolton, Washington Times: The former UN Ambassador and outspoken proponent of
Lobe Log publishes Hawks on Iran every Friday. Our posts highlight militaristic commentary and confrontational policy recommendations about Iran from a variety of sources including news articles, think tanks and pundits.
John Bolton, Washington Times: The former UN Ambassador and outspoken proponent of military action against Iran rebukes President Obama for creating ”the most antagonistic relationship ever between Israel and the White House” by not preemptively striking Iran for Israel due to his “ideological inclination”:
There is, however, a serious problem. Israel’s assessment and its ultimate decision are complicated precisely because of the superiority of American military strength. If Jerusalem defers to Washington and does not strike early enough, Iran’s program could well pass the point where Israel has the necessary capabilities to break Iran’s control over the nuclear fuel cycle. Or, even worse, Iran could fabricate nuclear weapons before being detected by either U.S. or Israeli intelligence, risking that a strike by either country could bring a nuclear response from Iran.
There are three principal reasons not to credit Mr. Obama’s assurances. First, the president’s every ideological inclination is not to use U.S. military force pre-emptively. By contrast, two months before Pearl Harbor, Franklin Roosevelt defended American attacks against Nazi submarines in the North Atlantic, saying, “When you see a rattlesnake poised to strike, you do not wait until he has struck before you crush him.” Plainly, Mr. Obama is no Franklin Roosevelt.
Elliott Abrams, Weekly Standard: The former Deputy National Security Adviser to George W. Bush considers Israeli general Amos Yaldin’s call for the US to commit to striking Iran in 2013 if the Iranian “problem” is not solved reasonable but unrealistic, so he proposes a Congressional authorization for the use of force against Iran instead:
More persuasive than the Ross or Yadlin proposals would be an effort by the president to seek a formal authorization for the use of force from Congress. This is the way for him to show seriousness of purpose, and for Congress to support it—and send an unmistakable message to the ayatollahs. This path was suggested here in THE WEEKLY STANDARD early July, by Jamie Fly and Bill Kristol, and this is the moment to move forward with it. Like the joint resolutions for the Gulf Wars in 1991 and in2002 and the joint resolution passed after 9/11 regarding terrorism, a new resolution would not declare war; it would say “The President is authorized to use the Armed Forces of the United States as he determines to be necessary and appropriate” to achieve the goal. In this case, that goal would not be to counter “the continuing threat posed by Iraq” or “against those nations, organizations, or persons he determines planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001…in order to prevent any future acts of international terrorism against the United States.” It would be to prevent Iran—the world’s foremost state sponsor of terrorism, in violation of countless U.N. Security Council and IAEA board of governors resolutions, and under international sanctions—from obtaining nuclear weapons.
Jennifer Rubin, Washington Post: The “Tiger Mom of the neocon movement” alleges that President Obama’s “Iran dilemma” boils down to being blamed for Israeli losses if he does not strike Iran on Israel’s behalf or being unprepared in the event of being “forced” into another mideast war:
An Israeli strike would be a blatant signal of distrust in Obama by the Jewish state. If the action is less than successful, or if large casualties in Israel result, fingers will point at Obama for having failed to deploy superior U.S. force. And if he believes an Israeli strike will set off a Middle East war, the president, who is in the business of diminishing U.S. military presence, could well be forced into a conflagration.
Rubin also describes going to war with Iran as a form of carpe diem:
Obama, as he has done so frequently, can wait and hope the Israelis don’t act. That might “work,” insofar as Israeli leaders might want to stretch out the timeline just a little bit longer. But passivity has its price, both geopolitically and electorally. It will be interesting to see whether Obama or Romney seizes the moment. It would certainly be an act of political leadership if one does.
Charles Krauthammer, Washington Post: Like Rubin, the neoconservative Washington Post columnist Charles Krauthammer references Elliot Abrams’ call for congressional authorization for the potential use of force against Iran (without naming Abrams) in an article that criticizes the President’s approach to Iran. In this instance, Krauthammer argues that Anthony Cordesman’s suggested approach to Iran, which includes hardening the US’s stance and upping the threat of force, needs to be seriously considered before the military option is exercised. Also like Rubin, Krauthammer agitates for action under the pretext of the time-is-running out claim:
]]>Would Iran believe a Cordesman-like ultimatum? Given the record of the Obama administration, maybe not. Some (though not Cordesman) have therefore suggested the further step of requesting congressional authorization for the use of force if Iran does not negotiate denuclearization.
First, that’s the right way to do it. No serious military action should be taken without congressional approval (contra Libya). Second, Iran might actually respond to a threat backed by a strong bipartisan majority of the American people — thus avoiding both war and the other nightmare scenario, a nuclear Iran.
If we simply continue to drift through kabuki negotiations, however, one thing is certain. Either America, Europe, the Gulf Arabs and the Israelis will forever be condemned to live under the threat of nuclear blackmail (even nuclear war) from a regime the State Department identifies as the world’s greatest exporter of terror. Or an imperiled Israel, with its more limited capabilities, will strike Iran — with correspondingly greater probability of failure and of triggering a regional war.
All options are bad. Doing nothing is worse. “The status quo may not prevent some form of war,” concludes Cordesman, “and may even be making it more likely.”
Washington Post: CNN’s Fareed Zakaria bravely singles himself out as one of the last media commentators to still be talking about “engagement”.
Strategic engagement with an adversary can go hand in hand with a policy that encourages change in that [...]]]>Washington Post: CNN’s Fareed Zakaria bravely singles himself out as one of the last media commentators to still be talking about “engagement”.
Haaretz: A professor at Purdue University who chaired Project Daniel in Israel and two retired U.S. military members with high security credentials write a hawkish editorial discussing the legal and practical issues involving a preemptive U.S. attack on Iran. Louis René Beres, Admiral (ret.) Leon “Bud” Edney and Lt. Gen. (ret. ) Thomas G. McInerney argue that if there isn’t “an American defensive strike on Iran”, the U.S. and Israel will have to deal with a “fully nuclear Iran, led by irrational Shiite clerics”. In case readers aren’t alarmed enough by such a prospect, the authors also tell us that we are at the “11th hour.”
Most interesting about this article is the considerable time the authors spend discussing how imminent a “threat” must be for the “survival” of a state before a preemptive attack can be legally launched and the quick and simplistic way they dismiss those arguments to justify their hawkish stance.
And why should the U.S. protect Israel from this alleged threat? A strange, almost paternalistic answer: Israel is “at greatest risk from Iranian nuclear weapons” and there is a “long and venerated international legal tradition that Great Powers have commensurately great responsibilities.”
Wall Street Journal: Mansour Arbabsiar, the number one witness and defendant in the U.S.’s controversial case about an “Iranian plot” to assassinate the Saudi ambassador in Washington, has plead not guilty to the charges laid against him. This is important because all the evidence made public so far is based on Arbabsiar’s confession and calls.
IPS News: Reporting from Iran, Yasaman Baji informs us that the U.S.’s allegations about an “Iranian plot” have stirred complex and nationalistic feelings in Iran.
Foreign Policy: Dalia Dassa Kaye, a senior political scientist at the Rand Corporation, explains that a military attack on Iran is still inadvisable for a list of reasons including
Tikun Olam: Richard Silverstein has been tracking a growing wave of hawkish articles appearing in Israeli media about a pending attack on Iran. This week Silverstein pointed out that Israel’s most prominent journalist, Nahum Barnea, is also warning of an Benyamin Netanyahu and Ehud Barak led strike. Silverstein argues that Barnea’s article makes the prospect of an Israeli attack imminent, but this is debatable considering how previous Israeli threats along these lines were mere posturing which resulted in further “concessions” made to them by the U.S. The article is in Hebrew, but Silverstein has translated excerpts of it. Here’s one:
Barak does not use the same superlatives, but is urging military action: he is certain that just as Israel prevented nuclear projects in the past, it must prevent this one as well. This is both his strategy and legacy…There are those who suspect Barak of having personal motives: he has no party; he has no voters. A strike on Iran would be the big bang that would make it possible for Netanyahu to bring him into the top ten of the Likud in the next elections. This way he could continue to be defense minister.