by Mitchell Plitnick
US Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel may have insisted that the latest sale of US arms to Israel sent a strong message to Iran, but the actual message was a bit more restrained. Hagel made a point of emphasizing that the arms sale reaffirmed the close ties between [...]]]>
by Mitchell Plitnick
US Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel may have insisted that the latest sale of US arms to Israel sent a strong message to Iran, but the actual message was a bit more restrained. Hagel made a point of emphasizing that the arms sale reaffirmed the close ties between the nations and repeated the Obama Administration’s mantra that Israel has the right to defend itself. The actual sale, though, gave the US another lever of control over a potential Israeli attack.
For Israel, the sale was a double-edged sword. The new equipment from the US does make it easier for Israel to attack Iran. Anti-radiation missiles disrupt anti-aircraft systems, and the new refueling jets modernize and expand Israel’s existing arsenal of such planes.
What they don’t do is give Israel the means to carry out an attack on Iran’s key nuclear facility at Fordo. For that, Israel needs the prize it has been seeking from the US: the new Massive Ordnance Penetrator (MOP), a “super bunker-buster” bomb weighing fifteen tons that’s capable of penetrating ten times as much concrete as previous models. With the Fordo site located some 300 feet underground, the MOP is the only bomb that might be able to impact the facility.
It is by no means certain that even the MOP could knock the Fordo facility out, but without that bomb, Israel cannot realistically try, short of a massive ground invasion. And even with the bomb itself, Israel would still need a plane to deliver the 15-ton explosive. Only a B-2 bomber can do that operationally and Israel currently does not have one.
The message being sent to Israel becomes clearer in light of an interesting event in the Senate on April 17. Senate Resolution 65 was an AIPAC-Sponsored bill that included a clause which committed the United States to supporting Israel if it attacked Iran. Usually, such AIPAC bills slide through the Senate and quickly reach an up or down vote on the floor. This one was marked up in the Foreign Relations Committee.
The markup was significant. Though it still commits the US to supporting Israel against Iran, it is not a simple green light for an Israeli attack with a rubber stamp on US involvement. It refers to legitimate self-defense, rather than just any Israeli decision to attack. The US can decide whether an Israeli act constitutes “legitimate self-defense”. The bill also makes clear that such defense refers only to Iranian nuclear targets. The markup also clarifies that any US support for an Israeli attack must conform to US law, including further Congressional authorization for any US action.
It’s still a problematic bill for many reasons, but it doesn’t create an automatic path for Israel to force the United States into a war with Iran. The fact that this AIPAC bill even went to a markup is unusual and says a lot. Combined with the public refusal to sell Israel the MOP — which gives the strong impression that the US is not even considering such a sale — an image of an Obama Administration determined to have a much firmer grip on its Iran policy during its second term emerges. Previously they felt too easily pressured by Israel’s and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s grip on Congress and public opinion.
The US did enhance Israel’s ability to attack Iran, but it continues to guard the key to making such a mission successful in terms of setting back the Iranian nuclear program. In this way, the Obama Administration has stood by its principle that Israel has the right to defend itself, while maintaining its control over critical decisions regarding Iran. And Congress did not end up thwarting the administration’s designs.
By making it clear that Israel is free to make its own decisions — and that the US will also do so — Obama hopes to blunt Netanyahu’s ability to mount the sort of pressure he did last time. Given that Israel seems to be publicly playing along with these moves, the plan may be working, at least for now.
While a lot of attention has been paid to the continuing US refusal to provide Israel with the massive bunker buster bomb, much of the strategy at play in this sale was revealed in a piece of equipment Israel was able to buy. The V-22 Osprey combines the speed and range of a plane with the vertical maneuverability of a helicopter. Its main use is as a personnel and supplies carrier, though it can also be equipped with surveillance devices.
Israel is the first country the US has sold the V-22 to. Its ability to land almost anywhere it can fit and hover over a given point combines with its range to significantly increase areas in which Israel can consider infiltration operations. It’s possible that some sort of commando operation into Iran could be augmented by the V-22, but it wouldn’t be a direct flight; Iran lies at the extreme edge of the V-22’s range. It would have to be carried there on a ship.
More likely, the V-22 is meant for use in the more immediate neighborhood. It will enable Israel, according to one anonymous Israeli colonel, to “…be able to carry out operations that we never imagined that one of our planes could execute. If we purchase the plane, our ranges of activity will dramatically change and we’ll be able to reach points we’ve never even dreamed of.”
The V-22 could be used to get commandos in and out of areas quickly, enabling Israel to strike specific targets deep inside Arab countries. It would enhance their ability to launch operations at selected militant camps or people and get their own soldiers in and out quickly.
Although the V-22 is likely to be sold to other US allies soon, selling it to Israel before any other country was clearly meant to further the charm offensive that President Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry have been pushing with their visits to the region recently. But underlying that is a tie-in with the efforts to mend the breach between Israel and Turkey.
The hope seems to be that Turkey and Israel can work together to enhance stability in the region as the dominant military powers. That is a bit of a stretch, it’s true, but the US wants to scale back its direct involvement in the region, and this is one way of doing that. It could work. In the worst and more likely case, the US will have enhanced Israel’s ability to strike at unfriendly groups within increasingly tumultuous Arab countries. That keeps Netanyahu happy and is the sort of activity that the US has generally wanted Israel to engage in, despite sometimes explosive consequences.
Photo: Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel gives his opening remarks during a joint media availability with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu before a meeting in Jerusalem, Israel, on April 23, 2013. DoD photo by Erin A. Kirk-Cuomo.
]]>by Farideh Farhi
From the looks of it, the second round of talks with Iran in Almaty, Kazakhstan was a complete failure, with both sides unable to even find a common language to begin a process of give and take. The sense I get is that the US side is rather [...]]]>
by Farideh Farhi
From the looks of it, the second round of talks with Iran in Almaty, Kazakhstan was a complete failure, with both sides unable to even find a common language to begin a process of give and take. The sense I get is that the US side is rather unhappy, even more than expected, with Iran. After all, it made a slight move during the first round by reportedly not demanding the complete dismantling of Fordo and rather asking for its suspension with provisions that would make its return to operation difficult. In return, it offered some sanctions relief regarding the gold trade and petrochemical industry.
The Iranian leadership did not think this was a balanced offer even if they acknowledged the US move as a positive step. The closure or non-operation of Fordo is a key component of a solution to the nuclear conflict while the slight sanctions relief offered in return hardly impacts the complex web of trade and financial sanctions that have been imposed on Iran. More importantly, for negotiation purposes, Fordo — an under-mountain site built in reaction to the repeated refrain of “all options are on the table” — is Tehran’s most important leverage for the talks. So, giving it away cheaply is just bad negotiating strategy.
There were attempts by some members of Iran’s foreign policy establishment to sell the US offer as a good first step to the Iranian public but that didn’t work out. In private conversations, even those hoping that Tehran would take the offer talked about the need for the Leader to take the “poisoned chalice,” a reference to Islamic Revolution founder Ayatollah Khomeini’s famous words when he accepted a ceasefire with Iraq in 1988. In other words, even those hoping for the acceptance of the offer considered it unbalanced and only necessitated through circumstances.
Subsequent efforts to make the offer more balanced during the technical talks in Istanbul failed. Hence, as they have done before, the Iranian negotiating team shifted gears and began talking about a comprehensive solution to the Iran question that will address other regional issues (i.e. Syria and Bahrain) as well as delineate what the end game will be. The endgame for Tehran since everything began in 2003 has always entailed the right to enrich uranium on Iranian soil. In retrospect, we should have expected Iran’s shift back toward a comprehensive discussion — which also happened in Moscow — after efforts during the technical talks to make the revised proposal more balanced failed.
As a result, the question of “now what?” will have to be on the table for the US. By moving a bit, the Obama administration has acknowledged that just making demands without at least appearing to address some of Iran’s bottom lines won’t move the process forward. Similarly, the presumption that a successful sanctions regime will convince Tehran to accede to a perceived bad deal in order to rescue Iran’s economy also just received a solid beating.
The US can of course continue to tighten the economic noose on Iran, although it is not clear how much more “useful” damage that will actually do. Two recent reports from completely divergent outlets — the National Iranian American Council and the Washington Institute for Near East Policy — suggest that Iran’s economy is adapting to the limits that have been imposed on its oil exports. Neither of these reports deny the harm sanctions have inflicted or the opportunity costs that have resulted, but they do acknowledge that Iran has been able to adjust and limp along at least in terms of macro trade and budget numbers. Even a recent joint-report by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and the Federation of American Scientists — while focusing on the costs and risks of Iran’s nuclear program — ends up acknowledging that costs from the loss of oil exports and opportunity costs resulting from the loss of foreign investment has been absorbed by Iran.
Indeed, continuing with what hasn’t worked in the past with the hope that it will one day work is what Gary Samore, Obama’s former nuclear advisor, expects. I guess the hope is that something magical will happen with Iran’s June 14 election and a newly elected president who will take charge by August. Perhaps he will be able to convince the Iranian leadership across the board that the offer Iran just designated as neither balanced nor comprehensive needs to be accepted.
This expectation or hope is a risky one. It is premised on the belief that Iran is a contested political environment and the harshness of sanctions will eventually pave the way for folks who think it’s time to abandon Iran’s nuclear program in favor of economic riches to gain the upper hand or argument. But the logic of Iran as a contested political terrain actually brings us to the opposite conclusion. One can more easily argue that the inability to begin a process of give and take on the nuclear issue before Iran’s election provides incentive to those who insist on Iran’s nuclear rights — and also happen to be in charge of the country — to make sure that a president is elected who will continue to toe their established line. In other words, the further escalation of sanctions may end up impacting the Iranian election, but not in the way that was intended.
So are there other options? Yes, according to another recent report by the Atlantic Council called Time to Move from Tactics to Strategy on Iran. It calls upon the Obama administration to “lay out a step-by-step reciprocal and proportionate plan that ends with graduated relief of sanctions on oil, and eventually on the Iranian Central Bank, in return for verifiable curbs on Iranian uranium enrichment and stocks of enriched uranium, and assurances that Iran does not have undeclared nuclear materials and facilities.”
Various sections of the report appear like they have been written by different members of the Council’s Iran Task Force, but the process laid out is pretty close to what the Iranians have articulated; if the issue is Iran’s nuclear program, then let’s lay out a roadmap and endgame for how the nuclear issue can be resolved to the relative satisfaction of all sides. The report also calls for opening an US Interests Section in Iran and increased people-to-people contact. Although it doesn’t come right out and say it, it effectively endorses various improved relations (people-to-people or government-to-government) as a companion to or simultaneous with a clearly defined step-by-step framework that reduces pressure on Iran in exchange for limitations on its nuclear program.
I’m not sure if the individuals who wrote the section on people-to-people contact and the need to use stepped-up public diplomacy to make Iranians “aware of the real reasons for sanctions” (to ensure the peacefulness of Iran’s nuclear program) understand how hard it is even for the most adept propaganda machine — and our country does have a pretty good one — to sell the idea that the US is justified in collectively punishing Iranians for the policies of their leaders. Nevertheless, making the case that the US is really not that bad while the sanctions regime is being relaxed through a step-by-step process of negotiations is a whole lot easier than what is being done right now: escalating the process of squeezing Iran while denying responsibility for it.
The Council report curiously does insist on maintaining one aspect of the Obama administration’s approach. It says that the majority of the Iran Task Force favors maintaining the military option as a last resort. It calls on the Obama administration to make sure that the option remains credible despite the acknowledgment that “While the drawbacks of a nuclear Iran are grave, the ramifications of a premature military strike—what the US military refers to as “second- and third-order effects”—could also be dire.” My dictionary tells me that “dire” is much worse than “grave” and I guess the report tries to ignore this by highlighting its rejection of a “premature” strike, whatever that means. But the dire effects of the premature strike are the same, I suppose, as a rightly timed strike.
Beyond this, I am truly puzzled by the inability of those promoting this type of public discourse to understand the corrosive impact that the language of “all options are on the table” has on the so-called international community that the Obama administration claims to represent, as well as various stakeholders in Iran, including the “Iranian people” who we apparently love and are so interested in establishing contact with. These fighting words do nothing to make the threat of military attack credible to those who run Iran’s nuclear policy precisely because of the “dire” effects that the Council report lays out. They also undercut any claim to righteousness regarding the nuclear row for the people who occupy the land and buildings that are being threatened. I cannot claim to know what the “Iranian people” think, but I can say that the overwhelming majority of Iranians I know, inside and outside of Iran, consider this language vulgar and appalling and reflective of an utter disregard for other people’s lives and livelihoods. Who else speaks this way nowadays? North Korea?
America’s “now what?” moment regarding Iran could be a productive moment if it begins to come to terms with the fact that the sanctions regime has not changed the calculation of the Iranian government — as evidenced by what just happened in Almaty. It can only do so, however, if it acknowledges that the military option cannot be made credible because the idea is both stupid and offensive.
]]>By Peter Jenkins
Joby Warrick and Greg Miller reported in the Washington Post on 8 April that White House officials are confident that Iran is not engaged in making nuclear weapons.
To those who follow closely the Iranian nuclear controversy this came as no surprise: it’s what the Director of National Intelligence has [...]]]>
By Peter Jenkins
Joby Warrick and Greg Miller reported in the Washington Post on 8 April that White House officials are confident that Iran is not engaged in making nuclear weapons.
To those who follow closely the Iranian nuclear controversy this came as no surprise: it’s what the Director of National Intelligence has been saying since late 2007. What struck was that the administration is now spreading this good news. Only a few months ago it was leading the American public to believe that the International Atomic Energy Association (IAEA) had found proof of an Iranian nuclear weapons program (which it hadn’t).
The contrast is stark, and encouraging for those who think that war with Iran to destroy its uranium enrichment plants would be a disaster. It suggests the administration has understood that negotiating a deal based on the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) is now the West’s wisest option, and that the upcoming talks in Istanbul offer an opportunity to launch a negotiation. An NPT deal would allow Iran to pursue a peaceful nuclear program unmolested, in return for its offering the best possible guarantees that all its nuclear material will remain in non-military use.
So for the first time in more than two years there can be hope that this ongoing conflict will have a peaceful outcome.
The timing looks good. Last month’s parliamentary elections have left Ayatollah Ali Khamenei stronger politically than at any time since 1989. His power is comparable to that of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini in August 1980 when he authorised the opening of negotiations for the release of the US embassy hostages.
Even though the Iranians have shown no sign of buckling under the pressure of ever tighter sanctions and know that the West’s military option is deeply unattractive to any of sane mind, the West has good cards in its hand. Sanctions are hurting Iran and Iran has an interest in getting them lifted, provided the price is right.
It’s now become apparent that the closure of one of Iran’s two enrichment plants, the small underground facility at Fordo, will be a Western objective. If it’s a pre-condition for moving beyond initial talks into a negotiation, as suspension of all enrichment has sometimes been, the game will soon be over. If it’s left for discussion at a much later stage, Iran will jib at closure, but perhaps some alternative to closure can be found: a permanent on-site IAEA inspector presence, for instance.
The West will also be targeting Iran’s small stock of 20% enriched uranium, according to David Sanger and Steven Erlanger in the New York Times (8 April). This looks less likely to raise Iranian hackles than plant closures. But Iran will be looking for assurances of access to the stock to produce fuel plates for the US-supplied Tehran Research Reactor.
Capping future enriched uranium production at below 5% is also likely to be negotiable, provided Iran is allowed to feel confident that the West will meet any future needs for 20% fuel without fuss.
So if the parties can find some way of moving beyond opening positions into a search for ways of giving expression to common interests, a negotiated outcome looks feasible.
That said, the scope for a negotiation to founder on cultural misunderstandings, negative prejudices born of past clashes, political in-fighting, and the interests of the West’s Middle East “allies” cannot be discounted.
In 2007, a promising opening evaporated when Iran’s chief negotiator clashed with President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. It was the President’s turn to be thwarted by domestic rivals in 2009. Then, in 2010, the timing of Iranian assent to a confidence-building proposal brokered by Turkey and Brazil cast doubt in Western minds about Iran’s sincerity.
The US negotiators must guard against a tendency to blind self-righteousness where international obligations are concerned. Although the US approach to international law has often been selective, Americans tend to treat non-Americans as miscreants when the latter err. It would be counterproductive to make Iran’s negotiators, who crave mutual respect and equality, feel like criminal suspects engaged in plea-bargaining.
However, the greatest threat to a successful outcome is likely to come from Middle East “allies”.
Since 1992, both leading Israeli parties have strived to convince Washington of Israel’s value to the US as an ally in a post-Cold War Middle East. For these Israelis, Iran’s nuclear programme has been manna from heaven—just what’s needed to persuade Americans that Iran is an evil state bent on destroying Israel, and that Iran’s programme, if left unchecked, will precipitate nuclear proliferation in an unstable region.
US neoconservatives, in thrall to dreams of reshaping the Middle East, have provided a ready echo chamber for these (highly questionable) propositions. These constituencies, Israeli and American, have no interest in the normalisation of the Iranian nuclear case through an NPT deal.
Meanwhile Saudi Arabia, though it appears to have refrained from poisoning the wells of American opinion, has been implying that it will ignore its NPT obligations if Iran is allowed to enjoy nuclear technology that the Saudis themselves are decades away from mastering. So any prospective deal that leaves Iran in possession of enrichment plants may well provoke Saudi protests.
Will President Obama be strong enough to resist pressure from these quarters? Has the administration understood that Iran’s nuclear programme is a symbol of a geostrategic shift–Iran is slowly returning to the ranks of Asia’s greater powers–and that wisdom lies in accommodating a shift that can only be prevented at the cost of hardship to much of mankind? Time will tell.
– Peter Jenkins was the UK’s Permanent Representative to the IAEA for 2001-06 and is now a partner in ADRg Ambassadors.
]]>