via IPS News 

Graphic: The figures signify the number of times each country was mentioned in the Oct. 22 presidential debate. Credit: Zachary Fleischmann/IPS

U.S. strategy in the Greater Middle East, which has dominated foreign policy-making since the 9/11 attacks more than 11 years ago, similarly dominated the third and last debate between [...]]]>

via IPS News 

Graphic: The figures signify the number of times each country was mentioned in the Oct. 22 presidential debate. Credit: Zachary Fleischmann/IPS

U.S. strategy in the Greater Middle East, which has dominated foreign policy-making since the 9/11 attacks more than 11 years ago, similarly dominated the third and last debate between President Barack Obama and Governor Mitt Romney Monday night.

The biggest surprise of the debate, which was supposed to be devoted exclusively to foreign policy and national security, was how much Romney agreed with Obama’s approach to the region.

His apparent embrace of the president’s policies appeared consistent with his recent efforts to reassure centrist voters that he is not as far right in his views as his primary campaign or his choice for vice president, Rep. Joe Ryan, would suggest.

The focus on the Greater Middle East, which took up roughly two-thirds of the 90-minute debate, reflected a number of factors in addition to the perception that the region is the main source of threats to U.S. security, a notion that Romney tried hard to foster during the debate.

“It’s partly because all candidates have to pander to Israel’s supporters here in the United States, but also four decades of misconduct have made the U.S. deeply unpopular in much of the Arab and Islamic world,” Stephen Walt, a Harvard international relations professor who blogs on foreignpolicy.com, told IPS.

“Add to that the mess Obama inherited from (George W.) Bush, and you can see why both candidates had to keep talking about the region,” he said.

But the region’s domination in the debate also came largely at the expense of other key regions, countries and global issues – testimony to the degree to which Bush’s legacy, particularly from his first term when neo-conservatives and other hawks ruled the foreign-policy roost, continues to define Washington’s relationship to the world.

Of all the countries cited by the moderator and the two candidates, China was the only one outside the Middle East that evoked any substantial discussion, albeit limited to trade and currency issues.

Romney re-iterated his pledge to label Beijing a “currency manipulator” on his first day in office, while Obama for the first time described Beijing as an “adversary” as well as a “partner” – a reflection of how China-bashing has become a predictable feature of presidential races since the end of the Cold War.

With the exception of one very short reference (by Romney) to Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez and another to trade with Latin America, Washington’s southern neighbours were completely ignored by the two candidates, as was Canada and all of sub-Saharan Africa, except Somalia and Mali where Romney charged that “al Qaeda-type individuals” had taken over the northern part of the country.

Not even the long-running financial crisis in the European Union (EU) – arguably, one of the greatest threats to U.S. national security and economic recovery – came up, although Romney warned several times that the U.S. could become “Greece” if it fails to tackle its debt problems.

Similarly, the big emerging democracies, including India, Brazil, South Africa, and Indonesia – all of which have been wooed by the Obama administration – went entirely unmentioned, although at least one commentator, Tanvi Madan, head of the Indian Project at the Brookings Institution, said Indians should “breathe a sigh of relief” over its omission since it signaled a lack of controversy over Washington’s relations with New Delhi.

Another key emerging democracy, Turkey, was mentioned several times, but only in relation to the civil war in Syria.

And climate change or global warming, which has been considered a national-security threat by U.S. intelligence agencies and the Pentagon for almost a decade, was a no-show at the debate.

“There was no serious discussion of climate change, the Euro crisis, the failed drug war, or the long-term strategic consequences of drone wars, cyberwar, and an increasingly ineffective set of global institutions,” noted Walt.

“Neither candidate offered a convincing diagnosis of the challenges we face in a globalised world, or the best way for the U.S. to advance its interests and values in a world it no longer dominates.”

Romney, whose top foreign-policy advisers include key neo-conservatives who were major promoters of Bush’s misadventures in the region, spent much of the debate repeatedly assuring the audience that he would be the un-Bush when it came to foreign policy.

“We don’t want another Iraq,” he said at one point in an apparent endorsement of Obama’s drone strategy. “We don’t want another Afghanistan. That’s not the right course for us.”

“I want to see peace,” he asserted somewhat awkwardly as he began his summation, suggesting that it was a talking point his coaches told him he must impress upon his audience before he left the hall in Boca Raton, Florida.

“Romney clearly decided he needed to head off perceptions of himself as a throwback to George W. Bush-era foreign policy adventurism, repeatedly stressing his desire for a peaceful world,” wrote Greg Sargent, a Washington Post blogger.

So strongly did he affirm most of Obama’s policies that, for those who hadn’t been paying close attention to Romney’s previous stands, the president’s charge that his rival’s foreign policy was “wrong and reckless” must have sounded somewhat puzzling.

As Obama was forced to remind the audience repeatedly, Romney’s positions on these issues have been “all over the map” since he launched his candidacy more than two years ago.

“I found it confusing, because he has spent much of the campaign season in some ways recycling Bush’s foreign policy, and, at least for one night, he seemed to throw the neo-cons under the bus,” said Charles Kupchan, a foreign policy specialist at the Council on Foreign Relations.

“Whether it was accepting the withdrawal timetable in Afghanistan, walking back a more aggressive stance on Syria, or basically agreeing with Obama’s approach on Iran, he seems to be stepping away from a lot of the positions he was taking just a few weeks ago,” he noted. “At this point, it’s impossible for voters to actually know what he thinks because he spent most of the campaign embracing a platform that was much further to the right.”

That Obama, who took the offensive from the outset and retained it for the next 90 minutes, won the debate was conceded by virtually all but the most partisan Republican commentators, with some analysts calling the president’s performance as decisive a victory as that which Romney achieved in the first debate earlier this month and which reversed his then-fading fortunes.

A CBS/Knowledge Networks poll of undecided voters taken immediately after the debate found that 53 percent of respondents thought Obama had won; only 23 percent saw Romney as the victor.

Whether that will be sufficient to reverse Romney’s recent gains in the polls – national surveys currently show a virtual tie among likely voters – remains to be seen.

Foreign policy remains a relatively minor issue in the minds of the vast majority of voters concerned mostly about the economy and jobs – one reason why, at every opportunity, Romney Monday tried, with some success, to steer the debate back toward those problems.

Two must-read analyses of the Iran portion from last night’s final presidential debate are brought to us by TIME’s Tony Karon and the Arms Control Association’s Greg Thielmann. (This TPM headline also sums up the entire debate quite nicely: “Romney’s Final Debate Message: I’ll Be A Better Obama”.)

Karon via Lobe Log

Two must-read analyses of the Iran portion from last night’s final presidential debate are brought to us by TIME’s Tony Karon and the Arms Control Association’s Greg Thielmann. (This TPM headline also sums up the entire debate quite nicely: “Romney’s Final Debate Message: I’ll Be A Better Obama”.)

Karon writes that regardless of who wins the 2012 presidential election, the United States will consider direct talks with Iran:

“It is essential for us to understand what our mission is in Iran,” Romney said in Monday’s foreign policy debate, “and that is to dissuade Iran from having a nuclear weapon through peaceful and diplomatic means.” His leverage of choice: “crippling sanctions” with the threat of military action as a last resort should Iran cross a red line toward developing “nuclear-weapons capability.” That’s broadly the same policy the Obama Administration has followed. Asked to differentiate himself, in the debate, Romney didn’t even raise the ambiguous question of where to draw the red line. (Obama sets his red line for action at Iran moving to acquire a nuclear weapon; Romney uses the phrase nuclear-weapons capability – although it’s not exactly clear whether this means the capability to build nuclear weapons, which Iran perhaps already has in latent form, or the capability to rapidly assemble and deploy nuclear warheads atop missiles.) Instead Romney simply insisted he’d have imposed tighter sanctions sooner.

But inflexibility from both sides may prevent a peaceful resolution to the Iran-US impasse:

While he may be open to a genuine compromise, Khamenei can’t be seen to surrender on “nuclear rights” for which Iran has fought and suffered growing isolation over the past decade, notes University of Hawaii Iran scholar Farideh Farhi. “With the draconian economic measures imposed on Iran in the past year, the [domestic] political terrain makes quite impossible the acceptance of a deal that does not bring about some immediate, palpable, even if small, relaxation of the sanctions regime,” says Farhi. Imagining sanctions as an alternative to military action may be misleading, she argues, because Khamenei believes their purpose is regime change, and mounting economic pain could prompt the regime to become more reckless in its effort to break out of the noose.

(Interestingly, Romney previously dodged questions about meeting directly with Iran, but Benjamin Armbruster reports that Paul Ryan was on network morning shows today saying that Romney would engage in bilateral talks without preconditions [from the Iranians?]).

Thielmann, a former senior State Department intelligence analyst, meanwhile clarifies the candidates’ positions on Iran:

Obama concluded last night that: “There is a deal to be had, and that is that [the Iranians] abide by the rules that have already been established. They convince the international community they are not pursuing a nuclear [weapons] program. There are inspections that are very intrusive. But over time, what they can do is regain credibility. In the meantime, though, we’re not going to let up the pressure until we have clear evidence that that takes place.”  At the same time, he warned that “the clock is ticking” and that he would not allow negotiations “to go on forever.”

For his part, Governor Romney appeared to tack away during the debate from his previous posture on Iran. Earlier, he had followed the lead of Israel’s prime minister, appearing more skeptical that any acceptable compromise could be reached with the current regime in Tehran and more willing to imply that unilateral military action would be taken sooner rather than later. Last night, Romney’s martial alarm was barely audible. Yet his avowed interest in diplomacy was belied by his call for treating Iran’s diplomats “as the pariahs they are.” It is difficult to negotiate constructively with those you are simultaneously labeling “pariahs.”

Both candidates appeared united in making one point about Iran policy options. Whatever the consequences of exercising the military option, they each signaled willingness ultimately to launch a preventive attack against Iran. This in spite of a near consensus among experts that, short of invasion and occupation, such an attack would not prevent but would bring about a nuclear-armed Iran.

The Truman National Security Project has created an interactive version of a war game with Iran. The goal is to highlight the costs of using the military option — financially massive and downright bad for US allies and forces in the region — on the Islamic Republic.

The game [...]]]> via Lobe Log

The Truman National Security Project has created an interactive version of a war game with Iran. The goal is to highlight the costs of using the military option — financially massive and downright bad for US allies and forces in the region — on the Islamic Republic.

The game was developed in consultation with senior former defense department officials and military experts. Users are put in the shoes of the President who is given various modes of deployment for attacking Iran after it crosses his stated red line — acquisition of a nuclear weapon. Players are faced with quickly rising oil and military costs from the get-go, as well as retaliatory attacks against US forces and allies in the region. In sum, once the war has begun, it’s impossible to escape unscathed as harsh force will result in harsh responses from Iran and its proxies while de-escalation attempts will further endanger US interests and forces.

The game is informative and frightening, to say the least, and indicative of why the highest echelons of the Israeli and US defence establishments are hardly gung-ho about going to war with Iran, especially when striking its nuclear facilities will likely intensify Iran’s drive to go nuclear as former Secretary of Defense Robert Gates has argued, and only set back its program by 3-5 years at best

The website was launched on Friday and an accompanying television ad featuring US Army veteran Justin Ford will begin airing tonight during the national security presidential debate.

US foreign policy specialist Stephen Walt lists the top ten questions you won’t hear during tonight’s last presidential nominee debate. Iran will be a central focus, if not the most talked about issue, but we’re unlikely to hear serious discussion along these lines according to Walt:

8. The United States has [...]]]> via Lobe Log

US foreign policy specialist Stephen Walt lists the top ten questions you won’t hear during tonight’s last presidential nominee debate. Iran will be a central focus, if not the most talked about issue, but we’re unlikely to hear serious discussion along these lines according to Walt:

8. The United States has the world’s strongest conventional forces and no powerful enemies near its shores. It has allies all over the world, and military bases on every continent. Yet the United States also keeps thousands of nuclear weapons at the ready to deter hostile attack.

Iran is much weaker than we are, and it has many rivals near its borders. Many U.S. politicians have called for the overthrow of its government. Three close neighbors have nuclear weapons: Pakistan, India, and Israel. If having nuclear weapons makes sense for the United States, doesn’t it make sense for Iran too? And won’t threatening Iran with an attack just make them want a deterrent even more?

(Follow up: You both believe all options should be “on the table” with Iran, including the use of military force. Would you order an attack on Iran without U.N. Security Council authorization? How would this decision to launch an unprovoked attack be different from Japan’s sneak attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941?

Mr. President, you have said in all manner of ways that an Iranian nuclear weapon would be “unacceptable,” and that you will not take options off the table to prevent this outcome—a clear reference to the potential use of military force. But a bipartisan group of foreign policy heavyweights, in addition to numerous top former Israeli security officials, believe that attacking Iran’s nuclear facilities could engender grave consequences, with the maximum benefit being only a delay in Iran’s nuclear program. What’s more, many of these experts think attacking could actually spur the Iranian government to kick out nuclear inspects and actually build a weapon. Can an attack stop Iran?

Governor Romney, after going back and forth on where you would place the “red line,” which would trigger military action, on Iran’s nuclear program, you’ve settled on declaring that you would stop an Iranian weapons “capability.” On yourcampaign website, you say that if the Iranians get even a weapons “capability,” “the entire geostrategic landscape of the Middle East would shift in favor of the ayatollahs.” Other than appearing to be at some point short of nuclear weapons “production”—where the President Obama set his red line—”capability” is an ill-defined concept. How do you define a nuclear weapons “capability” and how would that change the Middle East?

And on the issue of Israel-Palestine, which thanks to Bibi Netanyahu’s relentless Iran campaign this year has virtually disappeared from mainstream press attention, Walt asks:

3. Both of you claim to support a “two-state” solution between Israel and the Palestinians. But since the last election, the number of Israeli settlers in the West Bank and East Jerusalem has increased by more than 25,000 and now exceeds half-million people. If continued settlement growth makes a two-state solution impossible, what should United States do? Would you encourage Israel to allow “one-person, one-vote” without regard to religion or ethnicity — as we do here in the United States — or would you support denying Palestinians under Israeli control in Gaza and the West Bank full political rights?

The National Security Network also provides a wealth of additional resources for tonight’s event.

Sunday’s New York Times story that the US and Iran have agreed in principle to direct bilateral negotiations over Iran’s nuclear program provides opportunity for a more honest conversation on Iran than the presidential candidates have had so far. Well, at least this is my hope.

I know the NYT [...]]]> via Lobe Log

Sunday’s New York Times story that the US and Iran have agreed in principle to direct bilateral negotiations over Iran’s nuclear program provides opportunity for a more honest conversation on Iran than the presidential candidates have had so far. Well, at least this is my hope.

I know the NYT report has already been rejected by the US and Iran. But the rejections on both sides have a similar quality. Despite the Iranian refusal to meet with the US in the talks that began in Istanbul last April, neither has rejected the possibility of bilateral talks as an outgrowth of the P5+1 process. And both have said that talks within the P5+1 frame will begin in late November (time and place to be determined). In any case, the P5+1 frame has increasingly become a venue dominated by US demands.

But the value of the NYT revelation or leak is not in the reporting of an agreement on a potential meeting but in the impact it may have on the nature of the conversation about Iran’s nuclear program. The reality is that the presidential race has so far managed to avoid the real Iran question. Certainly there has been grandstanding and threats. There was the frenzy over the need to set red line or deadline for Iran which was thankfully calmed — at least temporarily — by Prime Minister’s Benjamin Netanyahu’s inane performance at the UN.

The campaign has also been full of sounds bites regarding the seeming contrast between “having Israel’s back” and “not allowing daylight between Israel and the United States”. But there has been no conversation regarding the rapidly approaching decision time regarding Iran. No conversation regarding whether the United States, after years of offering what it knew would be refused, is willing to offer something that Iran can accept.

Everyone knows what the elements of the offer are: limits on levels of enrichment combined with a more robust inspection regime in exchange for calibrated reduction of some of the sanctions. There are many details to be worked out in difficult negotiations, but these details cannot even begin to be addressed without public acceptance of some enrichment in Iran or the acknowledgment of Iran’s proverbial “inalienable right.”

Why do I say that there is a rapidly approaching decision time for which direction to go in? Well, sanctions have worked to create economic havoc in Iran. No doubt both President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Leader Ali Khamenei are primarily responsible for the deteriorating conditions. But their responsibility lies not in their incompetence in managing the economy per se but in their miscalculation. Khamenei, in particular, suspected negotiations would not go anywhere (at least, this is what he keeps saying) but he failed to prepare the country for his publicized “resistance economy.”

A resistance economy cannot be created overnight; certainly not when the economic helm of the country is in the combined hands of a populist president who underestimated the force of sanctions and a cantankerous Parliament caught between the demands of higher ups and pressures from lobbies and constituencies.

Not that Khamenei does not want a deal. He does and the encounters of the past four years have exhibited his openness to talks whenever there was hope in or detection of a degree of flexibility in the US position. But these encounters have also shown that he perceives himself as standing at the helm of a highly contentious political terrain that demands addressing certain bottom lines for Iran.

With the draconian economic measures imposed on Iran in the past year, the same political terrain makes quite impossible the acceptance of a deal that does not bring about some immediate, palpable, even if small, relaxation of the sanctions regime.

Some would say that this is precisely why this is no time for flexibility on the part of the United States. It will be throwing a lifeline to Khamenei and “them,” whoever they are. Now that sanctions are working, going for the throat is the right thing to do, they say. In response to this argument, which is also prevalent among some in the Iranian Diaspora who yell hard, accusing any country negotiating with Iran of being a traitor to the cause of the Iranian people, I would say that they are not adequately aware of the social and ideological forces than can be mobilized inside Iran to maintain a defiant, albeit limping, country.

Unless Khamenei and company are given a way out of the mess they have taken Iran into (with some help from the US and company), chances are that we are heading into a war in the same way we headed to war in Iraq. A recent Foreign Affairs article by Ralf Ekeus, the former executive chairman of the UN special Commission on Iraq, and Malfrid-Braut hegghammer, is a good primer on how this could happen.

The reality is that the current sanctions regime does not constitute a stable situation. First, the instability (and instability is different from regime change as we are sadly learning in Syria) it might beget is a constant force for policy re-evaluation on all sides (other members of the P5+1 included). Second, maintaining sanctions require vigilance while egging on the sanctioned regime to become more risk-taking in trying to get around them. This is a formula for war and it will happen if a real effort at compromise is not made. Inflexibility will beget inflexibility.

An additional benefit from directing the conversation away from whether to attack Iran and how to sanction it further is the positive impact on the nuclear debate inside Iran. There is no doubt in my mind that the conversation that has focused on attacking or sanctioning Iran until it kneels or submits has had the effect of making the hardliners defiantly louder and silencing those pushing for the resolution of the “Amrika issue.”

The loudness of the defiant folks rests on a simple argument again articulated last week in no uncertain terms by Khamenei himself: America’s problem with Iran is not the nuclear issue and talks for the US are not intended to resolve the nuclear standoff; they are a means to extract surrender from Iran.

If Khamenei is not correct, then a clearer public articulation of the extent of compromises the United States may be contemplating in order to resolve the nuclear standoff can encourage a conversation inside Iran as well. My bet is that it will also empower those pushing for Iran to show a bit more flexibility in its bottom line.

On the eve of Monday’s foreign policy debate between President Barack Obama and Republican challenger Mitt Romney, the electorate appears increasingly disillusioned with the so-called Arab Spring, according to a new survey released by the Pew Research Center here.

A majority (57 percent) of the more than 1,500 respondents said [...]]]> via IPS News

On the eve of Monday’s foreign policy debate between President Barack Obama and Republican challenger Mitt Romney, the electorate appears increasingly disillusioned with the so-called Arab Spring, according to a new survey released by the Pew Research Center here.

A majority (57 percent) of the more than 1,500 respondents said they do not believe that recent changes in the political leadership of Arab countries will “lead to lasting improvements” for the region, while only 14 percent – down from 24 percent 18 months ago – said they believe the changes will be “good for the United States”.

Nearly three out of four voters said the changes will either be “bad” for Washington (36 percent) or won’t have much of an effect either way (38 percent).

Both positions could favour Romney and the Republicans who, since last month’s killing of the U.S. ambassador to Libya and three of his staff in Benghazi, have argued that Obama’s policy toward the Arab world is unraveling.

Friday’s killing in Beirut of Lebanon’s top intelligence officer and at least seven other people could add to that perception, as Col. Wissam al-Hassan was aligned with the “March 14” coalition, a Sunni-led faction with close ties to Washington and strongly opposed to the Al-Assad regime in Syria.

The poll, which was conducted Oct. 4-7, also found a somewhat tougher position toward both Iran’s nuclear programme and on China’s trade policies.

Monday’s debate, the third and last in a series between the two candidates before the Nov. 6 election, is not expected to draw the huge television audiences – over 65 million people – of the last two, due to the relative lack of interest in foreign policy compared to domestic issues, especially the economy.

“While foreign affairs had had a higher profile recently, this is a campaign dominated by domestic issues,” according to Pew’s director, Andrew Kohut, who noted that only seven percent of respondents in another recent Pew poll cited foreign policy as a major priority compared to 41 percent when George W. Bush ran for re-election in 2004.

“The public is decidedly more isolationist than in some time,” he said, in part as a result of a lessening of “concern about terrorism as a national-security threat.”

The new poll got considerable media attention when it was released here Thursday because it showed Romney cutting deeply into the long-held lead sustained by Obama over many months in surveys that asked which candidate they trusted most to conduct the nation’s foreign policy.

In early September, a Bloomberg poll found that Obama led Romney by a 53-38 percent margin on this question, but Thursday’s Pew poll found that margin reduced to 47-43 percent in Obama’s favour. While Republicans leapt on the poll as evidence that their recent attacks on Obama’s Middle East policy – focused primarily on his administration’s alleged failure to respond to requests by its embassy in Tripoli for enhanced security – were drawing blood.

But Kohout suggested Friday that Romney’s gains were probably due more to Obama’s poor performance in the first debate, which took place Oct. 3, the day before Pew began polling, than to disillusionment with Obama’s foreign policy.

Noting that Obama is generally seen has having won the second debate Tuesday. “On the next poll, I expect Obama to do better on foreign policy,” he said, noting that polls over the past year have found consistently found foreign policy to be Obama’s strongest suit.

Monday’s debate is expected to centre on a number of key issues, particularly U.S. policy in the Middle East and Afghanistan and, to a somewhat lesser extent, on the most effective approach toward China, especially its trade and monetary policies about which Romney has been particularly hawkish on the campaign trail.

NATO and Russia under President Vladimir Putin, which Romney has called Washington’s “Number one geo-political foe”, are also expected to get some attention, possibly along with climate change which has been almost entirely ignored by both candidates in the campaign so far.

The main findings of the new poll include strong skepticism over whether the leadership changes in the Middle East will benefit either the local population or the U.S. Asked which was more important in the region – democratic governments and less stability or stable governments with less democracy, a 54 percent majority opted for the latter.

On Iran, the public appears to be somewhat more hawkish than 10 months ago. Asked whether, with respect to Iran’s nuclear programme, it was more important to “take a firm stand” against it or “to avoid military conflict with Iran, 56 percent opted for a “firm stand” – which, however, did not explicitly mention a military attack – six percent more than when the same question was asked last January.

Respondents were split equally over on the question of whether Obama or Romney, who is perceived as taking a more hawkish line on Iran, would be best in dealing with Iran’s nuclear programme.

Romney, who has promised to declare China as a “currency manipulator” on his first day in office and presumably follow up with sanctions, got his greatest support on the question of who would best deal with China’s trade policies. Forty-nine percent cited Romney compared to 40 percent for Obama whose “China-bashing has been somewhat more restrained during the campaign.

Indeed, the campaign appears to have contributed to a generally more hawkish attitude toward Beijing on economic issues. In March 2011, 53 percent of respondents said “building a stronger relationship” with China was more important than “getting tougher” with it on economic issues. Those figures are now practically reversed, with 49 percent favouring the second option and only 40 percent the first.

On the other hand, Obama’s main advantage was in dealing with political instability the Middle East by a 47-42 percent margin.

That may reflect popular support for what Republicans mock as Obama’s alleged preference for “leading from behind” in the region. Only 23 percent of respondents said they believe the U.S. should be “more involved” in fostering leadership changes in the Middle East, while a whopping 63 percent – including 53 percent of Republicans – said they believe Washington should be “less involved”.

Romney has generally favoured somewhat more interventionist policies in the region, notably with respect to arming rebels in the civil war in Syria.

On Israel, a plurality believes that current U.S. support for the Jewish state is “about right” as opposed to 22 percent who believe that Washington is too supportive, and 25 percent who think it has not been supportive enough.

The poll confirmed a major partisan divide on this question: 46 percent of Republicans believe U.S. policy has not been sufficiently supportive. “White evangelicals are extremely committed to Israel,” noted Kohout, who added that they form about 40 percent of the Republican base.

As in other recent surveys, the latest poll found major differences between the so-called millennial general – adults under age 30, and other age groups. On the question of Iran’s nuclear programme, for example, a 49 percent plurality of millennials preferred to “avoid military conflict”, while only 24 percent of those 65 and older take that position.

Similarly, on economic policy toward China, 70 percent of millennials favour stronger relations with Beijing instead of “getting tougher”. Only 41 percent of those 65 and older agreed.

“[The millennials] have a very different worldview,” said Kohout. “This is a much more liberal, Democratically disposed generation.”

A major challenge faced by the Obama campaign is to get millennials to the polls, as their abstention rate has been significantly higher than any other age group

Washington Post columnist Walter Pincus continues to provides incisive analysis to the debate over Iran’s controversial nuclear program. Following are a few of his suggested questions for the presidential candidates’ foreign policy debate on Monday.

What are the candidates willing to do to ensure their “red lines” on [...]]]> via Lobe Log

Washington Post columnist Walter Pincus continues to provides incisive analysis to the debate over Iran’s controversial nuclear program. Following are a few of his suggested questions for the presidential candidates’ foreign policy debate on Monday.

What are the candidates willing to do to ensure their “red lines” on Iran’s nuclear program aren’t violated and how much will Israeli concerns affect the ultimate outcome?

The president has said he would prevent Iran from “having a nuclear weapon” and has offered assurances that U.S. intelligence would be able to determine when building one had begun.

In his June “Face the Nation” appearance, Romney said he would be willing to use military force, but he did not define what that meant. Recently, he has said he would prevent Iran from having “a nuclear weapons capability,” but what does that mean?

Though the current policy of the United States and its allies rests on a U.N. Security Council resolution that calls for Iran to suspend its activities related to reprocessing uranium, Iran has produced uranium enriched to 20 percent. Enrichment up to 90 percent is considered weapons grade. Most of the enrichment has been up to 6 percent, usable as fuel in electric power reactors.

What solution is required by each candidate for this situation? Do they believe any deal with Tehran requires Israeli approval?

Does Romney or Obama believe they could attack Iran’s nuclear program without congressional authorization — as was the case with Libya — and without agreement from the United Nations or support from NATO or a group of other allies, including some countries in the region?

On March 21, 2011, Obama sent Congress a two-page letter saying that as commander in chief he had constitutional authority to authorize the military operations to prevent a humanitarian disaster. He said it would be limited in duration and noted that the U.N. Security Council had authorized a no-fly zone over Libya, and that the undertaking was done with British, French and Persian Gulf allies. Nineteen days after the strikes began, NATO took over command of the air operations from the U.S. Africa Command.

Does Obama or Romney believe that any military action against Iran would be as limited as the one in Libya? Does either believe that U.S. ground forces could be drawn into battle should Iran or its allies respond with attacks against Israel or other countries?