by Monica Byrne
Before I traveled to Iran, I didn’t want to read anything about Iran. Certainly nothing written by mainstream American news media, which often draws an absurdist caricature of the country. I wanted to arrive with an open heart.
But I knew that having an open heart wasn’t the same thing as an ignorant mind. I didn’t pretend to have more than a superficial knowledge of Iranian-American relations. I didn’t wish to gloss over the misdeeds of either country, including human rights abuses. I was just a writer, with three motivations:
- Travel is essential to my writing;
- I have Iranian friends in America who are passionate about their homeland, which made me curious; and
- for their sake and mine, I want reconciliation between our countries.
No small task, of course. Not when people from both countries have been working toward that goal ever since the 1979 revolution ousted a pro-American monarch and replaced it with an Islamic Republic.
The revolution has impacted a whole generation of people in both Iran and America. But a new generation—including my friends and I—born after 1979, don’t have a memory of the revolution, or the occupation of the US Embassy in Tehran. There’s no case to be made for ignorance, but there is a case to be made for innocence: To us, the estrangement of Iran and America makes neither political nor intuitive sense. America’s simultaneous fidelity to Saudi Arabia and Israel feels odd and hypocritical. While I was in Iran, I asked my guide to explain the reason behind the sanctions. He couldn’t really explain it. I researched the sanctions. I couldn’t even explain them to myself. They just seemed pointless and arbitrary.
An older generation resigns itself to everything being the way it is. A younger generation questions why any of it has to be.
So where do we begin? And by “we,” I don’t mean the nation states; I mean “we” as individual citizens. Do we seek common ground? I’m not going to insult everyone’s intelligence by saying Iranians are just like Americans. That not only implies that Iranian lives only have value insofar as they resemble American ones; it also obscures our differences, including the religious orientations of our current governments, and the effects those orientations have on the public and private behavior of individual citizens. Those differences are real and important.
Yet those differences are not a real barrier to reconciliation. And as an American, I see the primary responsibility for reconciliation in America’s court. We are far more ignorant about, and hostile toward Iranians than Iranians are toward us. That is our shame. Are there people in Iran who chant “Death to America”? Sure, I guess, somewhere. I didn’t meet any of them. Are there people in America who can’t even locate Iran on a map? Yes. I meet them every day.
The good news is that both countries have made small acts of good faith over time, which then led to acts of good faith among individual citizens; my homeland became a home for people of Iranian origin and descent. They grew up in (or came to) America and made friends, including me. Those friendships then inspired me to travel to Iran.
Filming a documentary in a vineyard near Pasargade. From left to right: the director, Monica Byrne, Mohamad Shirkavand. Credit: Fars Television
While staying near the historical city of Pasargade, the final resting place of Cyrus the Great, I had a wonderful experience playing the part of an American tourist in a documentary that happened to be shooting near my guesthouse. The producers gave me a verse of Hafez, the great Persian poet, to say in Farsi:
Derakhte doosti benshan,
ke kame del be bar arad.
Which means:
Plant the tree of friendship,
and it will give the fruit of the heart’s desire.
Even now, two weeks after leaving Iran, the line still resonates with me. I’m not a politician. I don’t have the ear of anyone in power. The negotiations over Iran’s nuclear program are not accessible to me. But travel and friendship: these are tools that are available to me. They’re also available to millions of Americans, especially after Hassan Rouhani—known inside Iran as a moderate cleric with reformist ambitions—was elected president last year. By travel I don’t mean joining a mindless mega-tour group, whose members don’t interact with anyone except through the viewfinder of their cameras. I mean travel as a mindful and radical act: to seek one-on-one consensual reconciliation of Other and Self, of mutual transformation that leaves both parties more perfectly themselves than they were before.
The Tomb of Hafez, Shiraz, Iran. Credit: Monica Byrne
The state will act at the level of the state, in Vienna or wherever. But individuals can act at the level of individuals, on American and Iranian soil: seeing and being seen, hearing and being heard, knowing and being known.
My last night in Iran, I went back to the Tomb of Hafez. The first time I’d gone was daytime, when tourists go; evening is when Iranians go.
The air was cool and electric. In the northeast corner of the courtyard, a square of rugs was set down for evening prayer. Up and down the steps of the tomb came students, artists, professors, pairs of women, pairs of men, parents with teenagers, parents with toddlers. A young couple—the girl wearing a scarf fashionably high on her head, the boy wearing all black, with a gold chain—walked up to the tomb and fidgeted there, unsure of how to behave. Some placed their fingers on the tomb, their lips moving. Others checked their smartphones, or took selfies. A man in a grey suit hovered by one of the columns, reciting Hafez to whoever would listen.
As per an Iranian tradition I’d read about, I circled the tomb seven times and then sat down, legs crossed, with my back to one of the pillars, and asked the question in my mind: How do Iran and America reconcile?
And then I opened my English translation of The Divan of Hafez, which my guide Mohamad had bought me as a gift. This was the first verse my eyes fell upon:
Joyous that day from when this desolate abode, I go:
The ease of soul, I seek: and for the sake of the Beloved I go.
The answer gave me chills.
But I didn’t have time to think more about it, because just then, the men who’d finished praying came to take a group picture on the steps of the tomb. They asked me where I was from, and like everyone who heard I was from America, were delighted and extremely welcoming. We could communicate very little, but they managed to tell me they were from nearby Estahban, a city famous for figs.
Our conversation drew onlookers. Soon it was a crowd of twenty or more. Someone asked if I spoke any Farsi. I got really excited because I remembered my line from the vineyard documentary, so I started:
Derakhte doosti benshan—
And the entire crowd finished it with me as if it were a song we’d long rehearsed.
—ke kame del be bar arad!
The man in the grey suit who’d been reciting Hafez behind us called “Yes! Yes! Thank you!” and rushed forward to pour peanuts and raisins into my hand.
A translator materialized; the crowd was now asking me why I’d come to Iran. “I want Iran and America to reconcile,” I said. Immediately applause broke out. “Tell your government!” someone called out. “I’m trying!” I said, waving my Moleskin. It felt like such a paltry gesture. But I have to believe that it was something. That these gestures of good faith would also come to bear fruit, like the gestures of good faith that had sent me there in the first place.
American news outlets often portray Iran as something like Mordor, the strange and unknown wasteland from J. R. R. Tolkien’s Middle Earth. The average American mostly follows suit. Now that I’ve been there, what can I say to that? Where can I even begin?
What I saw was a vast, gorgeous, brilliant country at the crossroads of the world, with an ancient culture seasoned by peoples from the north, south, east, and west who’d broken over Persia like waves for three thousand years. I fell in love with Hafez and the reverence of artists that his veneration represents. I fell in love with Iranian food (I’m rationing my remaining saffron sugar sticks like bars of gold). I fell in love with Iranian landscapes—Alamut, Abyaneh, Persepolis, Garmeh. I fell in love with Iranian places—the Zurkhaneh in Yazd, the homestay in Farahzad, the garden in Kashan. And Iranians themselves were unfailingly kind to me. How is it even possible that our peoples are still estranged? It makes no sense.
I spent my last night in Iran on the steps of Hafez’s tomb, talking. Men, women, mothers, fathers, teenagers, girls, boys, children—all eager to talk. A daughter translated, and a father filmed the impromptu interview. A son translated, and told me the meanings of all his family’s names. I ripped pages out of my Moleskin and wrote down my contact information for five, ten, twenty people; and got theirs in return. Blog, Gmail, Twitter, Facebook, Viber, Whatsapp, Instagram—we would find each other there (even if some of those applications are illegal in Iran). The men from Estahban returned with a handful of figs and poured them into my hand on top of the peanuts and raisins. My heart overflowed. I didn’t want to leave. In just thirty days, Iran had become beloved to me.
I’ll be back soon, inshallah. In the meantime, to every single American who is able, I echo Hafez:
For the sake of the Beloved, go.
Monica Byrne is a novelist, playwright, and traveler based in Durham, NC. Her first novel The Girl in the Road was published by Penguin Random House in May. She writes from home and abroad on her blog. (Featured Image: The doors at Takt-e Soileman, Iran. Credit: Monica Byrne.)
This article was first published by Lobelog and was reprinted here with permission. Copyright Lobelog.
]]>by Emile Nakhleh
Yesterday’s public announcement by Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Bahrain that they’re withdrawing their ambassadors from Qatar signals a serious rift within the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). The seismic regional changes that have occurred since the establishment of the GCC 33 years ago will likely torpedo [...]]]>
by Emile Nakhleh
Yesterday’s public announcement by Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Bahrain that they’re withdrawing their ambassadors from Qatar signals a serious rift within the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). The seismic regional changes that have occurred since the establishment of the GCC 33 years ago will likely torpedo this tribal organization.
The stated reason for the ambassadorial recall is Qatar’s perceived support of the Muslim Brotherhood, which the three states view as a threat to their rule. Yet, the other two GCC members — Kuwait and Oman — did not support the move.
Saudi Arabia is angry at Qatar for striking an independent foreign policy course in responding to Arab upheavals in the past three years. The Saudis are lashing out probably because of their arguably waning influence in the region. For example, they failed to get a unanimous GCC support for sending troops to Bahrain to quell the anti-regime uprising in 2011.
They were equally unable to sell the call for unification of the GCC states. Only the Bahraini King supported the Saudi position, which forced them to shelf the proposal.
The Saudis have also disagreed with Qatar’s position on Iran and Syria. As the largest and most powerful member of the GCC, Saudi Arabia resents Qatar’s larger than life posture in the region and internationally. Riyadh’s rulers are wary of Doha’s pro-active search for modernity, Western education, and political and ideological pragmatism. Qatar’s satellite news station Al Jazeera has been a thorn in the Saudi and Bahraini side.
The GCC came into being May 26, 1981 for the sole purpose of preserving the tribal, Sunni and hereditary family rule in the Gulf Arab states and countering perceived rising threats.
At the time those threats included the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, the Islamic revolution in Iran, the Iraq-Iran war, and the Israeli invasion of Lebanon. Ruling Sheikhs and Emirs viewed the rising wave of terrorism in the region as coming from Iran and its Shia supporters across the Gulf and beyond.
The establishment of the Islamic Republic in Iran and the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan forced Gulf rulers to turn to Sunni Islam, including the Muslim Brotherhood, for protection against the “atheist” Soviet Union in Afghanistan and the “Safavi, Persian menace.”
They preached and bankrolled Salafi Sunni jihad against both perceived enemies. By recasting the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) as the current enemy, these rulers are being seen as hypocritical and shortsighted. They are also playing a dangerous game.
Bahrain, for example, has promoted a Sunni Islamic ideology at home that is well grounded in the MB as a line of defense against the Shia opposition. Over the years, some Bahraini political and business Sunni leaders have established close relations with the MB, regionally and internationally, according to media reports.
The Saudis and the Bahrainis are also financing Sunni Salafi jihad in Syria against the Assad regime. Earlier they supported similar groups in Iraq against the Shia power structure. In fact, in the past two years, several radical Sunni activists from Bahrain went to Syria to wage jihad against Assad, presumably with the approval of the Bahraini authorities.
The Saudi, UAE and Bahraini anger at Qatar is yet another manifestation of the tensions that have simmered for years within the GCC. While they recognized growing threats to their rule in the early 1980s, they disagreed even then on how to respond to those threats.
The Al Khalifa regime, especially, finds itself in a dilemma: Supporting the Egyptian military junta against the MB, and at the same time relying on pro-MB activists to fight the Shia opposition and Iran, which they blame for the unrest in Bahrain.
Oman, Qatar, and Kuwait, on the other hand, are pursuing active political and economic relations with Tehran based on pragmatism and mutual economic interests.
Despite their annual summitry and the public rhetoric of Gulf unity, GCC rulers in the past thirty years have pursued their respective national interests separately with barely a nod to the organization. On very few occasions they acted collectively under the umbrella of the GCC security agreement.
The May 1981 GCC agreement stressed the importance of cooperation in education, manpower training, and economic diversification. But the GCC has been unable to transcend security and establish regional cooperative working arrangements in other areas.
GCC states shied away from economic complimentarity, as envisioned in the original agreement, and established separate airlines, banking systems, investment corporations, and media enterprises. Although they cling to authoritarian hereditary family rule, Kuwait has established a pseudo-democracy. Bahrain had a brush with representative democracy in the early 1970s but scuttled the experiment shortly thereafter. Each state devised a political system that is commensurate with its perceived cultural and demographic particularities regardless of their commitment to the GCC.
When I was doing research for my book on the GCC in the mid-1980s, I asked a successful Arab Gulf businessman what he thought of the GCC. He responded colloquially with one word, “Hatchi” meaning “just talk.”
A real gap exists in the minds of Gulf citizens between the rhetoric of the GCC as a collective organization and its social and economic accomplishments. While the member states have advanced in their individual pursuits, the GCC seems to be withering as an organization.
American and Western policymakers regularly cite the GCC in their public statements, but in reality they deal with member countries as separate states with little consideration of the organization.
Although Qatar is being accused of promoting the Muslim Brotherhood, especially providing a home for the televangelist preacher-scholar Yusif al-Qaradawi and his family enterprises, the tensions between Qatar and Saudi Arabia are much deeper than al-Qaradawi and Al Jazeera, which carries his programs.
Instead of blaming Qatar and recalling their ambassadors, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Bahrain should address their poor human rights record at home and respond to their peoples’ demands for genuine reform and social justice.
]]>by Henry Precht
The recent telephone conversation between Presidents Obama and Rouhani — and their positive descriptions of the exchange – are precisely on target for bringing an end to the Iran-US Cold War.
Distrust has been the background noise for that conflict for more than 35 years. It need not have [...]]]>
by Henry Precht
The recent telephone conversation between Presidents Obama and Rouhani — and their positive descriptions of the exchange – are precisely on target for bringing an end to the Iran-US Cold War.
Distrust has been the background noise for that conflict for more than 35 years. It need not have been so.
During the 1960s and 1970s, the US observed a restriction on dealing with Iranians that was virtually unique in our diplomatic relations: we refused to have contact with the sovereign’s opponents. Even on American soil we declined to sit with anti-regime Iranian students. Once in the 1970s, an enterprising political officer in Tehran made an appointment to call on a prominent bazaar mullah. The Ministry of Court called Ambassador Richard Helms and said the visit would be unwise. The appointment was cancelled. In 1975, visiting Senator Charles Percy was briefed at the American and Israeli embassies. The latter told him that the mullahs were the regime’s greatest threat. Such an analysis was never heard from the Americans.
Come the revolution of 1978 and it soon became apparent that we were in touch with only one-half of Iranian politics — the losing half. Slowly, cautiously, Embassy political officers began to talk to oppositionist Mehdi Bazargan and his friends. In Washington, however, Deputy Secretary Warren Christopher forbade me as an Iranian desk officer to meet with Ibrahim Yazdi who was on his way to serve Ayatollah Khomeini in Paris.
That gentleman, leader of the revolution, remained off limits until about a month before the end game. Bill Sullivan, ambassador in Tehran, proposed that Washington send a representative to meet with the Ayatollah. President Jimmy Carter agreed. Retired Ambassador Ted Eliot was picked to do the job of explaining US policy towards the conflict and urging a more moderate approach for the revolutionaries. The Shah was informed and shrugged, “A great power must protect its interests.”
Carter and his advisor Dr. Zbigniew Brzezinski left for the Guadeloupe summit of world leaders and returned with an altered perspective: the call on Khomeini was cancelled without explanation. Sullivan — on a secure phone line — cursed eloquently whoever made that “stupid decision.”
Would it have made a difference if there had been an American meeting and exchange with Khomeini? Might it have overcome the abiding conviction of the Iranian revolutionaries that we were unalterably committed to the Shah’s rule?
Perhaps not. Many on the wrong side of the barricades were convinced that Washington was determined to keep Iran as a subservient ally. But a meeting might — just might — have generated some reflection and questioning of customary wisdom. With follow-up meetings, talks could have led to a more moderate and balanced view of the American role in the region. As it was, in the months that followed, Iranian officials regularly scolded American embassy personnel for “not accepting the revolution.” Assurances to the contrary did not ring true when we refused even to talk to the revolution’s leader.
That was the backdrop for Washington’s efforts to construct a new and more normal relationship with Tehran. In the spring of 1979, Washington named a new ambassador, Walt Cutler, and Charge Charles Naas prepared to depart. Naas proposed that he seek a meeting with Khomeini to absorb the angry old man’s ire but leave the precedent of an exchange for Cutler’s benefit. Washington approved. Iran’s interim prime minister, Bazargan, was enthusiastic; here was evidence that the US was taking a new, fresh attitude towards the revolution. Perhaps a first step towards easing distrust? We hoped so, too.
But it was not to be. The Iranians executed a wealthy Jewish businessman and friend of the Shah, one of a series of judicial murders against the old regime. Led by Senator Jacob Javits, the US Senate quickly condemned revolutionary Iran in a resolution that was drafted without Executive Branch input.
Khomeini was furious at the perceived insult and interference in Iran’s affairs. He was also cautious. “Don’t break relations with them,” he told his associates. “But make them know they can’t treat us like the puppet Shah.” The agreement for Cutler as ambassador was nullified; the visit of Naas to Khomeini was cancelled.
Distrust blossomed. Washington had lost two openings to explain its policy toward Iran and gain a clearer insight as to where the country was headed. When the embassy was seized in November, we Americans had no established connection with the one man who might have ended the crisis. We could only shout at each other across an ocean.
Obviously, talking to an antagonist alone can’t fundamentally alter a relationship. But it can enhance understanding and cast doubt on dogma. Distrust breeds where one doesn’t hear, “on the other hand” or, “have you thought about the issue from this perspective?”
Not talking opens doors and windows to those who would further embitter a relationship out of ignorance, accident or design. The US-Iranian connection is replete with long periods of destructive silence.
If tensions between Tehran and Washington are to be eased, it is imperative that leaders in the two capitals keep up the flow of exchanges — at the most senior level and also between cadres of officials on both sides. Before too long, that would mean reopened embassies and revitalized exchange programs.
Iran is a land nurtured by poetry and rhetoric. Free speech is a prime American value. Relying on these aural talents, it is time for a continuous and growing exchange between the two nations.
]]>via IPS News
A review of Flynt Leverett and Hillary Mann Leverett’s “Going to Tehran: Why the United States Must Come to Terms with the Islamic Republic of Iran” (Metropolitan Books, 2013)
“Going to Tehran” arguably represents the most important work on the subject of U.S.-Iran relations to be published thus [...]]]>
via IPS News
A review of Flynt Leverett and Hillary Mann Leverett’s “Going to Tehran: Why the United States Must Come to Terms with the Islamic Republic of Iran” (Metropolitan Books, 2013)
“Going to Tehran” arguably represents the most important work on the subject of U.S.-Iran relations to be published thus far.
Flynt Leverett and Hillary Mann Leverett tackle not only U.S. policy toward Iran but the broader context of Middle East policy with a systematic analytical perspective informed by personal experience, as well as very extensive documentation.
More importantly, however, their exposé required a degree of courage that may be unparalleled in the writing of former U.S. national security officials about issues on which they worked. They have chosen not just to criticise U.S. policy toward Iran but to analyse that policy as a problem of U.S. hegemony.
Both wrote memoranda in 2003 urging the George W. Bush administration to take the Iranian “roadmap” proposal for bilateral negotiations seriously but found policymakers either uninterested or powerless to influence the decision. Hillary Mann Leverett even has a connection with the powerful American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), having interned with that lobby group as a youth.
After leaving the U.S. government in disagreement with U.S. policy toward Iran, the Leveretts did not follow the normal pattern of settling into the jobs where they would support the broad outlines of the U.S. role in world politics in return for comfortable incomes and continued access to power.
Instead, they have chosen to take a firm stand in opposition to U.S. policy toward Iran, criticising the policy of the Barack Obama administration as far more aggressive than is generally recognised. They went even farther, however, contesting the consensus view in Washington among policy wonks, news media and Iran human rights activists that President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s election in June 2009 was fraudulent.
The Leveretts’ uncompromising posture toward the policymaking system and those outside the government who support U.S. policy has made them extremely unpopular in Washington foreign policy elite circles. After talking to some of their antagonists, The New Republic even passed on the rumor that the Leveretts had become shills for oil companies and others who wanted to do business with Iran.
The problem for the establishment, however, is that they turned out to be immune to the blandishments that normally keep former officials either safely supportive or quiet on national security issues that call for heated debate.
In “Going to Tehran”, the Leveretts elaborate on the contrarian analysis they have been making on their blog (formerly “The Race for Iran” and now “Going to Tehran”) They take to task those supporting U.S. systematic pressures on Iran for substituting wishful thinking that most Iranians long for secular democracy, and offer a hard analysis of the history of the Iranian revolution.
In an analysis of the roots of the legitimacy of the Islamic regime, they point to evidence that the single most important factor that swept the Khomeini movement into power in 1979 was “the Shah’s indifference to the religious sensibilities of Iranians”. That point, which conflicts with just about everything that has appeared in the mass media on Iran for decades, certainly has far-reaching analytical significance.
The Leveretts’ 56-page review of the evidence regarding the legitimacy of the 2009 election emphasises polls done by U.S.-based Terror Free Tomorrow and World Public Opinon and Canadian-based Globe Scan and 10 surveys by the University of Tehran. All of the polls were consistent with one another and with official election data on both a wide margin of victory by Ahmadinejad and turnout rates.
The Leveretts also point out that the leading opposition candidate, Hossein Mir Mousavi, did not produce “a single one of his 40,676 observers to claim that the count at his or her station had been incorrect, and none came forward independently”.
“Going to Tehran” has chapters analysing Iran’s “Grand Strategy” and on the role of negotiating with the United States that debunk much of which passes for expert opinion in Washington’s think tank world. They view Iran’s nuclear programme as aimed at achieving the same status as Japan, Canada and other “threshold nuclear states” which have the capability to become nuclear powers but forego that option.
The Leveretts also point out that it is a status that is not forbidden by the nuclear non-proliferation treaty – much to the chagrin of the United States and its anti-Iran allies.
In a later chapter, they allude briefly to what is surely the best-kept secret about the Iranian nuclear programme and Iranian foreign policy: the Iranian leadership’s calculation that the enrichment programme is the only incentive the United States has to reach a strategic accommodation with Tehran. That one fact helps to explain most of the twists and turns in Iran’s nuclear programme and its nuclear diplomacy over the past decade.
One of the propaganda themes most popular inside the Washington beltway is that the Islamic regime in Iran cannot negotiate seriously with the United States because the survival of the regime depends on hostility toward the United States.
The Leveretts debunk that notion by detailing a series of episodes beginning with President Hashemi Rafsanjani’s effort to improve relations in 1991 and again in 1995 and Iran’s offer to cooperate against Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan and, more generally after 9/11, about which Hillary Mann Leverett had personal experience.
Finally, they provide the most detailed analysis available on the 2003 Iranian proposal for a “roadmap” for negotiations with the United States, which the Bush administration gave the back of its hand.
The central message of “Going to Tehran” is that the United States has been unwilling to let go of the demand for Iran’s subordination to dominant U.S. power in the region. The Leveretts identify the decisive turning point in the U.S. “quest for dominance in the Middle East” as the collapse of the Soviet Union, which they say “liberated the United States from balance of power constraints”.
They cite the recollection of senior advisers to Secretary of State James Baker that the George H. W. Bush administration considered engagement with Iran as part of a post-Gulf War strategy but decided in the aftermath of the Soviet adversary’s disappearance that “it didn’t need to”.
Subsequent U.S. policy in the region, including what former national security adviser Bent Scowcroft called “the nutty idea” of “dual containment” of Iraq and Iran, they argue, has flowed from the new incentive for Washington to maintain and enhance its dominance in the Middle East.
The authors offer a succinct analysis of the Clinton administration’s regional and Iran policies as precursors to Bush’s Iraq War and Iran regime change policy. Their account suggests that the role of Republican neoconservatives in those policies should not be exaggerated, and that more fundamental political-institutional interests were already pushing the U.S. national security state in that direction before 2001.
They analyse the Bush administration’s flirtation with regime change and the Obama administration’s less-than-half-hearted diplomatic engagement with Iran as both motivated by a refusal to budge from a stance of maintaining the status quo of U.S.-Israeli hegemony.
Consistent with but going beyond the Leveretts’ analysis is the Bush conviction that the U.S. invasion and occupation of Iraq had shaken the Iranians, and that there was no need to make the slightest concession to the regime. The Obama administration has apparently fallen into the same conceptual trap, believing that the United States and its allies have Iran by the throat because of its “crippling sanctions”.
Thanks to the Leveretts, opponents of U.S. policies of domination and intervention in the Middle East have a new and rich source of analysis to argue against those policies more effectively.
*Gareth Porter, an investigative historian and journalist specialising in U.S. national security policy, received the UK-based Gellhorn Prize for journalism for 2011 for articles on the U.S. war in Afghanistan.
Photo: Tehran skyline in Iran.
]]>My dear friend and colleague, Henry Precht, in his discussion Wednesday about the sad path of US-Iran affairs in the last 30 years, did not mention that a day after his snowy trip to the State Department, the Embassy in Tehran was under heavy [...]]]>
The attack was not totally unexpected because there was evidence of someone listening to our Marines’ communications and a small compound that we had considered retreating to in the event of attack was destroyed by bombing two days previously. Not much preparation, however, could realistically be done in the chaos of early revolutionary enthusiasm. The Iranian police guard force that had been with us for years had been removed. Cinema was useless guidance; there was no cavalry riding hard in our direction nor flight of additional marines landing with flags flying. As Ambassador William Sullivan said to me, we had to suck it up and pray.
The previous evening in his office, the Ambassador reviewed instructions to the small marine force that basically had the marines retreat slowly from guard posts without engaging in combat against the heavily armed invaders and to fall back into the chancery. We were aware that many years previously, when the Russian embassy was invaded, they had fought and perished.
Within the Embassy, the Ambassador and the Lieutenant General in charge of the assistance program very narrowly escaped being killed as bullets swept through the front office. Shock, fear and near panic. And then widespread telephoning to just about any person you might happen to have come to know in the five days of the new post-revolutionary government. In the meantime, we were letting onto the second floor staff and marines who went through clouds of tea gas as the invaders slipped into the basement and first floor. Documents that had not been destroyed and sensitive communications were being torn apart. Finally when the attackers, who were standing outside a 1/4 inch steel door that had been repeatedly penetrated by gunfire, threatened to set the chancery on fire, we opened the door and two Keffiyeh-clad young men entered with their kalashnikovs. Not long later, an informal rescue force was sent by Deputy Prime Minister Ibrahim Yazdi and after a bit of palaver the leftists departed.
We were extraordinarily lucky that the official from a five day-old government recognized the danger we were in, the possibility that any ties with the US were at stake and that he had the courage to send a force from his party element to save us — Americans, of all people.
Ten months later, when hundreds of students again invaded the chancery grounds, that same government was not in a political position to repeat their act of courage and the hostages endured their long imprisonment. This became known as the Iran hostage crisis.
These two examples of the seizure of the same embassy with a few of the same people and with the same government in power and other actual take-overs made me wonder whether the Senate had learned anything from past experiences and whether in the Benghazi hearings they even called upon those who have been unfortunate enough to be caught in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Senator McCain has been a man of true guts and perhaps the others close to him are as well, but quite obviously they were more interested in trying to make political points from the tragedy, which they hoped might affect the election. McCain at one point appeared indignant that we apparently were not certain about the identity of the group that was firing all sorts of weapons. Well, Senators, no one was going to go out into the street and enquire; keeping your head down and figuring how to survive and hoping some friendly force might arrive in time was, I imagine, the driving force.
The number of appalling questions on this tragedy was quite disturbing. It has not been a shining period by the Senate; perhaps their official background makes it all somewhat understandable. When they make their trips abroad, they are met at the plane, and hastened to town by armed convoy trying to avoid all dangerous and unpleasant spots in the itinerary.
Another more serious problem we face is the unwillingness of so many on the hill to realize that we are going through a period of great transformation of power and attitudes toward the United States. They can fight it all they want but that only adds to the difficulty of life abroad.
In recent decades, the destruction by bombing or the attacks by cadres of anti-American terroists have neared common-place; Pakistan, Beirut, East Africa, Kuwait, Bogota, Ankara the other day (check google, the list is too long to produce here.) Rather than spending time looking for some avoidance of responsibility and threatening to hold up the appointment of John Kerry as Secretary of State, the Senate Committee could have taken a serious look at the entire range of possible help that was available.
One thing remains clear and deserves repetition: if the government to which our envoys are accredited finds itself unable or not daring enough to risk sending counter forces, your embassy is as good as gone. There may be an example awaiting us of dispatching a well-armed rescue force, but that will be the unusual one. Bombing can only be avoided if the chancery is isolated and immune from daily traffic. Some governments are very reluctant to agree to special traffic arrangements since our embassies are frequently located in busy neighborhoods. When governments are dealing with major political disorder, our facilities are in danger and that seems to cover much of the Middle East and areas further east.
Two issues should predominate in our search for more safety. When we are aware of local insecurity and there is some history of anti-Americanism sentiment, do we try to continue to maintain normal relations, reduce staff, or in extremis close the facility? Budget questions may also intrude.
In pre-revolutionary Tehran I recommended a sort of half-staff that would permit much of the more important duties to be met, but one experienced political officer thought that three men and a vicious dog would suffice! In view of the course of events there, he may have been right.
What do you do when a government like Pakistan sits idly by until the embassy staff was in dire danger from fire. Should we continue any special programs with a country that does little to help? Should we take commensurate military action? There are many variations of these questions that deserve careful thought, but this will not occur if political maneuvering is the main ambition.
Photo: President Barack Obama and U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton honor the Benghazi victims at the Transfer of Remains Ceremony held at Andrews Air Force Base, Joint Base Andrews, Maryland, September 14, 2012. An attack on the U.S. diplomatic mission in Benghazi, Libya claimed the lives of Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens, Information Management Officer Sean Smith, and security personnel Tyrone S. Woods and Glen A. Doherty on September 11, 2012. [State Department photo/ Public Domain]
]]>by Henry Precht
US-revolutionary Iran relations were born in the aftermath of a heavy snowstorm in Washington. I was in charge of the Iran Desk in the State Department and was due in the office at eight am. Almost nothing moved on the unplowed streets in my neighborhood and I had [...]]]>
by Henry Precht
US-revolutionary Iran relations were born in the aftermath of a heavy snowstorm in Washington. I was in charge of the Iran Desk in the State Department and was due in the office at eight am. Almost nothing moved on the unplowed streets in my neighborhood and I had to hitch a ride to the office with a faithful church sexton on his way to tend to his church. In the biting cold, I gave little thought to the role that religion would play in our coming journey with Shia clerics.
When the snow was cleared, a meeting was held in the White House Situation Room to decide on policy towards the new regime in Tehran. I wasn’t there, but afterwards my boss, Hal Saunders, said to me, “You’ll be pleased. They decided to try to build a new relationship with Iran.”
“Pleased” wasn’t the right word; daunted was closer to it. Or dubious. But we were good soldiers…
The question under today’s clouded but snow-free skies is, might the 34-year journey have led to a better place. The answer seems to be, probably not — given the history, ideologies, internal politics and external pressures of both sides.
History. From Mossadegh through Nixon/Kissinger and Brzezinski to the Iraq War and current nuclear impasse, the Iranians have compiled a grudge list against us. During the halcyon days of 1979, our men in Tehran used to be asked almost weekly, “Do you really accept our revolution? REALLY, Really, really?” No protestation of affection could persuade. We persisted and had the impression from the Bazargan people that they too wanted to maintain ties but a very different relationship. We were okay with this.
On the American side there is the Hostage Crisis that won’t fade away and an ever-thickening file of alleged Iranian malfeasance and mischief.
Ideologies. The Iranian regime places high value on anti-Zionism, anti-imperialism and anti-Western values and pleasures.
We Americans seem to love the things they despise.
Internal Politics. Both sides court popular favor by flaunting the purity of their principles — from conservative US opposition to former Senator Chuck Hagel, to a [conditional) Iranian refusal of bilateral contacts. Very likely this kind of sloganeering has little interest or appeal to the broader populations which would just as soon avoid conflict and enjoy normal lives.
External Pressures. Hezbollah and Syria can pull heart strings in Tehran while Israel knows how to make Washington dance to its tune. Neither of the two principal antagonists is entirely independent in the exercise of its policy towards the other.
Still, looking backward, it might have been wiser in the beginning not to seek the “normal” bilateral relationship that was our goal. A period of living apart in mutual silence and minimal notice might have led in time to the healing of wounds. The wrong-headedness of our helping Iraq fight its unjust war and Tehran’s blind refusal to recognize power relationships in their region could have been avoided. A more acute, realistic and independent calculation of our separate interests would still help. As would a far deeper understanding of the other.
What might have been can probably still become — given good will and the courage of leaders.
- Henry Precht, a retired Foreign Service Officer, was in charge of Iranian Affairs in the State Department during the revolution and hostage crisis. His last assignment was as Deputy Ambassador in Cairo 1981-85.
Photo Credit: Marey’s Flickr photostream.
]]>The week before the 10th anniversary of 9/11 saw several alarmist editorials about Iran in leading U.S. new outlets. Leon Panetta also did something he probably shouldn’t do: prophesize about Iranian domestic politics.
Forbes: The writing of Mark Dubowitz of the neoconservative
The week before the 10th anniversary of 9/11 saw several alarmist editorials about Iran in leading U.S. new outlets. Leon Panetta also did something he probably shouldn’t do: prophesize about Iranian domestic politics.
Forbes: The writing of Mark Dubowitz of the neoconservative Foundation for Defense of Democracies reads like a broken record. On Wednesday he produced yet another “Iranian threat” article fraught with hyperbole. This is how it begins:
- Ten years after Sept. 11, the Islamic Republic of Iran constitutes the most serious threat to American national security, and its Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps is the world’s most deadly terrorist organization.
Dubowitz ends by admitting that the Obama administration’s sanctions policy has taken a toll on Iran’s economy, but says they are ineffective because “they have become an end in themselves, rather than means of making the regime vulnerable to other measures.” Dubowitz does not specify what “other measures” amounts to. He also criticizes the U.S. and E.U. for not providing “material support” to Iranians to overthrow their government in 2009.
The Washington Post: Another board editorial opinion piece argues that Iran is intent on building a nuclear weapon and has taken “two more steps toward” that goal without providing any supporting evidence.
Certainly Iran’s nuclear ambitions have advanced—even Israeli military historian Martin van Creveld admitted the Iranians would be “crazy” to not pursue nuclear weapons capability considering the threats they face—but many analysts argue that the Islamic Republic is moving towards “surge capability” or the ability to quickly produce a nuclear weapon should a situation require it. This capability would also serve as deterrence from foreign aggression. But the idea that Iran is trying to produce a nuclear weapon to have in hand suggests that it is pursuing an offensive rather than a defensive position, and considering its weak position both domestically and internationally, is that even plausible? Moreover, what could Iran possibly gain by attacking another country with a nuclear weapon? Surely nothing could exceed the losses such a move would result in if it was aimed at the U.S. and likely Israel as well.
Reuters: During an appearance on the Charlie Rose Show U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said the Iranian reform movement is “learning” from the Arab Spring and “it’s a matter of time before that kind of change and reform and revolution occurs in Iran as well.”
Panetta also indirectly explained why pursuing an open regime change policy (advocated by Michael Ledeen and many of his neoconservative colleagues) is counterproductive for U.S. interests:
- “We should try to take every step to try to support their effort but at the same time, we’ve got to analyze each situation to make sure that we do nothing that creates a backlash or that undermines those efforts.”
While “change” and “reform” are possible in the near future, revolution is unlikely. Most U.S. policy analysts abandoned the hope of another Iranian revolution in 2010 after it became clear that the Green Movement’s leadership was going to work within the system rather than directly against it — so it’s not clear why Panetta has revived that language.
Iranian discontent with their government is long-running and justified. Iranians are not only dissatisfied with President Ahmadinejad who no longer has the backing of even his superiors, they are also tired of the entire political and social system they are forced to live in. But as Iran analyst Farideh Farhi told me several months ago, revolutions don’t happen so quickly one after the other, and Iran’s revolution is only a little over 30 years old.
My own sense from talking to Iranians in the country during my last visit this year is that there was a narrow window of time in 2009 when millions were once again contemplating sacrificing everything, but it passed without its potential being seized. Since then the Green Movement has been simmering, but the leadership has lost much momentum. Iranians face deadly repression on a daily basis, but as shown by the revolutionary movements in Arab countries, that can’t be the only reason why people didn’t stay in the streets. Many Iranians told me they weren’t willing to fight to the death unless they were guaranteed that something worse wouldn’t replace the current government. Others didn’t seem able or willing to go that length. They were preoccupied with their jobs, their bills and family issues; they were simply trying to live. But considering the Islamic government’s history with political dissent, fighting to the death is the minimum requirement for bringing down this government forcefully and quickly. At present there is little to suggest that the majority of Iranians are going to take this approach.
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