Cracks in Iran

[seemslikeadream]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/27/AR2007012701096.html

Cracks in Iran
U.S. pressure may be having an impact on the mullahs. If so, the opportunity should be exploited.
Sunday, January 28, 2007; Page B06


THE BUSH administration's recent steps against Iran, which have included the dispatch of a second aircraft carrier to the Persian Gulf and the arrest of Iranian agents in Iraq, have worried a lot of people in Washington, who fear that the White House may be gearing up for another war. Fortunately, some influential people in Tehran appear to be getting nervous, as well. The stock market is dropping, and capital flight is accelerating. Some influential voices have begun publicly suggesting that flexibility as well as toughness is needed in dealing with the West. Pressure is growing on radical President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who has been rebuked by voters in recent elections, by parliamentary resolutions and by editorials in newspapers that reflect the views of the country's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

All this suggests that the U.S. measures, compounded by a U.N. sanctions resolution, may be having an effect on the mullahs. If so, the impact is sorely needed. During the past year Iran and its ally Syria have behaved as if they can defy the United States and United Nations with impunity. They have pressed a broad and violent offensive against Western interests across the region, from Baghdad to Beirut to the Gaza Strip, even as Iran has rejected Security Council orders to freeze its nuclear program.

It's too early to tell whether Iran will back off from that belligerent agenda: Last week its ally Hezbollah renewed its attempt to stage a coup against Lebanon's pro-Western government. But it's not too soon for the Bush administration to begin working on the next stage of its strategy. That's because the pushback tactics, while necessary to change the atmosphere of hubris in Tehran, aren't likely by themselves to achieve the administration's goals. The pressure needs to be carefully measured, since Iran, too, has the capacity to escalate, both in Iraq and elsewhere. While the threat of military action is useful, this president should not have to resort to that option.

What's needed is a mix of pressure with avenues for moderation by Tehran. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has offered to meet with Iranian officials and discuss a broad agenda of issues but only after the nuclear program is suspended -- a retreat Iran appears unlikely to undertake anytime soon. The administration doesn't help its cause by describing the Islamic regime as a Soviet-like monolith and publicly dividing the Middle East between pro- and anti-Iranian blocs. That ignores the very differences between extremists and moderates that can now be glimpsed in Tehran, and it invites Mr. Ahmadinejad to rally the country on a nationalist platform.

[seemslikeadream]

1. Confronting Iran, Bush burdened with legacy of Iraq distortions

http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/01/28/news/tehran.php

Confronting Iran, Bush burdened with legacy of Iraq distortions
By David E. Sanger Published: January 28, 2007

WASHINGTON: As President George W. Bush and his aides calibrate an escalating confrontation with Iran, they are discovering that their words and strategies are haunted by echoes from four years ago — when their warnings of terrorist activity and nuclear ambitions were clearly a prelude to war.

This time, they insist, it is different.

"We're not looking for a fight with Iran," R. Nicholas Burns, the undersecretary of state for policy and the chief negotiator on Iranian issues, said in an interview Friday evening, just a few hours after Bush had repeated his warnings to Iran to stop "killing our soldiers" and to halt its drive for nuclear fuel.

Burns, citing the president's words, insisted that Washington was still committed to "a diplomatic path" — even as it executes a far more aggressive strategy, seizing Iranians in Iraq and attempting to starve Iran of the money it needs to revitalize a precious asset, its oil industry.

Burns argued that these were defensive steps that are not intended to provoke Iran, though there has been a vigorous behind-the-scenes debate in the administration about the risks that the new confrontations could escalate, particularly if Iran strikes back.

To many in Washington, especially Bush's Democratic critics, the new approach to Iran has all the hallmarks of an administration once again spoiling for a fight

[Jackpine Radical]

2. Naive to say the Bushies don't "help their cause" with hardline tactics,

when their cause is war.

[magellan]

3. Do these writers do any research at all?

BBC NEWS | World | Middle East | Washington 'snubbed Iran offer'
"Washington 'snubbed Iran offer'

Iran offered the US a package of concessions in 2003, but it was rejected, a senior former US official has told the BBC's Newsnight programme.

Tehran proposed ending support for Lebanese and Palestinian militant groups and helping to stabilise Iraq following the US-led invasion.

Offers, including making its nuclear programme more transparent, were conditional on the US ending hostility.

But Vice-President Dick Cheney's office rejected the plan, the official said.

The offers came in a letter, seen by Newsnight, which was unsigned but which the US state department apparently believed to have been approved by the highest authorities."

more... http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/6274147.stm

Why would the US turn a deaf ear to this? The clue-in is further into the article:

"In return for its concessions, Tehran asked Washington to end its hostility, to end sanctions, and to disband the Iranian rebel group the Mujahedeen-e-Khalq and repatriate its members.

For those who don't know, the "rebel group" Mujahedeen-e-Khalq is also known as the MEK, and it's considered a terrorist organization around the world and in Iran. The MEK helped Saddam kill the Shia and Kurds after the 1991 Gulf War. And here's the punch-line: the MEK has been used by BushCo since the 2003 Iraq invasion to gain "information" about Iran's nuclear program and generally rattle Tehran's cage, much as Chalabi's group, the Iraqi National Congress, was used by the neocons to gain "information" about Saddam's nuclear program and incite an overthrow of his government.

Knowing this, and how BushCo is banging war drums over Iran's support of Hamas and Hezbollah and its refusal to "come clean" about its nuclear program, ask yourself why BushCo wouldn't agree to at least discuss this deal with Tehran back in 2003.