US Offers Talks on Iran’s Nuke Plans

The US government surprised the world earlier this week by acting in a responsible fashion over the question of Iran’s enrichment of uranium. The US offered to join the EU-3 talks with Iran if the mullahs stopped enriching uranium. The Iranians rejected this offer out of hand, but in a way that might let them accept the offer anyway. Talking is always better than fighting if there is a hope of solving the problem. The reconciliation of Iran’s nuclear ambitions and America’s security concerns, however, may be insoluble.

Secretary of State neoCondoleezza Rice said that the US would join the EU-3/Iran talks if Iran would stop enriching uranium. Iran has said that it won’t accept pre-conditions (which no one in international diplomacy ever accepts). Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said yesterday, “We won’t negotiate about the Iranian nation’s natural nuclear rights [outright rejection], but we are prepared, within a defined, just framework and without any discrimination, to hold a dialogue about common concerns [wiggle room].”

The interesting thing here is that Iran is not currently enriching uranium for technical reasons. Mark Fitzpatrick, Senior Fellow for Non-Proliferation, International Institute for Strategic Studies, told the BBC this yesterday. This is the kind of happy coincidence that makes diplomacy work. The US can latch onto the fact that the Iranians have stopped what they were doing. The Iranians can say that they continue to pursue the “peaceful” nuclear program and that the “halt” has nothing to do with America.

So, the US joins the talks, and then what? Iran has not violated any international agreements to which it is a party (and the Busheviks would have pointed it out if Iran had). Can the US and EU offer sufficient goodies to permit the mullahs to give up on a Persian Nuke? If not, can they get the Russians and Chinese (Security Council veto-holders) to go along with sanctions that they have resisted thus far? Are there any American and Iranian interests here that are not mutually exclusive? If the answer is “no,” then there can be no solution. Talking under such circumstances, however, does provide both sides with time to think. US-USSR nuclear talks resolved very little, but the world is still here in part because no one wanted to break off the discussions to do anything stupid.

At a minimum, the US has put a few diplomatic dollars in its badly depleted account at the UN with this move. A willingness to talk, even if set with conditions that cannot ever be met, sells better than a stony silence from outside the conference room. And from an administration that has a reputation for “shoot first and ignore all questions later,” it looks even better. Still, Iran is in a rough neighborhood, and it is unlikely that the mullahs will settle for security guarantees from anybody other than their own nuclear physicists.

© Copyright 2006 by The Kensington Review, Jeff Myhre, PhD, Editor. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written consent. Produced using Fedora Linux.

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