Bush May Be Changing Stance on Iran
Since its beginning, it has been the policy of the Bush administration to avoid talking to regimes it doesn’t like, the Ostrich Doctrine as it were. As the president plays out his lame duckery, one can see indications that this foolish and inept approach to global affairs is giving way to something approximating common sense. In the case of relations with Iran, the White House appears to be willing to have direct diplomatic contact. That this can even resemble a great leap forward says much about the atrophying of American diplomacy under the Crawford Crew.
The saber rattling of last week, including missile tests by Tehran and threats of attack from Tel Aviv and Washington, still hangs in the air like Damocles’ sword. However, this week-end in Switzerland, Undersecretary of State William Burns (the third ranking member of the State Department) will sit down with EU foreign policy boss Javier Solana to talk with Iran’s senior nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili. The Iranian nuclear program remains the bone of contention, and only the most gullible would expect a headline announcing a final agreement in Monday’s paper. However, this will be the highest level contract since Iran’s act of war in occupying the American embassy in Tehran in 1979.
The papers and the internet are also reporting that, some time in August, the US will set up an “interest section” in Tehran. This is sort of a halfway house to a genuine embassy. An interest section has diplomats operating in the host country but under the flag of a third party. Iran has an interest section in Washington based out of the Pakistani embassy, and it exists to help the large number of Iranians who visit or reside in the US.
The first report of this appears to have come from The Guardian, in large part because its reporter Ewan MacAskill is a damn fine Washington correspondent, and also because the American media wouldn’t know a story of great diplomatic importance if it fell in their laps. Mr. MacAskill reported with British understatement that this move would be “a remarkable turnaround in policy by President George Bush who has pursued a hawkish approach to Iran throughout his time in office.”
Some will label this a “flip-flop,” mostly those who believe stubbornness is a virtue. However, as John Maynard Keynes famously observed, “When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, sir?” Not talking to the mullahs for the past several years has put the world uncomfortably close to a military confrontation in which all would lose and none would achieve its objectives. This shrewd adjustment of policy may come to nothing. Yet continuing with the Ostrich Doctrine almost guarantees things will deteriorate. It is time for a change.
© Copyright 2008 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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