Petraeus v. Obama (Part 158): Israel and Iran

There was a bit of a media rumble this week over an interview that the new Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, gave Jeffrey Goldberg of The Atlantic. Netanyahu made it quite clear that he held open the option of an airstrike on Iranian nuclear facilties.

This is not dramatic news. Tel Aviv has been shaking an aerial fist at Tehran for years, but a unilateral Israeli operation, even if technically possible, risks an Iranian political and military response --- and reaction from other countries and groups --- throughout and beyond the Middle East.

So, at the least, Israel needs the US to cover its back. And the Bush Administration, despite all its pro-Israeli and anti-Iranian sympathies, refused such support in summer 2008.

This is where America's other President, General David Petraeus, enters the scene. Even as the Obama Administration has been pursuing engagement with Iran, Petraeus --- both directly and through acolytes --- has been loudly talking about Iranian support for insurgent operations against US troops in Iraq and Afghanistan.
On Wednesday, the General went a step further. He told the Senate Armed Services Committee, “The Israeli government may ultimately see itself so threatened by the prospect of an Iranian nuclear weapon that it would take preemptive military action to derail or delay it.”

This may not be an outright endorsement of a Tel Aviv strike, but it is comfortably close to acceptance of an operation. Petraeus didn't risk the usual (unsupported) pretext that Iran is close to a Bomb; instead, he stretched justification to “Iranian officials have consistently failed to provide the assurances and transparency necessary for international acceptance and verification”.

You could try out the explanation that the Obama Administration is playing "good cop, bad cop" with Tehran; on Tuesday, envoy Richard Holbrooke signals co-operation at The Hague conference on Afghanistan, 24 hours later Petraeus warns of consequences if Iran doesn't accept the extended hand.

That, however, is a fool's approach. The most casual observer could tell you that Iran does not react kindly to blatant pressure. And the consequences of Tehran walking away from talks in the face of Petraeus' threats, given the American position in Afghanistan, are far greater than they were in 2003 when the Bush Administration pulled a similar stunt.

No, the latest Petraeus intervention is as much a response to his President as it is to Tehran.

The General has a previous record on this issue. In 2007, he was serving under the then head of Central Command, William Fallon. The two men didn't see eye-to-eye: a year later, Fallon was gone with Petraeus on his way to succeeding him.

The standard narrative, for those who noted the battle, was that Petraeus had to get his Iraq "surge" past a resistant Fallon. That is certainly true, but more broadly, to deal with regional issues, Fallon advocated a strategy of engaging Iran rather than isolating it. That was also opposed by Petraeus.

Move forward two years. After the muddle in US policy, with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton clumsily trying to press Iran via the spectre of conflict with Arab states, Washington settles on the possibilities of a step-by-step engagement.

Who doesn't like that?

Israel. And President Obama's most prominent military commander.

Palinwatch: Scientology, van Susteren Harming 2012 Hopes

A series of connections between Sarah Palin, Fox News reporter Greta van Susteren, and van Susteren's Democrat husband and former Hillary Clinton presidential campaign aide John Coale has found itself in the spotlight this week, and the complex triangle may have serious implications for Palin's 2012 Presidential hopes. On Monday a Politico article pointed to a "state of confusion" between Palin's advisors in Alaska and the team at her PAC in Washington, DC, and claimed that GOP insiders are unhappy with Coales- a "major Democratic donor"- becoming involved with Palin's campaign. The story also has implications for van Susteren, whose fawning coverage of Palin both before and after the 2008 election now seems decidedly influenced by her husband's connection to the VP candidate.

Van Susteren, writing on her Fox News blog, hit back (weird fact- her piece appears to have been published the day before Politico's (unless someone at Politico has changed the date)), calling Politico's argument "fanciful and silly":

As for my husband, everyone in the media sure has gotten themselves going with all sorts of wild imagination. We are laughing at it at home because with each story it gets wilder and wilder. You would think from the stories that my husband ran her VP campaign.  Yes, he advised her - after the election -  how to set up a PAC (big deal - it is common - routine - for politicians to set up a PAC - virtually every politician has one set up and there is nothing wrong with them.. and incidentally, the PAC was created to pay travel bills she had accumulated and would accumulate in the future and to contribute to other candidates …and the Pac was not to be her chief political advisers which is what the article accuses.)  And yes, he thought it wrong the way she was attacked in the media.  As a matter of fact, so did I think she was treated unfairly by the media (I don’t like gratuitous attacks…issues, yes….but not gratuitous attacks) and I am not the only one who thought that in the media. [Formatting van Susteren's]

All would be well and good but for this from Geoffrey Dunn in the Huffington Post:

But what Van Susteren does acknowledge in her "brief" on the subject is equally troubling:

1. She acknowledges that her husband, John Coale, has been advising Palin, that they are in weekly contact, and that he played a central role in the formation of her national political action committee, SarahPAC--all while she has been covering Palin for Fox News.

2. She acknowledges that her husband met Palin through Van Susteren's media contacts with the governor. In short, he used his wife's journalistic access to Palin to gain his own political access.

There are some serious journalistic conflicts of interest taking place here, and Van Susteren is either being duplicitous or disingenuous to characterize them as "silly."

Point 2 here is strained- I'm struggling to find any evidence of this in van Susteren's post. But point 1 remains very valid indeed- while van Susteren was in Alaska kowtowing to the Palins her husband was in Washington helping set up SarahPAC. Yet van Susteren sees no conflict of interest here. Dunn adds a series of bizarre footnotes, including connections with a Scientology-linked Ponzi scheme, and Coale's attempts to set up a PAC based upon Scientology's teachings. He also alleges that the couple are as pally with the Clintons as they are with the Palins. Something ain't right.

Engagement Dance: The US-Iran Meeting on Afghanistan

Perhaps the most naive summary of the exchange between American and Iranian officials at The Hague conference on Afghanistan came in the opening sentence of The New York Times account: "It was brief, it was unscheduled and it was not substantive."

Anyone with a shred of diplomatic experience or perception would recognise that the "encounter" between Richard Holbrooke, the US envoy on Pakistan and Afghanistan, and Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Mohammad Mehdi Akhondzadeh (pictured) was far from accidential. The choreography behind the meeting would have done Twyla Tharp proud.

Because the Iranians had held back from sending their Foreign Minister, Manouchehr Mottaki, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had to maintain, "I myself did not have any direct contact with the Iranian delegation.” Because of domestic politics in both countries and because neither side wants to be see as approaching the other cap-in-hand, the Iranians officially denied these were "talks" and Clinton insisted, "“It was cordial, unplanned and they agreed to stay in touch." And to cover the Obama Administration's claim that any engagement will cover concerns over human rights, Clinton added that a letter setting out US concerns over Iran's detention of Roxana Saberi and student Esha Momeni and the fate of the missing Robert Levinson.

To get behind the dance, you only have to note the public Iranian position: "Iran pledges Afghan help in new gesture to U.S." Akhondzadeh told the conference that Tehran was ready to help fight Afghanistan's opium trade and to assist in reconstruction.

That is an opening position for "engagement" which is Spockian logical. The flow of drugs across the border has caused major social problems in Iran, and reconstruction of areas in western Afghanistan offers the prospect of financial benefit and enhanced Afghan-Iranian trade.

At the same time, Iran's position set outs to the US that it wants to move on specific issues rather than discuss the general American position, especially on the military side. Leave aside the obvious that the domestic audience in Tehran would be resistant to any Iranian support of the expansion of the American force. The experience of the US occupation in Iraq is enough to ensure both that Iran will want no association with a military intervention which can turn sour and that it will take advantage of any political vacuum/turmoil that results.

No, Mr New York Times. This was carefully scripted and it was very substantive. The silver lining of the past and possibly future debacle in Afghanistan is likely to be a US-Iranian rapprochement. If that is to occur, however, it will face a specific and limited Tehran agenda vs. the general ambitions of Washington in its "re-development" of Afghanistan and Central Asia.

Playing for Time: Clinton-Obama and the Hague Conference on Afghanistan

Related Post: Text of Clinton Remarks to Hague Conference on Afghanistan

Lots of sound and not much substance (yet). That's the quick summary of US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's address to the international conference on Afghanistan at The Hague yesterday.

First and very much foremost, the American priority was tipped off in the final paragraphs of Clinton's statement:

Now the principal focus of our discussions today is on Afghanistan, but we cannot hope to succeed if those who seek to reestablish a haven for violence and extremism operate from sanctuaries just across the border. For this reason, our partnership with Pakistan is critical. Together, we all must give Pakistan the tools it needs to fight extremists within its borders.

As for the continuing vagueness of "What Is to Be Done?" on Afghanistan, CNN's headline grab is a tip-off: "Clinton Backs Talks With Moderate Taliban".

At a superficial glance, that seems dramatic. The US talking to the same people who sheltered Al Qa'eda, who held Afghanistan under a reign of terror until they were toppled at the end of 2001? Here is how Clinton framed the call:

We must...support efforts by the Government of Afghanistan to separate the extremists of al-Qaida and the Taliban from those who joined their ranks not out of conviction, but out of desperation. This is, in fact, the case for a majority of those fighting with the Taliban. They should be offered an honorable form of reconciliation and reintegration into a peaceful society if they are willing to abandon violence, break with al-Qaida, and support the constitution.

All well and good, but who gets approached? Vice President Joe Biden is spreading the good news that 75 percent of Taliban members, with no incentive other than "desperation", can be stripped away from the organisation, but it is unclear how the US or the Afghan Government gets to those members.

In practice, if General Petraeus's model for Iraq is used, the manoeuvres will be with local commanders and leaders who may be persuaded --- by kind words or by lots of money --- to join the right side. In the Petraeus model, however, those former Sunni enemies of the US were already in powers in villages and towns. Is Washington considering a similar offer of political influence to ex-Taliban?

And who is to make the approach? Clinton's statement indicates that this will be "the Government of Afghanistan", and she none-too-subtly opened her remarks with an acknowledgement of "President Karzai, who fills a critical leadership role in his nation, and whose government helped to shape the shared comprehensive and workable strategy that we are discussing today".

Yet only weeks ago, some US officials were putting about the story that Karzai was to be curbed or even removed from power, and Washington was desperate not to let the President call a quick election for April. So is Clinton now signalling --- from reconciliation or from a lack of other options --- that the US will now accept Karzai's lead or equal participation in the political strategy?

Beyond the politics, Clinton offered the reconstruction approach of "the raw material of progress – roads, public institutions, schools, hospitals, irrigation, and agriculture". Again, nothing unexpected in the rhetoric. And again no specifics: earlier this year, the US Government was thinking that European and NATO partners could take the burden of non-military projects but President Obama's declaration last Friday of an expanded US civilian corps indicated that Washington may take the lead.

Clinton's statement tilted towards the former option: "We hope that others gathered here will heed the United Nations’ and Afghan Government’s call for help throughout the country with job creation, technical expertise, vocational training, and investments in roads, electrical transmission lines, education, healthcare, and so much else." At the same time, in another indication that Washington --- for all the charges of corruption leveled at the Karzai Government --- is having to put up with Kabul, Clinton supported "the Government of Afghanistan’s National Development Strategy, the National Solidarity Program, and other initiatives".

There was, however, a possible sting in the tail in Clinton's statement. Having set out a political, security, and economic approach which seemed to be premised on co-operation with the current Afghan Government, she declared:

To earn the trust of the Afghan people, the Afghan Government must be legitimate and respected. This requires a successful election in August – one that is open, free, and fair. That can only happen with strong support from the international community. I am, therefore, pleased to announce today that to advance that goal, the United States is committing $40 million to help fund Afghanistan’s upcoming elections.

Clinton's reference to "open, free, and fair" is jarring, to say the least: were previous Afghan elections --- and thus the rule of Hamid Karzai --- illegitimate? Washington's private assessment has been that the President is likely to win re-election in the summer. So is the US bowing to his continued presence, attempting (rather crudely) to put on a bit of pressure, or still pursuing an alternative leadership?

I don't have an answer. Nor, in my reading, does Washington. The more that one parses the Obama speech of last Friday and the Clinton statement yesterday, the more that it appears that the major objective for the Administration was to have something, anything, before next week's NATO gathering. The US is now clearly on its own militarily, and President Obama, for all that charm, will struggle in getting an expanded non-military commitment from European partners outside Kabul.

This is a "hold the line" approach, trying to ensure that the Taliban does not expand its hold on territory, until the right partnership with the right Government in Kabul can be foreseen. More importantly, the line is to be held until the US can resolve its core problem, which lies not in Afghanistan but across the border in northwest Pakistan.

And those prospects are no closer or clearer from last week's events and announcements.