A New York Times editorial proclaims that “Given America’s bitter experience in Iraq, one would think that President Bush could finally figure out that threats and brute force aren’t a substitute for a reasoned strategy. But Mr. Bush is at it again, this time trying to bully Iran into stopping its meddling inside Iraq.”
So the Times is saying that the use of threats and brute force cannot be “a reasoned strategy,” and only a strategy excluding threats and brute force, i.e. a diplomatic strategy, can be a reasoned strategy. But does the Times give even a hint of what the specifics of the reasoned, diplomatic strategy should be? Far from it; the best it can do is to say that
the one tactic the administration is refusing to consider is diplomacy. Mr. Bush has resisted calls to convene a meeting of Iraq’s neighbors to discuss ways to contain the crisis. There is no guarantee that Mr. Ahmadinejad can be persuaded that Iraq’s further implosion is not in Iran’s interest. But others in Tehran may have clearer heads. And any hope of driving a wedge between Iran and Syria will have to start by giving Damascus hope that there is a way in from the cold.
To be responsible, any call for negotiations with Iran and Syria must specify what concessions and compromises the U.S. should be willing to offer, and what concessions and compromises should be demanded of the Iranians and the Syrians. Only at this level of specificity can it be determined whether or not there exists a diplomatic strategy that has a reasonable expectation of being successful. After all, there may be no diplomatic strategy acceptable to Iran and Syria that does not involve sacrificing vital American national interests, both in Iraq and in the region.
Because the editorial falls well short of meeting this requirement, it is nothing more than a rant against the Bush administration. But that is what I have come to expect of the New York Times.
Dead on correct again, Marc. When one negotiates with theofascism, while one party is negotiating for some kind of common ground or compromise, the fascist, by his nature, is secretly planning the other’s death. It is a phenonemon of leftist anti-Americanism which has the Euro/American left (including the NY Times) so strangely obtuse to the threat to the left posed by theofascism in Iran. Ask the Times: After 137,000 Iranians have been killed in the 28 years since the Islamic Revolution, just how many leftists—especially left journalists—are left in Iran?
In this new century, it is going to have to be the political right in Euro/America which will carry the water in the fight against theofascism.
“There is no guarantee that Mr. Ahmadinejad can be persuaded”
There is an understatement. That zealot couldn’t be persuaded to come in out of the rain. And has been pointed out in other places, we really don’t have any cards to play with these guys right now, so what are we supposed to negotiate with? Allowing them nuclear capability if they stay out of Iraq? It is not unrealistic to think that the new attitude towards Iranian agents inside Iraq could be positioning for future diplomacy.
“...threats and brute force aren’t a substitute for a reasoned strategy…”
Translation: Carrots without sticks.
Let’s see, now, how many times has this approach worked in the past? Can’t think of one. The test I like to try is “would this have worked with Nazi Germany or Imperial Japan?” The answer to that is obvious.
A more hopeful sign is that Iran is desperately trying to upgrade and replace its oil production equipment – and the only places they can buy that are the USA, Canada, and Japan. They apparently have not asked the USA and Canada, but did ask Japan – and whaddaya know, Japan said “No!”
Meanwhile, the price of oil has plummeted, and after a visit by VP Cheny, the Saudis said they were INCREASING production, not cutting it.
So Iran is in a fix relative to its only source of revenue. The price it gets has gone down to almost the equal the cost of production. Alternative sources are becomiong available. It’s ability to up production to make up for that shortfall in income is nonexistant due to lack of equipment. I guess that all counts as “diplomacy”, but the NYT would probably call it threats and intimidation.
Yeah sure. We can just negotiate our rights away with the Islamo-fascist ayatollahs and everything will be OK (right Jimmuh Cahtah?).
My problem is that I have vivid memories of meetings with bitter and angry generals in 1980 after Jimmuh’s (and Zbniew Brezinki’s) negotiations with Ayatollah Khomenei to give Iran to the Islamo-fascists and Jimmuh’s glorious screw-up to free several hundred American embassy employees seized by Iranian Islamo-fascist criminals that the UN refused to recognize. I thought I was experiencing “Seven Days in May”, but in reality I was experiencing the beginnings of the Democratic Party’s slow, but sure, descent into a form of anti-Semitism that will eventually equal or exceed that of the American Communist Party (in its backing of the Soviet position in the notoriously racist Slansky trials) in the late 1940s. That’s not an idle charge folks, just take a good long look at the likes of Mearsheimer and Walt and the most recent Jimmuh anti-semitic smear in his juvenile “Palestine: Freedom not Apartheid”. Only the mentally deprived can read and honestly believe this nonsense.