Repeat after me: War.Is.A.Bad.Thing.

"There is a very real possibility that Donald Trump will start a new war in the Middle East, Joe Cirincione warns in
Trump’s March To War With Iran LobeLog 10/04/2018. "If that’s not his intention, then his administration is doing a damn good job of faking it."

He flags next month as an important possible escalation moment. "In early November, the administration will hit countries doing business with Iran with a new round of harsh sanctions. The likelihood that this pressure will explode into military conflict is rising dramatically."

A good result cannot be expected, except for weapons manufacturers and assorted other war profiteers:

War with Iran would be a painful and pointless disaster. It would make the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan look like warm-up acts. It would cost trillions of dollars, kill tens of thousands of people and destabilize an already volatile region. It would trigger a global recession as oil prices spike and uncertainty collapses markets. It would also drive the spread of nuclear weapons and increase the risk of nuclear weapons use.

War would not in any conceivable scenario lead to the establishment of a popular, democratic, and pro-Western government in Iran. With war would come chaos. If the current regime were to fall, the power would pass not to demonstrators in the streets but to those with the guns—the Revolutionary Guard. In all likelihood, war would bring to power a more virulent, more dictatorial, and more anti-American regime than the current one in Iran. [my emphasis]

As Cirincione sees it, National Security Advisor and professional warmonger John Bolton has free reign at the moment to pursue military confrontation with Iran aimed a regime change.

A war with Iran is a really, really bad idea.

Iran and immigrtion to Europe

The flaws in the eurozone and mass immigration are two major problems of the EU that in some ways reinforce each other. And either of them individually could cause a serious breakdown in the EU or an even moer drastic reduction in its size than Brexit provides.

Christiane Hoffmann highlights the Middle East foreign policy aspects of the immigration crisis in a way that, it seems to me, the major media in Austria and Germany seriously neglect: the connection between American/NATO policies and actions in the Middle East and the immigration pressures on Europe. ("Die kommende Krise", Der Spiegel 33-2018/11.08.2018)

There are two centrally important pieces to the real existing immigration problem in Europe, as opposed to the phony ones created in the minds of xenophobic European politicians. (And the Russian propaganda that sometimes utilizes them for their own purposes.) One is that the world is undergoing a mass movement of people that seems to be more drastic than anything before in human history. This is being driven by climate change and various effects of globalization, like the driving down of wages, and the climate crisis and digitial communication.

Second are the wars in the Middle East. The acute phase of the immigration crisis in 2015 on which the rightwing populists are still surfing politically was driven in major part by the Syrian civil war - which was generated at least in part by a severe draught - as well as by the war in Afghanistan, which is part of what Andrew Bacevich calls the Greater Middle East, though the term hasn't caught on widely yet. The spectacularly ill-advised NATO intervention in Libya which resulted in Libya falling into a failed-state condition also contributed mightily.

I call mass immigration issue as a longterm crisis for Europe, that has acute phases like 2015. (That terminology also seems not to have caught on beyond myself, but I'm sticking with it!) A new acute wave could be activated by a war with Iran or by a decision on Turkey's part to stop holding the nearly 3 million refugees they are now housing and sending some large portion of them to Europe.

What Hoffmann says about EU policy in relation to Iran sounds to me like straighforward realism, which more often than not is a good thing:

Anfang November will Trump eine weitere Sanktionsrunde folgen lassen, dann soll Iran kein Öl mehr exportieren können, die USA wollen die Lebensader der iranischen Wirtschaft kappen. Die EU bemüht sich um das Atomabkommen, sie leistet Widerstand gegen die US-Sanktionen und sucht nach Wegen, um den Iranhandel trotz der amerikanischen Strafmaßnahmen aufrechtzuerhalten. Das ist richtig, aber nicht genug. Die Gefahr geht mittlerweile weit über ein Ende des Atomabkommens hinaus.

Es reicht deshalb nicht mehr, dass sich die Europäer für das Atomabkommen einsetzen. Sie müssen in Washington sehr deutlich sagen, dass die Politik der Destabilisierung Irans und des Nahen Ostens gegen die Sicherheitsinteressen Europas verstößt. Trumps Nahostpolitik muss zu einer Priorität der europäischen Politik werden. Deutschland und Europa brauchen jetzt, anders als in den vorangegangenen Krisen, endlich eine vorausschauende, präventive Außenpolitik.

{At the beginning of November, Trump wants to impose a wider round of sanctions, which are expected to stop Iran from exporting any more oil, because the US wants to cut off the vital lines of the Iranian economy. The EU is trying to stick with the nuclear agreement, it is resisting the US sanctions, and is looking for ways to maintain Iranian trade despite the American punitive measures. That is correct, but not enough. The danger in the meantime reach much further than the end of the nuclear agreement.

It is no longer sufficient for the Europeans to adhere to the nuclear agreement. The must also say very clearly to Washington that the policy of destabilization violates Europe's security interests. Trump's Near East policy needs to become a priority of European politics. Germany and Europe now reallyneed, differently than in the previous crises, a far-sighted, preventive foreign policy.}

Angela Merkel is rightly criticized for her extend-and-pretend solutions to problems of the EU. The classic example was the "bailout" of Greece in 2015, which imposed severe Herbert Hoover/Heinrich Brüning austerity policies on a Greek economy already suffering a severe depression. And did so knowing that the measures would fail to fulfill their claimed purpose of restoring the economy - the "pretend" part. But the "extend" part was that it crushed the Greek opposition to the austerity madness and maintained the general neoliberal economic policies dominating the EU and did so without breaking up the eurozone with all the far-reaching consequences that would imply.

It's hard not to admire Merkel's skills as a political leader, however bad her policies may be. And it's true that kicking the can down the road, to use an American expression for extend-and-pretend, is usually an attractive option for politicians. And, in practical terms, sometimes the only feasible course when there is a political deadlock over an issue.

But it's one thing to kick the can down the road on a county zoning regulation. Doing so on the major problems that could wreck the EU is a whole different thing. As Hoffmann notes, Merkel herself has stated that ignoring the immigration issue too much prior to 2015 was a bad idea. And, to be realistic, Merkel during the immigration crisis in 2015 did seriously try to implement an EU-wide rule that actually would have provided a sensible and practical revision of the Dublin Regulations regime that had by then very plainly failed. But it was blocked by Czechia, Hungary, Poland, and Slovakia. Also to be realistic, that failure during the acute immigration situation in 2015 was in significant part due to the stunning arrogance Merkel and other EU leaders showed in the Greek crisis that year. But that's a story for another time.

Hoffmann may be over-estimating the chances of Iran becoming a "second Syria," i.e., a country with a full-blown civil war. An external war initiated or encouraged by the Trump Administration is probably the greater danger. But Hoffmann's advice would still be well-taken. And at some point with real crises, the extend-and-pretend possibilties run out.

This is an August 5 English-language documentary on Iran from Deutsche Welle, Iran: from theocracy to regional superpower?

Israel, Russia, and the Iran deal

American commentators and news junkies these days are too often trying to squeeze every bit of news about Russia into their preferred model of the Trump-Russia scandal.

But things to happen outside of America's borders. Russia has become a more important player in the Middle East in the last 10 years, something that in itself doesn't bother me. Given the disasters the US role in the Middle East has created over the past 20 years or so, Russian involvement there is about as bad a move as Russia's worst critics would wish on it.

Mark Katz explains the current balance of interests between Russia and Israel in Putin And Netanyahu: Converging Interests? LobeLog 05/11/2018. He sums it up this way:

Although Putin’s and Netanyahu’s interests with regard to Syria may be convergent, they are not identical. Putin wants Iran to remain in Syria as a junior partner in propping up the Assad regime but not acting provocatively otherwise. Netanyahu not only wants Iran out of Syria, but may even join U.S. National Security Advisor John Bolton and other hawks in seeking regime change in Tehran. If so, the Putin-Netanyahu tactical alliance will not last.

He describes the conflicting interests between Iran and Russia this way:

Israeli strikes on Iranian targets in Syria have the advantage of weakening Iran vis-à-vis Russia inside Syria without Moscow having to confront Tehran directly. And Tehran does have ambitions in Syria that Moscow does not share. For Tehran, preserving the Assad regime is not just an end in itself, but a means for Iran to better support Hezbollah in Lebanon in its conflict with Israel. Russia, by contrast, has strong economic and security ties to Israel that it wants to continue and expand. Moscow does not want Iran to disturb this, or create sufficient problems for Israel that the U.S. gets back into the Syrian conflict in Israel’s defense.

Unlike our President's imagination of the world, foreign policy is much more shades of gray and messy compromises than it is about win/lose situations or conflicts between Good and Evil.

Iran, Russia, Syria, Iraq

Al-Monitor has this report from Maxim Suchkov on Iran's main leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who had a summit this past week with Vladimir Putin in Tehran, along with Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, Iran’s Khamenei has three main messages for Putin at summit 11/03/2017. It summarizes three main points that Suchkov describes as the political message from Khamenei to Putin:

First, Iranians don’t see the war in Syria as being over or even coming to end. This is an important point, given the Russian military’s repeated statements that its operation in Syria is “coming to a conclusion” and the rumors that Russian air forces in the country will soon begin a gradual drawdown. ...

A drawdown would suggest Moscow would shift focus from military operations to finding a political settlement in Syria. Commenting on the Kommersant news, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov denied any concrete decision has been made on a drawdown and said, “The last word rests with the commander-in-chief.”

Second, Khamenei wants Putin to stay alert regarding the United States. On one hand, that reflects Tehran’s concern over the possibility of a deal between Moscow and Washington that would be detrimental to Iranian interests in Syria and Iraq. On the other hand, it alludes to Iran’s own readiness for a worst-case scenario in which the United States can come up with policies obstructing — militarily or politically — Russian and Iranian gains. ...

... Khamenei's third message to Putin [is]: Russia and Iran need to deepen their cooperation at other levels. Khamenei praised Putin for being a “strong and responsible leader” and said Russia is a country “with which you can have dialogue and cooperation.” The assessment certainly doesn’t mean Khamenei and the rest of the Iranian leadership aren’t wary of Moscow’s military deals with the Saudis and Turks, its energy interests in Iraqi Kurdistan and its willingness to maintain coordination with Israel and the United States. Yet there seems to be a broader understanding in Iran and Russia that befriending each other on the basis of anti-Americanism doesn’t make for a strategic partnership. [my emphasis]

Renad Mansour of Chatham House warns us to be cautious about propaganda claims that Iran is running the show in Iraq, whose regime, originally installed by the US invasion of Iraq and still supported by US troops, is clearly pro-Iranian, which is something very different than being dominated by Iran. Mansour writes (Iraq Is Not Iran’s Puppet New York Times 11/02/2017):

When it comes to Iran in Iraq, emotion fogs reality, limiting understanding in Washington. Yet for Iran, when it comes to the United States in the Middle East, pragmatism guides policy, translating to more successes.

For the Iraqi government, Iran is a foreign actor just like the United States is. Iraqi leaders view Iranian officials in their country — including Maj. Gen. Qassim Suleimani, the commander of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps’ elite Quds Force — as international military advises, just as they view American military advisers. Both are first looking out for their country’s national interests. The Iraqi government does not assign any ethical or moral superiority to one over the other, and it still needs both.

Sanctions can lead to war

It's true as a general matter that economic sanctions can bring pressure on a country without leading to war. It's also true that our general political culture regards sanctions are a relatively harmless war of pressuring a country that isn't doing what we Americans want. And we don't generally view sanctions as a step toward war. But sometimes they can be.

I'm still bumfuddled by the Senate vote yesterday about sanctions on Russia and Iran. It was hard from the early news reports to tell what they actually about. That's among the few news reports that people were able to find even with the Google machine.

Oh, and there's this:

Two days after Tillerson says US seeks regime change in Iran, Trump reveals he's investigated for obstruction of justice. Who'll fall first?

— Trita Parsi (@tparsi) June 16, 2017

What.The.****?

ThinkProgress generally reflects the corporate Democratic perspective. but they also often do good reporting. Adrienne Mahsa Varkiani reports for them in Tillerson calls for regime change in Iran 06/15/2017, "[Secretary of State Rex] Tillerson was asked on Wednesday whether the United States supports regime change inside Iran. He replied in the affirmative, saying that U.S. policy is driven by relying on 'elements inside of Iran' to bring about 'peaceful transition of that government.'"

Peaceful change? Like in 1953? Or maybe Brazil 2016? What could possibly go wrong?

Matthew Calabria and several co-writers wrote recently in a piece for the Atlantic Council, Bringing Iran Back into the Global Economy Will Bolster the JCPOA 06/07/2017:

Given the absence of bilateral ties, Washington lacks sufficient leverage to push Iran in one direction or another to advance core US regional interests—peace, security, prosperity, and stability. Unless the United States changes course, Iran will continue supporting anti-American aims, turning to European, Russian and Asian sources of investment and trade.

We recommend that the Trump administration issue a general license through the US Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control to allow US banks to complete dollar-clearing transactions for Iranian entities, except for those individuals and organizations on the Specially Designated Nationals and Blocked Persons List.

A license for dollar-clearing transactions would signal that the United States intends to go beyond the letter of its JCPOA commitments and honor the spirit of the accord, which promised Iran major economic benefits in return for long-term restrictions on its nuclear activities. Licensing would also undercut anti-US rhetoric from Iranian hardliners who maintain that the United States does not want to improve relations with Iran. Iran has a sizeable young, well-educated and pro-Western population that supports relations between Washington and Tehran. The United States should strive to maintain the goodwill of the younger generation; improving Iran’s economy is crucial to this goal.

Approving dollar-clearing transactions would also facilitate increased trade between Europe and Iran. Generally, the more ties Iran has to international markets and to Western countries, the more willing Iran should be to abide by international norms. If the United States facilitates Iran’s integration into international markets, Iran would have more to lose by violating these norms. Moreover, it would lessen the possibility that the European Union or other countries would lobby to have their currency replace the dollar as the global reserve standard.

I remember in the 1990s when Bill Clinton signed off on a Congressional resolution pushed by warmongers committing the US to a policy of "regime change" in Iraq. And we did it in a few years, even though Iraq had given up its "weapons of mass destruction." Libya agreed to give up their "WMDs" and a few years later we intervened militarily to overthrow the same government and leave violent chaos behind. Oh, and the head of state that made the disarmament deal with the US was unceremoniously murdered in the process. Our Secretary of State Hillary Clinton thought that was a big laugh, saying, "We came, we saw, he died." More specifically, he was anally raped with a bayonet and murdered just afterward.

Now Iran reaches a nuclear agreement that goes beyond the Non-Proliferation Treaty - and a couple of years later the Secretary of State declares "regime change" to be our policy there, too. And the Senate passes new Bipartisan sanctions near-unanimously.

Hey, North Korea, have we got a deal for you! Give up your nukes and we'll always be nice to you after that, honest to goodness we will! Pakistan? India? Let's talk about you giving up your nukes!

Trump vs. Iran in Saudi Arabia

The opening portion on Trump's current international tour show has not been encouraging.

Fred Kaplan writes of the President's speech on Islam while he was in Saudi Arabia (Trump’s Sunni Strategy Slate 05/22/2017):

... read closely, without a grading curve, the speech was by turns shallow, clichéd, and repellent. Even the few times when its authors approached a bold theme, they veered away, lest it soften the visit’s three main missions: to assure the region’s Sunni leaders that they can run their countries and oppress their critics with no finger-wagging from Washington; to wrap up a massive $110 billion sale of American weapons; and to declare war on Iran, or at least unabashed hostility toward its regime.

Haroon Moghul also has some harsh words for it in While Trump Ingratiates Himself With Saudi Extremists, U.S. Muslims Are Abandoned Haaretz 05/21/2017:

Trump praised Saudi Arabia while denouncing Iran, even as millions of Iranians participated in an election which makes that country more democratic, at least, than almost any of the countries that make up the Gulf Cooperation Council. A speech that began ostensibly with a message of peace and love ended by arguing for the isolation and demonization of Iran.

Far from actually fighting terrorism, Trump’s speech promises to make conditions in the Middle East worse for everyone.

Trump professed love, the common roots of the Abrahamic faiths, and called us the children of God. Unless, of course, you’re a refugee, in which case Trump wants to slam the door shut in your face. He made no mention of banning citizens of Muslim-majority nations from traveling to the United States, either.

Terrorism is not a cause of the Middle East’s backwardness. It is a symptom. Terrorism is a non-state response to overly centralized states, which leave no room for political, religious or social diversity.

That Trump’s anti-Muslim rhetoric was not merely campaign bluster is clear in the policies he’s proposed and supported: Islamophobic, homophobic, misogynistic, xenophobic, anti-immigrant and anti-science.

... we are doubling down on an historic American-Saudi partnership that has not only prevented the rise of extremism, but has been unable to prevent the fracture of the Middle East.

This is where somebody says, "Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, how did you like the play?"

Jaun Cole was also not impressed with the content of Trump's speech (Trump on Islam: Neo-Orientalism and anti-Shi’ism 05/22/2017):

Trump seems to think that pumping $110 bn in new shiny weapons into a volatile Middle East will lead to peace! If there is any sure correlate of war, it is massive purchases by one regional power of new armaments. You have to use them while you have the advantage or your rivals also acquire them.

For Trump to attack Iran, which just had a popular election where the electorate bucked the choice of the Leader, from Saudi Arabia, an absolute monarchy where the populace have no rights, is weird.

The American Right is deeply implicated in radicalizing Muslims. Afghan Islam was radicalized by the Reagan jihad against the Soviet Union. Eisenhower and Reagan both attempted to enlist Saudi Arabia’s Wahhabism against Communism. Most Palestinians were secular or mainstream until the Israelis cultivated Hamas as an alternative to the PLO.

Hillary Clinton and the fusion of neocon and liberal-interventionist foreign policy

Paul Pillar has a very good, brief analysis of Hillary Clinton's foreign policy, The Safety and Sameness of Hillary Clinton's Foreign Policy The National Interest 06/02/2016. He begins by endorsing Clinton's main line of criticism against Donald Trump's foreign policy:

Clinton is correct that what has passed for Trump's ideas on foreign policy “are dangerously incoherent. They’re not even really ideas – just a series of bizarre rants, personal feuds, and outright lies.” Trump's efforts to sound coherent have been laden with contradictions and declarations that resemble bumper stickers more than carefully thought-out policy proposals. Some of his most specific and distinctive pronouncements belong in the realm of the fantastic, such as excluding all Muslims from the country, building a huge wall and somehow getting a neighbor to pay for it, and encouraging Saudi Arabia, Japan, and South Korea to get nuclear weapons. Just when he has seemed to have made a suggestion that sounds fresh and constructive, such as referring to neutrality in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, he suddenly veers in a much different direction.

Pillar's critique of Clinton's policy comes from his outlook that US foreign policy "has, through several administrations, been suffering from some fundamental misdirections." And he notes of her recent major foreign policy address:

... she repeatedly fell back into aspects of a Washington conventional wisdom that have made for the persistence of problems rather than the solution of them. This was true, for example, in portions of her discussion of relationships with allies and adversaries. She showed a good understanding of what diplomacy with adversaries consists of when she remarked that these are “countries that share some common interests with us amid many disagreements” and that “Donald doesn’t see the complexity” involved. But she gave no acknowledgment that there also are mixtures of common interests and disagreements—indeed, not just disagreements but conflicting interests—in relations with countries commonly considered allies. This arose, for instance, when amid her appropriate defense of the diplomacy leading to the nuclear agreement with Iran she started talking about the security of Israel—without mentioning that the Israeli government has done all it can to subvert and kill the very agreement she was defending.

He also argues that it is actually hard to tell the difference between the policy of military escalation against ISIS that Trump advocates and that which Hillary proposes. And he expresses reasonable concern over Clinton's American Exceptionalism:

Clinton's overall approach is grounded in that central tenet of Washington conventional wisdom that, as she put it in the speech, “America is an exceptional country,” that “we lead with purpose, and we prevail,” and that “if America doesn’t lead, we leave a vacuum – and that will either cause chaos, or other countries will rush in to fill the void.” The awful metaphor of a vacuum, with the misleading notion that in any troubled place in the world if the United States does not occupy it then bad vapors will whoosh in, has underlain thinking that has repeatedly meant costly trouble for the United States, including in some of the places where U.S. troops are found today.

And he calls attention to an important report that seems to reflect Hillary's hawkish foreign policy positions:

The longstanding, despite being damaging, conventional wisdom central to Hillary Clinton's thinking on foreign policy mirrors what was laid out at greater length in the recently released report from the Center for New American Security titled “Extending American Power”. As critical readers of that report have noted, it represents a mashing of neoconservatism and liberal interventionism and a recipe for repeating many of the failures that have contributed to the very unease and wishing for change that have helped to build support for Donald Trump, notwithstanding how little he has to contribute in the way of solutions.

The CNAS report could turn out to be an important as a guide to the foreign policy of a Clinton II Administration. (Extending American Power May 2016) And it has justifiably received some serious attention, including:

Jim Lobe, Hillary’s Foreign Policy: a Liberal-Neoconservative Convergence? LobeLog Foreign Policy 04/29/2016

Jim Lobe, The Neocon-Liberal Hawk Convergence is Worse Than I Thought LobeLog Foreign Policy 05/25/2016

Alastair Crooke, Neocons and Liberal Interventionists — Like Hillary — Are Converging on Foreign Policy World Post 06/08/2016

The title itself is a cue to how common its become to assume that "extending American power" is in and of itself a worthwhile goal. Extending American power is a good thing only if it benefits the American people and the world. If the goal is focused on narrow ends, such as enabling American vulture funds to plunder developing countries, extending American power for that purpose is more destructive and harmful than beneficial.

And if the US attempts to shape events according to arrogant and unrealistic assumptions about what US military power can accomplish in political terms, even policies pursued for good and just ends can be horribly destructive.

This report promises to be an important source during this campaign and beyond. For now, I'll just note that the section on the Middle East specifically advocates the no-fly zone escalation in Syria that Hillary Clinton advocates. It also treats Iran effectively as an enemy of the United States has to actively oppose. Remarkably, the paper emphatically rejects the notion that the historic nuclear agreement with Iran should even be allowed to help produce better US relationships with Iran: "Tehran should understand that Washington is not expecting the nuclear agreement to lead to a changed relationship with the government of Iran. The nuclear agreement should not be linked to Tehran’s expectation of some kind of détente or broader opening to the United States."

This is standard neocon militarism and imperialism for the Middle East. And of course the report takes it as a given that the military budget needs to be increased. At some point, the democratic movement in the United States will have to once again making a major reduction of the military budget and a re-ordering of priorities in foreign policy a major issue and get it accomplished.

This is also striking, "there is no doubt that the management of the U.S.-China relationship is the single most consequential challenge for U.S. foreign policy." Not nuclear arms control. Not managing climate change.

I'm also struck by the frankness with which the CNAS report describes Britain as a Trojan Horse for the United States in the European Union:

Add the danger of British departure from the European Union (EU) and the migration crisis and one can imagine significant ruptures in Europe that would have a very severe effect on the cohesiveness and effectiveness of the transatlantic community. ...

Europe has always functioned best when the three or four leading European powers worked together cooperatively, in partnership with the United States. In recent years, the traditional “troika” of Great Britain, Germany, and France has weakened considerably. British foreign and defense policies have weakened its leadership role in Europe and the world more generally. Germany has been left in the uncomfortable position of providing not only economic but also political and strategic leadership in Europe. The United States should work to pull this “troika” back together, with the addition of Poland (assuming of course that its government demonstrates respect for the highest standards of democratic governance), to provide strategic leadership within the European Union. For all that institution’s shortcomings, the United States has an interest in the preservation and health of the EU. ...

The United States has a particular interest in Britain remaining a strong and active player within the EU. A British departure would weaken Britain, Europe, and the transatlantic community. Among Britain’s strengths, and one aspect of its value as an ally, has been its ability to play a leadership role in Europe, providing a transatlantic perspective that can sometimes be absent from European councils. A strong Britain in a strong Europe is a key American interest. American diplomacy must strive to do the hard work of maintaining not only an alliance but a vibrant, cohesive, and powerful transatlantic community. That means increasing the level and frequency of U.S. participation in high-level meetings even when a crisis does not exist.

Such increased transatlantic dialogue should encompass the whole range of global strategic challenges. Whether or not Europe has a critical role to play or is threatened by every global crisis, it will help all of us if Europe and the United States share perspectives, knowledge, and consideration of the moral and strategic challenges they face around the world. If the two sides of the Atlantic hope to share responsibility for defending the liberal world order, they ought to have, as much as possible, a common understanding of what that entails. [my emphasis]

In other words, the United States wants an obedient EU, strong enough to be useful to American policy, but not strong enough to challenge American geopolitical priorities in the world, and Britain is the main US proxy within the EU.

The report also expresses considerable urgency in rejecting the adoption of "offshore balancing" as a strategic approach, a concept advocated by representatives of the Realist school of foreign policy like Stephen Walt: "The next administration must make abundantly clear that it has no interest in pursuing an off-shore balancing strategy [in the Middle East], such as the “new equilibrium” some have suggested, which envisages a significant U.S. military drawdown from the region." (See Stephen Walt, Offshore balancing: An idea whose time has come Foreign Policy 11/02/2011; scroll down)

Obama's framing of the Iran deal

James Fallows has a good article based on President Obama's speech and a subsequent on-the-record press briefing with him talking about Obama's defense of the nuclear nonproliferation deal with Iran, The President Defends His Iran Plan The Atlantic 08/07/2015.

But one part of Obama's argument does concern me:

Many critics of the deal, and some supporters and others in the press, are furious about what they feel is Obama’s scare-tactic false choice: If you don’t vote for this deal, you’re voting for war. ... Eli Lake, of Bloomberg, lamented Obama’s stooping to the “politics of fear.”

He quotes Obama defending it by pointing out scenarios in which Iran could accelerate it's nuclear program much faster absent the agreement than if it's in place.

Then he quotes Obama's argument:

So in almost every scenario, our ability to monitor what’s happening in Iran, our ability to ensure that they are not breaking out, our ability to inspect their facilities, our ability to force them to abide by the deal has gone out the window.

And as I said in the speech, everybody around this table knows that within six months or nine months—I don’t know how long it would take—of Iran having pulled out of this deal, or cheated on this deal, or interpreted the deal in a way that was deemed contrary to the spirit, if not the letter, of the deal, that some of the same voices who were opposed to the deal would insist that the only way to stop Iran from getting a nuclear weapon is to take strikes. And it will be framed as limited military strikes, and it will be suggested that Iran will not respond. But we will have entered into a war.

That doesn’t mean that Iran suddenly attacks us directly. It does mean that I’ve got a whole bunch of U.S. troops on the ground trying to help Baghdad fight ISIL, and they’re now looking over their shoulders with a host of Shia militia. It does mean that Hezbollah potentially makes use of some of those rockets into Israel, which then precipitates us having to take action. It does mean that the Strait of Hormuz suddenly becomes a live theater in which one member of the IRGC, or Quds Force, or [Iranian Quds Force commander] Mr. Soleimani directs a suicide speedboat crashing into one of our naval ships, in which case I think it’s fair to say that the commander in chief of the United States will be called upon to respond. [my emphasis]

Fallows writes:

This sensitivity to fear-mongering is selective at best, considering the apocalyptic tone of many arguments against the deal. ...

So when he says it’s the deal, or war, this is the case he is making. “I do not say that a military option is inevitable just to be provocative, just to win the argument. Those are the dictates of cold, hard logic.”

Agree with him or not, to classify this as “fear-mongering,” on a topic where presidential candidates are talking about “leading to the door of the oven” and a “declaration of war on Israel,” is to stretch that term beyond meaning. (And a new term altogether would be useful for the irrepressible Dick Cheney, who most recently said that the deal would make “the actual use of nuclear weapons more likely.”)

It's very true that the Republicans pretty obviously favor war with Iran.

But is this Administration seriously worried that Iran-backed Shi'a militias would team up with the radical Sunni extremists in ISIS to fight Americans?

And it's not at all obvious to me why Hizbullah firing rockets at Israel would necessitate the US going to war with Iran!

Fred Kaplan writes about Obama's arguments for the agreement in Obama Unbound Slate 08/06/2015. This is one thing Obama seems to be doing right: "One thing he’s no longer trying to do is to convert the opponents, who, locked by justifiable anxieties or irredeemable biases, have shown that they’re unswayable by logic and uninterested in the facts."

And Kaplan gives some examples of Republicans expressing warlike intentions toward Iran:

Obama also noted the irony of the critics who howl at his suggestion that they’d rather go to war than sign the deal. He recalled, “Some of these same people, just a while back, were arguing we should just go ahead and take a strike.” Though he didn’t mention names, John Bolton, a former Bush administration official, has explicitly called for air strikes as the best option on the table. And in recent hearings, one of the deal’s most outspoken opponents, Sen. Lindsey Graham, exclaimed, “Who wins the war between us and Iran? ... We win!”

Paul Pillar gives the President a pass on continuing with some fear-mongering over Iran in this particular circumstance, in a piece where he is talking about several common but problematic assumptions in US foreign policy (Iraq, Iran, and the President on Mindsets The National Interest 08/05/2015):

Another element of this thinking that could be mentioned, but that President Obama did not explicitly do so, is a black-and-white perspective that tends to see the Middle East as starkly divided between good-guy allies and bad-guy adversaries, with Iran currently occupying the most prominent place in the latter camp. Although the president did speak of the wisdom of making deals with one's adversaries, he did not fundamentally challenge this perspective, despite its incongruence with reality. That is probably understandable and forgivable, given the need for him to maintain enough political correctness about Iran (and about Israel) to get the nuclear agreement through the Congressional gauntlet and across the finish line. [my emphasis]

What Eli Lake is doing in the column to which James Fallows objects is a very different kind of criticism. He's making a not-so-subtle suggestion that Obama is trying to motivate his (to Lake contemptible) base with anti-Semitic dog whistles (Obama Plays Politics of Fear to Get His Iran Deal 08/03/2015):

This kind of dog whistling from Obama does a disservice to his supporters. He's exploiting his base's deep fear of all things neoconservative. It's true that neocons in 2002 and 2003 supported and argued for the Iraq war. Some of them helped plan the war. But many Democrats also supported the Iraq war, including Obama's first secretary of state, Hillary Clinton. And yet in 2015 many prominent progressives still obsess about the out-of-power neocons, and darkly imply that they undermine the national interest on behalf of Israel.

For Obama's base, the neocons were not just policy intellectuals on the wrong side of an unpopular war, but were instead agents that pulled off a kind of coup d'etat and foisted a war on an unsuspecting public. Most serious people don't believe this anymore. But it's nonetheless a popular fable among the net-roots to this day. What a terrifying world! Every election brings with it the prospect that our republic will fall under the power of a bunch of disloyal bureaucrats eager to shed American blood for Israel.

I'm with Fallows in his criticism of Lake's column!

Argentine Foreign Minister Héctor Timerman and the AMIA/Nisman/vulture-funds tangle

Raúl Kollmann in “Ellos dicen culpables sí, juicio no” Página/12 29.04.2015 reports on the resignation of Argentine Héctor Timerman from the Jewish organization AMIA and explains the immediate background of his decision:

La renuncia de Timerman es a la AMIA, la mutual a la que están afiliados una parte de los integrantes de la comunidad judía. La AMIA administra los cementerios, la red educativa, algunos comedores, la asistencia social, el respaldo a personas de la tercera edad y muchas actividades culturales. Los socios de la AMIA votan su comisión directiva, hoy en día en manos de los sectores más religiosos y ortodoxos. Al mismo tiempo, para las cuestiones políticas se supone que la representación está en la DAIA, donde convergen las instituciones (entre ellas la AMIA), los templos, las escuelas, los clubes. Cuando se elige la conducción de la DAIA, las instituciones y clubes con más socios tienen varios votos: la AMIA, por ejemplo, tiene cuatro de los 120 totales. Con la carta de renuncia dirigida a Leonardo Jmelnitzky, actual presidente de la AMIA, Timerman quiso dejar en claro que no quiere ser representado por la conducción de la AMIA y tampoco por la DAIA.

En las últimas semanas surgió un grupo importante de integrantes de la comunidad judía que concretaron la primera convocatoria de judíos progresistas que no se sienten representados por la AMIA y la DAIA. El ex director ejecutivo de la DAIA Jorge Elbaum produjo una enorme repercusión con dos notas publicadas por Página/12 en las que mostraba y testificaba sobre las presiones que recibió la DAIA para bloquear el memorándum con Irán. Se alinearon voceros del PRO, de las embajadas de Estados Unidos e Israel y, enseguida, las fundaciones financiadas por los fondos buitre, en especial por Paul Singer. El propio fiscal Nisman se movió activamente como “amigo” de la Fundación para la Defensa de la Democracia, también financiada por Singer. Todas estas movidas fueron rechazadas en el plenario de argentinos de origen judío, que tuvo la conducción de la periodista Miriam Lewin ....

[Timerman's resignation is directed to the AMIA, the mutual society to which a part of the members of the Jewish community are affiliated. The AMIA administers the cemeteries, the educational network, some dining facilties, social assistance, support for the elderly and many cultural activities. The members of AMIA vote for their board of directors, these days in the hands of the most religious and orthodox sectors. At the same time, for political questions the representations is assumed to be in the DAIA, where the institutions converge (among them AMIA), the temples, the schools, the clubs. When the leadership of the DAIA is decided, the institutions and clubs with the most members have various votes: AMIA, for instance, has four of the 120 total. With the letter of resignation directed to Leonardo Jmelnitzky, current President of the AMIA, Timerman wants to make it clear that he doesn't wish to be represented by the leadership of the AMIA nor by the DAIA.

In recent weeks, an important group of progressive members of the Jewish community has emerged that constituted the first announcement by progressive Jews who do not feel themselves represented by the AMIA and the DAIA. The ex-Executive Director of the DAIA Jorge Elbaum produced an enormous repercussion with two notes published by Página/12 in which he demonstrates and testifies about the pressure the DAIA received to block the memorandum on Iran. Spokespeople aligned from the PRO, the embassies of the United States and Israel and, promptly, the foundations financed by the vulture funds, particularly by Paul Singer. Prosecutor Nisman himself actively behaved as "a friend" of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, also financed by Singer. All of these moves were rejected by the plenary session of [the progressive group] of Argentines of Jewish origin, which was lead by the journalist Miriam Lewin. ...]

A sidebar article reports on the left-leaning group of dissenters from the AMIA/DAIA positions, Un foro “colectivo y democrático” Página/12 29.04.2015.

Kollmann further reports:

En su diálogo con este diario, Timerman contó los intercambios con los dirigentes comunitarios sobre el memorándum. “Nosotros les dijimos que era un paso adelante, como lo sostuvieron Interpol o Amnesty International. Era intentar destrabar la situación y juzgar a los sospechosos, que Irán no iba a extraditar. Ellos dijeron que sí al principio y después que no. La Presidenta les ofreció que traigan una idea alternativa. Y no trajeron nada, salvo la posibilidad de reformar la Constitución para juzgar en ausencia, algo que en la Argentina nunca se hizo. Por eso insisto en el texto que ellos, los dirigentes de la comunidad judía, no quieren avanzar en buscar formas de juzgar a los sospechosos. Ellos dicen culpables sí, juicio no.”

[In his conversation with this paper, Timerman recounted the exchanges with the community leaders about the memorandum {the agreement with Iran}. "We told them that it was a step forward, as Interpol or Amnesty International maintained. It was intended to unfetter the situation and try the suspects that Iran had not extradicted. They said yes at first and later no. The President {Cristina Fernández} invited them to bring an alternative idea. And they didn't come up with anything, except the possibility of reforming the Constitution to allow a trial in absentia, something that has never been done in Argentina. For that reason, I insisted in the text {of the resignation letter} that they, the leaders of the Jewish community, did not want to have progress in looking for forms of trying the suspects. They are saying guilty yes, trial no."]]

As I've commented on here numerous times, the AMIA case has become deeply involved in efforts by American neoconservatives, the Government of Israel and the Republican Party to get up a war with Iran. Paul Singer is one of the biggest donors to the Republican Party, whose enthusiasm for the Likud Party of Israel's warlike policies he apparently shares. He's also a supporter of neocon policies and is engaged in a landmark legal dispute with Argentina over "vulture fund" investments in defaulted Argentine bonds. And all of this has become embedded into differences of priorities and outlook within Argentina's Jewish community and with the partisan opposition to Cristina's government and her Peronist Justicialista Party.

The Washington Post, whose editorial stance has been staunchly neoconservative for years, in a recent editorial accused Cristina and her government of promoting anti-Semitism in defending itself over the Nisman/AMIA case, Argentina’s president resorts to anti-Semitic conspiracy theories 04/23/2015. From everything I can see, this is a ludicrous accusation.

Jim Lobe and Charles Davis respond specifically to the WaPo editorial in Following the Money: The New Anti-Semitism? LobeLog Foreign Policy 05/01/2015.

Obviously, Foreign Minister Timerman is Jewish, as is Cristina's Economics Minister Axel Kicillof. Those are the two most prominent ministers of her Cabinet on the international scene.

On these themes, see also:

Charles Davis, U.S. Hedge Funds Paint Argentina as Ally of Iranian ‘Devil’ – Part One Inter Press Service 07/29/2013

Charles Davis, U.S. Hedge Funds Paint Argentina as Ally of Iranian ‘Devil’ – Part Two Inter Press Service 07/31/2013

Graciela Mochkofsky, Why Alberto Nisman Is No Hero for Argentina — or the Jews The Forward 03/10/2015, who gives this summary of Nisman's background:

In 1997, when he first became involved in the case — known in Argentina by the JCC’s acronym, AMIA — Nisman was a young and ambitious prosecutor making a career in the newly inaugurated system of open trials.

His task was to make presentable the fabrication concocted by Judge Juan José Galeano. With forged evidence, Galeano and other authorities had accused a ring of corrupt police officers of being the “local connection” in the bombing.

The open trial began in 2001 and ended in disaster in 2004. The forgery was so apparent that it didn’t survive scrutiny. The policemen were exonerated. The judge, the prosecutors, the head of the intelligence service, a high-ranking police officer, former president Carlos Menem and the leader of the main political Jewish organization were eventually indicted for the cover-up (and are going to trial in a few months). Nisman somehow survived, and President Néstor Kirchner (Cristina Kirchner’s now late husband, who took office in 2007) appointed him as special prosecutor for the AMIA case. He had to rebuild it from scratch. In 2006, based mostly on foreign intelligence reports, Nisman accused the Iranians of sponsoring the attack, allegedly carried out by Hezbollah militants.

Netanyahu and war with Iran

Reza Marashi and Trita Parsi writes of Bibi Netanyahu's Iran policy (Bibi's War Cry Rings Hollow in Congress The National Interest 03/03/2015):

Much pomp and circumstance has surrounded the Israeli prime minister’s trip to Washington, but the most important takeaway should now be clear: He is calling for zero uranium enrichment to be allowed on Iranian soil precisely because he knows that it is unachievable – and his real aim is to torpedo the negotiations and fast-track war.

Netanyahu's record has been one of continuous threat inflation over Iran:

Sources and credibility matter. Secretary of State Kerry said as much during his Senate testimony when he asserted that Netanyahu has been wrong about Obama’s Iran policy in the past. Israel’s prime minster condemned the interim nuclear deal with Iran when it was signed in November 2013, claiming “Iran got the deal of the century” and the P5+1 had made a historic mistake.” Later, he begrudgingly admitted that the interim deal helped rather than hurt Israeli interests. Looking ahead, such candor from the Obama administration will be vital to pushing back against opponents like Netanyahu who leak information, lack credibility, and act destructively.

The conclude by observing, "if you crave war like Netanyahu, it is peace that is an existential threat."

Oil glut and falling prices

"Venezuela is Latin America's biggest exporter of crude oil and has the world's largest petroleum reserves." - Brian Ellsworth and Andrew Cawthorne, Venezuela death toll rises to 13 as protests flare Reuters 02/24/2014

This post is not mainly about Venezuela. But given the kind of unrest that country has seen this year, especially toward the first of 2014, I like to keep that reminder prominent.

Christopher Adams et al report on another twist in world oil prices in Market rout as oil slide rocks energy groups Financial Times 11/28/2014. The OPEC cartel has declined to lower production to boost oil prices, which produced a drop in price of energy company stocks:

The sharp slide in the price of Brent oil after Opec’s decision not to cut output triggered warnings that oil companies would cut as much as $100bn of capital spending in response, imperilling [sic] the US shale bonanza and threatening much Arctic oil exploration.

Meanwhile oil’s fall continued to play havoc with the currencies of oil exporting countries, especially Russia. At one point on Friday, the rouble slid to a record low. ...

Opec said on Thursday that it was leaving its output ceiling of 30m barrels a day unchanged, prompting a swift 8 per cent drop in the oil price, which was already down by nearly 40 per cent since mid-June. Brent fell $2.80 on Friday to $69.78, a four-year low.

The move showed that Saudi Arabia, Opec’s largest producer and effective leader, had decided to relinquish its traditional role of balancing the oil market by increasing or reducing output, letting prices do the job instead, analysts said. [my emphasis]

I'm not familiar enough with oil price politics and markets to jump to any big conclusions about what the recent drop in oil prices mean. With the possible exceptions of the JFK assassination and Area 51, few things give rise to as many bizarre conspiracy theories as oil price changes. So I'm trying to be parsimonious in any conclusions I might draw at this point.

The particular vulnerability of Russia, a major oil exporter, to problems from drops in oil prices is one major factor to watch. While it may reduce oil companies' megaprofits to some extent, it could have significant benefits for other sectors, as noted in the Adams article: "Falling oil prices, meanwhile, are driving down expectations for global inflation, putting additional pressure on central banks to step up economic stimulus programmes."

An earlier article by Geoff Dyer and Ed Crooks, Saudi Arabia tests US ties with oil price Financial Times 10/16/2014, focuses on Saudi Arabia's current role in the process, one of the more interesting aspects of this. The Saudis have usually been willing to help out the United States' geopolitical goals by their stands in OPEC. It's not entirely clear they are doing that this time: "At a time when the US and Saudi Arabia are fighting a new war together in Iraq and Syria, the Saudis have taken the bold step of asserting their pivotal role in the oil market and subtly squeezing the finances of some of America’s fledgling shale companies." It may be a stretch to say that the US and the Saudis are fighting on the same side, not least because the US currently seems to be fighting on multiple sides at once in the same conflicts.

On the other hand:

Yet, at the same time, the falling oil price will deliver a de facto tax cut for American consumers and – if sustained – will hit both Russia and Iran at a time when Washington is trying to pressure both countries.

Deborah Gordon, director of the energy and climate programme at the Carnegie Endowment, sees the Saudi pressure on oil prices as a carefully calibrated move that will not alienate allies but will cause problems for rivals and foes such as Russia and Iran.

“The Saudis seem to have concluded that this could be a game-changer for them,” she says. “They get several benefits without hurting the people they do not want to hurt.”

With global demand for oil slowing sharply and US production surging, Saudi Arabia faced a choice. It could have cut production to stabilise the market, shouldering the burden itself. Instead, it appears so far to have decided to let the price fall, indicating that it would be happy with an oil price around $80, rather than the $100 it has previously backed.

Another factor at work is that high domestic US oil production from shale (using fracking) is challenging Saudi Arabia's current heavy-hitter role in the world oil markets, so the Saudis may also be concerned to counteract that.

Venezuela, Washington's least favorite Latin American country right now - after the perennial least-favorite, Cuba, of course - has also been feeling negative effects from lower oil prices, as Sebastian Boyd reports in Venezuela Quelling Default Talk Spurs Bond Surge: Andes Credit Bloomberg Businessweek 10/30/2014: "Venezuela’s gross domestic product will shrink 3 percent this year, the most since 2003, according to the International Monetary Fund. The nation’s reserves have dropped 8.7 percent in the past year to $20.2 billion." Algeria, for some reason, apparently extracted extra from Venezuela from oil they imported in November the Venezuela needed for mixing with some of their oil. (Maher Chmaytelli and Sherry Su, Algeria Bucks OPEC Discounts as Crude Goes to Venezuela Bloomberg Businessweek 10/29/2014)

US ally Japan, however, is seeing some good and some bad effects. (Louise Lucas and Ben McLannahan, Oil price fall offers mixed blessings for Japan Financial Times 10/16/2014 )

Matthew Philips wrote last month (It Looks Like $80 Oil Is Here to Stay Bloomberg Businessweek 10/30/2014):

A “structural transition has been reached,” analysts at Goldman Sachs (GS) wrote this week, and the ability to determine oil prices has shifted from OPEC to the U.S. The report, entitled “The New Oil Order,” argues that it’s time for American oil producers to slow down in the face of weak demand growth around the world and the quick pace of change. Goldman predicts that U.S. West Texas Intermediate oil will hit $75 a barrel during the first half of 2015 and that Brent will settle around $85 a barrel, about where it is now.

The shale boom in the U.S. isn’t likely to pull back until oil gets so cheap that people can’t make money drilling for it. There are a lot of estimates of the break-even price for U.S. shale producers. Some think it’s around $80 a barrel, others think it’s closer to $60, and it’s obviously not going to be the same for everyone. The number changes depending on where you’re drilling and how good you are.

According to the Christopher Adams article linked above, there already seem to be at least threats from major producers to cut back on capital investment significantly at current prices.

Phillips also points to Russia and Iran as possible targets of oil-pricing decisions:

It’s hard to predict how Vladimir Putin or Iran’s leaders will react to the economic squeezes that are likely to come their way. A year ago, Iran signaled its willingness to negotiate over its nuclear weapons program after tight sanctions crushed its ability to sell its oil for a decent price. Those sanctions would not have been nearly as effective without the U.S. shale boom, which kept a lid on prices while the world turned away from Iran’s oil. Whether anything fruitful comes of it remains to be seen.

As for Putin, there’s no real evidence that lower oil prices are making him more compliant. If anything, they have made him more desperate. Still, lowering the price of oil is likely the most effective lever the U.S. has to pull at the moment—more effective than almost any economic sanction or diplomatic effort.

But Benjamin Bidder in Wegbrechende Einnahmen: Ölpreis-Verfall würgt Russlands Wirtschaft ab Spiegel Online 28.11.2014 discusses ways in which the low oil prices could be a major problem for Russia, even a regime-change size problem.

Carol Matlack earlier this week looked at how Russia is handling the oil price situation (Why Russia Said 'No Deal' to OPEC on Cutting Oil Production Bloomberg Businessweek 11/26/2014)

Juan Cole looks at the effects of low oil prices on Russia, Iran and Iraq in Oil Price Fall: Saudi Arabia targets US Shale Oil, Iran, Iraq, Russia Informed Comment 11/29/2014. But he doesn't see politics as the main driver in Saudi Arabia's unwillingness to have OPECC cut production:

The cause of the fall, by $40 a barrel, in petroleum prices since last summer is almost completely on the demand side. Asian economies, especially China, are dramatically slowing, and won’t be requiring as much petroleum to fuel trucks, trains and cars to deliver people and goods around the country. Most petroleum is used to fuel transport. Some is used for heating or cooling, as in Saudi Arabia and Hawaii, but that practice is relatively rare. US journalists seem to feel it obligatory to mention US shale oil production as a contributor to the price fall, since prices are a matter of supply and demand, and US supply has increased by a couple million barrels a day. But frankly that is a minor increase in world terms– global production is roughly 90 million barrels a day. Between Iran, Iraq (Kirkuk), Libya and Syria, enough oil has gone out of production to more than offset the additional American oil. It isn’t that there is more oil being pumped, it is that the world doesn’t want it as much because of cooling economies. ...

Saudi Arabia did not cause the oil price fall, though since 2011 it has been flooding the market to offset the decrease in Iranian exports because of US sanctions. Riyadh, however, is the main geopolitical winner here, which is why the Saudis stopped the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries from reducing country production quotas. (That step would have reduced supply and put up prices). As it is, the Saudis can afford to wait as fracked oil is driven out of the market because too expensive, so that they regain their market share. [my emphasis]

But Cole also adds, "The Saudis must enjoy punishing Iran and Russia for defying them by propping up the Bashar al-Assad regime in Damascus and the Da’wa Shiite regime in Baghdad."

Izabella Kaminska in A game of ‘chicken’ threatens the oil production balance Financial Times 10/30/2014 addresses the breakeven price point at which investment in shale production would become uneconomic:

Yes there is. According to Wood Mackenzie, US shale oil developments would remain economic even if prices were as low as $70 or $75 a barrel. Some even say that most American producers would break even if a barrel fetched only $57. But the difference is that in the US, none of the producers are state-owned. Also, America doesn’t depend on oil export revenues to balance the government’s books. True, lower prices might no longer be a cause of unalloyed economic cheer. Because they thin the wallets of oil producers, they make life harder for the people whose livelihoods depend on them. Still, cheaper oil could also help stimulate the economy by reducing the price motorists pay at the pump, and bringing down the cost of industrial inputs. That would help put more people in work, and give them more money to spend after they leave the petrol station forecourt. [my emphasis]

They are currently running just around $70/barrel (on Brent crude, the standard general measure cited). See: Yuji Okada and Sharon Cho, OPEC Inaction Signals Pain for Refiners With Costly Oil Bloomberg News/Yahoo! Fiance 11/28/2014.

Argentina could also be affected in its plans to boost energy production to the extent they involve fracking. (See: Benedict Mander and Jude Webber, YPF seeks foreign partners to tap Argentina’s shale Financial Times 11/02/2014)

Israel, the US, Palestinians and Iran

Mitchell Plitnick grumbles about the focus on an anonymous American official's "chickens**t" comment about Israel's Bibi Netanyahu. (Netanyahu and Obama: Name-Calling and its Discontents LobeLog Foreign Policy 10/31/2014) He then proceeds to use it repeatedly himself in his article.

Plitnick isn't just tossing around insults, though. He's making an informed evaluation of the leadership style of Obama and Netanyahu. And he emphasizes that the real problem between the US and Israel is not the personalities of their leaders, but rather real differences in interests and policies. He also makes this useful observation about how that affects the options for American leaders:

[Obama] is a president with a non-confrontational style trying to govern with what is, arguably, the most defiant and combative Congress any president has ever had to deal with. And he is dealing with an Israeli government that is pursuing a very different strategy than its predecessors. The Israel of today no longer cares about the majority of the Jewish community in the United States. This Israel, correctly, determined that its ultimate desire to completely thwart a two-state solution and maintain an apartheid system over the Palestinians would never be acceptable to most American Jews. But most US Jews weren’t the ones providing the political power and, more importantly, the funding for congressional campaigns and for settlements in the West Bank.

The Jews that do provide these things, as well as the Christians, are right-wingers, either in their general politics or at least on Middle East policy (including policy toward the entire Arab world, Iran and Turkey). They are now the only ones Israel cares about. More liberal-minded devotees are not, at this stage, providing that much support for Israel, either economically or financially. Those of them who do provide this support will continue to check their otherwise liberal values at the Israeli door. The rest are not, in the estimate of the Netanyahu government, worth the compromises that must be made to garner their support. [my emphasis]

Plitnick cites this news report by Ron Ben-Yishai, Easing Gaza restrictions is the new two-state solution Ynet 10/11/2014 about current Israeli-Egyptian plans for keeping a lid on the Palestinians. He doesn't think it's like to succeed. But he emphasizes that the Obama Administration is supporting that effort:

This seems like another doomed plan, one that harkens back to old Israeli beliefs that Palestinian nationalism will eventually just go away. But we must recognize that this is happening with the silent approval of the United States. Egypt, in particular, would not work with Israel on such a plan if it believed that the United States would object. More to the point, the plan is also intended to provide the US with what it wants most: Palestinian silence. What American policy has always represented is the complete lack of importance placed on the welfare of the Palestinians, or anyone else (including ordinary Israelis) in the region, for that matter. The entire issue is only relevant insofar as it affects more “important” US concerns.

So, the Obama administration will likely allow Israel to proceed with its plans, even if it doesn’t believe those plans are likely to succeed. This is evident in the lack of material response to Israel’s direct challenge to the international consensus on a two-state solution. [my emphasis]

Even if he's overstating the case on American indifference to the fate of the Palestinians, his argument that the immediate point of greatest tension between the two countries is Iran is plausible:

If Congress persists in pressuring the administration on its Iran policy, a pressure which most understand as directed by Jerusalem, Obama may well respond through the Palestinian issue. In that case, we might see a more direct counter to Israeli policies, such as a Security Council resolution condemning the settlements or even an “Obama Plan” basing a two-state solution on the 1967 borders and sharing Jerusalem. That would be a turn of events not seen in decades, but Israel has also never worked so hard to undermine US goals on foreign policy matters as it has on Iran. [my emphasis]

Diane Feinstein takes a sensible position on Congressional war powers - at least for the moment

I'm not in the habit of particularly praising my California Sen. Diane Feinstein. She's a liberal Democrat and has a decent voting record on many domestic issues.

But as Chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee, she's had a terrible record on oversight of the intelligence agencies. She's been more of an advocate for expansive powers for intelligence agencies at the expense of democratic and Constitutional rights.

This is one of the major problems in the US right now. One of the major democratic deficits right now, to borrow a term rightly applied the EU in its current form. Congress has virtually ceded its war powers to the Executive. Elizabeth Beavers of the Friends Committee on National Legislation writes in Bring the War on Terror to an End 01/10/2014, a piece appearing on the website of US News and World Report (!), focuses on the expansive authority claimed by the Executive Branch - and so far largely unchallenged by Congress - under the open-ended 2001 Authorization for the Use of Military Force (AUMF):

How can the National Security Agency maintain its sweeping, invasive spying program? The only justification is the AUMF. Where did the president get the authority to indefinitely detain people for over a decade without charge or explanation? The AUMF provides that power, of course. Can U.S. citizens be targeted by drones for assassination without due process? Sure, says the AUMF.

It is doubtful that members of Congress envisioned the future they were creating when they voted "yes" for the AUMF in 2001. But now that future is the present world we live in, and it is time to re-examine it. Is it safer? Is it more secure? As Americans, do we have more liberty? As global citizens, are we leading by example to bring about justice and the rule of law? There is a strong case to be made that the answer to each of those questions is a resounding no, and it is directly because of the AUMF.

It is impossible to discuss the issues of warrantless wiretapping, the war in Afghanistan, the detention facility at Guantanamo or targeted drone strikes without discussing the AUMF. These troubling practices are only possible because they are considered "incidents of war" that are covered by the sweep of the AUMF's authority.

So it's a surprise to see Feinstein's speech, Feinstein on Iran: Give Diplomacy a Chance, Oppose Additional Sanctions 01/15/2014. In it, she's taking her usual stance of defending the Obama Administration's foreign policy, in this case the current negotiations with Iran over nuclear capabilities. And she's opposing a Congressional resolution backed by the Israel lobby that would likely make those negotiations impossible.

Thanks to Administration pressure, the public popularity of the negotiation efforts and backing from Congressional supporters of the negotiations like Feinstein, the effort to pass the anti-negotiation bill seems to be stymied for the moment, as Jim Lobe reports in Israel Lobby Thwarted in Iran Sanctions Bid For Now Inter Press Service 01/15/2014.

Feinstein's speech is interesting as part of a debate on how the Congress should assert its power in foreign policy. No one is questioning that Congress has the power to restrict the Executive's options in a negotiation; they clearly do. But they exercise it so infrequently in opposition to the Executive Branch and have lately been more interested in promoting a warlike foreign policy and especially to cover up, validate and even legalize dangerous practices by intelligence agencies that in restraining the already heavy temptation for the Executive to be reckless in foreign policy.

What's particularly notable about the dispute in which Feinstein is participating is that the anti-negotiations legislation (the Nuclear Weapon Free Iran Act of 2013) shows an appalling willingness of its sponsors - 59 Senators are co-sponsors - to waive their own Constitutional responsibility under their Constitutional war powers. The proposed legislation includes this provision:

if the Government of Israel is compelled to take military action in legitimate self-defense against Iran’s nuclear weapon program, the United States Government should stand with Israel and provide, in accordance with the law of the United States and the constitutional responsibility of Congress to authorize the use of military force, diplomatic, military, and economic support to the Government of Israel in its defense of its territory, people, and existence

Since Israel has repeatedly threaten to launch a preventive military attack on Iran over the nuclear weapons issue, the Congressional sponsors surely must realize this is a green light from Congress to encourage Israel to launch such an attack.

Which is pretty much what Feinstein says in her speech near the end says:

Let me acknowledge Israel's real, well-founded concerns that a nuclear-armed Iran would threaten its very existence. I don't disagree with that. I agree with it, but they are not there yet.

While I recognize and share Israel's concern, we cannot let Israel determine when and where the United States goes to war. By stating that the United States should provide military support to Israel in a formal resolution should it attack Iran, I fear that is how this bill is going to be interpreted.

Let me conclude. The interim agreement with Iran is strong, it is tough, and it is realistic. It represents the first significant opportunity to change a three-decade course in Iran and an opening to improve one of our most poisonous bilateral relationships. It could open the door to a new future which not only considers Israel's national security, but protects our own. [my emphasis]

We'll be hearing quite a bit of commentary this year about the beginning of the First World War. We can at least hope most of it will be less frivolous than that of Bill Kristol, which is after all a very low bar to meet.

But one major factor in the immediate chain of decision-making that led to the all-out war in 1914 was Germany's assurance to the Austro-Hungarian Emperor Franz Joseph II's government that Germany would back them in a war against Serbia. It wasn't a German Archduke that Gavrilo Princip assassinated in Sarajevo. And a less reckless government than Kaiser Bill's might have reasoned that giving a green light to the Habsburg Empire for a war on Serbia might not be something to agree to without more careful consideration.

Just as a more responsible Congress in 2002 could have and should have been less willing to give President Cheney an authorization to launch a preventive war on Iraq based on false claims. More importantly, a more responsible Congress would have tried to impeach a President and Vice President who violated the Congressional resolution they did pass in October 2002 when they did invade Iraq.

The problem is not that Congress isn't willing to exercise its authority in foreign affairs. The problem is that in doing so, they are far too deferential to the Executive Branch in general and, even more importantly, lacking in a sense of responsibly exercising their Congressional duties in foreign affairs and especially in the use and enforcement of their war powers.

Diane Feinstein has been a textbook case for that lack in a sense of responsibility on intelligence oversight. But in telling the Senate it would be irresponsible for give Israel a green light for a war that would not be in America's interests, she asserted a sensible approach toward Congressional war powers and responsibilities.

Tags: diane feinstein, iran, israel, israel lobby, nuclear proliferation

Interim nuclear deal with Iran and continuing negotiation

The agreement with Iran over their nuclear program is really good news. It's long past time for the US to move toward more peaceful relations with Iran. The Cheney-Bush Administration passed up the substantial opportunity to do so after the 9/11 attacks because Cheney didn't want peace with Iran, he wanted war.

John Judis discusses the agreement in Obama's Iran Nuclear Deal Could Be a Major Triumph New Republic 11/24/2013:

While negotiations over a final agreement take place, the current deal stops Iran from using its nuclear facilities to make bombs. It allows the International Atomic Energy Commission to conduct rigorous daily inspections. Daryl Kimball, the executive director of the Arms Control Association, says, “The limits on Iran's nuclear program are, unequivocally, a major success in reining-in Iran's nuclear potential and an essential stepping stone toward the negotiation of an even more effective, final agreement.”

The agreement also continues a welcome thaw in American relations with Iran. Some hardliners in Congress like to present America as the wounded party in the longstanding quarrel between the two nations, but that is simply not the case. This August, the Central Intelligence Agency finally unclassified documents that revealed its role in the overthrow of Iranian nationalist Mohammed Mossadegh in 1953. That act, and America's continuing support for the Shah's dictatorship, figured prominently in the minds of the Iranian revolutionaries who held American diplomats hostage in 1979.

That 1953 coup against Mossadegh was one the legendary successes of CIA black-ops - and its still causing trouble for the United States!

Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu has been bitterly critical of the agreement. But Israel has hundreds of nuclear arms and the most powerful military in the Middle East. It can defend itself against any likely threat from Iran.

Earlier in November as the formal negotiations were getting underway, Stephen Walt wrote in Let's Make a Deal.... Foreign Policy 11/08/2013 about how supporters and opponents of a deal lined up:

The battle lines on this issue are now easy to identify. On one side are Obama and Kerry, the U.S. negotiating team, most of the arms control community, and much of America's national security apparatus, including seventy-nine well-connected former officials who endorsed the administration's efforts yesterday. This broad group understands that Iran is not going to accept zero enrichment and that the United States cannot physically prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon if it really, really, wants to get one. Even if the US used force to damage Iran's nuclear infrastructure, they could rebuild it and disperse it and we would have to keep attacking them forever. This group believes -- correctly, in my view -- that Iran is not currently trying to build a nuclear weapon and that a deal can be struck that makes it hard for Iran to sprint toward a bomb if it ever changes its mind. This group recognizes that another Mideast war would be a disaster for us and for others and would merely increase Iran's desire to acquire an effective deterrent. Finally, this group understands that the deal is likely to get worse the longer we delay.

On the other side are Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (who has already denounced the interim deal), Saudi Arabia, the hardline elements within the Israel lobby, extremist journalists like Jennifer Rubin, and various Congresspersons who are overly beholden to some or all of the above. Despite a dearth of genuine evidence, they believe Iran is hell-bent on getting a bomb and that this development would have far-reaching negative effects on world politics. They think Iran is only negotiating now because we tightened sanctions, and that tightening the screws some more will get Tehran to say "uncle" and give us everything we want. Perhaps they haven't noticed that the United States could have gotten a better deal in 2006 -- before the latest round of sanctions was imposed -- but the Bush administration foolishly spurned Iran's offer. The opponents have a lot of energy and fervor on their side, but logic and evidence doesn't seem to be their strong suit.

And in U.S. Middle East Strategy: Back to Balancing Foreign Policy 11/21/2013, argues that the United States' strategically high advantageous position in the world has (perhaps paradoxically) lead the US to grossly overstate relatively minor dangers to US security, including that from Iran:

One consequence of this favorable position, by the way, is that the country routinely blows minor threats out of all proportion. I mean: Iran has a defense budget of about $10 billion (less than 1/50th of what the United States spends on national security), yet we manage to convince ourselves that Iran is a Very Serious Threat to U.S. vital interests. Ditto the constant fretting about minor-league powers like Syria, North Korea, Muammar al-Qaddafi's Libya, and other so-called "rogue states." [my emphasis]

People who want war instead of a peaceful agreement would like to sabotage the currently-promising staged negotiating process by tightening international sanctions against Iran. You don't have to be a professional negotiator to see that punishing the other side when they agree to what you want is unlikely to be conducive to further agreements. Kingston Reif, of the Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation observes (Making a nuclear deal with Iran Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists 11/20/2013):

... doubling down on sanctions in the middle of a promising negotiation could blow up the talks by undercutting Iranian moderates and empowering hardliners. Furthermore, it’s not clear how more sanctions would collapse Iran’s economy fast enough to prevent the regime from achieving a breakout nuclear weapons capacity. While Iran’s economy is suffering under the weight of existing sanctions, Kahl writes, it does not appear to be on the verge of imminent collapse. Additional penalties could also undermine the international cooperation that has been essential to the effective implementation of existing sanctions. For example, Turkey has indicated that it will not make further reductions in oil imports from Iran. A premature US rush to pass more sanctions might cause other countries to take similar steps or even increase Iranian imports, especially if the United States rejects a deal that the rest of the international community views as reasonable.

To make matters worse, passing more sanctions now in the hopes of collapsing Iran’s economy could convince Khamenei that the United States isn’t actually interested in a negotiated settlement but rather desires regime change. This could prompt Iran to decide to acquire nuclear weapons. In the event that diplomacy fails or Iran does not make good on its commitments, passing more sanctions will still be an option.

The generally liberal Israeli newspaper Haaretz gives editor Seth Lipsky of the rightwing online tabloid New York Sun the chance to trash the agreement in an op-ed, absurdly arguing that this deal is the prelude to a new Holocaust, Obama and Kerry's betrayal of 'never again' 11/24/2013:

In plain English, the best that could be said of it is that — for the time being — the mullahs can keep their crematoria, so to speak, on standby.

That may sound harsh. But feature the fact that President Obama has been saying for years that he has Israel’s back. What this turns out to mean is that he will treat with Israel’s enemies behind Israel’s back, enter a partnership with them on terms to which the freely elected government in Jerusalem objects, and in boasting about the betrayal declare that Israel has good reason to be skeptical of Iran’s intentions.

For the neocons, it's always 1938 and the West is always on the verge of selling out Czechslovakia:

Neither Kerry nor Obama were alive at the time of Munich. But the catastrophe of 1938 was well marked on Sunday by Israeli MK Moshe Feiglin, who called the handshake at Geneva this weekend “the Iranian version of the Munich Agreement.” He noted that like the doughty Czechs in 1938, Israel was not a party to the parley. “Israel today watches from the sidelines,” is the way he put it.

One could but add that there was one difference between Geneva today and Munich in 1938. The envoys of the free European governments knew deep down that they had blundered at Munich. "Imbeciles" was the word Prime Minister Daladier of France famously muttered when, on his arrival back at Paris, he was cheered by throngs of his countrymen. Where is the self-awareness in the Western leadership today?

The fact that the argument is frivolous doesn't stop prominent people who want war with Iran from making it.

And what good Republican could resist the temptation to invoke St. Reagan to make the case? "Reagan would have long since either found a way to bolster Iran's democratic opposition or helped found a government-in-exile of Iran that could have levied a revolution."

Because, you know, that's been so brilliantly successful other places we've tried. Heck, we overthrew Mossadegh in 1953, didn't we? Awesome.

Jeffrey Lewis takes note of the argument that sanctions should be tightened (Our Last, Best Chance Foreign Policy 11/25/2013):

... the usual suspects will complain that we've given away too much in terms of sanctions relief, but there are three things to keep in mind. (1) Much of the sanctions relief is temporary. If the Iranians collapse the deal, there will be plenty of takers for imposing tougher sanctions. (2) It isn't clear to me that the sanctions regime is indefinitely sustainable. The Iranians have had quite a bit of luck challenging sanctions in European courts, and Washington doesn't have quite the same pull in Moscow and Beijing these days. Sanctions have always been a wasting asset. It makes sense to get something for them now. (3) Moreover, if the Iranian economy starts to recover, that might be a good thing. There is a whole field of research into something called "prospect theory" that more or less boils down to a profound insight into the irrationality of human beings: we tend to fear losses more than we value gains, even if they are numerically the same. This is why your favorite basketball team waits too long to trade that promising draft pick who'll never be more than a rotation player. If the Iranian economy starts to recover, that will probably increase the pressure on Rouhani to make a deal, not decrease it.

Jasmin Ramsey in (Historic Iran Deal Aims at Final Nuclear Resolution IPS News 11/24/2013 describes the terms of the agreement this way:

“All sides would gain [from this deal], except those few who believe that it’s feasible to expect that Iran could be sanctioned enough to give up enrichment entirely,” George Perkovich, a nuclear non-proliferation and strategy expert focused on Iran at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, told IPS.

Under the six-month phase of the deal, Iran is expected to halt uranium enrichment above five percent; convert its existing stockpile of 20-percent-enriched uranium to fuel for its Tehran Research Reactor or dilute it to five percent grade; halt "further advances of its activities" at its Natanz and Fordow Fuel Enrichment facilities and at its Arak reactor; and implement further, advanced monitoring by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

In return Iran will gain approximately 7 billion dollars of sanctions relief; Iran will be given relief from U.S. sanctions on its auto industry as well as spare parts and repairs for its aviation industry; no further U.N., EU or U.S. nuclear sanctions will be issued; and a channel will be established to better facilitate humanitarian trade.

But any gains would be "provisional," cautioned Perkovich, adding that "the ultimate measure will be in a final agreement."

Tags: iran

Iran, Cuba, Iraq? Just how well do US sanctions work?

Hillary Mann Leverett and Flynt Leverett write about The coming collapse of Iran sanctions Aljazeera English 02/25/2013. They sketch this history of US sanctions against Iran:

Virtually since the 1979 Iranian revolution, US administrations have imposed unilateral sanctions against the Islamic Republic. These measures, though, have not significantly damaged Iran's economy and have certainly not changed Iranian policies Washington doesn't like.

Between 2006 and 2010, America got the UN Security Council to adopt six resolutions authorising multilateral sanctions against Iran - also with limited impact, because China and Russia refused to allow any resolution to pass that would have harmed their interests in Iran.

Beyond unilateral and multilateral measures against Iran's economy, the US has, since 1996, threatened to impose "secondary" sanctions against third-country entities doing business with the Islamic Republic. In recent years, Congress has dramatically expanded the range of activities subject to such sanctions, going beyond investments in Iranian oil and gas production to include simple purchases of Iranian crude and almost all financial transactions.

This year, Congress blacklisted transfers of precious metals to Iran, to make it harder for Tehran to repatriate export earnings or pay for imports in gold. Congress has also increased the sanctions that can be imposed on offending entities, including their cut-off from the US financial system.

We've had sanctions on Cuba for decades, inflicting a considerable amount of privation on the people there, but without bringing about the overthrow of the regime.

Our sanctions on Iraq after the Gulf War didn't bring down Saddam. But they were one element of a continuing policy that led eventually to a new war.

As the Leveretts point out, US sanctions against Iran are currently under pressure from both Europe and China.

Gareth Porter reviews the Leveretts' recent book, Going to Tehran: Why the United States Must Come to Terms with the Islamic Republic of Iran (2013), in Former Insiders Criticise Iran Policy as U.S. Hegemony Inter Press Service 02/25/2013.

Bob Dreyfuss observes, "Despite years of war-whooping and crisis-mongering on Iran, it's beginning to sink in that Iran’s nuclear program doesn’t represent much of a threat. In fact, Iran has been taking steps on the ground to reassure the most hawkish observers, including Israel, that a bomb isn't imminent." (Progress in Iran Talks: Can We Stop the War-Whooping Now? The Nation 02/27/2013).

Argentina isn't an especially close ally of the US. But Iran's recent agreement with them over the 1994 bombing of the AMIA Jewish community center in Buenos Aires may shows some diplomatic flexibility on Iran's part. Marcela Valente reports on that agreement in Argentina Strikes Deal with Iran to Probe AMIA Bombing Suspects Inter Press Service 02/22/2013.

Tags: amia, iran, iran war