World Beat

Over the weekend, pirates provided plenty of fuel for neocons to call for a "coalition of the willing" to invade Somalia. Given that response, I can only guess as to the inevitable chatter points today regarding North Korea's departure from six-party talks and strongly worded statement indicating that the DPRK will resume nuclear development.

Meanwhile, I read precious little from the right regarding the closed-door trial in Iran of U.S.-Iranian citizen Roxana Saberi. Saberi, a prominent journalist whose work has appeared on NPR, the BBC, Fox News, and more, has been held in Tehran since January on charges of spying for the U.S. While I'm not eager to hear more clamor and criticism from the talking heads on how Saberi's incarceration makes Obama weak and America pitiful (see this vid from Kos, via Benen, for the worst of the worst from the right on the topic again of pirates), it would be nice if the plight of a U.S. reporter held under questionable circumstances would draw a little more attention and calls from the once-heralded "compassionate conservatives" for justice to win out.

On second thought, maybe the right's silence is golden. The less Saberi becomes a political chip in this country, the more chance she has of not being (further) played as one in Iran.

Calling Crap Crap

LATE UPDATE: Rereading the entry, I realized the earlier update ought to be punctuated like this: "Glenn Greenwald and I are of like minds, only his boasts a greater historical perspective. Check out his take on today's Friedman."

UPDATE: Glenn Greenwald and I are of like minds. Only his boasts a greater historical perspective, so check out his take on today's Friedman.
__________

Today's Tom Friedman: Barack Obama will be a great diplomat if he takes Dick Cheney with him to meet Tehran.

When negotiating with murderous regimes like Iran’s or Syria’s, you want Tony Soprano by your side, not Big Bird. Mr. Obama’s gift for outreach would be so much more effective with a Dick Cheney standing over his right shoulder, quietly pounding a baseball bat into his palm.

Essentially, Friedman is saying that sticks and carrots should continue to be the modus operandi of American diplomacy, especially in the most delicate situations such as relations in the Middle East. The problem is that the pendulum has already swung in favor of developing nations to stand against the US: Iran, North Korea (we still can't tell where that's going) and Venezuela. Friedman's suggestion that a "bad cop" Dick Cheney lurking in the shadows just over "good cop" Obama's shoulder reveals that the author himself has failed to recognize the larger, world-wide assessment of America's falling star. Though American diplomacy still holds some clout--and it can only improve in 2009, unless we hire Rudy Giuliani--watch for fewer rogue nations to really care what America might offer or threaten.

In the meantime, the notion that Democrats are waiting for a candidate who can "dial up" the appropriate level of Dick Cheney as they assemble their foreign affairs teams is preposterous. One big beef against Hillary among liberal Dems is that she's playing this game of keeping "all options on the table," (one of the more painfully overexposed phrases of our decade). In the meantime, both Jimmy Carter, to whom Friedman specifically points as an example of what Obama does not need to bring to the negotiations table, and Al Gore are enjoying terrific resurgences in popularity for their unapologetic commitment to improving the human experience on earth--a claim few, if any, will ever make about Dick Cheney.

So my response when I read Tom Friedman today is "Why am I still reading Tom Friedman?"

Haleh Esfandiari Leaves Iran

Haleh Esfandiari, an Iranian American scholar held since December by the Iranian government on charges of crimes against the nation and intending to foment a "velvet revolution," has been freed after 8 months of detention and imprisonment and is now in Austria. The Washington Post has the story here.

According to the Post, Tehran is still holding at least three known Iranian Americans and--possibly--an American ex-FBI agent:

There is still no news, however, on the status of four other Americans either detained or missing in Iran. New York-based social scientist Kian Tajbakhsh and California businessman Ali Sharkeri are in solitary confinement in Evin Prison. Both were picked up in the same three-day period in early May when Esfandiari was arrested.

Parnaz Azima, a correspondent for U.S.-funded Radio Farda, is out on bail of more than $600,000. As in Esfandiari's case, Azima was in Iran visiting her ailing mother when her passport was confiscated, and the bail was guaranteed by handing over the deed to her mother's home.

. . . Former FBI agent Robert A. Levinson has been missing since March when he made a business trip to Iran's Kish Island, where visas are not required. Unlike in the other cases, the government of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad denies knowledge of Levinson's whereabouts, despite repeated diplomatic requests by the United States through other countries.

The most curious part of the story? That Esfandiari's release was secured as the result of a letter from her colleague Lee Hamilton directly to Ayatollah Ali Khomenei, Supreme Leader of Iran.

Her release followed a letter from Wilson Center President Lee Hamilton, a former Democratic congressman and co-chairman of the Iraq Study Group, to Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. In an unusual move after other efforts failed, Khamenei responded to the letter and pledged to try to resolve Esfandiari's case.

Is there a rift between the Ayatollah and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad? Seems like an echo of the release of 15 British sailors captured in March.

Getting Into the Mix

Via Juan Cole, Turkey is planning a military invasion into northern Iraq to root out members of the Kurdish guerrilla organization PKK. That is, if US and Iraqi forces forces don't do something about it first.

Turkey is putting pressure on the US and Iraqi governments to reduce the presence of the Kurdish group, seen as a threat to Turkey's borders, or prepare for Turkish air strikes and a possible incursion.

In a fresh bout of sabre-rattling on Wednesday, the chief of staff, General Yasar Buyukanit, asked the government in Ankara to set the parameters for an incursion across the border. "Will we go to northern Iraq just to fight PKK rebels, or, for example, what will we do if we come under attack from local Iraqi Kurdish groups?" Gen Buyukanit said.

Sounds like your average, run-of-the-mill preemptive warfare if you ask me. I hear the US has no problem with that sort of strategy.

Meanwhile, to the south, CNN reports that an Iranian backed Hezbollah leader is in custody and is connected to the January 20 Karbala attack that killed 5 American troops. I don't have any problem with the details, but I do question the timing. Does anybody hear a little summer sabre-rattling?

Greenwald on the NYT on Iran

Glenn Greenwald deconstructs today's New York Times article chronicling the administration's internal debate over Iran. I think he gets it right.

But so many of the "facts" here are, at the very least, questionable. While some U.S. officials have accused Iran of arming Taliban insurgents in Afghanistan, Iran has categorically denied that accusation, and, as that same article reported, even Robert Gates refused to confirm the allegation with anywhere near the level of certainty that the Times bestowed this morning on this claim.

Indeed, the Times itself even reported last week: "Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates said Monday that Iranian weapons were being smuggled into Afghanistan and into the hands of Taliban fighters, but that it was unclear whether Iran's government was behind the arms shipments." Contrast that caution from Bush's own Defense Secretary with the unambiguous claim of the Times today that Iran is "inflaming the insurgencies in . . . Afghanistan."

And then there is the claim that Iran is "inflaming the insurgencies in Iraq . . . and in Gaza." It is more or less established that Iran aids the Shiite factions which are close to Iran and close to the Iraqi government, but those are not "insurgents." And it is far from established that Iran aids the actual insurgents in Iraq attacking U.S. troops -- in particular, the ex-Baathist Sunni elements and "Al Qaeda in Iraq." The claim by the Times -- presented as unquestionable fact -- that Iran "is inflaming the insurgency in Iraq" is, at best, quite sloppy, and as presented, is also misleading.

The same is true for the claim that Iran is "inflaming an insurgency" in Gaza. The sole basis for that claim appears to be the aid provided by the Iranians to Hamas. But Hamas is not an "insurgency," but rather, the majority party which was democratically elected by the Palestinians. Theoretically, at least, to aid Hamas is to aid the democratically elected majority party in the Palestinian Authority, not arming an "insurgency."

[snip]

Of course, questions such as whether we ought to be doing any of that, whether such actions are justified, whether Iran or the U.S. is the more provocative party here, are all questions which can and should be debated. And nobody doubts that Iran -- like large numbers of countries around the world, including some of our most important allies -- is internally repressive. But no account of a potential U.S.-Iran war can possibly be complete -- or even accurate -- without including all of those facts about what we are doing to provoke the Iranians into conflict.

Yet the Times article contains none of that. It presents a view of Iran that adheres almost completely to the administration's depictions -- namely, that "Iran is emerging as an increasing source of trouble for the Bush administration," as though it is unilaterally and without provocation running around waging war against the U.S. In doing so, the article repeatedly asserts as facts propositions which are nothing more than unconfirmed administration claims.

While I'm not convinced that the article goes so far as to make it easier to make a claim for strikes on Iran, Greenwald is right that the article is short on facts, and he reminds us that to swallow the traditional talking points may be to forget, so soon, how easily the American media, and by turn the public, swallowed the traditional talking points in the run-up to Iraq.

From Moscow to Tehran to . . . Moscow?

On Monday I quoted Juan Cole on Iran: "But Tehran is a minor player on the world stage, and trying to build it up to replace the Soviet Union is just the worst sort of fear-mongering . . . ."

Today I read this, and wonder why we need to build Iran up to replace the Soviet Union, when we're doing just fine with Vladimir Putin's Russia.

Juan Cole on Tehran

Juan Cole offers fresh air on Iran:

Polling shows that the percentage of Americans who view Iran as the number one threat to the United States has risen to 27 percent now. I think it was only 20 percent in December 2006. First of all, how in the world can a developing country with about a fourth of the population of the US, about a $2000 per capita income (in real terms, not local purchasing power), with no intercontinental ballistic missiles, with no weapons of mass destruction (and no proof positive it is trying to get them), with a small army and a small military budget-- how is such a country a "threat" to the United States of America? Iranian leaders don't like the US, and they talk dirty about the US, and they do attempt to thwart US interests. The same is true of Venezuela under Chavez. But Tehran is a minor player on the world stage, and trying to build it up to replace the Soviet Union is just the worst sort of fear-mongering, and it is being done on behalf of the US military industrial complex, which wants to do to Iran what it did to Iraq. It is propaganda, and significant numbers of Americans (a 7 percent increase would be like 21 million people!) are buying it. (Emphasis mine)

Cole points out that, whether Iran is a credible threat or not, 21 million more Americans perceive Iran as the cardinal threat to American security than did just six months ago. I don't know how big a threat Iran really presents behind all the bluster. No one wants to see the country with a nuclear weapon, and yet I keep wondering if the country's nuclear pursuit isn't a martyr's game. Ahmadenijad has a great opportunity to gain the appearance of clout when there's a Dick Cheney across the ocean who is endlessly willing to validate the little man's insane posturing. In the meantime, wouldn't it be a kick if Tehran really was interested in nuclear energy (I'm not sure I believe this, but it's worth stopping to consider) and actually wanted Americans to blow our wad in an effort to disprove that peaceful pursuit was the order of the day. We'd go in, raise a bunch of dust, find no evidence of nuclear weapons development, and at the end of the day have nothing but George Bush's word that it was the right thing to do. Sound familiar?

As for Islamic extremists, the best they can hope for is to draw American forces yet further into the Middle East. They don't have to come to us because we're only too eager to come to them. If this is what's driving Iran, then shouldn't America just slow down? By this I mean we don't necessarily need our leaders to respond to sabre rattling with more of the same, and we don't need our media outlets to hard-sell us more hype and fear. As much now as ever before, we need thoughtfulness and cool-headedness, not to mention sound intelligence, as America assesses and approaches the Iranian problem.

Detained in Iran: Where is the Responisble Reporting?

I'm not sure any media outlet can responsibly report the upcoming talks between the U.S. and Iran without mentioning that the government of Iran is currently holding no less than three Iranian American scholars and an Iranian American journalist. Haleh Esfandiari, Kian Tajbakhsh, and Ali Shakeri, along with Parnaz Azima, were all detained on recent visits to Iran. Human Rights Watch reports on the four here. Their Iranian and U.S. passports were seized, they've been subject to repeated interrogations, and, it appears, the government is preparing its case that these are American spies working to foment a "velvet revolution" within Iran.

The reason it is so important to report this fact when reporting on the upcoming talks is because you can bet that, as long as the mainstream media isn't talking about these detained U.S. citizens, neither will the U.S. envoys when it comes time to meet their Iranian counterparts.

Luxury Retreat to Overthrow Iran

Thanks to Steve Clemons for publicizing this.

Jim Lobe reports on the upcoming weekend retreat to plan how best to confront Iran (alright, it takes place in the middle of the week, but still). It reads like a scene out of Syriana, where all the oil bigwigs, politicians and billionaire investors get together to launch something like the "Free People for a Democratic Iran"-PAC. The takeaway ends up being "destabilize to restabilize," or something catchy like that. Life imitates art imitates life . . . . I see the snake swallowing its tail as the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies logo. After you've visited the FDD homepage, be sure to click on Biographies to get the down low on the who's who. My favorite, from Lobe, right at the very bottom: "Invitees will have all their expenses paid and receive a $1,000 honorarium."

Tit-For-Tat

Kevin Drum hits on something I've been wondering about the last couple days. Why are American/Iranian citizens being detained in a blatantly high-profile manner?

And this from News Blaze:

McCormack also cited the case of Parnaz Azima, a dual citizen of the United States and Iran who works as a correspondent for Radio Farda. Azima has been denied access to her passport and ability to travel despite being forced to pay a substantial bail bond on charges that her employer "spreads propaganda against the Islamic Republic," according to Iranian prosecutors.

And how does this fit in? "Iran wants former Palo Verde engineer released from custody."


Could it all have anything to do with reports this week of major U.S. naval exercises in the Persian Gulf?