As horrifying tales of torture, rape, and murder leak out around the edges of the Koran Curtain surrounding the Islamic Republic of Iran, the silence thunders on at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue and the not-too-distant quarters of Hillary Clinton and the State Department. Even Joe Biden who is normally quick with the lip has been singularly quiet.
Some kind of "engagement," ain't it, bucko?
Oh, there were a few soothing, ambiguous words out of SecState Clinton during her eleven day safari through Africa. But, these amounted to nothing more than boiler plate tropes. There was no bite. No indignation. No condemnation. No "engagement."
Even Ronald Reagan during his period of "constructive engagement" with South Africa was willing to say negative things about some of the more outrageous actions of the white minority regime. Way back when, long before the Nice Young Man From Chicago was born (or that matter the much older Secretary of State either), Franklin Roosevelt, the paragon of the Democratic Party actually, really, honest-to-gosh, for sure, criticised Soviet dictator Joe Stalin for the purges, death camps, and show trials which decorated his reign. Can you believe it? Engagement--and negative at that.
Dwight Eisenhower went more than a tad negative over the show trials and executions which marked the beginnings of the Castro period in Cuba. JFK did the same. Golly, the historical record is replete with examples of American presidents and secretaries of state staking out firm ethical positions regarding the perceived wrongs committed by governments with which the US stood in opposition.
US presidents and secretaries of state have criticised, even strongly condemned, the actions of governments even as we sought to establish or maintain a diplomatic gavotte with them. No matter how much the US might have needed to do a deal with a country, no president, no secretary of state, no administration before that headed by President Obama has failed to take and maintain a strongly enunciated stance when a government has violated norms and values espoused by the United States.
Admittedly, President Obama has opened a new chapter in American diplomacy with his emphasis upon cringing apologies for presumed wrongs committed in the past. Sometimes, as in his reference to Operation AJAX in the course of his Cairo Address, the cringing is so extreme as to violate historical reality. But, he is evidently not one to allow mere historical (or any other form of) truth to get in the way of servile supplication for forgiveness for wrongs never inflicted in the (vain) hope of gaining cooperation from the unwilling in return.
FDR did not let Krystalnacht go by unmentioned, uncondemned. Nor did Harry Truman allow the Soviet excesses of repression slip by without a word. JFK was not given to ignoring the violations of human rights and democracy pass him by without being acknowledged with pejorative (and occasionally salty) comment. Ike even took allies to task for actions contrary to the norms of civilized behavior as in the Sinai War of 1956.
The list goes on through every president, every secretary of state. Until now. Until the Obama Ascendancy.
Mealy mouthed responses to the actions of the reactionary mullahs and their accomplices in wholesale violations of human rights, democratic processes, and judicial procedures are not only out of keeping with the American tradition. The weak-kneed stance of the Obama administration is not pragmatically sanctioned. If the president and his foreign policy team expects that their disengaged, more-than-merely-arm's-length reaction to the mullahocracy will result in some movement toward a diplomatic resolution of the nuclear weapons contretemps, the whole crew has its collective head in an anatomically improbable location.
Considering that the actions of the reactionary clerics in Tehran have proven so reprehensible as to result in evident seismic splits in the clerical ranks generally, the expectation that a tolerant US position on the election and its aftermaths will result in "let's make a deal" is completely unsupportable by the realities. The totalistic reactionaries from Ayatollah Khamenei to "President" Ahmedinejad do not understand tolerance, acceptance, understanding as anything other than weakness--the weakness of surrender.
There is a time and place for the tough line. There is a time and a place for the firm, consistent stance in support of fundamental principles.
Now is the time. Iran is the place.
While the Bush/Cheney administration might have been terribly ill-advised with the invasion of Iraq, it did scare the dickens out of the mullahs. The so-called "grand bargain" might have been a myth and Iran might plausibly have already solved the problems of the physics package for their nascent nuclear weapons program, but the reality is that the mullahs were frightened enough to make exploitable offers of cooperation to the US.
Fear has a powerful capacity to focus the mind. For a few months following the invasion of Iraq the mullahs were afflicted with sufficient fear to provide an opportunity for American diplomacy. It is to be regretted that the Bush administration did not use the brief window of opportunity. The fine military historian Edward Luttwak pointed out recently in the WSJ that the opportunity was forsaken needlessly and would not come again absent an equal application of fear in Tehran.
To be "engaged" requires an ear willing and able to listen. Right now that ear is absent. It will not return unless and until the Iranian regime is given a good reason to do so.
That means the time is now, right now, to crank up the fear machine. If the Obama administration is serious, if the president is honest about policy, the Iranians must not be permitted to acquire nuclear weapons. Given that they are not far from that goal (how far is a matter of debate between people of equally good will) the mullahs must be made to focus their minds. They must be scared again.
This means drop the cringing. Stop the disengaged stance on the vile actions of the mullahs and their ilk. It means stop bemoaning our military weakness, our inability and unwillingness to send more men, more weapons, more ships, more planes, to the far corners of the world in support of policy. It means taking a very strong, very well articulated and quite consistent stance against the current Iranian regime and its actions. It means openly (and covertly) supporting the opposition. It means drawing a firm line in the sand and letting the Iranians know the precise consequences which will result should they cross the line.
It means taking risks. Very real, very large risks. It even means, (say it ain't so) putting the Great Agenda For Transformation at risk.
It means both talking the talk and walking the walk.
It is either that or abject surrender of our core values, principles and, potentially, national and strategic interests to a collection of reactionary True Believers.
That's the choice. It isn't pretty. It isn't nice. It isn't pleasant to contemplate. But, the way in which the choice is made will have massive and continued impact on the future of the US and the world. It is President Obama's call.
The question is simple: Is the Nice Young Man From Chicago both tough enough and smart enough to make it?
One can be forgiven for shuddering over the probable answer.
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