October 11-13
by Warren L. Nelson
President Obama says going into talks with the Islamic Republic isn’t a matter of trusting Iran but of testing it.
The Obama Administration has come under attack from some Republicans who see the exchange of pleasantries between Obama and President Rohani last month as the start of a cave-in by the United States that will result in Iran being allowed to build nuclear weapons.
Rohani is facing similar criticism from hardliners in Tehran who fear Rohani is being lulled and gulled by the Americans.
Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry have been at great pains to explain that Washington is not prepared to ease sanctions based on pledges of cooperation by the Islamic Republic. Sanctions, they have said, will be eased as Iran takes concrete steps to bring its nuclear program in line with international demands—that is, after it has been tested.
Those demands may in flux. The UN Security Council resolutions call for Iran to “suspend” enrichment. But Obama has noticeably avoided the word enrichment. It is widely believed the administration is prepared to accept enrichment by Iran that does not exceed 3.5 percent.
The word Obama harps on now is “transparency.” That suggests the administration is emphasizing an agreement that will allow inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to more closely monitor what Iran is doing in the nuclear realm. And the IAEA itself has said that requires the Islamic Republic to sign the “Additional Protocol” to the Non-Proliferation Treaty, which authorizes more intrusive inspections in the countries that have signed it.
Of the 145 nations in the IAEA, all but 24 have the Additional Protocol in force now. Most of those outside the Additional Protocol are insignificant, like Kiribati, Antigua and Cape Verde, but they also include India, Algeria and Malaysia as well as Iran.
But the Majlis has forbidden Iran to adhere to the Additional Protocol and it is a hot button issue with hardliners.
Kerry responded to Americans opposed to talks by saying that to refuse to engage with Iran would be “diplomatic malpractice.” This is a point Democrats have made for a decade dating back to the reluctance of the George W. Bush Administration to engage in negotiations with Iran.
Many Republicans argue that talking to Iran is a concession to it and confers legitimacy on it. Democrats argue that a refusal to talk makes the United States look recalcitrant and plays into the Islamic Republic’s hands. Democrats like to point out that Europe only agreed to tough sanctions on Iran after Obama made clear his desire to talk by writing letters to Iran and making repeated public offers of talks that were rebuffed by Iran.
While Republicans denounced Obama as kowtowing to Iran with pleas to come to talks, Europeans instead began to see Iran as the problem, not Washington, and shifted to strong support for tough sanctions.
In an interview Saturday with The Associated Press, Obama made the point that he is out to “test” Iran with the upcoming talks.
First, Obama talked about his view of what has been going on inside Iranian politics.
“Here’s what we know,” he said. “He [Rohani] was not necessarily the preferred candidate of some of the ruling clerics when he initially threw his hat into the ring. He won pretty decisively.
“So what we know is that, in the Iranian population at least, there is a genuine interest in moving in a new direction. Their economy has been crippled by international sanctions that were put in place because Iran had not been following international guidelines, and had behaved in ways that made a lot of people feel they were pursuing a nuclear weapon.
“I think Rohani has staked his position on the idea that he can improve relations with the rest of the world. And, so far, he’s been saying a lot of the right things. And the question now is: can he follow through? The way the Iranian system works, he’s not the only decision maker — he’s not even the ultimate decision maker.
“But, if in fact he is able to present a credible plan that says: Iran is pursuing peaceful nuclear energy but we’re not pursuing nuclear weapons, and we are willing to be part of a internationally verified structure so that all other countries in the world know we are not pursuing nuclear weapons, then, in fact, they [Iran] can improve relations, improve their economy. And we should test that.” Obama said.
The AP noted Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu last year said Iran was about six months away from having most of the enriched uranium needed to produce a nuclear weapon while Obama said in March that he thought Iran was a year or more away. The AP asked what the US intelligence assessment is now on that timetable?
“Our assessment continues to be a year or more away,” Obama said.
But Obama was very kind to Netanyahu and suggested that Israel was not being unreasonable given the Islamic Republic’s hostility for Israel.
“I think Prime Minister Netanyahu understandably is very skeptical about Iran, given the threats that they’ve made repeatedly against Israel, given the aid that they’ve given to organizations like Hezbollah and Hamas that have fired rockets into Israel. If I were the prime minister of Israel, I would be very wary as well of any kind of talk from the Iranians.
“But what I’ve said to Prime Minister Netanyahu is that the entire point of us setting up sanctions and putting pressure on the Iranian economy was to bring them to the table in a serious way to see if we can resolve this issue diplomatically. And we’ve got to test that,” Obama said, returning to his theme of testing Iran.
“We’re not going to take a bad deal,” he said in a response to US critics. “We are going to make sure that we verify any agreement that we might strike.
“But it is very much in not only the United States’ interest but also Israel’s interest to see if we can resolve this without some sort of military conflict. And so we now have the time to have those serious conversations, and we’ll be able to measure how serious the Iranians are,” he concluded, again returning to his theme of testing Iran.