Negotiations, If You Want Them

Kofi Annan says Iran is happy to negotiate about its nuclear program but, rather sensibly, isn't willing to concede everything in advance by suspending uranium enrichment as a condition for having the talks. Meanwhile, one two three silly UN-bashing posts from Marty Peretz at the Plank. I'm told he'll be getting a blog of his own soon, to help replace the dearly departed Lee Siegel.

My fellow liberals in town keep assuring me that there's not going to be a war with Iran. It's just not possible, it's too crazy, etc. I don't know. They could be right. Their argument makes sense. But I'm not so sure. Certainly, most of the relevant people are acting like they'd like to start a war with Iran. And the relevant people inside the government haven't exactly been known to let "X would be a really bad idea" stop them from doing X. I'd be worried. I'm especially worried that our progressive leaders don't seem to be worried. Clearly, there are people out there agitating for war. If the people who don't want a war don't take them and the threat they pose seriously, that only makes it more likely that they'll get their war.

Comments

It's hard to believe the US would start another war, but with this group... well you just never know. But if Bush does indeed attack Iran, here's some things I've been thinking about:

Iran has never been successfuly invaded. Ever. As well, they have a real army, not one where half the troops (having been paid off by the US) will lay down their weapons & run away like Saddam's troops. American casualties will be through the roof compared to Iraq. How will the US public react to these new deaths?

Where would the troops come from? US forces are already stretched thin. Perhaps Bush would take troops from Iraq & redeploy them in Iran. Not exactly the withdrawl from Iraq people are calling for. I can't see how Bush could fight a war with Iran without instituting some kind of draft. Again, I don't think public opinion would be favourable.

There'll be no "coalition of the willing" this time around. I doubt even Tony Blair would be on board (& if he were, it would spell the death of his political career & perhaps the death of his party). The US would be on its own.

Any doubts on the Arab street that Bush's War on Terror is really a crusade against the Islamic world would be dispelled. In the event of an attack/invasion against Iran, you could expect an attack on American soil within the year.

I only hope that Chris Nelson (over at The Washington Note) is right & that Bush is listening to Condi more than Cheney or Rumsfeld for now, & opting for a more diplomatic approach. Then again the last few months have been disturbingly similar to the runup to the Iraq war, so...

Posted by raff | September 4, 2006 12:28 PM

They're not gonna invade. The Army doesn't want to invade, because they know they don't have the troops, and they know that getting involved in a ground war in the Asian equivalent of Switzerland is the worst idea ever.

What they're gonna do is bomb. The Air Force is run with a mixture of high technology and batshit insanity. They think they can bomb the nuclear plants (Osirak! w00t!) and probably hit some military and civilian places as well that are closely related to ter'. These bomb strikes will fail.

Iran will try to strike back, probably in Iraq, and the US will then agitate for a full war. It will be a magnificent fuckup.

The only question for me is whether it will happen before the elections or after.

Posted by DivGuy | September 4, 2006 12:49 PM

"I'm told he'll be getting a blog of his own soon, to help replace the dearly departed Lee Siegel."

Thank god. Dude really uglies up The Plank.

Posted by Petey | September 4, 2006 1:01 PM

I'm with DivGuy (above) -- the plan is to bomb, not to invade. Bombing will fail in whatever goals Bush and Cheney set for it.

Iran may want to massively disrupt the entire global economy, and I think they could do it pretty efficiently without ever engaging a significant US military asset in conventioal warfare.

I'm thinking a global depression is a possibility. The Dems should make sure that, if we "need" to fight Iran, the American people should be prepared for a Great Depression.

If Iran does what it could do, an awful lot of American highways will be barren of automobiles and we'll be walking everywhere we go. Of course, there won't be much of anywhere we need to go, since there won't be any jobs.

That seems much more inviting than talking to evildoers, I'm sure.

Is the above scenario likely? No, but it's possible. We can't always pick fights with people who don't retaliate with a gutshot.

Posted by riffle | September 4, 2006 1:02 PM

Right, somehow I didn't mention what Iran could do to the world economy. That's really hte worst thing.

Unless, of course, US air strikes on military-civilian targets cause the Iranian people to rise up in pro-American revolt! We need to take that into account if we are to be serious, hard-headed foreign-policy-talking guys.

Posted by DivGuy | September 4, 2006 1:07 PM

"Clearly, there are people out there agitating for war. If the people who don't want a war don't take them and the threat they pose seriously, that only makes it more likely that they'll get their war."

How on earth do you reach that conclusion?

If the WH bombs Iran, they'll do it after November 7th. They'll have a bit more than two years after November 7th to bomb any nation they damn well please.

How, exactly, will getting people to take "the threat they pose seriously" have any effect whatsover on the WH's use of cruise missiles and bombers after the election? They're willing to endure low poll numbers. They're don't need any prior approval.

If they want to bomb, they'll bomb. This is the wages of losing elections.

(To clarify: I have nothing against reporting or opining on the folly of bombing Iran. I only object to the folly of not recognizing that the WH has an absolutely free hand in practical terms. We are at the mercy of Dick Cheney's notion of prudence.)

Posted by Petey | September 4, 2006 1:22 PM

Iran has never been successfully invaded? Do you mean in the modern era? How many attempts have their been? What about the Mongols? What about the Caliphate? Invading Iran will certainly be more difficult and it a terribly stupid idea, but why try to bolster your case with hyperbole?

Posted by Patrick | September 4, 2006 1:53 PM

How, exactly, will getting people to take "the threat they pose seriously" have any effect whatsover on the WH's use of cruise missiles and bombers after the election? They're willing to endure low poll numbers. They're don't need any prior approval.

They don't need any prior approval, but I think it's foolish to believe that public opinion has no impact on these decisions. The White House doesn't exist in a vacuum apart from the broader Republican Party and whether or not bombing Iran is popular will factor into the decision-making.

Posted by Matthew Yglesias | September 4, 2006 2:30 PM

Iran has never been successfully invaded? Do you mean in the modern era?

During WW2 the British and Soviets occupied Iran, to secure a route for Western aid to reach the Soviet Union.

Posted by David Tomlin | September 4, 2006 2:42 PM

People have been asking me for over a year whether I expected us to go to war with Iran. For a long time, my answer was "no, we're not seeing war propaganda." But now we are, and it's two steps before a full blitz marketing campaign. The same people who trumpeted the babies in incubators and the meeting in Prague are now (slightly) revising their talking points to nukes in Tel Aviv and the usual parallels to Hitler.

I'm not just worried, I'm a minute shy of fatalistic. This is the exact same push as before, and I don't see any reason it won't work again. The only hope is to win the midterms before the bombs start falling. I haven't heard any reports of the military realigning itself towards Iran. Campaigns take huge amounts of planning, management, logistics and the mass realignment of assets. It's not the sort of thing that can be kept quiet. Given what stage we are at with the marketing campaign, and given that the carrier groups and air force haven't started moving, I don't think we can see war until after the election. And given the impossible situation a new war would put us in, that makes democrats winning this election to the extent of taking back at least one house as the only hope for the future of this country.

Posted by MAX HATS | September 4, 2006 3:06 PM

well, matthew, what fun is it to have a ready riposte for petey and then see that you've already written it?

so, instead, let me ask you: what kind of dimwits are you hanging out with who try to assure you that there's not going to be a war with Iran? have they really not been paying attention the last 5.75 years? to follow on with the accurate kernel of petey's point, there's never been an administration more willing to ignore logic and public opinion than the bush administration. just because a given policy doesn't make sense is no reason to think that the backbone administration won't pursue it, and the people who are assuring you otherwise are being exceedingly foolish.

Posted by howard | September 4, 2006 3:32 PM

"Too crazy"?!?

Invading Iraq was also too crazy. "Of course they didn't actually want to invade Iraq, that would be insane. They wanted the AUMF partly as a pure political ploy for the 2002 elections, and partly to use to pressure Saddam to let the arms inspectors back into Iraq." Democrats convinced themselves that the latter was reasonable enough to justify promptly voting for the AUMF in the vain hope that they would thus disarm the former as a campaign issue. They were famously wrong on both counts. These unnamed "liberals" are just as wrong about Iran. Failing the emergence of some other more attractive October Surprise, you can be sure that some time in October, we will have either an invasion/bombing of Iran, or at least a vote on invading/bombing Iran.

Nothing, no matter how disastrously stupid for this country and the world, is too crazy for these people if it can be used to help them stay in power. And in 2002 and 2004, staying in power just meant continuing to enjoy the perks of power. In 2006, staying in power means staying out of jail for at least dozens, perhaps hundreds, of them. They have already -- just based on what is already publically known after 5 years of one-party, no-Congressional-oversight, rule -- broken the law systematically to pursue their last round of crazy illegal schemes designed to win them the last two elections. They will need even crazier, more outrageously illegal schemes to win in 2006 to evade punishment for these earlier sins. The new round of illegal craziness will make it that much more necessary for them to go even further into illegal craziness to win in 2008, and so on for 2010, 2012, etc, etc, growing ad infinitum until the real world finally rallies to smash them, and, by that time, this country that they have betrayed with their criminal insanity.

2006 is probably our last chance to stop them before this cycle spins out of the control of the regular processes of our political system. God help us all if Democrats fail to regain Congress in 2006, and then to restore real Congressional oversight.

Posted by Glen Tomkins | September 4, 2006 3:48 PM

"what kind of dimwits are you hanging out with who try to assure you that there's not going to be a war with Iran?"

Matthew may be confusing the chatter slightly. I've thought all year that the likelihood of bombing Iran pre-11/06 was very, very slim. And I think that's some of what folks have been saying.

As to the chances of a bombing campaign between 11/06 and 1/09, I guess the odds are no better than 50/50, and possibly a good deal lower than that. It's important to remember that the WH and the Iranian leadership both think they benefit from war talk. In that kind of environment, we're obviously going to hear lots of war talk no matter whether bombing is in the cards, or bombing is not in the cards.

Shorter Petey: the Iran war talk doesn't signify that we're bombing Iran, and it doesn't signify that we're not.

Posted by Petey | September 4, 2006 4:09 PM

Petey, i'm not sure why you're so convinced that the bush administration wouldn't make a military move on Iran prior to election day, and i'm certainly not sure why the bush administration wouldn't push for a congressional authorization for the use of force against Iran prior to election day.

but that said, exactly: there is no such thing, with this administration, as assuming that rationality will rule, and apparently matthew's "liberal" informants either forgot to mention they meant prior to election day (or matthew forgot to mention it) or forgot with whom they were dealing.

Posted by howard | September 4, 2006 5:07 PM

If you gave me even odds on whether we would bomb Iran, I would bet against. (Like others, I can't see an invasion. Too many practical obstacles) But that isn't to say it doesn't concern me or that I think we ought to discount the possibility. It certainly isn't out of the question and its something we need to be thinking about.

Posted by Gabe | September 4, 2006 5:27 PM

Iran "sensibly" refuses to "concede everything in advance" by suspending enrichment? What? Suspending isn't dismantling. How does it concede the entire question? Instead, it just ensures Iran doesn't enter negotiations for the express purpose of stringing things along until it has nuclear weapons or the ready capacity to build them. If making enrichment suspension a condition is such a far out wacky Bush administration idea, why did the Europeans secure it in their 2003 deal before the Bushies had even come on board?

Posted by rd | September 4, 2006 6:56 PM

Iran has never been successfuly invaded. Ever.

Never is a long time, and the repetition of "ever" suggests an absolute statement. Alexander the Great and the Mongols come to mind as successful conquerors of the area of modern Iran. The Seljuk Turks, too.

Posted by John | September 4, 2006 9:03 PM

They aren't going to just bomb Iran. They are going to nuke them. They haven't even been particularly secretive about their "divine" plan.

Posted by Brautigan | September 4, 2006 9:59 PM

"Petey, i'm not sure why you're so convinced that the bush administration wouldn't make a military move on Iran prior to election day"

I think it'd likely be a net negative for them in the midterms. Same thing with a resolution - they don't want public hearings ahead of the midterms.

Because of the hearings, I think the odds are somewhat against them going for a resolution even after the midterms. If they bomb, I think they'll want to do it with as free a hand as possible - kinda like Kosovo.

Posted by Petey | September 4, 2006 11:43 PM

petey, obviously time will tell, but personally, i think a ginned-up atmosphere in the last couple of weeks of the election season could make an enormous difference, and i didn't notice a spine transplant taking place that would encourage the gop to do something as sensible as "holding hearings" when the bush administration says "we have a brief window of opportunity to do something about iran and we must act now." i'm not saying it will happen, but i won't be suprised in the slightest if it does, and it it benefits the gop.

Posted by howard | September 5, 2006 1:25 AM

Anti-Iranian propaganda has gotten harsher of late, but there's nothing to suggest the problem is urgent, and it's still far from being a focus of popular hysteria. Until fairly recently I thought Bush might start bombing before the election, but now I don't think there's time for the usual preparation of public opinion.

They might pass some kind of resolution before the election, to make some Democrats choose between base and center. It seems that Democrats with substantial Jewish constituencies, like Hillary, think Iran-bashing is a plus for them.

Posted by David Tomlin | September 5, 2006 5:06 AM

Suspending isn't dismantling. . . . it just ensures Iran doesn't enter negotiations for the express purpose of stringing things along until it has nuclear weapons or the ready capacity to build them.

It also allows the U.S. to string Iran along.

If making enrichment suspension a condition is such a far out wacky Bush administration idea, why did the Europeans secure it in their 2003 deal before the Bushies had even come on board?

Was that part of a deal? I thought it was a unilateral concession by the Iranians, which they eventually rescinded because they got nothing in return for it.

Posted by David Tomlin | September 5, 2006 5:14 AM