Iran Policy and the 50th Anniversary of the Cuban Missile Crisis
The unrepentant neo-cons and backbenchers on Mitt Romney's foreign policy team, such as Dan Senor and Cofer Black, always advise their candidate to attack signs of "weakness"
coming from President Obama. The Administration's announcement of direct talks between the U.S.
and Iran should be welcomed as good news by those who
don't wish to see yet another bloodbath in the Middle East but Romney can be counted on to
condemn the diplomatic breakthrough as insufficiently
hawkish. The news that Obama has chosen dialogue over saber-rattling gives
Romney the opportunity to vent his criticism at the sole foreign policy debate
that falls on the 50th anniversary of the night when President John F. Kennedy first made public the
existence of Soviet nuclear missiles in Cuba. Fifty years ago,
President Kennedy, after being informed that Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev
had deployed intermediate-range nuclear missiles in Cuba, was able to move
beyond his knee jerk reaction to bomb and invade the island. Fortunately, over
the course of days Kennedy tempered his response by adding statesmanship to his
brinkmanship. The idea of bombing Cuba followed by a ground invasion was
sidelined in favor of more incremental pressures: seeking multilateral
assistance while enforcing a Naval "quarantine" of Soviet vessels to
give negotiations more time.As the United States tries to assess the danger of
Iran becoming a nuclear power the lessons of JFK's dealing with the Soviets over
the change in the nuclear status quo is more relevant than ever.The bluster and
war mongering of repeating the mantra "all options are on the table"
needlessly heightens tensions and makes war more likely if it is not
accompanied by face-saving ways out of the crisis. The U.S.'s adversary du jour,
(in this case the fallible clerics who run the Islamic Republic of Iran), typically do not
respond well to military threats of air strikes, "red lines," or
"axis of evil" rhetoric (thank you David Frum). These kinds of intimidating tactics coming from a nuclear power that
can lay waste to Iran, although favored by the neo-cons who brought us the
disastrous war in Iraq, if devoid of any links to a pathway out of the
confrontation amount to little more than bullying and belligerence. In the case
of Iran, the threat of "the use of force" after years of George W.
Bush's calamitous policies in the region do nothing to dissuade the Ayatollahs
from continuing their nuclear enrichment program.Iran remains a signatory to
the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), which has safeguards and allowances
for the civilian uses of nuclear power. The best U.S. intelligence analyses
conclude that Iran is not building an atomic bomb. If President Kennedy could offer an off-ramp from
disaster to Nikita Khrushchev, who was at the time the U.S.'s most bombastic
ideological foe who possessed a nuclear arsenal big enough to do serious
damage, then a sitting U.S. president today can give Ayatollah Ali Khamenei (a
far weaker adversary) a similar face-saving way out of the current
"crisis." Through secret backchannels, Kennedy offered Khrushchev
sweeteners in the form of offering to remove the U.S.'s Jupiter missiles
from Turkey and pledging not to invade the island in exchange for the Soviets
agreeing to take their missiles out of Cuba. Any public ultimatum
("red line") against Iran absent of private
offers of concessions amounts to nothing more than war mongering. A wiser
policy toward Iran more akin to the one Kennedy applied to Cuba during the
missile crisis would be to take the military option "off the table,"
quiet down the noise level from actors in the U.S. and in the region (such as Bibi Netanyahu) who are screaming for a war, and deal with Iran on terms of mutual
respect and a realist recognition of shared interests. This dual-track policy
appears to be where President Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Rodham
Clinton are heading. It is the only policy that can defuse the
"crisis." There is no military solution. Let's not forget that in the
aftermath of the 9/11 attacks Iran offered to help the United States track down Al Qaeda and has assisted in stemming the drug traffic out
of Afghanistan. And let's also not forget that the Reagan Administration armed the government of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini in the mid-1980s in an
attempt (according to Reagan) to open up a "dialogue." And let's not
further forget that it was the U.S. Central Intelligence
Agency that in August 1953 overthrew the democratically elected government of Mohammad Mossadegh and
installed the Shah Reza Pahlavi. The CIA coup d'état, organized from within the U.S. embassy in Tehran, re-wrote that
nation's history denying Iran in the early 1950s what might be called today a
"Persian Spring." There has never been an adequate American
acknowledgement that the U.S. was responsible for
propping up a dictatorship in Iran under the Shah for 25
years, which set the stage for the 1979 revolution that brought the clerics to
power in the first place. The recent history of American-Iranian relations,
which has been a lengthy series of underhanded and failed policies, must be
taken into account. A little humility on the American side could go a long
way.In October 1962, President Kennedy's sobering experience during the missile
crisis led directly to his American University speech of June 1963
where he called for an end to the demonization and brinkmanship of the Cold
War. The crisis also put the Atmospheric Test-Ban Treaty on the front burner of
his priorities and Kennedy spent considerable political "capital" in
prodding the U.S. Senate to ratify the treaty. Had Kennedy decided to bomb and invade Cuba it would have been
popular with the hardliners around him and with American public opinion. But it
is also highly likely that one of the 98 tactical nuclear bombs on the island
would have been detonated over the heads of U.S. marines. (There had
been good cause for politicians and other residents of Washington to begin readying
bunkers and bomb shelters.) On October 22, 1962, in announcing the existence of the missiles President Kennedy
chillingly told the world that any detonation of a nuclear device in the Western Hemisphere would be considered
"an attack by the Soviet Union on the United States, requiring a full retaliatory response upon the Soviet Union." Yet he understood that
Khrushchev would have to brush back the hardliners inside his own government.
Imposing a U.S. Navy "quarantine" of Soviet ships heading for Cuba and bringing in the
United Nations and allies to help find a way out of the crisis was the least
pugnacious of the military options and it bought time for negotiations. Robert F. Kennedy was sent as his brother's emissary to privately talk to the Kremlin-connected journalist, Georgi Bolshakov,
and to Soviet Ambassador Anatoly Dobrynin. The U.S. offered to dismantle
its Jupiter missiles in Turkey and agreed not to try
to topple the Castro regime. In late 1963, Kennedy even sent out feelers to the
Cuban government that normalizing U.S. relations might be a
possibility if Castro agreed to certain conditions, such as limiting the Soviet
military presence. Although these efforts were cut short by Kennedy's
assassination they illustrate that he was willing to make substantial
concessions and push against the Cold War orthodoxy of the period that took as
gospel that the Soviets only respected threats of massive violence.With the
ongoing partisan attacks against President Obama when facing challenges in a
more complicated world than existed a half century ago, along with his
ill-advised escalation of drone attacks that only increase tensions and create
new enemies, the last thing this country needs is to blunder itself into
another misguided war. What's needed when dealing with Iran and its nuclear
program is the cautious pragmatism and willingness to bend and make concessions
that characterized President Kennedy's strategy 50 years ago.During the missile
crisis the United States and the Soviet Union sidelined regional actors who
called for military actions that would be in nobody's interest (including those
demanding it). And like the crisis of 1962 the tensions with Iran in 2012 can
be lessened with a greater willingness to compromise, the offering of
concessions, and a recognition that war will only bring added misery and
hardship to the people in that part of the world who have already endured
enough. Romney will no doubt go on the offensive against Obama's new Iran initiative decrying
it as "weak" and not aligned with his neo-con proclivities. The
Right's echo chamber will denounce the timing of the announcement of talks with
Iran as an "October Surprise." But we mustn't allow their shrill,
politicized whining about sensible diplomatic overtures drown out the crucial
need for a peaceful resolution of the conflict. Unfortunately, neither
candidate today could make the kind of speech that President Kennedy delivered
in June 1963 without enduring considerable political fallout. Kennedy said in
his American University address: "History teaches us that enmities between nations, as between
individuals, do not last forever. However fixed our likes and dislikes may
seem, the tide of time and events will often bring surprising changes in the
relations between nations and neighbors. So let us persevere. Peace need not be
impracticable, and war need not be inevitable. By defining our goal more
clearly, by making it seem more manageable and less remote, we can help all people
to see it, to draw hope from it, and to move irresistibly towards it... For in
the final analysis, our most basic common link is that we all inhabit this
small planet. We all breathe the same air. We all cherish our children's
futures. And we are all mortal .We shall
do our part to build a world of peace where the weak are safe and the
strong are just. We are not helpless before that task or hopeless of its
success. Confident and unafraid, we must labor on not towards a strategy of
annihilation but towards a strategy of peace."
Romney and Obama in last chance debate
President Barack Obama and
Republican challenger Mitt Romney face off in front of the cameras for a final
time this afternoon as opinion polls show their battle for the White House has
tightened to a dead heat.With 15 days to go until the November 6 election, the
two candidates turn to foreign policy for their third and last debate.The
stakes are high. The two candidates are tied at 46% each in the Reuters/Ipsos
online daily tracking poll, and the debate will likely be the last time either
candidate will be able to directly appeal to millions of voters.Though few
voters cite the war in Afghanistan or other national-security topics as a top
concern, Obama can point to a number of successes on his watch, from the end of
the Iraq war to the killing of Osama bin Laden.Romney will use worries about
the prospect of a nuclear Iran and turmoil in Libya to try to amplify concerns
about Obama's leadership at home and abroad."Many voters are ready to fire
Obama if they see Romney as an acceptable alternative," said David Yepsen,
director of the Paul Simon Public Policy Center at Southern Illinois University."Foreign policy has not been a big driver of this
campaign but I think Romney could add some icing to his cake if people say,
'Hey, this guy is on top of world affairs.'"Impact of debates Presidential debates have not always been
consequential, but this year they have had an impact.Romney's strong
performance in the first debate in Denver on October 3 helped him recover from
a series of stumbles and wiped out Obama's advantage in opinion polls.Obama
fared better in their second encounter on October 16, but that has not helped
him regain the lead.The Obama campaign is now playing defense as it tries to limit
Romney's gains in several of the battleground states that will decide the
election.Romney could have a hard time winning the White House if he does not
carry Ohio, and a new Quinnipiac/CBS poll shows Obama leading by 5 percentage
points in the Midwestern state.Last-chance More than 60 million viewers watched each
of their previous two debates, but the television audience this time could be
smaller as it will air at the same time as high-profile baseball and football
games.Much of the exchange, which takes place at Lynn University in Boca Raton,
Florida, will likely focus on the Middle East. Other topics such as trade with
China and the debt crisis in Europe could allow the candidates to circle back
to the economic concerns that are topmost on voters' minds.Campaigning in
Canton, Ohio, Vice President Joe Biden on Monday reminded voters of Obama's
pledge to pull troops out of Afghanistan in the next two years and pointed out
that Romney and his running mate Paul Ryan have made no such
guarantees."They said, quote, it depends. Ladies and gentlemen, like
everything with them, it depends," Biden said. "It depends on what
day you find these guys."Romney accuses Obama of presiding over a
weakening in US influence abroad, but he has to assure voters he is a credible
alternative to the president on the world stage. The former Massachusetts
governor's July trip to London, Jerusalem and Poland was marked by missteps.Libya
attack The two men at their second debate last week clashed bitterly
over Libya, a preview of what is to come in today's debate.They argued over
Obama's handling of the attack last month on the US consulate in Benghazi,
Libya, in which Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans were
killed.The Obama administration first labeled the incident a spontaneous
reaction to a video made in the United States that lampooned the Prophet
Mohammad.Later, it said it was a terrorist assault on the 11th anniversary of
the September 11, 2001, attacks.This shifting account, and the fact that Obama
went on a campaign trip the day after the attack, has given Romney ammunition
to use at the Florida debate."The statements were either misleading by
intention or they were misleading by accident. Either way, though, he's got to
get to the bottom of this," Romney adviser Dan Senor said on NBC's
"Today" show.'Leading from behind' Obama and his
allies charge that Romney exploited the Benghazi attack for political points
while officials were still accounting for the wellbeing of US
diplomats.Regarding foreign policy overall, Obama's allies accuse Romney of
relying on generalities and platitudes."It is astonishing that Romney has
run for president for six years and never once bothered to put forward a plan
to end the war in Afghanistan, for example, or to formulate a policy to go
after al Qaeda," US Senator John Kerry, the Democrats' 2004 presidential
nominee, wrote in a memo released by the Obama campaign on Monday.Romney has
promised to tighten the screws over Iran's nuclear program and accused Obama of
"leading from behind" as Syria's civil war expands.He also has
faulted Obama for setting up a politically timed exit from the unpopular
Afghanistan war, and accused him of failing to support Israel, an important
ally in the Middle East.The Republican challenger is likely to bring up a New
York Times report from Saturday that said the United States and Iran had agreed
in principle to hold bilateral negotiations to halt what Washington and its
allies say is a plan by Tehran to develop nuclear weapons.The 90-minute debate,
moderated by Bob Schieffer of CBS, will be divided into six segments: America's
role in the world; the war in Afghanistan; Israel and Iran; the changing Middle
East; terrorism; and China's rise.
'Fit' Fidel Castro appears in public
Cuban revolutionary
leader Fidel Castro has reappeared in public, meeting at a Havana hotel with a
Venezuelan politician - quashing swirling rumours that the former leader was on
his death bed.Castro - who led Communist Cuba for almost five decades before
illness sidelined him - "is very well", Venezuela's former vice
president Elias Jaua said on Sunday after meeting the bearded revolutionary
icon.The 86 year-old Castro "is very well, very lucid", Jaua, a loyal
supporter of leftist Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, whose government keeps
the cash-strapped Cuban regime afloat with cut-rate oil and aid - told
reporters.After the five-hour meeting on Saturday, Castro accompanied Jaua back
to the posh Hotel Nacional, where the visitor was staying, and then posed
wearing a straw farmer's hat for pictures with hotel staff."We are going
to have Fidel with us for a long time," said hotel manager Antonio
Martinez, who posed with Castro for a picture, in which Jaua also flashes a
broad smile.Martinez said the former Cuban president was accompanied by his
wife Dalia Soto del Valle during the visit to the hotel.Jaua, who is currently
a candidate for Miranda state governor for Venezuela's ruling party, said he
spoke with Castro about agriculture, history and international politics.Castro,
who rose to power after the 1959 revolution, ceded the presidency to his
younger brother Raul, 81, in July 2006 for health reasons.Castro had not been
seen in public since 28 March, when Pope Benedict XVI paid a landmark visit to
Cuba, and again briefly the following week on 5 April with Chilean student
leader Camila Vallejo. Serious
intestinal surgeryThat fuelled rumours his health had worsened, that he
was dead or on his death bed - particularly since Castro also had not published
one of his usually frequent editorials in official state media since 19 June.In
the past five years since falling ill after serious intestinal surgery, Castro
has penned about 400 editorials as well as books about the revolution, and
welcomed a few international leaders in private events.Last week, he sent a
letter of congratulations to medical school graduates which was picked up in
state media, but he did not appear in public at the time.With rumours about
Castro's health rife abroad, one of his sons, photographer Alex Castro, said
last week at an exhibit in Guantanamo of pictures he took of his father after
2010 that Castro "was in good shape, doing his daily activities,
exercising, reading and taking care of himself".The re-election of Chavez,
58, in Venezuela this month likely brought huge sighs of relief in Havana. For
now, it can continue to count on Caracas' critical economic support, as Cuba
presses its quest for its own oil to fund the Americas' only Communist regime
in the future.Meanwhile, President Raul Castro, sporting his general's uniform,
was out early on Sunday at a polling station to cast his ballot in one-party
municipal elections, state TV showed. Fidel Castro cast his vote by absentee
ballot, as those with physical ailments are allowed to do.
