Category: Iran

The latest version.

Fallows hits the nail on the head:

You could also argue, from a purely operational perspective, that as the first woman ever to have a plausible chance to become president, Hillary Clinton is the one candidate who can never ever appear to be "soft." It’s fine for senators like Jim Webb or Chuck Hagel, with their Vietnam-combat photos on their office walls, to say that a particular war would be rash, unnecessary, doomed, or self-defeating. Indeed, both of those senators were among the 22 with the guts and sense to vote against Kyl-Lieberman. (Barack Obama said he was against the measure, but he didn’t change his campaign schedule to show up and cast a No vote.) But — the operational argument would continue — the moment a Democratic female candidate cast such a vote, she would lose her "political viability within the system," in words her husband once used.

I can understand that logic. The question in: when does it end? If the experience of supporting the Iraq war wasn’t enough to embolden her to oppose Kyl-Lieberman and its implied threat of war with Iran, what would? If she is sworn in as the first female president, she will still have to remove doubts about her "toughness." There will be the 2010 midterms to think of. And of course the 2012 reelection campaign. And if she is tough enough to get through that, then concerns about her legacy. Over the long run, is there any difference between a candidate who needs to "seem" hawkish on questions like Iraq and Iran, and a candidate who is an actual hawk?

Clinton’s foreign policy is determined by the post-Reagan Democratic defensive crouch, compounded by the gender issue. It gives her much less flexibility as a potential president than Obama. On the key questions on Iran and Iraq, Clinton’s judgment has been wrong and Obama’s right. Doesn’t all this have to make a difference? On the war, why on earth would a Democrat want to elect a punching bag who is already afraid of the VRWC?

Greenwald notices a January 2006 quote from Clinton that will not likely endear her to the base, especially in the wake of the Iran NIE this week:

Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) accused the Bush administration of playing down the threat of a nuclear Iran and called for swift action at the United Nations to impose sanctions on the Iranian government.

The senator’s statements, in which she said the administration should make it clear that all options remain on the table for dealing with the Iranians, came during a speech about the Middle East on Wednesday night at Princeton University. She criticized the White House for turning the problem over to European nations and said Iran must never be permitted to acquire nuclear weapons.

"I believe we lost critical time in dealing with Iran because the White House chose to downplay the threats and to outsource the negotiations," Clinton said. "I don’t believe you face threats like Iran or North Korea by outsourcing it to others and standing on the sidelines."

Matt parses the veep:

It’s not as if Cheney read the NIE and decided he had some reason to believe it was incorrect. Rather, he read it, decided he’d better not contradict it, but also decided that bottom line conclusions about how Iran had halted its nuclear weapons program were inconvenient, and thus decided to talk around that minor point and try to get the American people confused about what’s happening. Stunningly cynical and yes I’m resolving once again to never be stunned.

A nice summary:

Iran’s choice is reasonably smart: talk big like Libya, stop short of weapons like Japan, but signal willingness to aggressively defend like Israel. I told you these guys are not stupid.

Sy Hersh says that Bush told Olmert about it before Hadley said the president was first informed. In the end, the bullshit catches up to you.

Greenwald wonders why ElBaradei’s rep is so poor; Joyner summarizes Victor Davis Hanson’s first response:

Since our intelligence estimates are so often wrong, the neocons might still be right about Iran’s nukes. And, if not, it’s only because the neocons were right on Iraq!

Heh. They’re always right, doesn’t James realize that? Neocon Central has five questions for the NIE. Robert Farley suspects that the Iraq war might yet have had a good effect:

I think it’s possible that U.S. activity in Iraq may have had some effect on the Iranian decision. First, the destruction of Hussein’s regime removed the greatest threat to Iranian security, and ensured that Iran would have a greater influence over Gulf affairs whether or not it produced a nuclear weapon.

For my part, the news from the NIE comes, obviously, as a relief, although I think it’s fair to take all judgments from the NIE with a degree of salt. I don’t think it means abandoning diplomatic and economic pressure on Tehran; but I do think it removes all likelihood of this administration launching a new war in the next year. This will be the next president’s problem, and we have to ask: who is best capable of delivering a strategy of careful threats and inducements?

The president explains exactly when he got the message that Iran had suspended its nuke weapons program:

He was told of the new data in August, but seemed uninterested in what it had to say.

From a piece in May 2006:

"Inside the Pentagon, senior commanders have increasingly challenged the President’s plans . . . A crucial issue in the military’s dissent, the officers said, is the fact that American and European intelligence agencies have not found specific evidence of clandestine activities or hidden facilities; the war planners are not sure what to hit… [A] high-ranking general added that the military’s experience in Iraq, where intelligence on weapons of mass destruction was deeply flawed, has affected its approach to Iran. ‘We built this big monster with Iraq, and there was nothing there. This is son of Iraq,’ he said.”

Hat tip: Shaun Mullen. In the end, Cheney simply couldn’t match the facts about Iran. And the Iraq debacle doubtless strengthened his critics.

Does he gain the most? Larison notes Huckers’ recent statement on Iran:

While there can be no rational dealing with Al Qaeda, Iran is a nation state looking for regional power, it plays the normal power politics that we understand and can skillfully pursue, and we have substantive issues to negotiate with them.

He certainly sounds more clued-in than Romney, Giuliani or McCain. Paul is the exception, again, who proves the rule.