U.S.-Iran War Deadline: March 2013?

It is often argued that the 2003 War in Iraq was a "war of choice". But in fact it was a war of last resort. As Micah Zenko puts it in the article below, "After 12 years of diplomacy, 17 U.N. Security Council resolutions, increasingly targeted economic sanctions, multiple international inspection efforts, no-fly zones over both northern and southern Iraq, the selective use of U.S. military force in 1998, and Saddam Hussein's rejection of a final opportunity to leave Iraq and avoid war, the United States and the international community were out of options."

Almost a full decade later, the United States has begun to shift its strategy with respect to Iran. As with Iraq in 2003, the United States and its allies recognize that negotiations with Iran cannot drag on ad infinitum. Zenko explains, "Last week... the United States made a significant shift in its strategy. This move, if it plays out, could finally result in the long-rumored and much-debated military attack on Iran's known nuclear sites. In a prepared statement to the agency's Board of Governors, Robert A. Wood, chargé d'affaires to the IAEA, said:

Iran cannot be allowed to indefinitely ignore its obligations by attempting to make negotiation of a structured approach on PMD [possible military dimensions] an endless process. Iran must act now, in substance.... If by March Iran has not begun substantive cooperation with the IAEA, the United States will work with other Board members to pursue appropriate Board action, and would urge the Board to consider reporting this lack of progress to the UN Security Council."

This is certainly a development to watch in the months ahead. The world cannot allow the fanatical Iranian authoritarian Islamic theocracy, driven by 7th Century eschatology, to obtain nuclear weapons. Zenko's article is below. - R.O.

Headlines to watch:

- Iranian nuclear bomb would trigger arms race: Iran ex-official

- US, allies said to be prepared to ‘rapidly’ intervene if Assad utilizes chemical weapons

- USS Eisenhower aircraft carrier arrives off Syrian shore
- Israeli Intelligence Official: Border With Syria Will Soon be “the Hottest Border in Israel”

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Final Countdown: Did the U.S. just set a March deadline for war with Iran?

By: Micah Zenko - December 4, 2012 - Foreign Policy.com

Robert A. Wood, chargé d'affaires to the IAEA. Credit: Foreign Policy.com

If you have followed the covert and diplomatic efforts to prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon over the past five years, you know that new or noteworthy movements from Tehran, Tel Aviv, or Washington are few and far between. Iran makes fantastic claims about advances in its civilian nuclear program, many of which are subsequently confirmed by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); Israel threatens to attack Iran in a thinly veiled effort to impel the P5+1 negotiating group (China, Russia, the United States, France, the United Kingdom, and Germany) to increase economic and diplomatic sanctions; and American officials repeatedly pledge to prevent a nuclear Iran, while the U.S. military gradually strengthens its capabilities in theater and deepens its cooperation with Gulf states in order to contain Iran.

Underpinning this rhetorical bluster is the recognition that negotiations to compel Iran to cooperate with the IAEA -- to demonstrate that the Iranian civilian nuclear program does not have possible military dimensions, forbidden by the NPT Safeguards Agreement signed by Iran in 1974 -- are not sustainable. Experts predict that the nuclear dispute between the P5+1 (predominantly the United States) and Iran will ultimately be resolved -- either through negotiations or the use of force.Some (including yours truly) have speculated this resolution will come this year, or the following year, or the year after that. During a press conference on Thursday, Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak acknowledged this enduring forecasting problem: "I think that it will happen during 2013, but I thought that it will happen during 2012, and saw what happened -- and 2011."

Last week, however, the United States made a significant shift in its strategy. This move, if it plays out, could finally result in the long-rumored and much-debated military attack on Iran's known nuclear sites. In a prepared statement to the agency's Board of Governors, Robert A. Wood, chargé d'affaires to the IAEA, said:

Iran cannot be allowed to indefinitely ignore its obligations by attempting to make negotiation of a structured approach on PMD [possible military dimensions] an endless process. Iran must act now, in substance.... If by March Iran has not begun substantive cooperation with the IAEA, the United States will work with other Board members to pursue appropriate Board action, and would urge the Board to consider reporting this lack of progress to the UN Security Council.

Later that day, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was asked about Wood's mention of a March deadline. Her reply contained several interesting points:

What was meant about the March reference was either about the IAEA and its continuing work or the fact that we finished our election and now would be a good time to test the proposition that there can be some good-faith serious negotiations before the Iranians get into their elections, which are going to heat up probably around the March period, heading toward a June election.

It's a difficult matter to predict, because it really depends upon how serious the Iranians are about making a decision that removes the possibility of their being able to acquire a nuclear weapon or the components of one that can be in effect on a shelf somewhere and still serve as a basis for intimidation...We'll see in the next few months whether there's a chance for any kind of a serious negotiation.

Here, Clinton implies that the reason to "test" Iran now is not because of progress toward alleged weaponization, but because there is a window for negotiations, after the U.S. election and before the Iranian election. It is interesting that the Obama administration deemed it wrong to "test" Iran during the heat of the U.S. presidential elections but thinks it plausible that, during similar electoral uncertainty, Iranian leaders will reach a broad strategic agreement limiting the country's uranium-enrichment program.

Then, Clinton introduces a vague new goal for negotiations. Until now, Obama administration officials have repeated three claims about U.S. intelligence on Iran's nuclear program.

First, Iran has not decided to pursue a nuclear weapon. In February 2011, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper testified, "We continue to assess Iran is keeping open the option to develop nuclear weapons." But, he added, "We do not know...if Iran will eventually decide to build nuclear weapons." The following February, Clapper stated, "We don't believe they've actually made the decision to go ahead with a nuclear weapon."

Second, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei will make the final decision. As Clapper phrased it: "The decision would be made by the Supreme Leader himself, and he would base that on a cost-benefit analysis in terms of -- I don't think you want a nuclear weapon at any price."

Third, because Iran's nuclear program is an intelligence collection priority, U.S. officials would know when the Supreme Leader made this decision and what sort of evidence would reveal his intentions. Clapper: "[A] clear indicator would be enrichment of uranium to a 90 percent level." The declared nuclear sites where such enrichment occurs are subject to IAEA physical inventory verifications, which track progress in Iran's low-enriched uranium stockpiles and are published in quarterly reports.

Why did the Obama administration decide to set this new March deadline? Perhaps, like the Bush administration, it has simply become tired of confronting Iran. Here, the Bush administration's approach to Iraq is worth recalling. In a recent Foreign Policy piece reviewing U.S. policy options toward Iran, Steven Hadley, deputy national security adviser during the run-up to the invasion of Iraq, wrote:

The U.S. military action [in Iraq] was not, as many suggest, either a war of choice or a war of preemption. It was, rather, a war of last resort. After 12 years of diplomacy, 17 U.N. Security Council resolutions, increasingly targeted economic sanctions, multiple international inspection efforts, no-fly zones over both northern and southern Iraq, the selective use of U.S. military force in 1998, and Saddam Hussein's rejection of a final opportunity to leave Iraq and avoid war, the United States and the international community were out of options.

It is difficult to understand why the Bush administration decided to abandon a successful containment strategy of Iraq that cost $14.5 billion a year and no loss of life, for another that will ultimately cost over $3 trillion and the lives of 4,422 U.S. troops. Undertaking a war of choice without definitive evidence of an active chemical or biological weapons program -- let alone a nuclear program -- or threats to the U.S. homeland was an enormous strategic miscalculation with dire consequences.

The confrontation with Iran over its nuclear program dates back to August 2002, when it was first revealed that Iran had begun a covert uranium-enrichment program in the late 1980s. Since then, the IAEA has repeatedly stated what its Director General Yukio Amano declared last week: "Iran is not providing the necessary cooperation to enable us to provide credible assurance about the absence of undeclared nuclear material and activities, and therefore to conclude that all nuclear material in Iran is in peaceful activities."

At some point in February or early March of 2013, there will be two significant events relating to a potential countdown to an attack on Iran. Clapper will testify before the House and Senate as part of his annual threat briefings, and the IAEA will release its next quarterly report. Unless there is new intelligence, it is likely that Clapper will maintain his assessment that the Supreme Leader has not made the decision to pursue a bomb -- meaning to enrich enough uranium to bomb-grade level that can be formed into sphere that could be compressed into a critical mass. Meanwhile, absent breakthrough in the P5+1 negotiations or a decision by Tehran that unprecedented transparency with the IAEA will make things better, Amano will again report that there is inadequate cooperation.

In that case, the IAEA Board of Governors could refer Iran to the UN Security Council, which might pass a more robust version of Resolution 1929, which imposed sanctions. But then what? If the Supreme Leader does not make a decision to pursue a bomb (which the United States claims it would detect), and if Iran does not produce sufficient highly-enriched uranium for a bomb at a declared site (which the IAEA would detect), then what would trigger an attack by the United States and/or Israel? What would the "redline" be?

The answer depends greatly on whether the timeline to attack Iran is based on Israel's national interest and its military capabilities, or those of the United States. Israeli officials have stated at various times that redlines should be "clear" (without providing clarity) and that they "should be made, but not publicly." One also said, "I don't want to set redlines or deadlines for myself." Since November 2011, Israeli officials have also warned about a "zone of immunity," which Barak has described as "not where the Iranians decide to break out of the non-proliferation treaty and move toward a nuclear device or weapon, but at the place where the dispersal, protection and survivability efforts will cross a point that would make a physical strike impractical."

It is unclear how dispersed, protected, or survivable Iran's nuclear program would have to be, but Secretary Clinton's warning of "components...on a shelf somewhere" could indicate that the Obama administration is moving toward the zone of immunity logic. But what are these components, how many would be required to assume "weaponization," and how would this new intelligence be presented as a justification for war? In addition, it is tough to make the case for going to war with Iran because it refused to concentrate its nuclear sites (that are under IAEA safeguards) in above-ground facilities that can be easily bombed.

Previously, U.S. officials have been less eager than the Israelis to define a specific redline, largely because the two countries have different perceptions of the Iranian threat and vastly different military capabilities. Setting a March deadline provides some certainty and perhaps coercive leverage to compel Iran to cooperate with the IAEA. But declaring deadlines also places U.S. "credibility" on the line, generating momentum to use force even if there is no new actionable intelligence that Iran has decided to pursue a nuclear weapon. Based on what we know right now, that would be a strategic miscalculation.

By: Micah Zenko

Russia warns NATO to stay away from Syria

Today Russia's Deputy Foreign Minister Gennady Gatilov stated, "In our contacts with partners in NATO and in the region, we are calling on them not to seek pretexts for carrying out a military scenario or to introduce initiatives such as humanitarian corridors or buffer zones," Gatilov said, according to the Interfax news agency.

I'm not advocating for NATO intervention, but with the body count in Syria at 30,000 and rising - while the world community watches and does nothing - it is worthy to note that the Russians are even opposed to the idea of a humanitarian corridor to provide some relief to the millions of suffering Syrians. 

Every now and then the Russians remind the world that they are just as cold-hearted and ruthless as they were during the Cold War. No wonder the United Nations is as useless as it ever was. Naked self-interest still rules the day. - R.O.

Russia warns NATO to stay away from Syria

REUTERS 10/02/2012

MOSCOW - Russia told NATO and world powers on Tuesday they should not seek ways to intervene in the Syrian war or set up buffer zones between rebels and government forces.

The statements from Deputy Foreign Minister Gennady Gatilov was one of Moscow's most specific warnings yet to the West and Gulf Arab leaders to keep out of the 18-month-old conflict.

"In our contacts with partners in NATO and in the region, we are calling on them not to seek pretexts for carrying out a military scenario or to introduce initiatives such as humanitarian corridors or buffer zones," Gatilov said, according to the Interfax news agency.

Russia and China have vetoed three UN Security Council resolutions condemning Syrian President Bashar Assad and blocked attempts to impose sanctions on the country or intervene more directly in its conflict.

Syria's neighbor Turkey has floated the idea of setting up "safe zones" inside Syria to protect civilians but that would also have to be approved by the Security Council.

Gatilov urged restraint between Syria and NATO-member Turkey, one of Assad's harshest critics. Ankara has repeatedly complained of artillery and gunfire spilling over its border and last week it signaled it would take action if there was a repeat of a mortar strike on its territory from inside Syria.

"We believe both Syrian and Turkish authorities should exercise maximum restraint in this situation, taking into account the risings number of radicals among the Syrian opposition who can intentionally provoke conflicts on the border," Gatilov was quoted as saying.

Assad gives orders to 'cleanse' Aleppo
Meanwhile, Syrian President Bashar Assad visited the city of Aleppo to take a first-hand look at the fighting between government forces and rebels, a Lebanese paper said on Tuesday. The report also claimed that Assad has ordered 30,000 more troops into the battle.

Al-Diyar newspaper, which is known for its pro-Assad stance, said the president had flown by helicopter at dawn from the presidential palace in Damascus to Aleppo. It did not specify what day the trip started but said that Assad was still in Aleppo. The visit was decided on after reports that the situation in the city, Syria's largest and its commercial center, had become very serious.

"President Assad ordered units 5 and 6, estimated to be 30,000 soldiers and 2,000 personnel carriers, to move from Hama to Aleppo and to attack any occupied areas of Aleppo province from the Turkish border," it said. The paper said that Assad gave orders that Aleppo must be "cleansed" during the visit.

Reuters was unable to independently verify the report.

Rebels mounted a new offensive last week to seize the city, which was until July firmly under Assad's control. They claim to hold most of the Old City but are struggling to hang on to their positions in the face of heavy artillery fire.

The rebel forces are in the east and Assad's forces in the west of Aleppo. Fires started by the combat have gutted the historic market in the Old City, a world heritage site.

Opposition activists say 30,000 people have been killed in the 18-month-old anti-Assad uprising, which has grown into a full-scale civil war.

Syria's slaughter is the real insult to Islam

A worthy read. McParland states that since it is Muslims killing Muslims in Syria, while the Arab world sits back and does nothing, this is the real insult to Islam - not some obscure video produced in the United States. - R.O.

Kelly McParland: Syria’s slaughter is the real insult to Islam

Kelly McParland, National Post
Friday, Sept. 28, 2012

The UN General Assembly is a talking shop, where calling for action takes the place of actual action, but sometimes the talk becomes so opaque that even sorting out what the words mean becomes a challenge.

Such is the case this week in New York, where the world’s leaders met for their annual opportunity to lecture one another. Syria’s president Bashar al-Assad wasn’t there, because he’s still at home directing the slaughter of his countrymen. But his spirit was on hand, as a British organization announced that 305 people has been killed in a single day if fighting, the bloodiest day so far, and the UN’s own High Commissioner for Refugees warned that 700,000 refugees may have fled the country by year-end.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the daily death count included only victims whose names had been documented. “If we count the unidentified bodies, the figure will be much higher,” said Rami Abdel Rahman, according to Reuters. The group said 199 of the dead were civilians.

By some counts, the monthly carnage in Syria has now surpassed the highest levels reached during the Iraq war. There is no similar international effort in the works to oust Assad, probably because the U.S. organized the last one, and isn’t about to blunder into that hornets nest again. President Barack Obama ran on the promise he’d get U.S. troops out of Iraq and Afghanistan, not into new foreign adventures. And the U.S., for all the talk of its global influence having diminished, is still the only power that organizes these things.

That leaves the diplomats to demand action, without explaining what that might mean. Ban Ki-moon, the UN secretary-general, told the assembled worthies the Syrian revolt is “a regional calamity with global ramifications”.

“This is a serious and growing threat to international peace and security which requires security council action,” Ban said. “The international community should not look the other way as violence spirals out of control.”

He also called for those responsibility for atrocities in Syria to be held accountable, noting “there is no statute of limitations for such extreme violence”, and placing most of the blame on the Assad regime.

“Brutal human rights abuses continue to be committed, mainly by the government, but also by opposition groups. Such crimes must not go unpunished,” he said. “It is the duty of our generation to put an end to impunity for international crimes, in Syria and elsewhere. It is our duty to give tangible meaning to the responsibility to protect.”

In the world of diplomacy, these are unusually blunt words. But what exactly does Ban want? He didn’t say, exactly. He urged “the international community – especially the members of the Security Council and countries in the region – to solidly and concretely support the efforts” of a UN special envoy seeking to end the violence. “We must stop the violence and flow of arms to both sides and set in motion a Syrian-led transition as soon as possible.”

Well and good, but those efforts are going nowhere. Mr Ban’s predecessor, Kofi Annan, walked away from the job of special envoy, declaring it a hopeless task. His successor, Lakhdar Brahimi, lacks his stature and hasn’t made any headway. He says he’s working on a new plan, but won’t say when it might be ready.

Egypt’s new president, Mohamed Morsi, said the conflict is “the tragedy of the age,” and must be brought to an end. How? Again, he didn’t say, except that the West should keep its nose out of things and leave it to regional powers like Egypt, Iran, Saudi Arabia and Turkey.

“I am against foreign intervention by force in what happens in Syria,” Morsi said. “I do not condone this and I think that it is a big mistake if it happens,” he added through an interpreter. “Egypt does not agree to this.”

Vladimir Putin, the Russian president, has blocked earlier UN peace efforts and also thinks the West should [external] mind its own business.

“We are not imposing – especially by force -what we believe in, but we want to stimulate the internal development,” said Putin. “We have warned that we must act with caution, without imposing by force in order not to cause chaos. And what do we see today? We see a chaotic condition.”

So, everyone wants action, but not by Western powers that have the military muscle to force a climax. The regional powers that demand jurisdiction have done nothing to stem the spiraling body count. They want it ended, but are either incapable or unwilling to end it themselves and don’t want anyone else stepping in to try. Despite the hollering of domestic critics, the U.S. president seems disinclined to defy them, and has the body of the murdered Ambassador to Libya as a evidence of how good intentions often go off the rails once military action is put into play.

The truth seems to be that, despite what Mr. Ban and Mr. Morsi have to say, intervention in Syria doesn’t suit anyone’s purpose just now. No enough to risk their own skins, or those of their countrymen, anyway. If the Turks and the Egyptians and the Saudis want a solution, no one is going to block them from formulating one. For all the outrage over insults to Islam that have played out over an amateurish film on the Prophet, it’s Muslim corpses that are piling up in Syria, Muslim refugees who are fleeing for the border, and Muslim countries that are standing by. If Mr. Ban is increasingly frustrated about it, let him talk to Mr. Morsi.

National Post

With Iran Talking Genocide, Obama Must Show Courage

THE most important reason to stop Iran. A timely piece by Goldberg. - R.O.

With Iran Talking Genocide, Obama Must Show Courage
By: Jeffrey Goldberg

Sept. 3, 2012

The U.S. has often been feckless in its response to genocide. In the years leading up to World War II, and even during the war itself, it didn’t do nearly what it could have to offer refuge toEurope’s Jews and to thwart Adolf Hitler’s Final Solution, although much later we did build some excellent museums commemorating the event.

Our words since then have sometimes rung hollow. “Never again,” the slogan goes, but, as David Rieff once said, in actual practice “never again” has meant, “Never again will Germans kill Jews in Europe in the 1940s.”

The writer Ron Rosenbaum, in an essay for Slate that I mentioned last week, asks the question: How much discussion about the Holocaust is too much? Why does he raise this now? Because we’re approaching a pivotal moment in the continuing drama surrounding Iran’s nuclear progress -- and that means the U.S. may once again find itself in a position to confront the threat of genocide.

The rulers of Iran, who deny the historical reality of the Holocaust even as they dream of annihilating Israel, may in the very near future possess the ability to build nuclear weapons and to immunize their nuclear program from outside intervention. Rosenbaum argues eloquently that it isn’t neurotic or hysterical or parochial to worry that a regime that seeks the annihilation of Israel may be gaining the means to achieve it.

Civilized people have condemned the Iranian rhetoric, of course, most recently Ban Ki-moon, the United Nations secretary- general (who nevertheless granted the Iranian regime legitimacy by attending an international conference in Tehran last week). But Rosenbaum is surprised, as I am, that more people don’t seem to grasp the urgency of keeping nuclear weapons away from a regime that openly threatens genocide.
Clear Pattern

With a few exceptions, the American response to genocide, and to threats of genocide, has followed a clear pattern over the years, one characterized first by indifference and timidity, then paralysis, and ultimately regret. The pattern was set by Franklin D. Roosevelt’s administration, and in particular by his State Department, which reacted with depraved indifference to the gathering threat in Europe.

Postwar history is strewn with similar examples. In the late 1980s, the administrations of Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush not only did nothing to stop Saddam Hussein’s attempted genocide of the Kurds -- a slaughter that employed chemical weapons -- but even supported Saddam in his war against Iran. It was only when he invaded Kuwait that we took notice. Talk about dispiriting: Genocide didn’t bother us, but a threat to the smooth flow of oil did.

In 1994, President Bill Clinton did virtually nothing to stop the murder of 800,000 Rwandans (although he later expressed very feelingly his remorse at not intervening)

But it isn’t just our elected leaders who respond inadequately to genocide. The news media play a role, too. Here’s one recent example. Last month, the Washington Post published a lengthy article exploring Iraqi attitudes about the future after the final U.S. troop withdrawal from their country earlier this year.

“In dozens of interviews this summer across Iraq, many people said that their lives were safer and more prosperous under Hussein and that the U.S. invasion was not worth the price both countries have paid,” wrote the reporter, Kevin Sullivan.

This struck me as odd. Many Iraqis, particularly members of the Sunni Arab minority that ruled the country until Saddam’s ouster, regret the U.S. invasion, and many in the Shiite majority certainly regret the bungling and negligence that followed. But how do Kurds feel?
Elision of History

Kurds make up about 20 percent of the Iraqi population, and they were the group most victimized by Saddam’s Baathist regime. As many as 4,000 Kurdish villages were eradicated by his army; dozens of those villages were attacked with chemical weapons. Thousands of innocents were tortured. There is broad agreement in the international human-rights community that the anti- Kurdish campaign amounted to genocide.

The American invasion meant that Iraq’s Kurds were finally free from the threat of further slaughter. For this reason, it’s not easy to find a Kurdish Iraqi who opposed Saddam’s overthrow. But nowhere in the article is this mentioned. In fact, nowhere in the article is a Kurdish Iraqi even quoted. My point is not to pick on Sullivan, who’s an intrepid reporter. It’s to note that this elision of history in a prominent newspaper is symptomatic of a collective unwillingness to fully grapple with a mass murder we could have prevented.

The U.S., under Barack Obama’s administration, is now in a position to upend this unfortunate history. Yet we feel insufficient urgency to blunt the Iranian regime’s openly stated genocidal intentions, and we do embarrassingly little to stop the mass slaughter of thousands of mainly Sunni Syrians by their country’s minority Alawite rulers.

It is true that the continuing massacre in Syria doesn’t yet rise to the level of genocide. It is also true that Obama’s passive response makes it more likely that one day it will. In Iran, Obama’s promise to use all means necessary to prevent the regime from getting nuclear weapons -- to forestall the possibility of a future genocide -- may also one day soon be put to the test.

Sometimes, we turn away from issues that seem insoluble or that raise doubts about our humanity. But turning away always -- always -- makes things worse.

(Jeffrey Goldberg, a national correspondent for The Atlantic, is a Bloomberg View columnist. The opinions expressed are his own.)

Hillary Clinton: The Art of Smart Power

New Statesman - The art of smart power
An impressive summation of American foreign policy today and the overwhelming burden of leading the free world. A worthy read for anyone interested in geopolitics. -R.O.