Mule Train Mail: Dr. Richard Eaton "Iran, Can There Be a Grand Bargain?"

In early May 2003, just after American troops had triumphantly swept up the Tigris-Euphrates and taken Baghdad, an extraordinary message was delivered to Washington via the Swiss Embassy in Tehran.  It came as a two-page fax, on plain paper.  Now known as the “Grand Bargain,” this proposal had the apparent support of all the major actors in Iran’s government of then-President Muhammad Khatami.  Although the proposed deal offered to settle all disputes between Iran and the United States, the Bush Administration dismissed it with contempt.  Not only did American officials refuse to receive the message; they even scolded the Swiss ambassador in Tehran for having forwarded it to Washington.

At the time Bush rejected the offer, it seemed nothing could be gained from talking with Teheran.  The United States was sated with hubris.  American troops had just toppled the statue of Saddam Hussain, who himself would soon be captured and ultimately hanged. Just days earlier, George Bush had swaggered aboard the S.S. Abraham Lincoln to give his infamous “Mission Accomplished” speech.  In Afghanistan, Osama bin Laden was reportedly on the run, while neo-cons in Washington, flushed with these victories, were already eying Iran as the next domino to fall to America’s grand plan of  unilateral regime-changes in the region.  As Bill Gates and Zbigniew Brzezinsky stated in their 2004 report to the Council on Foreign relations, Why talk with the Iranians when we’ve got them hemmed in on both their eastern and western flanks? 

Today, however, with some six million Iraqis either killed or exiled as a result of the war, with the country’s infrastructure destroyed, and with no end in sight to America’s five-year debacle in Iraq, the world is a very different place.  Here at home, war-fatigue has set in, and the economy is dangerously weak.  Nonetheless, neither proponents nor opponents of the war -- including presidential aspirants -- have offered ideas on how American might end its Iraq adventure.  This, then, might be an appropriate time to revisit Tehran's offer.

Since most Americans are unfamiliar with the Grand Bargain, which the mainstream media ignored it when it was made, we can begin by asking what it proposed to do.   For their own part, Iran offered to make no attempts to obtain nuclear arms and to accept much tighter controls by the IAEA in exchange for access to nuclear technology.  They offered to stop supporting Hamas and Hizbullah in Palestine and Lebanon respectively.  They offered to cooperate with Iraq in all matters dealing with that country's security.  And crucially, they offered not only to recognize the state of Israel, but also to accept a two-state solution for Israel and Palestine.  Quite obviously, the offer contradicted Bush’s claim, which was made then as it still is today, that Iran is committed to sponsoring terrorism and to seeing the destruction of Israel. 

For its part, the U.S. would fully normalize its relations with Iran, end its sanctions on the country imposed at the time of Iran’s Revolution in 1979, cooperate on a wide range of issues dealing with technology transfers, and recognize Iran’s security concerns. That would mean ceasing to characterize Iran as an “axis of evil” or a “terrorist” state.  It also meant ending threats to attack their country.  And finally, America would take action against the Mujahidin-i Khalq in Iraq, a group of hold-overs from the days of the Iranian Revolution who had never accepted the Islamic Republic and are determined to undo the revolution by overthrowing Iran’s current regime.

Read the Rest of the Grand Bargain After the Flip...

 

A. Iran and Nuclear Weapons

Should something like the Grand Bargain of May 2003 ever be revived, a range of issues would have to be addressed.  Of these, the matter of Iran’s alleged nuclear weapons program is the one we hear the most about. It is also the easiest to clarify and dispense with, for Iran has no nuclear weapons program.  IAEA Director Mohamed ElBaradei has repeatedly stated as much, most recently on Oct. 28, 2007.  This finding was confirmed early last December by America’s National Intelligence Estimate, which stated that such a program had been dropped five years ago – coincidently, about the same time that Iran made its offer of a Grand Bargain.   Not only have Iran’s leaders publicly forsworn any quest for nuclear weapons for themselves; they have gone further and proposed that the entire Middle East be nuclear-free.   But of course a nuclear-free Middle East would involve dismantling Israel’s nuclear weapons program.  And given America’s acquiescence to Israel having its own nuclear weapons program, and given, too, Israel’s insistence that it shall forever be the only nuclear power in the Middle East, this could be a sticky point.  If and when it is raised, however, Iran is already on board for a nuclear-free Middle East.

Furthermore, the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty -- which Iran has signed, unlike Israel -- guarantees to any signatory the right to develop nuclear energy for civilian purposes.   This is something Iran not only says it is doing.  It is something it must do in order to satisfy its own energy needs while it sells abroad its primary source of foreign exchange, namely, its oil and gas resources.  In short, the matter of nuclear weapons is a non-issue as far as Iran is concerned.  But the fact that we keep hearing about it suggests that it serves to disguise some other issue.   

B. Iran and Israel

The issue of Iran’s relations with Israel is more complicated, though by no means beyond the realm of negotiation.  For this to happen, however, all three countries – the United States, Israel, and Iran – would have to surmount their respective internal politics and focus on their long-term strategic concerns, which lie in mutual guarantees of regional security.  Here it is the American media, together with the hysterical rantings by Israeli politicians, that appear to be the major impediments.  Just listen to the rhetoric of Israel’s leaders. 

Here’s former Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu: in Sept. 2006: “Ahmadinejad could be more dangerous than Adolf Hitler.” Then in December of that year:  “It’s now 1939, and Iran is Germany.  And Iran is racing to arm itself with atomic bombs.” And then a month later: “Iran’s nuclear program is aimed at genocide of the Jews.” 

Here’s Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in April 2006:  “Ahmadinejad is a psychopath whose declarations resemble those of Adolf Hitler.  Iran’s ambitions threatened not just Israel but all of Western civilization.”  And then a month later:  “Iran is just a few months away from acquiring the ability to build an atomic bomb.”

Just last October President Shimon Peres surpassed both Netanyahu and Olmert by comparing Ahmadinejad with both Joe Stalin and Adolf Hitler, adding, “We must not ignore Iran's aspiration to become a religious, extremist Persian empire that would rule the entire Mideast.  The Iranian leader is publicly calling for Israel's destruction and investing billions of dollars in developing long-range missiles with the clear intent of loading them with nuclear warheads."

Although such rantings were initiated by supposedly responsible Israeli politicians, they are now echoed by America’s highest leaders. We all recall how Condi Rice and Pres. Bush, in the run-up for their war in Iraq, frightened us with their lurid images of smoking guns and mushroom clouds.  Just last October Bush stated, “If Iran got nuclear arms, it could lead to World War III.  We’ve got a leader in Iran who has announced that he wants to destroy Israel.”  

In short, the  caricature of Pres. Ahmadinejad as a latter-day Adolf Hitler bent on “wiping Israel off the map” is now thoroughly ingrained in the minds of the American and Israeli leadership – if not, indeed, in the collective psyches of the American and Israeli people.  But such a caricature is not only dangerous, but false.  What the Iranian president actually called for, if one reads the original Persian text, was the end of the regime that is currently occupying Jerusalem.  He never mentioned a map, the state of Israel, Jews, or the people of Israel. What he called for, quite simply, was regime-change -- an idea that should have resonated with George Bush, who after all has called for regime change in Tehran.   

Nonetheless, the idea that the Iranians wish to wipe Israel off the map, although a mistranslation from the original Persian, clearly recalls the Holocaust and hence resonates deeply with Israelis.  But this issue, like the nuclear one, is not at all beyond the realm of sorting out.  After all, adolescents call one another names all the time, yet they eventually mature.  Among adults, calling people names -- be it "mad mullah", "axis of evil," Adolf Hitler, or whatever -- is almost always a symptom of some deeper issue, which we need to track down.

C. Iran and Iraq

The third consideration that any renewal of Iran's Grand Bargain would have to take into account is Iran’s complicated relations with Iraq.  We can start by glancing at a map and noting the enormous border shared by the two countries.  Like any sovereign nation-state, Iran naturally wants stable neighbors on its borders.  Over the course of the past five years, this concern has dictated Iran’s notably pragmatic and cool-headed policies vis-à-vis both Afghanistan to its east and Iraq to its west.   After all, these countries are to Iran what Canada and Mexico are to the US.  Iran will always reside next door to Iraq.  What is more, for the past several centuries Iran has never waged a war of aggression against any of its neighbors.  It has no history of coveting Iraqi territory.

Since the overthrow of Saddam Hussain, moreover, the centuries-old Sunni dominance in Iraq has ended, perhaps for good.  Inasmuch as Shi`is comprise some 60% of Iraq’s population, it was inevitable that Shi`is would rise to power in any sort of democratic system that would replace Saddam.  And this is exactly what has happened, thanks to considerable expenditure of American treasure and blood.  Indeed, the two major parties in Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki’s government – the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq and the Da`wa party – both have intimate ties with Iran, inasmuch as many of their leaders took refuge in Iran during Saddam’s brutal regime.  The most important spiritual head of Iraqi Shi`is, Grand Ayatollah Sistani, is himself from Iran.  Even despite the long and bitter Iran-Iraq War, which was launched by Saddam with the urging of Henry Kissinger, the Iraqi government has found a natural ally in Iran, the only country in the world actually ruled by Shi`is.   As a result, despite what the Americans or Israelis might wish to believe to be the case, Iran holds more influence in Iraq than does any other country.  This is the stubborn, hard fact with which Americans and Israelis must come to terms. 

In practical terms, this means that the most likely way the Americans will ever extricate itself from its Iraq debacle, and perhaps the only way, is with Iran’s help.  Since  the downfall of Saddam, Iran has skillfully supported nearly all of Iraq’s important players, most significantly the two major Shi`i factions, Nuri al-Maliki’s government and his rival to the south, Moqtada al-Sadr and the Mahdi Army.  The Iraqi government’s recent invasion of Moqtada al-Sadr’s Mahdi Army in Basra in late March and early April revealed beyond any doubt the extent of Iran’s influence across the entire political spectrum within Iraq.  While al-Maliki’s government and his American handlers initiated the invasion of Basra, it was Iranian mediators who brokered a ceasefire between the government and Moqtada’s Mahdi Army.  Agents of al-Maliki’s government went to Tehran to negotiate the deal with Iranian officials there, and to Qum to negotiate directly with Moqtada, who has been living there for at least the past six months. Clearly, the Iranians are the one party that both warring factions can trust and are willing to talk to. Yet the man mainly responsible for brokering the accord between Iraq’s most important Shi` factions -- General Qasim Sulaimani, head of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard -- is designated a terrorist by the US Government. 

Nothing more dramatically captured Iran’s enormous influence in Iraq, in contrast to America’s, than the spectacle of Pres. Ahmadinejad’s public visit to Baghdad several months ago. Whereas Iran’s President rode in a motorcade in broad daylight from the airport through downtown Baghdad to meet with Iraqi leaders, high-ranking American officials have to sneak into the country in the dead of night, unannounced, so concerned for their own security that they won’t even stay in the heavily protected Green Zone.

It is clear that a secure Iran that does not feel threatened by the US or by Israel could do a lot more of exactly what it has already proven it can do, which is, to help stabilize Iraq.  And this, in turn, could facilitate an orderly and dignified withdrawal of US troops from Iraq.   That is the essential and all-important carrot that Iran could now offer the Americans in a renewed Grand Bargain, which it could not have offered in the original Grand Bargain five years ago.  Therefore, instead of resisting Iran’s extraordinary influence in Iraq, Americans should welcome it as their best bet for ever getting out of the hopeless mess they themselves have created.

D. Iran and America

Another dimension of any renewed Grand Bargain is Iran’s relations with America itself.   Ever since the Hostage Crisis of 1979-80, which so traumatized Americans, the US government has been absolutely obsessed with Iran.  Saber-rattling is now routine, even among presidential candidates.  While Hillary Clinton promises to “oliberate” Iran if it attacks Israel (which it has never threatened), John McCain sings a little ditty, “Bomb, bomb, bomb – bomb, bomb Iran” to a Beach Boys tune.  But despite all the demonizing, recent history has proven that reason can prevail. Bilateral negotiations between the two countries can work, and already have.  In 2001 Iran helped the US defeat the Taliban in Afghanistan.  They did this for the simple reason that, as a sovereign country governed by stodgy conservatives, Iran is unwilling to tolerate a bunch of radical fanatics on its eastern border.  They also played a central role in writing Afghanistan’s new Constitution, which sounds more like the behavior of sober lawyers than of raving lunatics.   

What is more, despite America’s rejection of the Grand Bargain, despite the Bush administration’s demonization of Iran and Iranians, and despite America’s long history of intervening in Iran’s internal affairs – most notably in 1953 when  we overthrew Iran’s democratically-elected government and imposed a dictator on them – despite all of that, and despite the Iranian government’s own demonization of America, the amazing fact is that the Iranian people probably have greater affection and admiration for the American people than do most other peoples anywhere in the world.  This is deeply ironic, given our own media’s demonization of Iran.  Yet it also provides us with a huge opportunity for exploring a revived Grand Bargain.

But there is still another good reason for the US to embrace a renewed Grand Bargain at this time.  We have all heard the famous joke, namely: the Iraq War is over, and Iran won.  If the Iranians already hold so much influence in the region, and if they truly have already won America’s war in Iraq, one might then ask what motive they would have for pursuing a renewed Grand Bargain with us.  The answer is simple: like any regime, and especially like any revolutionary regime, Iran craves international recognition and legitimacy. Such regimes want and need a renewed connection with the international community that revolutions inevitably sever.  And importantly, only Washington can offer Tehran this valuable carrot.   Diminished though it is as a result of its Iraq adventure, only Washington has the international clout, the military credibility, and the economic might to bring about a meaningful re-integration of Iran into the international community. 

So, as a result, we stand at an historic juncture that is rich with possibilities for imaginative diplomacy.  On the one hand,

a)  Iran – and perhaps only Iran -- can help rescue America from its tragic debacle in Iraq by creating the stability that will allow the US to exit in a dignified and orderly way.  Iran can also once again help America suppress a revived Taliban in Afghanistan.  But at the same time, and here’s the other side of the equation,

b) America – and only America -- can assist in Iran’s re-integration into the international community. 

This is the historic quid pro quo on which a renewed Grand Bargain can, and must, build.   Whoever wins the 2008 presidential election could break the current log-jam by going straight to Tehran, or by appointing a new Secretary of State to do so, with a view to showing that talking with leading Iranians is not only possible, but productive.  Obviously, this requires imagination and courage, but it can be done. 

There are, of course,  impediments that we would have to overcome in order for this conceptual and diplomatic breakthrough to occur, namely, (a) the lack of candid discussion respecting the origins of both 9/11 and the war. (b) America's continuing trauma over the Iranian Revolution, and (c) Iran's continued support of Palestinians who live under Israeli occupation.

The muzzling of discourse over both 9/11 and Iraq

Although Rev. Jeremiah White was recently slammed for suggesting that 9/11 resulted from American actions, he was of course merely stating the obvious.  For it is historically axiomatic that where there is occupation, there is resistance.  After all, al-Qaida was established with a view primarily to overthrowing the Saudi regime, owing to that regime’s corruption and to its collusion with its American defenders and clients.  Getting American military bases out of Arabia was one of al-Qaida’s primary objectives, which suggests why 15 of the 19 hijackers on 9/11 were Saudis. 

There is an even greater silence surrounding the Iraq War and its original causes.  It is astounding that the current war, launched on the pretext of eradicating WMD’s that didn’t exist, is attributed to a failure of intelligence.  But this was no failure; it was a spectacular success.   The Office of Special Plans, created in the Defense Department in Sept. 2002 by Paul Wolfowitz and Douglas Feith under the direction of Donald Rumsfeld, managed to subvert the entire intelligence gathering apparatus in its goal of persuading the American people that Saddam posed a dangerous threat that had to be eliminated.  Subverting or bypassing the intelligence establishment with a view to frightening the public into war was the precise aim of that office.  “Fixing facts around policy,” was how American officials described their aims to the British Cabinet.  “Stovepiping” is what it’s called in the intelligence community.  And it worked.  Colin Powell knowingly presented fabricated evidence to the UN, while Condi Rice scared the wits out of us by speaking of mushroom clouds.  How can that be construed as a failure?

Of course, the true purpose of the war had to be concealed from the Congress and the people.  But this, too, was a success.   Even before Bush came into power in 2000, a group of neocons and Zionists had urged the overthrow of Saddam for the purpose of enhancing Isrrael’s security.  Later, when they rose to power in Bush’s government, those same people put those plans into effect, enabled by the climate of fear and hysteria generated by the attacks of September 11, 2001. To their credit, Israeli officials have publicly and candidly expressed their gratitude for America’s efforts.  Just the other day (April 16) Benjamin Netanyahu stated, “We are benefiting from one thing, and that is the attack on the Twin Towers and Pentagon, and the American struggle in Iraq.”  These events, he added, had “swung American public opinion in our favor.” 

Although Israelis might be candid in acknowledging what this war was about, and who benefited form it, Americans still live in the fog of silence.  After all, if supporters of the war acknowledged that the war was waged primarily to enhance the security of a foreign country, they would be open to the charge of treason.   Conversely, if opponents were to charge that the war is waged primarily to enhance the security of a foreign country – namely, Israel – they, in turn, would be open to the charge of anti-Semitism.  As a result, neither supporters nor opponents of the war can mention the war’s central raison d’etre for fear of being labeled either traitors or anti-Semites.  The result: we continue to wage an open-ended war whose origins and aims cannot be publicly discussed. 

And now, the same quarters that urged us to invade Iraq and overthrow Saddam Hussain --  the state of Israel and many of its supporters in this country – are clamoring for war with Iran.  As a precondition for a renewed Grand Bargain with Iran, then, the State Department would have to recover re-affirm a foreign policy that puts America’s own interests above those of any other country.

Legacy of Iran’s 1979 Revolution

The second precondition for reviving the Grand Bargain would be to reject obedience as the goal US foreign policy – with coercion as the means to that policy -- and to replace these with principles of mutual respect, mutual obligations, and mutual security.  This would mean extending official recognition to Iran’s government, which in turn would require an acknowledgement of what Iran’s Revolution of 1979-80 was all about.   This will be difficult, since that revolution was in fact about overthrowing a dictator that the Americans themselves had installed back in 1953.  That was when the government of Pres. Eisenhower and his Secretary of State John Foster Dulles deposed the democratically elected government of Prime Minister Muhammad Mossadegh, mainly because the latter had the audacity to nationalize Iran’s oil, on the assumption – unacceptable to the Americans and the British at the time – that Iran’s oil belonged to the people of Iran.  So Mossadegh had to go, and an America-friendly Shah was brought to power.

Ever since 1979, American governments have demonized Iran for having the impudence to overthrow a dictator that we had installed over them -- in short, for defying America’s will.   But to apply nineteenth century norms of international politics to twenty-first century realities is out-dated.  Punishing disorderly children who misbehave may have been the way things worked back in the days of European colonialism, but the rest of the world has got over that.  Obviously, there can be no renewed Grand Bargain with Iran unless and until this sort of neo-colonial mind-set has been rejected. 

Iran’s support of Palestinians.

The third and perhaps thorniest obstacle to negotiating a renewed Grand Bargain with Iran is the fact that of all the governments in the world, that of Iran has been the most vocal in expressing its support for the plight of the Palestinian people.  As is well known, Palestinians have had to endure unspeakable suffering as their land has been systematically seized and occupied by Israeli settlers, their flocks of animals poisoned, and their homes bulldozed as a form of collective punishment – all with the tacit support of the Israeli and American governments.   For sixty years, objections voiced and resolutions passed in the United Nations have remained ineffectual.  On the other hand, the government of the Islamic Republic, alone among nations, has not only voiced its objection to this, but has extended material support to the resistance.  Back when Palestinians looked to Saddam Hussain for political support, neo-conservatives and Zionists in this country argued that Saddam would have to go.  Now that Palestinians look to Iran for such support, the same clamor is aimed at the Islamic Republic.

But despite these very serious impediments, a revived Grand Bargain is possible.   If America were to come to terms with why it has been waging war in Iraq for the past five years, if it would abandon its out-dated neocolonial habit of demanding obedience from other countries, and if it would join Iran in recognizing the legitimate rights of the Palestinian people, a renewed Grand Bargain with Iran could be achieved.  And that, in turn, could lead directly to an exit from the Iraq quagmire.

It is true that these all seem distant prospects.  But the world has changed dramatically since Pres. Bush launched Operation Iraqi Freedom.  Although Bush clearly has no intention of leaving Iraq, the political and economic realities facing the next President will demand some hard thinking.  It won’t do simply to recite feel-good mantras before we go to bed at night, such as “God Bless America,” “Stay the Course,” “Support the Troops,” or “The Surge is Working” - not when Americans continue to return from Iraq in coffins, or when gasoline prices soar to 5 or 10 dollars a gallon.  Eventually, Americans will reach the sober realization that their only practical ticket out of Iraq is waiting for them in Tehran.  Sooner or later, that fact will take root in our collective consciousness.   And the sooner, the better.

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[James A. Bretney]

4 words: the surge is working