Unfortunately, the 'Nixon goes to China' approach assumes that the Bush administration's goal is to improve USA/Iran relations.

Raoul is correct & given behavioral cues it is hard to draw any other conclusions

I think the proposal is the only sane path but I doubt it will be "made so"

BTW...I`m hopin Steve gives us a solid report on what he has learned in his travels

"The bond of our common humanity is stronger than the divisiveness of our fears and prejudices." - James Carter

Some idiot called Diane Rehm yesterday with some non-sense about Iran and the Taliban and Diane and none of the panelists caught it. Before 911, Iran ALMOST went to war with the Taliban over the murder of Iranian diplomats in Afghanistan. Iran hated the Taliban and al Qaeda and why should that change? There is no way Iran supports al Qaeda and its anti-Shiite sentiments. That would be like Jews in the US supporting the Klan.

Bush was on the air again today bashing Iran. Even if Iran is the enemy of Israel, as Bush claims, it is not in Israel's best interest for the US to be in a fued with Iran. Bush thinks he can win at international diplomacy by bullying other countries. It doesn't work that way. I worry that the Bush administration may be planning a few bites to go along with Bush's bark.

The Iranians have been speaking about a dialogue of civilizations for a long time, and Washington has responded only with threats and enmity, really.

Yep.
Threats and enmity.
We've got a two-trick pony for a leader.

Just think how much better off the world would be if Bush had been born to another family and found his true place in life:

Getting in barfights and head-butting other goons after losing at bowling on Friday night.

Alas... by some sick miracle of Modern Democracy this sub-ordinary thug assumed the reigns of the most powerful nation in history.

Jesus... there really must be a devil at work in the world.

In one of the recent polls, the only item on which Bush is above 50% is people's belief that he is a man of his word and convictions. And Iran is not like any other issue where folks can come along and smooth it over for him. For all his many failings, Nixon was not stupid and had foreign policy knowledge and experience and could go to China. I doubt that Bush would ever be smart enough to reach out to Iran as he would have to change his convictions. He and we are stuck with his Axis of Evil for the next 34 months.

Murtha was on PBS the other night observing that China, al Queda, and Iran all love that we're staying the course in Iraq. They're watching closely as we bleed ourselves dry.

It's not that different than the USSR's military expenditures and overreach hollowing out their economic foundation and contributing to collapse, whether you believe it was Reagan's 'brilliance' in accelerating an arms race, or just the entire trajectory of the Cold War.

If you think about it, even GHW Bush had to get someone else to pay for the first Gulf War; Dubya is maxing out all the national credit cards.

My question for Steve is -- Is there anything to the speculation that George Herbert Walker, Scowcroft, and James Baker are very actively advising Dubya on all these matters? That not only do they not oppose Dubya's policy, but that are its architects? I never believed the whole "George W is stupid" meme. And the whole "Scowcroft/Herbert Walker Bush/&Co is moderate" meme is equally without much foundation, on the face of it. What about it? In this scenario Bush I gets to maintain the facade he's moderate, but is completely unaccountable for a policy he designed. Bush II (I like to think of him as George V) is off the hook for being "stupid." I recall lots of 'observations' dropped by the shills on the political talk shows about how 'George Bush doesn't even listen to his father at all. They don't talk at all.' Makes a nice story.

It would go a long way towards explaining why Bush is so invulnerable to impeachment. Throw enough money & power around in Congress, and even the fiscally-conservative Republicans'll keep their mouths shut.

I think that Bush I and a few other folks realized how much you can get away with during extraordinary times. (Think WWII & Great Depression) Maybe there's more oil out there than we know about -- but if you think it's scarce, then...

Or maybe Bush read Catch-22 when he was a yout'.

Finally, maybe the best Realpolitik, cost-effective, and politically (diplomatically & militarily) sound move would be to give or sell nuclear weapons technology to Iran.

Sound heretical? In terms of moving the national interest ahead, not inciting enemies, not getting sucked into Pyrrhic victories/ losses, what would be the fallout?

In terms of not squandering blood and treasure, not further bankrupting the country, what would be the fiscal gain?

On top of which, Iran wants nukes to defend themselves from US (not to mention less-than-stable neighbors w/nukes, in all directions).
Getting them there would also remove a major reason for perceiving us as an antagonist.

Maybe there was always a fatal flaw in the concept of nonproliferation. Iran is a sovereign nation, they can do what they want. Nonproliferation flies in the face of America's rationale for its own establishment. Technological capacity is advancing, and can't be stopped. Might as well flip the concept on its head, and ride the wave while reaping the benefits. B/c someone else is gonna grab that market.

Re an Iran policy change ala Nixon-in-China:

As posted at Dvmx.com in January 2005:

Iran
We'll be essentially turning Iraq over to Shiia majority rule on January 30. The best we can hope for now is a more or less stable Shiite-dominated Iraqi government. Shiite Iran will inevitably play a big role in Iraq's evolution, and will want to manage this closely, having already fought a long and bloody war with Saddam's Iraq in the 80's. The best thing America could do would be to get on a new track with Iran, aimed at a constructive relationship with an eventually nuclear Iran, neutral at least, if not friendly to the US, and where Iran is a force for stability in the mideast and west asia. Such a triangulation might well afford the West opportunities to advance the situation in the mid-east which are impossible today. There are obstacles, not least the mythic anti-americanism of the still-ruling-though-dwindling Iranian Revolution, but in the long run, Iran is the best bet we have for a major partner for regional stability. Re-opening relations with Iran at this point would be akin to Nixon's opening to China, and it could be as big a key to a flexible pursuit of long term regional stability as the China opening was to the denouement of the Cold War. I'm not sure we can count on that degree of forsight at the present time, but there are no good alternatives, so we may end up there like it or not.
http://dvmx.com/index-jan30_05.html

Getting back in dialogue with Iran is the smartest thing America could do if they want to gain influence there. Right now they can offer Iran nothing, except not bombing them. They have to leave every offer and negotiations to others, who do the work, only to see the Buhites say: 'We're unhappy with everything short of an unconditional Iranian surrender'.
Sorry folks, but that ain't gonna happen. And it's not going to make America more popular either. It doesn't get you friends, when you taunt people to do work for you, and spend diplomatic capital, when you intent to throw it away anyway. Todays news was that Russias compromise wasn't good enough for the U.S. Once again.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20060310/pl_afp/usirannuclearpolitics

I have the feeling the Bush crew is seting up Iran just like they set up Iraq. The final thing they want to do is to get a UN security council decision condemning Iran, giving them what they can claim to be a mandate. So, that part is well underway: It doesn't matter if it's not, the broader U.S. audience doesn't get international law anyway - NPT, Safeguard agreement - where's the difference? Condi does her best to blur the distincion. (Details, schmetails ...)

It is pretty clear to me that those leading the war of words, have indeed an interest in provoking the conflict with Iran. A war of words was iirc the way Bolton then killed negotiations with North Korea - it's a proven tactic to create a climate too hostile for negotiations.

Those who were seared regarding Iran during previous administrations (say: Hostage crisis, Lebanon and Hezbollah), not to mention George 'I know evil when I see it!' Bush, will be quite boneheaded insist on confronting Iran, I presume. I don't expect them to change much in the next three years. Thus, I'm not very optimistic that a change in U.S. policy will occur.

The U.S. IMO had a unique chance to offer Iran a hand after 9/11 - that would have been an offer Iran could not possibly have refused. Instead they squandered it, and went on to work down their checklist of 'rogue states', by the book.

The danger of having a doctrine is that it can be too persuasive. I hold that lists like 'axis of evil' etc. tend to barely be questioned once issued. That's not only about the politicos, but also about the U.S. security establishment in general. Enemies are inherited, also thanks to groups lobbying in congress (talk about Cuba).

Meet the Kremlin. Sometimes I feel the soviet aparachiks were more pragmatic than the Bushies are.
I guess, because the U.S. are so much more adept at PR, they are more likely to fall for their own propaganda.

At least Kissinger & Nixon had some credibility as serious & astute leaders before they began overtures to the Chinese. Neither Bush II nor his Secretary of State have comparable respect with allies or adversaries. With Bush now at 37% approval rating leadership of any foreign government can also see he doesn't even command the respect of his own citizenry. Why should they take any offer from the Bush White House seriously? Since Bush is worse than a "lame duck"--really a "dead duck"--isn't this a good reason for Bush/Cheney impeachment as soon as the Democrats retake the House in November? We need to put Bush II, our country and the world out of their misery at the earliest opportunity!

All of the center-left liberals love to beat Hitchens on any notion. That is how much scared intellectually are of him. Rosen by his smart Alec answer to Hitchens proposal shows the depth of his bias against him. Rosen obviously believes, that when Hitchens was on the left side of politics more than five years ago, he was saying intelligent things. But now that he is on the right, the left Theodicy has deprived him of the faculty to utter intelligent things.
Rosen's choleric answer proves him to be both a pathological hater of Hitchens as well as a
failed rival who cannot intellectually compete with him.

Furthermore, for Rosen to state, that "the Iranians have been speaking about a dialogue of civilizations", after the Khomeini revolution stamped its own Islamic fundamentalist civilization on Iran and dubbed America as the Great Satan, and in this context to assume that Iranians "are the natural allies" of the US, is to pitifully show that Rosen's mind desperately needs a "straitjacket".

BEWARE OF OUR INTELLECTUAL PRETENDERS.

http://congeorgekotzabasis.blogspot.com

Con George-Kotzabasis,
I guess what Mr. Rosen wants to suggest with his phrase 'natural allies' is that Iran and the U.S. have common geostrategical interests - insurance against salafist extremism in Afghanistan and Pakistan, insurance against the unstable central asian states, protection of sealanes, oil, etc. - these interests made the U.S. hoist in the Shah, and they did not go away when the Ayatollahs came.

And there is always the difference between the people and what their gvts say. It isn't any different in the U.S. What the U.S. have to do when engaging Iran is to get clear that Iran will not join MacWorld and adopt the American Way of Life (tm) - in a sense that was what the islamic revolution was all about:
The insight that westernisation, or secularisation, was destroying traditional (islamic) ways of life, threatening societies and that rationalisation threatened faith.
I find it quite striking that this view parallels a similar development in the U.S. that led to the christian right. They both have at least one legitimate point, whatever they make of it.

That the Iranian gvt blames America for all this first, is a result of Iran's history. Wether they are right is another thing. America was Irans primary factor of western influence, and in the Ayatollah's view this Great Satan was purged to purify and protect Iranian society and Islamic faith. In Iran, too, enemies are inherited.

Maybe I can give you a figure on how long it can take to get over stuff like this: France and Germany were hostile to each other for approx 145 years after Napoleon crushed the Holy German Empire, and even then it took two great leaders, de Gaulle and Adenauer to get over it. But then things did change.
But I don't see either Ahmadinejad or Bush up to the task. It needs two people for a conversation, and if both are unwilling nothing will happen. But I remember there was a time before Ahmadinejad, and the U.S. gvt was just as hostile then - to a cooperating Iran (that allowed U.S. troops to operate into Afghanistan from Iranian territory).

The Shah was toppled only 26 years ago. I think that's pretty recent history, and for people in the Middle East it was only yesterday. Patience is a virtue, and foreign policy requires a long historical attention span.

In any case, the U.S. has some thinking to do, just like the Iranians, and that cannot be bad I recon. A dialogue of civilizations is imperative.

NS you make a lot of good points. Like Weber, I fear it may be too late to save the Iran situation. The US should have initiated an ouverture before the last election there, or shortly following. And as Weber notes, the Bush admin credibility, (and their competency) is so low that major foreign policy undertakings will be fraught with many unpredictable dangers. You can see this already in the half-ass handling of the realignment with India, not to mention the Dubai ports deal.
Would that we could call a time-out in the world until we have rearranged our own government in 2009...
Unfortunately we can't, and a couple rough years lie ahead.

Stephen Miller,
unfortunately I have to agree with you. I have found it utterly annoying to see the Bushies squandering and squandering chance after chance and years of goodwill, slap friends in the face, just by being themselves.

It'll take time until the U.S. can restore their reputation as a predictable partner in international affairs. I remember having read a quip of a high ranking european diplomat that went along the line: "We don't care what exactly the U.S. position is - if they could only limit themseves to one".

I found the interagency fighting in Bush Jr.s first term appaling, just think of the State Department diplomacy being undermined by Pentagon and VP Cheney, like in the negotiations with North Korea. It gives testimony of the terrific managerial qualities of the president for allowing Kindergarten games like this. I would think that that's a luxury America can ill afford.

At least that part seems to have improved somewhat recently, but the Condi's better style and less open interference aside, there hasn't been much improvement in substance. The policy still sucks.

Add on top of that clowneries like playing domestic politics with the U.S. share of the U.N. budget and the U.N. in general, excentricities like appointing John Bolton as ambassador to the U.N., their ambivalence towards Europe's growing role in NATO, my way or the highway, the treaty killing or torture as a de-facto official policy, not to mention Iraq, you get a picture of U.S. actions that even people who wish them well, and there I count myself in explicitly, have a hard time to digest, and sell.

I have to tell me, and others, time and time again that Bush represents only 51% of the U.S. electorate and that his approval ratings are plummeting, and that, like a particularly revolting flu, he will go away.
What I usually do not tell, is that in my view this is not merely about Bush but about America not having found a consensus on how it's role in the world should be like. America needs to do some soulsearching, to find out what they want. Soon.

Norbert Schulz

A modicum of your argument would have the resonance of reason if you could only make a. the geopolitical ambitions of Iran to become the leader of Jihadist Islam, once it acquired its nuclear armaments,and b. global terror, disappear by a magic wand. To speak in such a context of "common geostrategical interests", is to be completely unhinged from the politics of reality.

You say, that in the contest of the West, and especially of America, with Iran, "rationalisation threatened faith". And this is where the great obstacle to diplomacy lies. Only an Iranian government which placed its national "fate" in rationalisation and not faith, could commense a "dialogue of civilizations". As long as its government still considers, as it is obvious by its present President Ahmadinejad, America as the Great Satan, such a dialogue is a will-o'-the-wisp.

In times of great danger the timeliness of firm action is crucial. To consider "patience as a virtue" in such a context, is to consider self-poisoning as the highest of virtues.

The dialogue of civilizations with fanatics, is a "MISIMPERATIVE".

http://congeorgekotzabasis.blogspot.com

George,
be happy that this is about the Iranians. Unlike the whacko Salafists of Al Queda, Shiites do Ijtihad.

"Ijtihad -- or hermeneutics -- refers to the institutionalized practice of interpreting Islamic law (sharia) to take into account changing historical circumstances and, therefore, different views. Ijtihad is the independent or original interpretation of problems not covered by the Koran (Islam's holy book), the Hadith (traditions concerning the Prophet's life and utterances), and ijma' (scholarly consensus). In the early days of the Muslim community, every adequately qualified jurist had the right to exercise such original thinking."

http://turcopolier.typepad.com/sic_semper_tyrannis/2006/03/the_gate_of_ijt.html

The Shiite Iranians are, despite all their rambling, much closer to a 'rationalisation' than the entire Sunni world. If you can talk with anyone there, it's the shiite Iranians.
Anyone more moderate will not have the standing neccesary to have any effect on the discussion among the Islamists. It needs someone very conservative to make a persuasive argument in favour of the west and against violence that is heared and accepted by them, even when it comes from a Shiite.

But there we have made a full circle, as Raoul has said: This approach assumes that the Bush administration's goal is to improve USA/Iran relations.

I find the idea that 'because they hate us, talk is futile' silly. That might apply for Bin Laden, but not for the entire Arab world. The flawed concept of the 'Clash of the Civilisations' is for my taste too convenient an excuse for not trying.

While not trying can easily and self-flattering be rationalised as exercising 'moral clarity', I feel it is trying to have the easy way out. But there are no easy ways out of this dilemma. To quote Thomas Mann: "War is only a cowardly escape for the problems of peace."

PS:
"As long as its government still considers, as it is obvious by its present President Ahmadinejad, America as the Great Satan, such a dialogue is a will-o'-the-wisp."

It is worth to keep in mind that the U.S. heated up rhetoric on Iran well before to everybody's surprise Ahmadinejad was elected. It is too easy to blame a scarecrow like him for something that is actually older.
Besides, looking at Iran's constitutional system he is still relatively weak against the clerical guardian council. So why all the panic?

It has a certain irony that his predessessor was scoffed as weak because of this problems overcoming clerical resistance. Towards Ahmadinejad the cleric's council is actually moderating, if his difficulties in getting his oil minister through is any indication.

The red hot U.S. rhetoric might well generate a real Iranian requirement and demand for a possibly nuclear deterrent against U.S. intervention.

The whole point of being angry about the 'Great Satan' rehtoric is almost funny, and has the ring of insulted vanity to it. The Iranians do insufficiently love the U.S.??! After all the U.S. did for them? How dare they!
I remember joking to a friend over a beer, how a third rate country could best provoke a U.S. invasion: By saying 'I don't like you, leave me alone, go away'.

The U.S. loses nothing by talking. Having nothing, and no credible (military) options, they can only win. So why not try? It's cheap, too.

I don't know if it's a fair comparison, but I'll make it: Saddam & the Shah. Both were extremely brutal leaders. Iraqis are glad to be rid of the Saddam, so one can only assume that Iranians were glad to be rid of the Shah and angry with the folks who put him in charge.

Norbert Schulz,

This is political banality at its best!
A hermeneutical dissertation about the term Jihad (which I used in its meaning of holy war)is no substitute for the fact that Iran's acquisition of nuclear weapons, especially by snubbing its nose at the West, and America itself, will confer simultaneously the leadership of Islam upon it.

You also seem to be totally blind to the fact that around the rhetoric of the Great Satan, a deadly FANATIC ideology has been span, that one would be foolish to "joke over a beer".

PEACE CANNOT ARISE FROM A COWARDLY ESCAPE FROM A NECESSARY WAR.

Sometimes people only hear what they want to hear:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/03/13/AR2006031301672_pf.html

Ceterum censeo cartaginem esse delendam.

Amen.

Besides George,
when you're afraid of a nuclear Iran - how do you feel about crumbling Pakistan with real Al Quaeda and Taleban sympathies - and a real nuclear arsenal as opposed to a suspected or imaginary one? Don't you have enough urgent problems that you feel the need to generate new ones?

As for now Iran is not even in violation of the NPT. They have abandoned an additional voluntary 'safeguards agreement' they agreed to as a one sided goodwill gesture, even though U.S. statements do the best to blur that distinction.
Nobody *knows* for sure wether Iran has a nuclear military program or not. There are suspicions, but that's it.

The Iran crisis is as I perceive it a pushed hysteria. While paranoids do have real enemies too, their doomsday view drives them to excess. This is Iraq part II analysis wise:
Knowing Iran's evil character, and their evil rhetoric, it is evident that if Iran sais they have no nukes they are clearly lying - and that they are lying - now that's REALLY suspicious.

Gimme a break.

And your 'neccessary war' is a non starter. Did you like the unintended consequences of the srew-up that goes by the name Iraq? The U.S. don't have any good option to start one on Iran. Not that that could deter a true enthuisiast ...

http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/110904C.shtml

Norbert,
To quote Cato-as you do- the wise Roman statesman, is like a boomerang that knocks over your unimaginative and obscurantist position. All wars are replete with unintended consequences. Uncertainty rules the realm of mankind. But sometimes man tragically, must unsheath the sword to protect vital interests.

Carthage had to be destroyed, under the imperative geopolitics of that era.

History is replete with examples, yet history proves nothing.

The war on Iran might well be rather like Athen's expedition to Syracus. The Athenians thought that war imperative, too. And erred. It marked the beginning of their demise.

The U.S position in Iraq in case the U.S. starts war with Iran will be unpleasant, considering their long lines of communications and the troop levels. I doubt the Iranians will sit back idle and wait for their well deserved punishment at hands of The Chosen Nation (tm), history's preferred instrument.

I also doubt that U.S. lenders will be thrilled by the prospect of the U.S. jeopardising the world's economy. High oil prices will hurt the U.S. economy, making it America less attractive as a market for foreign investment. The U.S. economy is highly dependent on other countries lending money to the U.S.
Russia will be rather happy about high oil prices, as their own exports will bring much better revenue. Energy hungry China will be much less enthusiastic as keeping it's economy running is dependent on cheap oil, too, so high oil prices are bad for their economy, too. Why should they invest and fuel a country that doesn't take into account their interests? That's not good business. They might decide to pull U.S. currency reserves and to reinvest, say in Euros. The result might trigger a inflationary spiral in the United
States.

The failed port deal, just like China's attempted take-over of UNOCAL, have both already underlined that the U.S. seem to see globalisation as a one way street. In doing so, America bites the hand that feeds her, further reducing the attractiveness of the U.S. as a market for foreign investment. Unintended consequences may go well beyond the tactical realities on the ground where the fighting occurs.
It is worth keeping in mind, that the mighty Soviet army was never beaten in the field, it was the crumbling economy that that brought the U.S.S.R.'s demise.

The U.S. are a very powerful nation, but, as Iraq has proven, U.S. power has palpable limits. Better be aware of that.

This is why I advice caution and restraint.

Yes considering the position current in Pakistan, with their current Govt under notice by a really mad population, that got fired on because the US said to do it. That Govt that already has Nuclear weapons and is real close to falling to Al Queada / Telaban religious overthrow.
And again in Iraq where the violence looks to spread into the whole region.

Yes its much past time Bush got a new plan becides endless war. Iran and the US both have a valid point, both are over 20 years old, time to move on.

unintended consequences....

This is really true and we'll be seeing these flowing from Bush policies more and more.

An official recently said, in defense of the Dubai Ports deal, that the US needs $3 billion net inflow per day to keep the economy afloat.

One cannot combine this with a "we'll invade any one we want" attitude for long...

Bush and co may remake the world, but it won't be in the way they dream of.