Month: March 2015
Netanyahu’s win has consequences
The Netanyahu who won yesterday’s Israeli election is a Netanyahu with two big international policy objectives that put him at odds with the current American administration: he wants to block both a nuclear deal with Iran and creation of a Palestinian state. He will try to form a rightist coalition that supports him on both these key points. He and his rival Isaac Herzog have already rejected President Rivlin’s proposal for a national solidarity government that includes them both.
The relative success of the united Arab coalition in this election is likely to have little impact on Netanyahu’s fourth term in office, beyond spooking Israel’s rightwing into even more virulent anti-Arab rhetoric. It will be difficult for the Arab members of the Knesset to deliver much if Netanyahu is successful in forming his preferred coalition.
Americans need to take stock of this election result and consider their options.
Netanyahu is not a party to the Iran nuclear negotiations, but his efforts to encourage US Congressional opposition have born fruit not only in his address to Congress but also in the form of a Republican “open letter” to Iranian leaders that was intended to undermine the Administration’s negotiating stance and wreck prospects for a deal. We should expect more of this kind of subversion in the future. Netanyahu and his allies in Congress want war with Iran and will stop at nothing to get it.
It has long been clear that Netanyahu’s conditions for creation of a Palestinian state preclude the creation of one worthy of that name. He has wanted continued Israeli military control over both Gaza’s entry and exit points and large portions of the West Bank, while insisting on Palestinian demilitarization. But during the election campaign he went further, declaring no Palestinian state would be created while he is prime minister. Washington needs to recognize that there is no point in continuing the Middle East peace process in any form now that Israel’s prime minister has ruled out a two-state solution, which has been the declared US objective.
What do you do when your putative ally departs from your goals on priority issues?
You re-examine the alliance. That is difficult in this instance, because Israel has strong backing across party lines in the Washington. Any effort to restrain settlement-building in the West Bank or other moves to enable realization of a Palestinian state will be met in Congress with vigorous, and likely veto-proof, opposition. Even American votes or abstentions in the UN Security Council in favor of Palestine could engender dramatic political responses in Congress. The Obama Administration may thus be reduced on Palestine issues to immobility.
But that should not happen on Iran, where Netanyahu has a less direct role. The Administration needs to bring home next week a truly good agreement on Iran’s nuclear program that will give the international community a year’s warning of any Iranian effort to “break out” and the intrusive monitoring necessary to make a “sneak out” impractical and detectable. Netanyahu can fulminate against such a deal, but he is unlikely to be able to stop it or to take unilateral (and likely ineffectual) military action against Iran.
For those who once hoped for Israelis to reject Netanyahu, the election result is an enormous disappointment, even if his additional seats come mostly from rightwing rivals. The impact on the Middle East peace process will be dramatic. But the impact on nuclear negotiations with Iran need not be.
Peace picks March 15-20
1. Rebels, Radicals, and the Regime: Finding a Way Forward in Syria| Monday, March 16th | 12:00- 1:30 PM | Carnegie Endowment for International Peace | REGISTER TO ATTEND | Following the recent collapse of the main U.S.-backed rebel group, Harakat al Hazm, how should the U.S. re-think its strategy toward Syria’s moderate opposition? How might its recently launched train-and-equip program in Turkey affect dynamics inside Syria? How likely is the UN-proposed freeze in Aleppo to succeed, and how viable is Moscow’s renewed push for peace between the regime and its opponents? On the fourth anniversary of the devastating Syria conflict, The Middle East Institute is pleased to welcome Michael Eisenstadt, The Washington Institute for Near East Policy, Robert Ford, The Middle East Institute, Former U.S. Ambassador to Syria, Mohammed Ghanem, Syrian American Council, and Dafna Rand, Center for a New American Security, for a discussion about how to break the stalemate in Syria and move the country toward a peaceful political transition.
2. A Nuclear Deal, Iran’s Regional Role and US Relations with the Gulf | Monday, March 16th | 2:00-3:30 PM | The Atlantic Council | REGISTER TO ATTEND | The Arab nations across the Gulf from Iran are watching with some trepidation as nuclear talks between Iran and the five permanent members of the UN Security Council plus Germany appear to be nearing a conclusion. Speakers will address the validity of these concerns and how they might be addressed by the Obama Administration to reduce sectarian tensions and bolster nuclear non-proliferation. Speakers include: Richard LeBaron, Former US Ambassador to Kuwait, Alireza Nader, Senior International Policy Analyst RAND Corporation, Ilan Goldenberg Director, Middle East Security Program, Center for a New American Security. Read more
Kerry’s hint
Secretary Kerry’s few words Sunday about negotiating with Bashar al Assad have roused the commentariat to hyperbole: Aaron David Miller says
…if…the U.S. comes to terms with Mr. Assad, then Washington will have achieved a horrible trifecta: legitimizing a mass murderer, feeding ISIS propaganda, and alienating its own Sunni allies.
That is eminently quotable. But the sentence that precedes it is more to the point:
If Russia and Iran would support a transition in Syria that forces Mr. Assad, his family, and the regime’s mafia from power; that includes Alawites, Sunnis, Christians, and Kurds in the new Syria; and that doesn’t open the door to further ISIS gains, the outcome could be fine.
The simple fact is that Washington has long been prepared to negotiate with Assad or his regime. It did so at the Geneva 2 talks in early 2014. I imagine it would do so again if it can move Assad aside or out. Kerry clearly intended this when he said yesterday:
To get the Assad regime to negotiate, we’re going to have to make it clear to him that there is a determination by everybody to seek that political outcome and change his calculation about negotiating.
This reminds me of Kerry’s apparently offhanded remark about Syria’s chemical weapons, which led to a diplomatic rather than a military initiative to remove them. That effort was not 100% successful, but it was easily over 75% successful. Kerry also went on to say:
That’s under way right now. And I am convinced that, with the efforts of our allies and others, there will be increased pressure on Assad.
This could be wishful thinking. But if he is hinting that Tehran and Moscow (those are presumably the “others”) are prepared to increase pressure on Bashar, we might well be within range of a 75% breakthrough along the lines of the one Miller described as acceptable.
What might that look like? It would have to involve the central premise of the 2012 Geneva communique: a transitional governing body with full executive powers. It is difficult for me to picture Assad staying in the country while that happens. His life would be in danger. He might remain nominally as president, but take a long vacation in Moscow or Tehran, with his family. Or perhaps in Latakia. Someone else would need to be put in charge, either as acting president or prime minister.
Who might that be? The current vice presidents of Syria are Farouk al Sharaa (despite frequent rumors of his defection) and Najah al Attar. Both are Sunni Muslims and loyalists to Assad, who appointed them after long service in the Ba’ath party and his government. Neither would be much welcomed among the externally based Syrian Opposition Coalition (SOC), but a constitutional succession (like the one in Yemen) would presumably preserve more of the Syrian state and its capabilities to fight the Islamic State (ISIS) than a violent overthrow of the regime.
More likely perhaps would be a military takeover, something that has happened frequently in Syria’s past. This would have to exclude Bashar’s younger brother Maher, who was a major protagonist of the crackdown on peaceful protesters and the subsequent civil war. He and the rest of the Assad family would have to join the President in exile, or decide to fight. That would make the current civil war in Syria deteriorate further, as the regular army (or a large part of it) supports the military takeover while the Alawite militias try to protect both the remaining Assad family members and the Alawite population, which is split between western Syria and Damascus.
That will not be the only complication. There will be nothing easy about a political settlement of the Syrian conflicts if Kerry is correct and one is in the offing. ISIS, Jabhat al Nusra and perhaps also some Kurdish forces will continue to fight whatever transition arrangement is made. Iran and Russia will continue to try to preserve their assets in Syria.
Tehran will be particularly keen on its Revolutionary Guard forces playing a major role, in order to guarantee continuation of Syria’s role as a bridge to Hizbollah, whose forces are also engaged there. Moscow will want its port access and strong military supply relationship with Syria preserved, but its main preoccupation will be to portray whatever settlement is reached as a triumph for Russian diplomacy and a defeat for the US, which it managed reasonably well in the case of chemical weapons.
Secretary Kerry may be hinting at something better than preservation of Assad in power, but implementation won’t be easy.
The road forward is civilian as well as military
I spoke this afternoon at on a “political analysts” panel at The Road Forward conference on planning the future of the Syrian American Community. Here are my speaking notes:
1. Let me start by saying the obvious. This comes from someone who would have preferred that you stick with nonviolent rebellion. But four years have passed and that is history.
2. Now you’ve got to do better on the military front. There is no substitute for that.
3. The regime’s relative success on the battlefield, with ample Iranian and Russian support, has made a political solution less feasible than in June 2012, when the Geneva communiqué was adopted.
4. If you want to get back to its provision for a transitional governing body with full executive powers, you are going to need somehow to threaten Bashar al Assad’s hold on power, making him feel that failure to agree puts him more at risk than agreeing. That is vital for a negotiated solution.
5. But it is only a necessary condition. It is not a sufficient one.
6. Today’s Syria is the scene of a devastating regional proxy war pitting Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Iran against each other, with the US and Russia only slightly more removed.
7. Syrians need to re-establish control over their own destiny.
8. The civilian dimension is as important as the military one.
9. One vital civilian dimension is diplomacy. The Syrian opposition did well at the Geneva 2 conference. But it failed to follow up on that triumph by uniting its factions.
10. That is still vital. Broad unity under a single umbrella would make the opposition a more serious negotiating partner not only for the regime but also for the Americans, Russians and Iranians.
11. A second important civilian dimension is governance. You cannot hope to be taken seriously unless you are serious about plans to govern effectively inside Syria. The “Back to Syria” idea was a good one, but it was never implemented.
12. It never even got out of the planning stage, so far as I know.
13. Even that would have an impact: a serious plan to govern protected areas in the north and south would give people sympathetic to your pleas for American help, like me, what they need to argue in your favor.
14. It is now ancient history, but in both Kosovo and Bosnia civilian governance during the wars weighted heavily with the international community. In Kosovo, the Albanians created institutions that provided health and education, in addition to a parliament and a presidency. In Bosnia, the collaboration of Croats and Muslims in the Bosnian Federation was vital to success at the Dayton peace talks.
15. The time is ripe in Syria. One way or another, Syrians trained in US-sponsored programs will begin to be inserted back into the country over the next year or so.
16. Failure to protect them from bombardment could lead to a Bay of Pigs fiasco.
17. No-fly zones, even with anti-aircraft weapons, are insufficient. The regime and extremists could well attack with artillery. What Syrians need are protected areas along the Turkish border and in the south, where American, opposition, Jordanian and Israeli interests converge.
18. These would not be “safe” areas. They would be target-rich environments in the view of both extremists and the regime.
19. On the ground, they will have to protect themselves. But air cover should come from Coalition countries, including Turkey and Jordan.
20. Military protection will not however make protected areas a success. Only if governance succeeds will they represent a serious step forward.
21. Success in governance will depend on planning and unity.
22. The national plans for The Day After and the Syrian Transition Roadmap have been overtaken by events. Nor is it sufficient for disparate administrative local councils to accomplish heroics here and there.
23. What you need is a plan for governance and enough performance to convince the powers that be that the opposition is a viable governing entity and a bulwark against extremism.
24. I have to admit that I voted twice for Barack Obama, who has made big mistakes in Syria. If you want him to correct those mistakes, you need to do better not only on the battlefield but also in diplomacy and governance.
25. This is a dark moment for the Syrian opposition, but also an opportunity: to write a serious plan for governing liberated areas of Syria.
26. I hope you’ll move in that direction. I pledge my personal support for such an effort.
No viable alternative
The furor over the Republican letter to the Iranians and the debate over the President’s authority to reach an agreement with Iran is obscuring a vital issue: is there a viable alternative? Let’s consider the options:
1. A better agreement. That’s what Netanyahu told the Congress he wanted. He wants one in which Iran gives up its substantial (he called it vast) nuclear infrastructure. This is presumably a reference to its 20,000 or so centrifuges. Since we don’t know precisely what the agreement will provide in this area, it is difficult to comment on this option. But the fact is that no nuclear power has ever used nuclear facilities safeguarded by the Intenrational Atomic Energy Agency to produce the materials needed for a nuclear weapon. It doesn’t really matter how many centrifuges they’ve got. Diversion of this sort is readily detected. It would be the least of my worries. Intrusive IAEA inspections are a necessary part of any agreement.
2. Maintenance of sanctions. The other members of the P5+1 (UK, France, Germany, Russia and China) are unlikely to cooperate if the US walks away from what they regard as an acceptable agreement. If they eliminate sanctions, Iran would feel little pressure on the nuclear question. The US could of course maintain its own sanctions, as it likely even if there is an agreement because some of them were imposed because of human rights abuses and Iranian support for terrorism. But it is important to remember what 50 years of unilateral embargo got us from Cuba, a much more vulnerable economy: zero.
3. War. The US could presumably destroy a good portion of Iran’s nuclear program. It would require a massive attack in many parts of the country, including destruction of Iran’s air defense system. We are not talking a one-night stand here, but rather a campaign over weeks if not months. The outcome would be uncertain, but few think it would set back the Iranians from nuclear weapons more than two or three years. So we would have to repeat the effort several years down the pike. In the meanwhile, the Iranians would wreck vengeance on US troops in Iraq as well as on US allies in the Gulf. As a consequence, oil prices would jump, helping the Iranians with reconstruction and the Russians with their aggression in Ukraine.
4. Regime change. Oops. I forgot to bring my magic wand, so that may not be possible today. The Bush Administration tried hard and failed, not to mention his predecessors. President Obama has forsworn it, not because he doesn’t want it but because it is impossible to negotiate with people if you are trying to unseat them. There is no telling when the Iranian people will throw off the yoke of the Islamic Republic, much as I might wish for it. Hope is not a policy.
A nuclear agreement–with or without Congressional approval–starts to look a lot better when you take a clear-eyed look at the alternatives. Congress could of course undermine an agreement or even make it impossible to implement. But so too could the Supreme Leader or the Iranian Majles. American won’t renege if the agreement provides for a year of warning time before Tehran can make a nuclear weapon and demonstrably improves the visibility of what Iran is up through IAEA inspections. The Iranians won’t undermine an agreement that removes enough sanctions to allow some measure of economic recovery.
When you’ve got no viable alternative, compromise starts looking good.
True, but irrelevant
Republican senators have written an open letter to Iran’s leaders warning them that any agreement with the United States on its nuclear program not approved in Congress can be revoked “with the stroke of a pen” by the next President. That’s true, but irrelevant.
For several reasons:
1. The Iranians already know it. Does anyone in Congress imagine that no one in Tehran knows the difference between a “mere executive agreement” made by the President on his own and a treaty ratified by the Senate? The Iranians are difficult, but not dumb.
2. If a deal is struck, it will have to be one that demonstrably restrains Iran from getting nuclear weapons and gives the world advance warning if it moves in that direction. The Administration is aiming for a one-year breakout time. Does anyone think the next president will jettison an agreement of that sort without any substitute?
3. A move to junk an agreement would not find support even from the United Kingdom and France, much less Germany, Russia and China. Without the support of these other P5+1 countries, the US would be unable to reimpose multilateral sanctions on Iran and would be reduced to the kind of unilateral effort that has proven so fruitless for more than 50 years against Cuba.
I imagine someone in the Iranian Majles is arguing for a reply to the Senators that might read, if it were honest, along the following lines:
If our two current presidents reach an agreement and a future American president reneges on it, our Supreme Leader will ditch Iran’s obligations and do as he wishes. This could include pursuit and deployment of nuclear weapons, though you won’t know because the extra monitoring of our nuclear program provided for in the agreement will no longer apply.
The Iranians of course are far too sophisticated to reply along those lines, but the Senatorial letter will certainly bring joy to the hearts of those hardliners who would like to do so.
The letter is clearly intended to make the negotiations more difficult. Some might even say it is an effort to interfere in them, making the letter a potential violation in spirit of the (never enforced) Logan Act, which prohibits private correspondence with foreign governments “in relation to any disputes or controversies with the United States, or to defeat the measures of the United States.” That is presumably one of the reasons it is an “open” letter.
The Senators’ letter is of course not really about Iran but about American politics, in particular Republican relations with President Obama. The Republicans are trying to restrain him from what they regard as his unjustified and allegedly illegal efforts to shape policy, in particular on immigration, health care and global warming but also more generally on anything they think a Republican president would do differently.
I really don’t know what the next president will do with any nuclear deal the current one comes up with by the end of the month. If the Administration were to ask for Congressional approval, the agreement would be far more binding and harder for the president to undo. It might be preferable if it were an executive agreement and therefore readily abrogated if the need arises. That is something the Republicans should reflect on.
