The Obama Maneuver

posted at 9:30 pm on September 25, 2009 by J.E. Dyer
[ Diplomacy ]   

Mmm, mmm, mm,

Barack Hussein Obama!

He strategizes like a pro,

To Mean Iran’s nukes he says NO!

Barack Hussein Obama!

If I hadn’t read it myself I would not have believed anyone could write something as sycophantic and credulous as Joe Cirincione’s HuffPo piece today on The Obama Maneuver.  Let the opening speak for itself:

Obama knew all along that Iran had a secret uranium factory. He may be more of a master strategist than his foes–and even his friends–have realized.

In no hurry to move on from this theme, Cirincione continues thus:

The key to understanding today’s announcement on Iran is this: President Obama knew about the secret Iranian facility nine months ago. Before he began his strategy of engagement, he knew Iran was lying about its program. When he extended his hand in friendship, he knew Iran had built a secret factory to enrich uranium. Before he offered direct talks, he knew Iran was hiding a nuclear weapons breakout capability.

He can see you’re still not getting it, so Cirincione adds this clarification:

Each move was denounced as “weak” and “naïve” by the right. That talk looks foolish today. These were the moves of chess master, carefully positioning pieces on the board, laying a trap, and springing it at the opportune moment.

A trap, I tell you.  A trap!  And so cleverly laid.

We now know that Obama was not acting on impulse, or philosophy or general principles, but on deep strategy. He knew better than his critics that Ahmadinejad could not be trusted. He just had a better plan for how to deal with him.

I should probably stop picking on Cirincione.  He reveals a certain analytical naiveté of his own in the next sentence:

Obama is now well positioned to unite world leaders in a long-term strategy to back Iran away from nuclear weapons.

This is a key weakness in his argument, because the truth is:  Not really.  Obama is dealing with the same world leaders he was dealing with on Wednesday, and there is no evidence their positions have changed.  Britain, France, and Germany are with us on sanctions, although the extent of their commitment is untested yet.  Russia’s Medvedev, as Jennifer Rubin points out, does not exclude sanctions on Iran, but in clarifying Moscow’s position expresses as little favor toward them as ever.  China’s diplomats have not evinced a change of front today, after the US revelation, as opposed to their firm dismissal of sanctions yesterday.  Nor are Russia and China the only variables.

Of the other nations currently serving on the UN Security Council, we cannot necessarily expect consensus in favor of “tough” sanctions.  Turkey’s and Croatia’s may be the only “safe” votes for truly punishing sanctions.  Japan and Austria, also serving terms, have significant and growing commercial ties to Iran; Japan has had reservations about sanctions during previous efforts to impose them. Moreover, Japan’s new prime minister, the first in more than a generation not elected from the conservative Liberal Democratic Party (and billed as the “Japanese Obama”), has been making a tremendous point of changing the relationship of Japan with America, and entering a new era of relations with Russia and China.  His avowedly “Asian” focus could well militate against breaking ranks with the Asian giants, Russia and China, on the Iranian problem in “their” back yard.

Among the other nations on the Security Council right now – Burkina Faso, Costa Rica, Libya, Vietnam, Mexico, and Uganda – there are no automatic votes “for” tougher sanctions on Iran.  We can expect still other leading nations, like India and Brazil, to resist a toughening of sanctions.  The UN has had sanctions imposed on Iran since 2006, and these nations, along with a number of others, are likely to agree among themselves that a continuation of lighter sanctions – perhaps with some minor and non-punitive tweaks – represents the right mix of politics and operational methodology.  Certainly Venezuela, and Chavez’s growing flock of president-for-life associates in Central America, will oppose stronger sanctions on Iran.  A number of African nations will join Libya, which is almost certain to oppose tougher sanctions.

Obama himself proclaimed in his UN speech that the era of American leadership is over.  But it will take some serious leadership to get the UN to impose serious sanctions on oil-exporting Iran during a global recession.  The disclosure of the undeclared uranium enrichment site at Qom is a revelation only to the Western left:  everyone else was already clear that Iran has been systematically lying to and deceiving the international community.  Obama’s presentation of a new data point will not change minds that already grasped the underlying trend.  Arm-twisting, horse-trading, playing the leader card – these are the methods of obtaining a grudging consensus to do difficult things.  Obama has basically promised that we will not use them.

As for the rest of Cirincione’s ode to Obama, counterfactual assertions occur early and often.  ”Obama’s missile defense decision,” he says, “a move that puts more military assets in position more quickly against the Iranian missiles…increases the pressure on Iran.”  This is an absurd statement.  Scrapping the East European missile sites instead assures Iran that we will be unable to intercept the long-range missiles it is developing.  It was wholly unnecessary to scrap those sites in order to deploy tactical anti-missile forces against Iran’s shorter-range missiles.  Since our tactical capability already exists, is mobile, and is well-known to Iran, the relevant point for Tehran’s planners is whether we have it deployed at a given time.  To the announcement that we plan to deploy it as a shield against shorter-range missiles, Iran’s logical response would be: “Du-uh.  Tell me something I can’t figure out by reading Aviation Weekly.”

It is wearying, and would take too long, to deconstruct every sentence.  Cirincione does make the superficially sensible point that “The obvious solution is for Iran to agree to intrusive inspections.” In a bubbling cauldron of goo like this piece, the superficially sensible is a welcome relief.  But even here skepticism is in order.  This is an obvious solution, but is it an effective one?

Iran has been inspected frequently since 2003, accepting varying levels of intrusiveness.  Of course, what Cirincione has in mind is more intrusive inspections.  But who will execute and supervise them?  The same IAEA that has backed and shuffled on Iran’s deceptions for the last six years?  The IAEA that has come out two or three times a year with eye-opening reports, accompanied by warnings that the situation is of grave concern - but that also phrases its communications to blunt the appearance of urgency in its message, because of its leadership’s political opposition to confrontation?  The politicization of the IAEA’s mission in Iran has been well established.

What the Obama Maneuver is likely to buy us is the appearance of Iranian cooperation, under the beaming satisfaction of a UN relieved, by that chimera, of immediate responsibility.  Iran has agreed to “more intrusive” inspections before, and may do so again.  The P5 and other parties may profess themselves satisfied, with the usual proviso that there be rigorous verification; and photo ops are sure to abound.  Iran may even find it the better part of valor to ostentatiously “give up” the newly revealed site at Qom, perhaps turning it into a facility for renewable energy research. And yet none of this will mean that Iran’s nuclear purpose has been deflected.

We have a new line of effort in the Iranian nuclear game.  But we have all the same old players, factors, and influences.  The Obama Maneuver is most likely to end up a sideshow, distracting us from the set-up going on in the center-ring.

J.E. Dyer blogs at The Optimistic Conservative and “contentions“.

Blowback