Frustration And Rage With Iran
Writing at ThreatsWatch, blogger Steve Schippert today published photos from what he called Iran’s “Tienanmen Square” and the images certainly are disturbing. There really is no overstating the brutality and depravity of this regime. Schippert closes with a condemnation of American defenders of a soft-power approach to Iran, among whom I would count myself:
There is a way to condemn a regime axing its citizens in the streets of Tehran and other cities across Iran without “making this about the US.” You, and our president, are intelligent men and women and lacking no gifts of speech and prose. Find what’s missing. Each of you frustrate and sadden me. Argue your eloquent points elsewhere. My ears are deaf as of now.
Even though Schippert has declared himself “deaf” to “eloquent” words about Iran from losers like me, I have great sympathy for his viewpoint. It is impossible to watch the images that trickle out past Iran’s censors without outrage. Nonetheless, it is difficult not to add frustration to the list of emotions as well, because there seems little more that can be done that has not already been done. Yes, the invitations for Iranian diplomats to Fourth of July celebrations was clumsy and stupid (and now canceled), but it isn’t like the President has been as silent as folks like Schippert claim. While carefully differentiating between condemning Iran’s rampant and growing travesties against human rights and taking sides in the underlying electoral controversy, President Obama has already condemned the brutalities of the regime in strong terms. What more can be done?
Unfortunately, critics of the President just keep claiming (falsely) that he has been “silent” rather than putting forward any answers to this question. Vicious regimes do not fall quietly and often times — especially when the actors are the United States and Iran — outside efforts to “help” topple the regime do more harm than good. Iran’s leaders already are disposed to try to blame the United States for the chaos, and every single time the President speaks, he may lend legitimacy and persuasiveness to those claims. And beyond words, no one apart from a few long-discredited foreign policy quacks have any ideas for escalation. Even Schippert can find nothing more than a vague “find what’s missing” dumping the burden of specific alternatives on somebody else.
Schippert has declared himself deaf, but when it comes to providing options, he and others like him are also mute.
I agree with Jason completely on this subject. Those who would argue for some sort of overt US intervention in the Iranian post-election imbroglio and violent crackdown on street protests seem to me to hold the widespread and often subconscious view that “we simply MUST do SOMETHING!” Sometimes, doing nothing is exactly the wisest course of action, even if it calls for patience and a consideration of the bigger picture and the long-term view — all rare commodities nowadays.
At the same time, I cannot help but ponder the sad fact that legitimate street protests are increasingly stifled, harassed and greeted with intolerance in this country also, and that protests of the size and nature of those we are witnessing in Iran today would most likely receive a lesser but similar response from the authorities in the USA as well.
Obama is being tested all over the world right now.
He went to the G20 and was smacked down.
He went to the nato summit and asked for more troops in Afghanistan and was smacked down.
North Korea is firing missiles and detonating Nukes.
Iran is rioting in the streets and he is essentially silent till they can run a poll on the American people to find out what to do.
Pakistan is in danger of falling to the Taliban types and losing control of their nukes. The USA in this case should be pounding the Taliban right now.
In response to collateral casualties they have changed the way they fight in Afghanistan to no longer go after known terrorists if they are among innocents.
His own congress is passing resolutions despite him.
100 billion sent to the IMF as a bailout while the rest of the world does nothing and we have near 10 percent unemployment at home.
None of this is shocking in reality coming from a far left politician. The loud war cry from the left was that TALK is the only way to deal with the worlds problems and talk he has done quite a bit of.
By the same token I think those that advocate soft power seem to think the only alternative to soft power is bomb, bomb, bomb…bomb, bomb Iran. So far Bush, Reagan and Bush 1. Have not bombed Iran or North Korea nor have they been guilty of soft peddaling with them. Not much was accomplished. Carter, Clinton and now Obama have tried the soft power approach and not much has been accomplished other then they have been able to go ahead and build nuclear weapons and take our bribes in stride.
The question now becomes….what are we strategically trying to accomplish. Without a clear strategic goal then we are doing nothing but playing pop a mole diplomatic games around the world. What is Obama’s strategic vision?
I also agree that Obama did end up striking the right tone in his comments, although it was also fair to ask “What took so long?”
As for escalation, I also agree that the U.S. has relatively few options. The next best move would have to come from the E.U.: gasoline embargo. Obama could push for this under the surface. If an embargo were combined with a sizable general strike in Iran, it would put tremendous pressure on an already crumbling Iranian economy and top leadership, broadening the support for a reorganization. Khamanei no longer projects much moral authority and has to rely on brute force. If the key groups/elements providing the brute force decide that it is in their interests to back another horse, it would be very tough to stop them. Perhaps some/many of the Basiji would still be loyal to Ahmadinejad/Khamanei, but I expect that these bullies would find out quickly what it’s like to be victimized.
Now, that does beg the question of what type of regime would replace the current one? Maybe it would be a mere reshuffling of the leaders while keeping the same basic power structure: oppostion clerics unseat Khamanei and/or Ahmadinejad, but then replace one/both with new “reformers” who hold many similar views but project “change.” Maybe nationalistic military elements will take over on the pretext of cleaning house and keeping order just long enough to transition into a more representative government, only they forget to turn things back over to the civilians and/or clerics. But I wonder if the people of Iran would put up with either of these two bad outcomes at this point? Are Iran’s productive people fed up enough with how the country has been run that they would passively resist – in small but very debilitating ways – any attempts to install a bogus “reform” regime? The new clerical or military regime would still have brute control over the country, but would they be able to keep their strategic resources from ebbing down the drain?
I don’t know the answers to these questions, but I do think that the current Iranian regime has earned any non-interventionary interventions that we throw its way. By all means, let’s do everything we can to be as strategic as possible by not broadcasting messages that the regime can weave into its propaganda narratives – i.e., “it’s an evil plot orchaestrated by the British Zionist American Great Satans . . .” But Iran has been at war with us for over 30 years, “intervening” in our affairs every chance it got – even since 9/11 supporting terrorist networks (by this I also mean Hezbollah and Hamas), sending its scumbags into Iraq, etc.
The Iranian regime gives its people jackbooted thugocracy and calls it “democracy.” We should have no problem with giving the Iranian regime an intervention and calling it the “open hand” of dialogue.