Talking to your opponents

The United States has imposed sanctions on Cuba for over 52 years.  So far as I can tell, the sanctions have accomplished nothing, other than condemn the Cuban people to poverty.  What were they intended to accomplish?  Does anyone remember?  Does anyone have any idea of what it would take -- what Cuba would have to do -- to end the sanctions?

I doubt it.  Whatever our original objectives, if  any were ever actually formulated, the winning of Cuban-American votes in Florida has been the only real concern for administration after administration, both Democratic and Republican.

Let's not repeat the Cuban fiasco in Iran.

In an Op-Ed article in today's New York Times, Professor Vali Nasr¹ suggests that we may have reached an optimum time at which to negotiate an agreement with the Iranian government.  He argues that the gradual tightening of sanctions to date has had the desired effect, that the Iranians are ready to deal, and that we should conduct serious negotiations with the objective of restricting Iran's ability to enrich uranium to weapons grade level, while permitting lower grade enrichment for domestic use in nuclear power plants.

As I understand our stated objectives, such a deal would achieve those objectives.   Professor Nasr fears, however, as do I, that, instead, we intend to continue tightening sanctions to force a total "surrender" on the part of the Iranian government.  Or, I might add, a "regime change," analogous to our probable half-century hopes, however vague, that we might force Fidel Castro out of office.

As Nasr notes, sanctions are more popular than serious negotiations with American voters.  But we expect our govenment to conduct foreign affairs with some degree of sophistication beyond that of the voting public, while still remaining democratically responsible to that public.  This expectation requires a certain amount of tightrope balancing, I agree.  But it is an expectation strongly supported by that conservative icon, Henry Kissinger.  And we might look at the history of the British Foreign Office, whose record, while not perfect, has demonstrated greater professionalism -- on average -- than has that of our own State Department.

Iran is not Cuba.  Ruining Cuba for half a century harmed only the Cubans.  Ruining Iran -- either by sanctions or by use of force -- will destabilize the largest, most modern, and most sophisticated Islamic nation in the Middle East (except, possibly, Turkey), a nation that has its own security concerns relative to most of its Islamic neighbors, arising out of Iran's "heretical" Shi'ite faith.  And, we need to keep in mind that these security concerns have been intensified by an unfortunate history of past American actions, as in the Iraq-Iran war of 1980-88. 

Successful negotiations require (1) knowing precisely your own objectives; (2) understanding the probable primary objectives of the other party; and (3) understanding the hopes and fears that may affect the rationality of the decision-making of the other party.  I'm not confident that those actually in charge of American foreign policy -- under either the Obama or earlier administrations -- have a good conscious grasp on any of these considerations.

As Nasr suggests:

And rather than offering only vague promises that serious concessions might be rewarded someday by dropping all the sanctions as a package, Washington should offer to do away with specific sanctions, piece by piece, in exchange for specific Iranian concessions.  In that way, both sides might begin dismantling the most dangerous aspects of Iran's nuclear program in incremental, verifiable ways.

Iran has legitimate security concerns.  Iran has legitimate economic ambitions to develop sources of nuclear energy.  Iran may or may not have, or have had, ambitions to develop a nuclear military capacity for either offensive or defensive purposes.  We need to untangle these various goals in our own mind, and find a solution that permits Iran to accomplish its legitimate objectives in ways short of becoming a nuclear military power.
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¹Vali Reza Nasr is Dean of the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, and a member of the State Department's Foreign Affairs Policy Board.