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AP: "The White House on Monday
worked to contain the damage caused by one of President Barack Obama's
closest aides, who, in a seemingly candid, behind-the-curtain magazine
story, ripped the Washington press corps, boasted of creating an 'echo
chamber' of supporters to sell the Iran nuclear deal and appeared to
dismiss long-time foreign policy hands, including Hillary Clinton, as
the Blob. Deputy national security adviser Ben Rhodes' comments to The
New York Times Magazine have sparked a mix of bewilderment and outrage
in Washington's political and policy circles. While some marveled at a
savvy White House aide's apparent eagerness to discuss what some
consider the ugly sausage making of modern governing, other noted he'd
kicked up a hornet's nest of a debate over whether the White House
oversold the legacy-burnishing deal to curb Iran's nuclear program. The
article revived criticism of the agreement. In a statement issued
Monday, Sen. John McCain, a long-time critic of the Iran pact, said the
piece 'provided a troubling glimpse of the White House spin machine
that has put sustaining 'the narrative' above advancing the national
interest.' The piece portrays Rhodes, Obama's top foreign policy
speechwriter and arguably one of his most influential aides, as
singularly in tune with his boss's thinking and narrowly focused on
crafting a messaging machine to support it. It quotes Rhodes lamenting
the ignorance of Washington reporters. ('They literally know nothing.')
And it describes Rhodes, a former aspiring novelist, as focused on
crafting a storyline and dismissing facts that don't fit. Rhodes
appears to try to keep secret news that Iran had seized 10 U.S. Navy
sailors until after the president's State of the Union speech. The
article quotes Rhodes and his aides describing how they used social
media, journalists and friendly interest groups to disseminate White
House-generated talking points about the Iran deal. 'We created an echo
chamber,' Rhodes said. 'They were saying things that validated what we
had given them to say.' Rhodes sought to soften the remarks on the
website Medium. A post late Sunday included something of an overture to
reporters he's dismissed, saying the Iran deal had been well-covered
and debated. He wrote that he didn't try to dupe the press or spin
Washington... Still, some experts involved in the debate said they
recognized the hard sell described in the story. David Albright, a
physicist and arms control expert with the Science and International
Security in Washington, said he was surprised to see a White House
official 'opening up this can of worms again.' The intensity of the
debate over the Iran deal left many in the arms control and policy
world bruised, not the least because of the White House's
take-no-prisoners approach, said Albright, who was briefed by the
administration during the negotiations and remained neutral on the
deal. 'It was, Are you with us or are you against us?' Albright said,
'The White House was looking for sound bites that beat the opposition,
not necessarily sound bites that captured the truth of what was going
on. I wish they were just putting out facts. They exaggerated and
overstated to sell the deal.'" http://t.uani.com/24IjpG9
Mehr
(Iran):
"Iran's FM Zarif has announced that Iran's foreign policy is
guided directly by Leader of the Islamic Revolution. Speaking to the
elected candidates for the 10th Iranian Parliament, who had gathered
together on Saturday morning with the aim of explaining the
requirements of legislation in the new era, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad
Javad Zarif deemed foreign policy as a national and non-partisan issue
stating 'our view of the requirements of foreign policy and sovereign
and dignified presence in the world is based on the principle that the
country's foreign policy should only serve national interests at
regional and international levels.' 'For the reason, the Leader himself
remains at the helm of outlining foreign policy as his prominent role
is quite evident as we are committed to his commands and comments,' he
added... Mohammad Javad Zarif later announced two serious priorities of
the Foreign Ministry in the days and months ahead as ensuring proper
implementation of the JCPOA by Westerners and well as coordinated
confrontation with the threats of terrorism and extremism; 'JCPOA was a
historical necessity and was led by the Leader in special conditions of
the country and no agent in the world would claim that Iran has
suffered a loss in the nuclear deal.' Iranian FM went on to touch upon
what he called the Special conditions of the country before the JCPOA
enumerating various difficulties felt due to sanctions including oil
sale and money transmission restrictions; 'meanwhile, the South Korean
president traveled to Iran accompanied by 240 Korean firms with 25
million dollars of finance though several other states had previously
visited Iran with billion-dollar plans to participate in the country.'
.... The official further added 'our enemies, especially the Zionists
are desperately seeking to induce unsafe conditions in Iran and to deter
foreign investors from participating in Iran; consequently, we must
promote the fact that Iran is the safest and most profitable country
for investment regardless of differences in views.'" http://t.uani.com/24K1rq3
AFP: "Iran is preparing
international legal action to recover nearly $2 billion that the US
Supreme Court has ordered be paid as compensation to American victims
of terror attacks, President Hassan Rouhani said on Tuesday. 'We will
soon take the case of the $2 billion to the international court,'
Rouhani said in a televised speech. 'We will not allow the United
States to swallow this money so easily,' the president said to a crowd
of thousands in the southeastern city of Kerman. The US Supreme Court
ruled on April 20 that Iran must hand nearly $2 billion in frozen
central bank assets to the survivors and relatives of those killed in
attacks it has been accused of organising. The attacks include the 1983
bombing of a US Marine barracks in Beirut and the 1996 Khobar Towers
bombing in Saudi Arabia. The Supreme Court ruling affects some 1,000
Americans." http://t.uani.com/1T7wM0y
Nuclear
& Ballistic Missile Program
WSJ: "An Iranian military official
said Iran conducted its third ballistic missile test-firing since the
country's landmark nuclear deal went into effect in January, but a few
hours later Iran's defense minister countered the report. The
semiofficial Tasnim News Agency reported earlier Monday that the
country fired a missile with a range of 2,000 kilometers (1,243 miles)
two weeks ago, citing Brig. Gen. Ali Abdollahi. The missile was
precision-guided and could accurately strike a target with a 26-foot
margin of error, he said. But Defense Minister Brig. Gen. Hossein
Dehghan said Iran hadn't test-fired a missile of the range cited by the
media, according to the official Islamic Republic News Agency, an
apparent reference to the Tasnim report. He nevertheless said Iran was
moving forward in building up its defensive capabilities, including
through its ballistic missile program... 'We remain deeply concerned
about Iran's ballistic missile test-launches, which are provocative and
destabilizing,' a senior Obama administration official said Monday.
'These launches are inconsistent with U.N. Security Council resolution
2231, in which the Security Council called upon Iran not undertake any
launches of ballistic missiles designed to be capable of delivering a
nuclear weapon.' Obama administration critics blamed the White House
for what one, Sen. John McCain (R., Ariz.), called 'Iran's growing
belligerence in the aftermath of the reckless Iran nuclear deal.'"
http://t.uani.com/1TxW3eG
Reuters: "The United States said on
Monday it could not confirm reports that Iran had tested a
precision-guided missile two weeks ago but if true such a step would be
provocative and destabilizing. 'We are aware of Iranian comments on an
additional ballistic missile launched,' State Department spokeswoman
Elizabeth Trudeau told a briefing, saying any launch by Iran would be
inconsistent with a U.N. Security Council resolution. 'We remained
concerned about Iran's ballistic missile test launch which are
provocative and destabilizing.'" http://t.uani.com/1qbaUUl
Free
Beacon: "Fox
News correspondent James Rosen reported Monday that the Obama
administration campaigned extensively to deceive the media and the
American people about key aspects of the Iran nuclear deal. Appearing
on Special Report with Bret Baier, Rosen explained how Ben Rhodes, the
White House deputy national security adviser for strategic
communications, led a public relations effort to spin a narrative about
the Iran nuclear agreement that was contrary to facts... Rosen also
reported for the first time that video from a State Department press
briefing two years ago showing possible deception by the administration
had been deleted for unknown reasons. 'Late today, we discovered that
the State Department's video of its December 2, 2013, press briefing,
at which I confronted spokesperson Jen Psaki about the false statement
made by her predecessor, Victoria Nuland ... has itself, with the use
of a white flash, been deleted from both the State Department's
official website and from its YouTube channel,' Rosen reported. 'In
that exchange, Psaki effectively admitted that the administration had
lied to me because the diplomacy [between the United States and Iran]
needed privacy,' Rosen added. 'The State Department told me just
moments ago it cannot explain this deletion and is working to restore
the excised material.'" http://t.uani.com/1ZAVJzP
U.S.-Iran
Relations
Politico: "A former U.S. Marine who was
held prisoner in Iran for more than four years is suing the
Islamist-led country, seeking damages for torture he endured while in
custody, his lawyers announced Monday. Amir Hekmati, an
Iranian-American from Michigan, was convicted on vague espionage
charges after being taken into custody while on a visit to Iran. He and
three other Americans of Iranian descent were released earlier this
year as part of a prisoner swap negotiated between Iranian officials
and the Obama administration. The lawsuit has been filed in the U.S.
District Court for the District of Columbia, and it seeks economic,
compensatory, and punitive damages from a country that does not have
diplomatic ties with the United States and is unlikely to recognize any
court ruling against it. According to a news release, the complaint
maintains that 'Iran's despicable behavior was outside the scope of
immunity provided by the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act (FSIA) and
therefore subjects Iran to suit in the United States.' It says that
Hekmati was subject to beatings, sleep deprivation, forced drugging and
psychological abuse. 'Iran's treatment of Amir Hekmati was utterly
contemptible,' his attorney, Scott Gilbert, said in a statement. 'Amir
can never be adequately compensated for his suffering. ... Our
intention, with the filing of this lawsuit, is to attempt to provide at
least some measure of justice for Amir and his family.'" http://t.uani.com/1Wn4EHO
Business
Risk
Al-Monitor: "Since a landmark nuclear
deal went into effect in January, US officials have conducted roundtables
with banking officials in more than 15 countries, but failed to
reassure major foreign banks that it is OK for them to return to Iran,
Al-Monitor has learned. A business source briefed on the issue told
Al-Monitor at a May 3-4 business conference in Zurich on condition of
anonymity that two Swiss banks - Credit Suisse and UBS - were among
those approached by officials from the US Department of State and the
US Treasury. Most big foreign banks have so far rejected a return to
Iran for a host of reasons, including heavy fines paid to the US
government for past sanctions violations and concerns that the
sanctions environment could change again for the worse. Gregg
Rosenberg, a spokesman for UBS, told Al-Monitor that his bank was not
going to handle Iran business. 'At this time there are no changes to
our global sanctions policy, which restricts business activity with or
involving Iran, including client activity such as payments or trading
that involves Iran,' Rosenberg said in an email. A Credit Suisse spokeswoman
had a similar reply: 'As a global bank Credit Suisse complies with
various national and international sanctions programs. While the
international community has recently lifted a part of the sanctions
against Iran, other Iran sanctions that impact our Bank's international
operations remain in place. Credit Suisse maintains its general policy
to abstain from conducting business with or involving Iran. We continue
to closely monitor the situation.' ... Mostafa Beheshti Rouy, an
executive board member and director of international affairs for Bank
Pasargad, Iran's largest bank, told Al-Monitor that only third-tier
European banks have shown any willingness to re-enter the Iranian
market... In addition, a spokesman for the Obama administration told
Al-Monitor on condition of anonymity, 'Iran has kept its end of the
deal, and we have upheld ours and are committed to continuing to do
so.' The official added, 'Iran is already seeing real benefits from the
sanctions lifting that occurred in January - nearly doubling its oil
sales, beginning to access funds abroad and starting to reconnect to
the international banking sector.' The official acknowledged, however,
that 'questions remain' about what foreign companies can and cannot do,
which is why 'Treasury and State officials have traveled worldwide to
meet with government and private sector partners to provide clarity on
our sanctions. ... While we are committed to providing clarity on the
sanctions issues that are within our control, the reality is that there
are factors beyond our control that also continue to slow Iran's
economic engagement - including corruption and lack of transparency in
its financial and business sectors. These are issues that have nothing
to do with sanctions, and Iran has its own work to do to address these
and earn the confidence of international companies and financial
institutions.' ... In addition, there is uncertainty surrounding the
future of sanctions because of US presidential elections." http://t.uani.com/27ay66U
Bloomberg: "Companies are delaying
investment decisions [in Iran] pending the result of the U.S.
presidential election, Helima Croft, chief commodities strategist at
RBC, says at Platts Global Crude Oil Summit in London." http://t.uani.com/1sa4DKy
Sanctions
Enforcement
WSJ: "Freight railway
company Burlington Northern Santa Fe, a unit of Berkshire
Hathaway Inc., disclosed payments possibly in violation of Iran
sanctions made by a foreign subsidiary, the company said in a
securities filing. BNSF said one of its foreign subsidiaries made sales
through a third party entity that may have involved the government of
Iran from 2013 to 2015. The total revenue from the sales was $45,000
and the net income for the company was around $2,500, the securities
filing said. The company said it notified the U.S. Department of the
Treasury, Office of Foreign Assets Control, U.S. Department of Commerce
and Bureau of Industry and Security Friday about its investigation. 'We
will submit further information to OFAC and BIS after completing an
internal investigation, which we are conducting with the assistance of
outside counsel, and we intend to cooperate fully with both agencies,'
the securities filing Friday said." http://t.uani.com/1TCaoGt
Sanctions
Relief
Reuters: "U.S. Secretary of State John
Kerry will meet representatives of British and European banks in London
on Thursday to discuss issues involved in doing business with Iran, a
British banking industry source said on Tuesday. The United States and
Europe lifted sanctions in January under a deal with Iran to limit its
nuclear programme, but other U.S. sanctions remain, including a ban on
transactions with Iran in dollars being processed through the U.S.
financial system. This has meant that few European banks, and none of
the big ones that have deep relationships with the U.S. banking system,
have been willing to get involved in trade with Iran, much to Tehran's
frustration. The British Bankers' Association confirmed a meeting was
due to take place between Kerry and representatives from member banks,
but declined to provide further details. An industry source in London
said Iran would be the focus of the meeting and representatives from
several European banks would also be involved." http://t.uani.com/1UPyp25
Military
Matters
AFP: "Iran's army is now equipped
with a Russian air defence system after a long and controversial
delivery process, Defence Minister General Hossein Dehghan was quoted
as saying Tuesday. 'I inform our people that... we are in possession of
the strategic S-300 system' and that it 'serves our air force's
counterattack command,' Dehghan said, according to ISNA news agency.
Parts of the system, including missile tubes and radar equipment, were
displayed on April 17 during a military parade in southern Tehran. The
United States and Israel have criticised Russia for the sale of the
S-300 system to the Islamic republic... Dehghan also announced that
Iran will start manufacturing this year an air defence system, Bavar
373, 'capable of destroying cruise missiles, drones, combat aircraft
and ballistic missiles.' 'This long-range system is able to destroy
several targets at once,' he added." http://t.uani.com/1Npig23
Syria
Conflict
Reuters: "Up to half-a-dozen Iranian
soldiers deployed in Syria have been captured by rebel forces, a senior
Iranian lawmaker said on Monday, two days after the Iranian
Revolutionary Guards confirmed losses in a battle near Aleppo... Rebels
seized the village of Khan Touman on Friday, some 15 km (9 miles)
southwest of Aleppo, and killed several Iranian soldiers, dealing one
of Tehran's biggest losses in Syria. 'According to the latest numbers,
13 defenders of the shrine were killed, 18 were wounded and five to six
were captured,' Esmail Kosari, chairman of the Iranian parliament's
defense committee, was quoted as saying by the Mizan Online news
agency... It was the first time Iran had confirmed that any of its
combatants had been taken prisoner in Syria. In December, Islamist
rebels in Khan Touman said they had seized two Iranians but that was
never confirmed by Tehran." http://t.uani.com/21SjjKj
Saudi-Iran
Tensions
WSJ: "Low oil prices have also
forced the kingdom to scramble to fend off competition for oil buyers
from Asia to the U.S. Saudi Arabian officials have warily eyed the rise
of Iranian exports as the Islamic Republic ramps up production
following more than three years of crippled output because of Western
sanctions on its nuclear program. Saudi Arabia and Iran have announced
price cuts for their crude as they compete in Europe and Asia. In an
interview, Mohsen Ghamsari, the director in charge of marketing oil at
the National Iranian Oil Co., said Iran wouldn't provide outright
discounts for its crude. But, he said, 'with Saudi Arabia, there is a
price competition.' The removal of longtime Saudi oil minister Ali
al-Naimi over the weekend was widely seen as a bid by Prince Mohammed
to dig in his heels against the encroachment of Iran on its oil buyers.
The prince 'seems fully committed to waging a brutal battle for market
access against arch regional rival Iran,' said Helima Croft, global
head of commodity strategy at RBC Capital Markets LLC. 'He apparently
is not prepared to concede an inch in terms of oil market access,' she
added." http://t.uani.com/1T7xbzZ
Human
Rights
Reuters: "The husband of a
British-Iranian aid worker who has been jailed in Iran for the past
five weeks called on Iranian officials to free his wife on Monday.
Richard Ratcliffe also said that Iranian officials have confiscated the
passport of the couple's 22-month-old daughter, barring the infant from
leaving Iran as well. 'The cruelty of the situation seems both
outrageous and arbitrary,' Ratcliffe said in a statement on Monday.
'That a young mum and baby can be treated as some national security threat
is absurd.' Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe is a 37-year-old program
coordinator with the Thomson Reuters Foundation, a charity organization
that operates separately from Reuters News. Monique Villa, the chief
executive of the foundation, called for the situation to be resolved as
soon as possible. 'At the Thomson Reuters Foundation she has no
professional dealings with Iran whatsoever,' Villa said in a statement.
'In fact, the Thomson Reuters Foundation has no dealings with Iran and
does not operate in the country.' Iranian Revolutionary Guard officials
detained Zaghari-Ratcliffe on April 3 when she arrived at an airport to
fly back to Britain, her husband said. She is now being held in
solitary confinement in an unknown location in Kerman Province, 1,000 kilometers
(620 miles) south of Tehran. No charges have been filed in the case,
but Zaghari-Ratcliffe has told family members in Iran that she was
forced to sign a confession under duress, her husband said. He added
that Iranian officials have told her relatives in Iran that the
investigation relates to an issue of 'national security.'" http://t.uani.com/1T8KpJR
Domestic
Politics
Al-Monitor: "With the newly elected
Iranian parliamentarians set to take their seats by the end of May,
more than 100 members of the current conservative-led parliament took
one last shot at President Hassan Rouhani's comprehensive nuclear
agreement with the six world powers. In a written warning to the
president, the members of parliament said the United States had not
fulfilled its promises and asked Rouhani to set a deadline for
reconsidering the voluntary steps Iran took in reducing its nuclear
program. The statement by the members of parliament said that while
Iran has fulfilled all of its commitments in the nuclear agreement, it
accused the United States of 'bad promises, sabotage and obstruction'
in fulfilling their end of the agreement, specifically in the case of
'removing sanctions, banking transactions and blocking money.' ... With
pro-Rouhani candidates soon to have the most seats in the newly elected
parliament, the statement does not pose a problem for the comprehensive
nuclear deal. However, the statement does reflect that Rouhani
continues to face economic challenges, and since the January
implementation of the nuclear deal, and despite oil exports having
increased, Iranians are still waiting to see the economic results of
the deal. Conservative newspapers that were opposed to the nuclear deal
have now turned their focus to poor economic news. A May 9 article in
Vatan-e-Emrooz reported that despite the lifting of sanctions on Iran
and the hopes of the administration, major energy corporations did not
attend the recent international oil, gas and petrochemical exhibition
in Iran. A front-page May 9 article in Kayhan newspaper was headlined,
'You filled the country with imported goods then speak of production?!'
The article was in reference to comments by Ayatollah Abdollah Javadi-Amoli
about how smuggled goods was adding to the unemployment problem facing
the country. Even Reformist media, which has supported the nuclear deal
and Rouhani's other policies, concedes that there are still no tangible
effects of the nuclear deal." http://t.uani.com/1sa8vLI
Opinion
& Analysis
UANI
Advisory Board Member Dennis Ross in Politico: "The United States has significantly
more military capability in the Middle East today than Russia-America
has 35,000 troops and hundreds of aircraft; the Russians roughly 2,000
troops and, perhaps, 50 aircraft-and yet Middle Eastern leaders are
making pilgrimages to Moscow to see Vladimir Putin these days, not
rushing to Washington. Two weeks ago, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu traveled to see the Russian president, his second trip to
Russia since last fall, and King Salman of Saudi Arabia is planning a
trip soon. Egypt's president and other Middle Eastern leaders have also
made the trek to see Putin. Why is this happening, and why on my trips
to the region am I hearing that Arabs and Israelis have pretty much
given up on President Barack Obama? Because perceptions matter more
than mere power: The Russians are seen as willing to use power to
affect the balance of power in the region, and we are not... But in the
Middle East it is Putin's views on the uses of coercion, including
force to achieve political objectives, that appears to be the norm, not
the exception-and that is true for our friends as well as adversaries.
The Saudis acted in Yemen in no small part because they feared the
United States would impose no limits on Iranian expansion in the area,
and they felt the need to draw their own lines. In the aftermath of the
nuclear deal, Iran's behavior in the region has been more aggressive,
not less so, with regular Iranian forces joining the Revolutionary
Guard now deployed to Syria, wider use of Shiite militias, arms
smuggling into Bahrain and the eastern province of Saudi Arabia, and
ballistic missile tests... This does not mean that we are weak and
Russia is strong. Objectively, Russia is declining economically and low
oil prices spell increasing financial troubles-a fact that may explain,
at least in part, Putin's desire to play up Russia's role on the world
stage and his exercise of power in the Middle East. But Obama's recent
trip to Saudi Arabia did not alter the perception of American weakness
and our reluctance to affect the balance of power in the region. The
Arab Gulf states fear growing Iranian strength more than they fear the
Islamic State-and they are convinced that the administration is ready
to acquiesce in Iran's pursuit of regional hegemony. Immediately after
the president's meeting at the Gulf Cooperation Council summit,
Abdulrahman al-Rashed, a journalist very well connected to Saudi
leaders, wrote: 'Washington cannot open up doors to Iran allowing it to
threaten regional countries ... while asking the afflicted countries to
settle silently.'" http://t.uani.com/1QXi98p
WashPost
Editorial:
"At the heart of the Obama administration's diplomatic engagement
with Iran is the notion that the regime is divided among hard-liners
who foment its terrorism and regional aggression and more moderate
forces who are open to cooperation with the West. The embodiment of the
latter is said to be Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, an
English-speaking favorite of many Western journalists and, even more
so, Secretary of State John F. Kerry. However, if there really is a
gulf between Mr. Zarif and the supposed hard-liners, he often does a
good job of disguising it. During the 18-month imprisonment of The
Post's Jason Rezaian, for example, Mr. Zarif offered public support for
the absurd and mendacious claim that Mr. Rezaian was guilty of
espionage. The foreign minister suggested Mr. Rezaian had been taken
'advantage' of by an 'overzealous low-level operative' of the U.S. government.
More recently, Mr. Zarif was asked to explain why Iran is sponsoring a
cartoon festival beginning this Saturday on the theme of the Holocaust.
It's the second time the regime has staged such a event; the first, a
poisonous orgy of anti-Semitism, was held in 2006 under President
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad - one of the 'hard-liners,' according to Obama
administration theory. Mr. Zarif's response to interviewer Robin Wright
of the New Yorker was a form of denialism: He claimed the Rouhani
administration had nothing to do with the exhibition. The sponsor is a
nongovernmental organization 'that is not controlled by the Iranian
government,' he said. Moreover, he said, the organization had not
needed government permission to stage the event. It was, he said, comparable
to the activity in the United States of the Ku Klux Klan. 'Is the
government of the United States responsible for the fact the there are
racially hateful organizations in the United States?' he demanded.
Naturally, it didn't take long for this dissembling to be challenged.
What was interesting is that some of the pushback came from Mr. Zarif's
own government. A spokesman for the Ministry of Culture and Islamic
Guidance confirmed that the ministry supports the exhibition, along
with other programs that 'enlighten people about the Holocaust.' A
festival official also reported that it was cooperating with the
ministry." http://t.uani.com/1QXifwF
Richard
Cohen in WashPost:
"I've read a fair number of books on foreign policy in recent
years, yet the one that has made the greatest impression on me was
assigned in the sixth grade. It was Esther Forbes's novel 'Johnny
Tremain,' and the lesson I took from it was the very one Johnny himself
had to learn the hard way: 'Pride goeth before a fall.' Maybe too late,
I recommend the book to President Obama and his foreign policy team.
Their pride has already turned to smugness. For evidence, I suggest
reading a lengthy interview with Benjamin Rhodes, the president's
supremely cocky foreign-policy speechwriter and, by his own admission,
master manipulator of the moronic media. The interview, published in
the New York Times Magazine, makes for gripping reading. It is not usual,
after all, for a senior White House official to crow about how he
deceived the press (and the nation) about when negotiations with Iran
over its nuclear program actually began. It was not when the more
moderate current regime took power, but earlier, under the auspices of
more recalcitrant hard-liners. In effect, the White House lied. The lie
exposes a truth. Obama wanted the deal (almost) no matter what. He had
not been beckoned into the talks by more reasonable Iranians, but had
initiated them with the previous regime. In other words, he wanted the
talks more than the Iranians did - a negotiating position of great
weakness. It explains why nothing in the agreement thwarts Iranian
efforts to support terrorism in the Middle East or continue to make mayhem
in Iraq. It lowers the odds that Iran will continue to adhere to the
agreement. Rhodes, who had scant background in foreign affairs before
typing his way into the heart of the president, is now so close to
Obama that 'I don't know anymore where I begin and Obama ends.' (One
more interview like this and he's going to find out.) Many say Rhodes
and the president have a 'mind meld,' and so the reader authoritatively
learns of the centrality of Iran to the president's thinking. If Obama
can reach some understanding with Iran, he can rid himself of the pesky
Middle East and pivot - a word that comes to mind - elsewhere.... No
one knows anymore how many have died in Syria's civil war - maybe as
many as 400,000. More than 4 million people have fled the country, swamping
Europe and coming pretty close to destabilizing governments. The
continent has turned sour, inhospitable to migrants yet hospitable to
right-wing groups last seen in black-and-white newsreels. Russia now
arguably has more influence in the Middle East than the United States
does, and Iran and its proxies are everywhere. The United States hasn't
pivoted. It's plotzed. If this is success, what constitutes failure?
When Obama and his mind-melded sidekick proclaim their own brilliance
and the failure of almost everyone else, what are they talking about?
Maybe the president could use some obnoxious aides who challenge him
and don't come at him, puppy-like. First, though, they could use some
humility. In the Times piece, Rhodes is likened to Holden Caulfield.
That's not who came to my mind. I thought of Johnny Tremain." http://t.uani.com/1VRLOYM
Eli
Lake in Bloomberg:
"This is instructive for understanding Obama's signature foreign
policy achievement, the nuclear deal with Iran. Rhodes was the
architect of selling that deal to Congress and the public. He tells
Samuels that the White House 'created an echo chamber.' He had arms
control wonks, presented in the press as independent experts, 'saying
things that validated what we had given them to say.' On the one hand,
Rhodes takes some pride in his work. 'We drove them crazy,' he says of
the deal's critics. On the other hand, he says, 'I mean, I'd prefer a
sober, reasoned public debate,' after which members of Congress would
reflect and take a vote. 'But that's impossible,' he concludes. Rhodes
calls the foreign policy establishment 'the Blob.' He doesn't like this
Blob. The Blob supported the Iraq War in 2003, supported sanctions on
Iran, and opposes accommodation with our adversaries. It's a familiar
pose to anyone who read progressive blogs in the 2000s. Bloggers such
as Matthew Yglesias (now an editor at Vox) delighted in mocking how
'serious' foreign policy always seemed to mean supporting war. In that
free-wheeling era, this pose went unchallenged. But when applied to the
Obama White House in 2016, it is piffle. The idea that Rhodes is
somehow independent of, or in opposition to, the foreign policy
establishment is delusion. He embodies that establishment, particularly
when it comes to the Iran deal. Let's start with our Holden Caufield
character. When Rhodes decided to give up fiction writing and take up
foreign policy, he landed his first job at the Woodrow Wilson Center.
He got a job with Lee Hamilton, the former chairman of the House
Foreign Affairs Committee. Hamilton brought Rhodes onto the Iraq Study
Group, whose co-chairman was George H.W. Bush's secretary of state and
campaign manager, James Baker. In future dictionaries, the entry for
'foreign policy establishment' should include an illustration of Baker
and Hamilton enjoying martinis at the Woodrow Wilson Center. The Iraq
Study Group was not an independent challenge to the foreign policy
establishment. That gets it backwards. Rather, it was the
establishment's reaction to the Iraq War. After Sept. 11, George W.
Bush and several of his advisers realized that the establishment's
vision of stability -- of a Middle East managed by dictatorships -- had
led to massive instability and the rise of al-Qaeda. Yet the study
group recommended a U.S. withdrawal and cooperation with Iraq's
neighbors -- who were supporting various terrorists and ethnic
cleansers in Iraq at the time -- to try to reach the peace. If that approach
sounds familiar, it should. This is pretty much what Obama today is
trying today in Syria. It is also the impulse that led to Obama's
bargain with Iran. Rhodes has portrayed the Iran deal as a great
accomplishment over the Blob, which was incapable of evaluating it on
its merits. So he chose to sell the deal as a rare opportunity that
presented itself after Iran's relatively moderate president, Hassan
Rouhani, came to power in 2013. (Even though, as Samuels makes clear,
Obama had made an offer to the Iranians in 2012 before Rouhani was
elected.) Rhodes and his echo chamber would have you believe that
striking a deal with Iran was a bold challenge to the foreign policy
establishment. But again, he has this backward. Every president since
Ronald Reagan has reached out to Iran in search of moderates. Even
George W. Bush reluctantly authorized emissaries to explore
negotiations with the Tehran regime, before and during the Iraq War.
Specifically, the idea of a reset in relations with Iran after Sept. 11
was the brainchild of something known as the Iran Project. As Peter
Waldman of Bloomberg News reported in July, the Iran Project was funded
by the Rockefeller Brothers foundation. Its participants included:
Jessica Mathews, the former president of the Carnegie Endowment for
Peace; Tom Pickering, a vice president Boeing and former undersecretary
of state for political affairs; and Robert Silvers, the editor of the
New York Review of Books. Does Rhodes think these people are not part
of his establishment Blob?" http://t.uani.com/1T3mZTG
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Eye on Iran is a periodic news summary from United Against
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