Iraq and Region Update for October 17, 2008
Special Issue
U.S. Foreign Policy Establishment: Radically Different U.S. Middle East Policy Needed
With Congress in recess until after the November election, this “Update” reviews a number of authoritative reports and statements that have appeared in the past two years. The growing consensus? U.S. policy toward Iraq, Iran, and the Arab-Israeli conflict must be fundamentally overhauled.
These reports and statements agree on three main points:
1. The United States should begin direct, comprehensive negotiations with Iran and improve relations with Syria.
2. The United States must support the participation of all Iraqi political factions in the Iraqi electoral process and national reconciliation negotiations.
3. U.S. national as well as regional interests require the United States to commit itself to an Israeli-Palestinian and wider Arab-Israeli peace.
Underlying these points of agreement is the assumption that the United States must promptly and completely withdraw all of its military forces from Iraq. Without such a withdrawal the regional agreements and internal Iraqi understandings envisioned in the reports will almost certainly be impossible to achieve.
This emerging consensus is a radical departure from past U.S. policies, yet paradoxically much of its momentum comes from the center of the U.S. foreign policy establishment.
We at FCNL are working to advance this consensus in Congress, which as a whole, remains well behind the curve. Some members are leading change, however: In the 110th Congress, 128 members of the House have supported at least one bill calling for negotiations with Iran. Unfortunately, it is also true that 280 representatives cosponsored H. Con. Res. 362, which calls in effect for a blockade and diplomatic quarantine of Iran. A year ago the House could muster only 136 votes for a bill requiring that Congress approve any military action against Iran. Congressional support for vigorous U.S. Israeli-Palestinian diplomacy is even weaker. Yet many members of Congress do champion a new U.S. approach to the Middle East, and we and others are working to persuade more members to support the following recommendations:
1. Begin direct, comprehensive negotiations with Iran (and improve relations with Syria).
The Iraq Study Group Report: This December 2006 report, prepared by a bipartisan commission established by Congress and cochaired by former Secretary of State James Baker and former Rep. Lee Hamilton (IN), was one of the earliest and most powerful calls for a fundamentally revised U.S. Middle East policy. “The United States,” it said, “should engage directly with Iran and Syria in order to try to obtain their commitment to constructive policies toward Iraq and other regional issues.”
The National Intelligence Estimate on Iran: This November 2007 report implicitly advocated engagement and rapprochement with Iran, stating that economic sanctions should be matched with “opportunities for Iran to achieve its security, prestige, and goals for regional influence” to maximize the chances of resolving the impasse over Iran’s nuclear program.
Five Former Secretaries of State: In April and again in September Madeleine Albright, Colin Powell, Warren Christopher, Henry Kissinger, and James Baker called for the U.S. government to expand diplomatic negotiations with Iran.
Changing Course: A New Direction for U.S. Relations with the Muslim World: This report was released in October 2008 by a panel that includes former Secretary of State Madeline Albright, former Executive Director of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee Thomas Dine, and former Middle East negotiator Dennis Ross. The panel listed “engage Iran” as the first step that the United States must take if, as the report recommends, this country is to make diplomacy the primary tool for resolving conflict involving Muslim countries.
“Grand Bargain” Advocates: Former National Security Council and CIA analysts Flynt Leverett and Hillary Mann Leverett argue that “the next U.S. president . . . should reorient American policy toward the Islamic Republic of Iran as fundamentally as President Richard Nixon reoriented American policy toward the People's Republic of China in the early 1970s.” The Leveretts served in the Clinton and Bush administrations and were involved in secret negotiations between the United States and Iran from 2001 to 2003. Henry Kissinger has also said the United States should seek a “grand bargain” with Iran.
2. Support the participation of all Iraqi political factions in the Iraqi electoral process and national reconciliation negotiations.
The Iraq Study Group Report: The report stressed the importance of including insurgents and militia leaders as well as factions represented in parliament in Iraq’s national reconciliation process and said the United States itself should talk to all factions except al-Qaeda in Iraq.
Iraq after the Surge: This April 2008 report by the International Crisis Group credits the United States with "smart, pragmatic tactics" in Iraq over the previous year and a half but argues that a successful strategy requires an inclusive approach to Iraqi political factions built around the upcoming provincial elections.
Changing Course: This report states that the United States needs to “promote broad-based political reconciliation in Iraq.”
3. U.S. national interest and regional interests require that the United States commit itself to an Israeli-Palestinian and wider Arab-Israeli peace.
The Iraq Study Group Report: “The United States will not be able to achieve its goals in the Middle East unless the United States deals directly with the Arab-Israeli conflict.” The report also stressed the urgency of this country’s seeking a two-state solution to the Israel-Palestine conflict and of agreements involving Syria and Lebanon.
Changing Course: After engaging with Iran, the authors of Changing Course argue, U.S. diplomacy should next seek to “immediately deescalate and negotiate a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.”
The Annapolis Letter: A bipartisan group of foreign policy specialists, including Zbigniew Brzezinski, Brent Scowcroft, and Lee Hamilton, outlined requirements for a two-state solution of the Israel-Palestine conflict in a letter to President George W. Bush in November 2007, on the eve of the Annapolis peace conference. The letter was subsequently signed by more than 60 experts and political figures. An Israeli-Palestinian settlement should include, the signers said, two states based on the pre-1967 border with minor, reciprocal adjustments; Jerusalem as home to two capitals, with Arab neighborhoods under Palestinian sovereignty, Jewish neighborhoods under Israeli sovereignty, and special arrangements for the holy places; and a solution to the refugee problem that provides compensation and resettlement assistance to Palestinians but retains a Jewish majority in Israel.
We at FCNL will be working with the next Congress to build support for the emerging consensus, reflected in these reports and statements, that the United States must set a radically new course to address conflicts in the Middle East. We will also urge Congress to reflect on how the region’s conflicts are connected, with the U.S.-Iran relationship a central junction point.
Not only preventing war with Iran but achieving a rapprochement with Iran will be crucial to reaching U.S. foreign policy objectives. As the former National Security Council staffers Flynt Leverett and Hillary Mann Leverett have said, "Simply put, the next U.S. administration will not be able to achieve any of its high-profile policy goals in the Middle East — in Iraq, Afghanistan, or the Arab-Israeli arena — or with regard to energy security without putting U.S.-Iran relations on a more positive path.”