Iran: Obama Administration Dampens Down War Chatter (Mazzetti/Sanger)

After weeks of whipped-up talk by commentators of an Israeli airstrike on Tehran, President Obama's have moved to dampen down thoughts --- through a message to West Jerusalem, to the American public, and possibly to the Iranian regime --- of military action. Mark Mazzetti and David Sanger of the New York Times are the channel:

The Obama administration, citing evidence of continued troubles inside Iran’s nuclear program, has persuaded Israel that it would take roughly a year — and perhaps longer — for Iran to complete what one senior official called a “dash” for a nuclear weapon, according to American officials.

Administration officials said they believe the assessment has dimmed the prospect that Israel would pre-emptively strike against the country’s nuclear facilities within the next year, as Israeli officials have suggested in thinly veiled threats.

For years, Israeli and American officials have debated whether Iran is on an inexorable drive toward a nuclear bomb and, if so, how long it would take to produce one. A critical question has been the time it would take Tehran to convert existing stocks of low-enriched uranium into weapons-grade material, a process commonly known as “breakout.”

Israeli intelligence officials had argued that Iran could complete such a race for the bomb in months, while American intelligence agencies have come to believe in the past year that the timeline is longer.

“We think that they have roughly a year dash time,” said Gary Samore, President Obama’s top adviser on nuclear issues, referring to how long it would take the Iranians to convert nuclear material into a working weapon. “A year is a very long period of time.”

American officials said the United States believed international inspectors would detect an Iranian move toward breakout within weeks, leaving a considerable amount of time for the United States and Israel to consider military strikes....

Now, American and Israeli officials believe breakout is unlikely anytime soon. For one thing, Iran, which claims it is interested in enriching uranium only for peaceful purposes, would be forced to build nuclear bombs from a limited supply of nuclear material, currently enough for two weapons. Second, such a decision would require kicking out international weapons inspectors, eliminating any ambiguity about Iran’s nuclear plans.

Even if Iran were to choose this path, American officials said it would probably take Iran some time to reconfigure its nuclear facilities to produce weapons-grade uranium and ramp up work on designing a nuclear warhead....

Several officials said they believed the mounting cost of the economic sanctions, especially those affecting Iran’s ability to import gasoline and develop its oil fields, has created fissures among Iran’s political elite and forced a debate about the costs of developing nuclear weapons....

Read full article....

The Latest from Iran (19 August): Freedom & Detention

2015 GMT: Political Prisoner Watch. Families of detainees who recently ended their hunger strike have still not received visit permits.

2010 GMT: Divorce Shocker! Ayatollah Safaei Bushehri, Friday Prayer leader and the Supreme Leader's representative in Bushehr, has revealed that 50% of marriage break-ups are caused by bad hijab.

2000 GMT: Parliament v. President. "Hardline" MP Hossein Nejabat has declared that Parliament's problems with the President did not exist during the administration of the reformist Mohammad Khatami (1997-2005). He said Ahmadinejad has to abide to the laws, otherwise he will be called before the Majlis.

In a more cautious statement, MP Hossein Sobhani-Nia sad that he hoped the Supreme Leader's words will induce the Government to implement the laws of Majlis and on the judiciary to remove possible problems with those laws.

NEW Rewriting Iran’s History: The 1953 Coup, the CIA, the Clerics, and “Democracy” (Emery)
NEW Iran Cartoon of the Day: 1953 Speaks to 2010
Iran Document: Nourizad’s Last Letter to Supreme Leader “The 10 Grievances”
Iran Feature: Sanctions, Iranians, and YouTube’s “Life in a Day” (Esfandiary)
UPDATED Iran Special: Have Fars (& Revolutionary Guard) Faked a Reformist “Confession” on Election?
The Latest from Iran (18 August): A Letter and A Call for Bombing

1945 GMT: Khamenei to US "Have I Made Myself Clear?". The Supreme Leader's office wants to be sure that Washington (and the rest of the world) gets Khamenei's point, made in his speech to senior Iranian officials --- Ahmadinejad, Rafsanjani, and Seyed Hassan Khomeini were in the audience --- that Tehran will not enter discussions over uranium enrichment unless Washington pulls back sanctions. Not only did they put out the lines on Twitter even before the speech had hit the Iranian media; they have now put out an English version of the statement: "Ayatollah Khamenei further reiterated that the Islamic Republic of Iran is ready to start negotiations provided that the US abandons its domineering attitude, puts an end to threats and sanctions and does not impose its goals on the negotiations."

Given the timing of mid-term Congressional elections in the US, it's a safe bet that there will not be a word breathed in Washington about a possible relaxation of sanctions. And that means there is no chance of public talks on Iran's nuclear programme before mid-November.

1700 GMT: Political Prisoner Watch. Golnaz Esfandiari has more on the case of detained women's rights activist Shiva Nazar Ahari, including this comment from Zahra Rahnavard: "We are worried for Shiva Nazar Ahari, her trial, and its result because we are all Shiva Nazar Ahari. We, women, who make up half of Iran’s population, we are all Shiva Nazar Ahari."

1420 GMT: Iran MediaWatch. Radio Farda has more on the ban on the newspaper Asia, which specialises in economic matters.

Asia has been critical of the economic policy of the Government, but the official reasons for its closure, according to Deputy Minister of Culture and Islamic Guidance Mohammad Ali Ramin, are "publishing pictures against public chastity", “promoting wastefulness and extravagance", and "persistence in carrying out the aforementioned violations".

1405 GMT: Sanctions Watch. Peyke Iran claims that, after the Swiss Government's adoption of additional sanctions against Tehran, the assets of 40 Iranian companies have been blocked.

According to Fars News, Venezuela has said it will continue to supply Iran with gasoline despite sanctions.

David Velasquez, Venezuela's ambassador to Tehran, said, "We are at the service of Iran, and whenever Iran needs, we will supply it with gasoline."

1400 GMT: Political Prisoner Watch (Nourizad Edition). Back to our opening story today....

Video from RASA TV of Mohammad Nourizad's celebration with well-wishers before his return to prison has now been posted.

0910 GMT: I will be in meetings today about the Journal of American Studies, so updates will be limited until mid-afternoon.

0855 GMT: Political Prisoner Watch (Nokia Siemens Lawsuit Edition). Golnaz Esfandiari interviews Edward Moawad, the lawyer for detained journalist Isa Saharkhiz, who has filed a motion in US Federal Court against Nokia Siemens for provision of equipment to Iran assisting in surveillance. Moawad claims, "njuries to the main plaintiff here, Isa Saharkhiz, and to [his son] Mehdi and multiple others were inflicted as a result of the actions of Nokia Siemens network."

0850 GMT: The Battle Within. The latest journalist to consider the escalating tension within the Iranian political system is Robert Tait of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, who sees the root cause as President Ahmadinejad's "religious-nationalist" approach.

0840 GMT: Political Prisoner Watch. Gozaar offers a detailed profile of human rights activist Shiva Nazar Ahari, detained since July 2009. Her lawyer says a trial date is set for 4 September on charges of "mohareb" (war on God), which carries a death sentence.

Academic and Mir Hossein Mousavi advisor Ali Arab Mazar has been released from detention on $200,000 bail. He was arrested on 28 December and was in solitary confinement for three months.

0735 GMT: Political Prisoner Watch. The Pro-Vice Chancellor of Britain's Durham University, Anthony Forster, has expressed concern over the health and situation of Ehsan Abdoh-Tabrizi, a Ph.D. student imprisoned in mid-January after travelling to Tehran to visit his family.

Forster said Durham, in agreement with Abdoh-Tabrizi's father, had taken a low-profile approach after the arrest, conducting discussions with the Iranian Embassy in London; however, Durham's most recent letter had not been acknowledged by the embassy.

0730 GMT: We have published two features linking the 19 August 1953 coup that overthrew the Mossadegh Government and today's events in Iran. In Nikahang Kowsar's cartoon, Mohammad Mossadegh offers advice to Mir Hossein Mousavi, and Chris Emery has serious issues with a Washington Post article which claims to revise the history of the coup.

0625 GMT: Execution (Ashtiani) Watch. Britain's Foreign Office minister Alistair Burt summoned the Iranian ambassador, Rasoul Movahedian, on Wednesday to raise the case of Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani, the woman sentenced to death for adultery. Burt also brought up the situation of seven members of the Baha'i faith, each sentenced to 20 years on charges of spying for Israel. and of Ebrahim Hamidi, who faces execution for sodomy.

Turkish officials have told Zaman that Ankara has also brought up Ashtiani's case in discussions with Iranian counterparts.
0605 GMT: Wednesday was marked by a series of statements: from the rhetoric of the Supreme Leader (don't mention internal matters, focus on relations with the US) to the declarations of opposition figures like Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karroubi (this Government is discredited; the Iranian people will emerge and prevail) to the letter from journalist and filmmaker Mohammad Nourizad, now returned to Evin Prison, to Ayatollah Khamenei (here are the grievances against you and the system that you have led into disrepute).

But, at the end of the day, we noted this item, sent from an EA correspondent: Oxford University student Mohammad Reza Jalaeipour, seized by Iranian forces earlier this year after he was told to collect his passport, has been released from detention after 66 days in solitary confinement. The news was confirmed by his wife Fatemeh Shams, also a student at Oxford, who spoke to him by phone.

In total, Jalaeipour has spent 111 days in solitary confinement since the 2009 Presidential elections. It is unknown how much bail was posted for his release, and it is unclear whether he will get back his passport in time for the new academic year.

And we also saw the photograph, one of a set, that we are using for this post: Mohammad Nourizad, having written his 6th letter to the Supreme Leader in the knowledge that it would bring a summons from the authorities, is surrounded by well-wishers as he prepares for his return to prison.

Rewriting Iran's History: The 1953 Coup, the CIA, the Clerics, and "Democracy" (Emery)

On Wednesday, The Washington Post published a re-presentation of the 19 August 1953 coup in Iran by Ray Takeyh, fellow of the Council on Foreign Relations and former State Department Official, "Clerics Responsible for Iran's Failed Attempts at Democracy". (The opening paragraphs of the article are at the bottom of this entry.)

Much has been written about the US involvement, notably through the Central Intelligence Agency in the overthrow of Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadegh and the support for renewed power of the Shah, but Takeyh writes, "The CIA's role in Mossadeq's demise was largely inconsequential. The institution most responsible for aborting Iran's democratic interlude was the clerical estate, and the Islamic Republic should not be able to whitewash the clerics' culpability."

Iran Cartoon of the Day: 1953 Speaks to 2010

EA's Chris Emery, a specialist on US-Iran relations, is not so sure that Takeyh's revision is accurate. Indeed, he is not even convinced that the primary aim is historical accuracy:

1. This opinion piece seems needlessly insensitive at a time when many ordinary Iranians would take heart from a note of contrition from US-based observers --- which is reasonable, even according to the version of events presented by Takeyh. In timing and in tone, this is an extremely provocative (but not intellectually rigourous) attempt to re-frame a genuine area for historical debate. I would expect it from a professional polemicist, but not one with an academic pedigree. It reads like scholarly sabre rattling, which in my mind compliments much of the other kind we have seen recently.

2. Are ordinary Americans being told they shouldn't apologise for trying to remove democratically elected leaders as long as their removal is reliant on other factors as well? Is intent irrelevant?

3. Is Takeyh consciously trying to establish a wider historical context for the belief that Iran's suffering is entirely self-inflicted by the "Mullahs"? Clearly this will resonate well with many opposed to engagement between the US and Iran.

4. Considering the provocative headline, would it not have been better to devote more space to actually proving the allegation? Takeyh does not even direct the reader to recent scholarship that might support his conclusion. Instead we get precisely one sentence outlining how "the clerics" ousted Mossadegh: "Through their connections with the bazaar and their ability to galvanize the populace, they were instrumental in orchestrating the demonstrations that engulfed Tehran." He then seems to suggest that further proof lies in the hyperbole of Kermit Roosevelt, the CIA officer overseeing US covert operations, written more than 25 years after the events.

In other words Takeyh cannot find a US source acknowledging the pivotal role supposedly played by the clergy. He does not even acknowledge that the CIA possibly bribed Ayatollah Kashani, the former Speaker of the Majlis, with a large sum of money.

5. The final sentence of the piece --- "Responsibility for the suffocation of the Iranian peoples' democratic aspirations in the summer of 1953 lies primarily with those who went on to squash another democratic movement in the summer of 2009: the mullahs" --- is deliberately disingenuous, suggesting a link between the clerical elite then and now that Takeyh knows is false or at least far more complex (politically, doctrinally, and historically) than presented here.

Has Takeyh really failed to notice "mullahs" such as Mohammad Khatami, Grand Ayatollah Montazeri, Grand Ayatollah Sane'i, Mohammad Ali Abtahi, and Ayatollah Dastgheib who have protested the suppression of rights and denial of justice since June 2009?

Clerics Responsible for Iran's Failed Attempts at Democracy
Ray Takeyh

Thursday marks the anniversary of one of the most mythologized events in history, the 1953 coup in Iran that ousted Prime Minister Muhammad Mossadeq. CIA complicity in that event has long provoked apologies from American politicians and denunciations from the theocratic regime. The problem with the prevailing narrative? The CIA's role in Mossadeq's demise was largely inconsequential. The institution most responsible for aborting Iran's democratic interlude was the clerical estate, and the Islamic Republic should not be able to whitewash the clerics' culpability.

The dramatic tale of malevolent Americans plotting a coup against Mossadeq, the famed Operation Ajax, has been breathlessly told so much that it has become a verity. To be fair, the cast of characters is bewildering: Kermit Roosevelt, the scion of America's foremost political family, paying thugs to agitate against the hapless Mossadeq; American operatives shoring up an indecisive monarch to return from exile and reclaim his throne; Communist firebrands and nationalist agitators participating in demonstrations financed by the United States. As Iran veered from crisis to crisis, the story goes, Roosevelt pressed a reluctant officer corps to end Mossadeq's brief but momentous democratic tenure.

Yet this fable conceals much about the actual course of events. In 1953 Iran was in the midst of an economic crisis. An oil embargo had been imposed after Tehran nationalized the Anglo-Iranian Oil Co., and by that summer, the situation had fractured Mossadeq's ruling coalition. Middle-class Iranians concerned about their finances gradually began to abandon Mossadeq. The merchant class was similarly anguished about the financial consequences of Mossadeq's stubborn unwillingness to resolve the stalemate with the British. The intelligentsia and the professional classes were wary of the prime minister's increasingly autocratic tendencies. Rumors of military coups began circulating as members of the armed forces grew vocal in their frustrations with the prime minister and began participating in political intrigues.

Not just the stars but an array of Iranian society was aligning against Mossadeq.

Now, the CIA was indeed actively seeking to topple Mossadeq. It had made contact that spring with the perennially indecisive shah and Iranian officers, including Gen. Fazollah Zahedi, an opportunistic officer who sought the premiership himself. Roosevelt had laid out a plan in which the shah would issue a monarchical decree dismissing Mossadeq; it was to be served to him on Aug. 15. But the commander who was to deliver the message was arrested, and the plot quickly unraveled.

This is where the story takes a twist. As word of the attempted coup spread, the shah fled Iran and Zahedi went into hiding. Amazingly, U.S. records declassified over the past decade indicate, the United States had no backup plan. Washington was largely prepared to concede. State Department and CIA cables acknowledge the collapse of their subversive efforts.

But while crestfallen Americans may have been prepared to forfeit their mission, the Iranian armed forces and the clergy went on to unseat Mossadeq....

Read rest of article....

Iran Cartoon of the Day: 1953 Speaks to 2010

Nikohang Kowsar's cartoon, published in Rooz Online, links the 19 August 1953 coup that overthrew the Government of Mohammad Mossadegh to today's events in Iran: "Mosadegh to Mir Hossein Mousavi: Don't Let the Coup Gang Knock You Down"

Pakistan and the Floods: America's Broken Response (Mull)

EA correspondent Josh Mull is the Afghanistan Blogging Fellow for The Seminal and Brave New Foundation. He also writes at Rethink Afghanistan:

The scale of Pakistan's flooding disaster is beyond imagination:

More people have been affected by Pakistan's catastrophic floods than any other natural disaster on record -- over 20 million and counting. That's more than were affected by the 2005 Pakistan earthquake, the 2004 Asian tsunami, and this year's earthquake in Haiti combined.  As millions of dislocated Pakistanis search for shelter and food and as health conditions deteriorate and disease spreads, the need for an immediate, large-scale humanitarian response is urgent.  And this is just the beginning.  Once the floodwaters subside from Pakistan's swollen rivers, the task of rebuilding will be staggering - with a price tag in the billions, and lasting for years to come.

US Analysis: The Limits of Military Power (Miller)

From a humanitarian standpoint, the disaster should be a fierce call to action like nothing else in our lifetime. But that's not the primary US concern in foreign policy, is it? Charity and human decency are great, but we care about terrorism, security, and American dominance:

The effectiveness of the response to these relief and rebuilding challenges will have serious implications for the wellbeing of the country's citizens, for the peace and stability of Pakistan and the entire South Asian region, and for U.S. national security.

There's no way around it, this is a national security issue for the United States. Galrahn explains at Information Dissemination:

There is a long history of natural disaster playing a significant role in the global security condition, or influencing war, or having a significant and generational impact on nations. When considering the scope and geography of this disaster, it would be difficult to suggest that the monsoon floods of 2010 won't have a huge impact on the security of Pakistan, or a significant impact in influencing the war in Afghanistan, or a huge generational impact on Pakistan. [...]

Pakistani people know the United States unmanned drone very well thanks to their newspapers and our actions in that country against Al Qaeda and affiliates. Here is a chance to put a positive visible symbol of US power over Pakistan at a time the need far exceeds local capacity - and we can't do it why?

Actually, we know why we can't do it. We've known for years. Remember 2006?

Stretched by frequent troop rotations to Iraq and Afghanistan, the Army has become a “thin green line” that could snap unless relief comes soon, according to a study for the Pentagon.

Andrew Krepinevich, a retired Army officer who wrote the report under a Pentagon contract, concluded that the Army cannot sustain the pace of troop deployments to Iraq long enough to break the back of the insurgency. He also suggested that the Pentagon’s decision, announced in December, to begin reducing the force in Iraq this year was driven in part by a realization that the Army was overextended.

Of course, the military didn't "snap". That's not how it works, as Hilary Bok wrote on Obsidian Wings at the time:

It's not as though one day we will hear a loud snap and find the Army broken in two. We will not get up one morning, flip a switch, and discover that the Army doesn't work any more. We will not have to hire a tow truck to drag it off to war. Whatever goes wrong with the Army, it won't be like that.

For one thing, there is no sharp, discontinuous transition between an "unbroken" Army and a "broken" one: the kind that happens when a plate shatters, a fuse blows, or a motor finally gives out. For another, a "broken" Army will still be able to function, more or less....

What we are doing to the Army is less like breaking something, and more like slowly degrading its ability to perform its tasks to an unacceptable level. It's a gradual process, one that does not provide us with clear points at which we can look at the Army and say: well, now it is well and truly broken.

To be clear, these reports were specific to the US Army, and Bok focused mostly on the recruitment and stability of the officer corps, but it isn't hard to apply this to the other military branches,or to the US foreign service as a whole.

After all, on Pakistan's Independence Day, as 20% of the country lay under water, this was the American priority:

The US carried out its first Predator airstrike inside Pakistan's tribal areas in almost three weeks. Twelve "rebels" were reported killed in the airstrike in Pakistan's Taliban-controlled tribal agency of North Waziristan.

The strike took place today in the village of Issori, just outside of Miramshah, the main town in North Waziristan. One missile fired from either a Predator or the more more deadly Reaper struck a compound thought to be sheltering Taliban or al Qaeda operatives.

That's not all the US did, to be sure. We have US marines on the ground in Pakistan, and we're conducting rescue and relief operations by air. But that's still not enough --- indeed, it is a blip compared to the enormous scale of the disaster. . We can send helicopters to Pakistan, but are they effective? Are we accomplishing anything close to what we'd like to?

I realize this analysis is a bit odd. Normally when the issue of an over-stretched and ineffective military is discussed, we think of it in terms of being defenceless against enemies. If we're attacked, we'll be defenceless because of our broken military. TIME magazine wrote in 2003:

Deep inside the Pentagon, where young colonels arrive before dawn to revise once more the short list of available combat units ready to deploy overseas, a nightmare scenario hangs in the air, unmentioned but unmistakable. With 140,000 U.S. troops tied down stabilizing Iraq, 34,000 in Kuwait, 10,000 in Afghanistan and 5,000 in the Balkans, what good options would George W. Bush have if, say sometime next spring, North Korea's Kim Jong Il decided to test the resilience of the relatively small "trip-wire" force of 37,000 American troops in South Korea? Where would the Pentagon turn if it had to rush additional combat troops to the 38th parallel? Might a lack of ready reinforcements force Washington to consider using nuclear weapons to save South Korea from defeat?

But that's not really realistic, is it? North Korea isn't about to roll across the 38th parallel any more than Putin is about to rear his head over Alaskan airspace. Those aren't the kinds of national security threats we face in 2010 (or 2003 for what it's worth). What we have to deal with now are natural disasters, collapsing states, massive displaced populations, terrorism and radical militancy, narcotics and organized crime, captured, corrupt, or oppressive governments --- all of which converge in Pakistan.

These are the consequences of a decade of military adventurism, occupying Iraq and Afghanistan. This is why, no matter what it is that the US is sending to Pakistan, it will not be enough. We just don't have enough to give.

It's not only the military breaking, or the State department, or the White House, or Congress, or the media, or the apathy of the American public. It's all of these things adding up to a slow, incompetent, ineffective response to the threats we face. The ability for the United States to project power abroad --- to protect its national security interests --- is broken.

The so-called battle for hearts and minds in Pakistan, the battle against anti-Americanism, radicalism, and militancy in the tribal regions, the battle for a secure and stable Central Asia: this is the war that America will lose because of our occupations in Iraq and Afghanistan. This is what we are defenceless against, helpless to stop.

This outcome is quite possibly more dangerous than any of the other tragic consequences of our wars. It has wreaked havoc on the American budget and deficit, sapped us of funds for basic social services, and dramatically raised the threat of terrorism both here and overseas. But we have let all this happen with at least the illusion that we were still the most powerful country, capable of defeating any threat.

That's not true. We are so tied down in our wars that when a real threat appears --- not Kim Jong-Il in North Korea, but floods in Pakistan --- we cannot response

We have to end our reckless, bloody and expensive occupation in Afghanistan. Not only because we can't afford it domestically, but along with Iraq it has catastrophically weakened our ability to protect our country and our interests abroad. We don't know yet what horrors will be unleashed, for generations to come, thanks to our failure in Pakistan, and this is only one disaster. How many more will there be while we're wasting away in Afghanistan?