Obama to Russia: We Drop Missile Defence, You Stop Iran's Nuclear Programme

Today's New York Times reveals the flip side of the Obama Administration's "engagement" with Iran:

President Obama sent a secret letter to Russia’s president last month suggesting that he would back off deploying a new missile defense system in Eastern Europe if Moscow would help stop Iran from developing long-range weapons, American officials said Monday.

The letter to President Dmitri A. Medvedev was hand-delivered in Moscow by top administration officials three weeks ago. It said the United States would not need to proceed with the interceptor system, which has been vehemently opposed by Russia since it was proposed by the Bush administration, if Iran halted any efforts to build nuclear warheads and ballistic missiles.

The letter was delivered by Undersecretary of State William J. Burns and followed similar messages from Secretary of Defense Robert Gates last year, "“I told the Russians a year ago that if there were no Iranian missile program, there would be no need for the missile sites.” A "senior administration official" commented about the latest manoeuvre, “It’s almost saying to them, put up or shut up. It’s not that the Russians get to say, ‘We’ll try and therefore you have to suspend.’ It says the threat has to go away.”

News of the proposal accompanies the revelation, in The Los Angeles Times, that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told the foreign minister of the United Arab Emirates at the Gaza Donors Conference that it was "very unlikely" American engagement will persuade Iran to give up its nuclear programme. However,"an Iranian rebuff could strengthen America's diplomatic position", as the US would have shown that it had exhausted all possible efforts at diplomacy before seeking further pressure on Tehran.

Taken together, the stories indicate that the Obama Administration is on the verge of a serious mis-step in its approach to Iran. Either out of naivete or --- more likely --- the quest for a non-military campaign against Iran, key US officials are conflating the pursuit of nuclear energy with the pursuit of a nuclear weapon.

That might work with the US public and, to an extent, with European allies who do not want to break with Washington, but it is unlikely to work with Moscow. The Russians have no desire to link their relations with the US to a change in their position on Iran, and they have plenty of other cards --- remember their manoeuvring over the US supply line to Afghanistan? --- to play if the Americans are seeking "linkage".

Would you like a clue? Russian spokesman said on Monday that Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov will discuss missile defence with Clinton on Friday in Geneva, before Obama and Medvedev meet on 2 April in London. However, the Russian spokesman said nothing about Iran.