From: wolda002@umn.edu
Date: Fri Jul 25 2008 - 05:17:19 EDT
Independent.co.uk
Condi's coup: how the neo-cons lost the argument over Iran
Secretary of State's influence pivotal to Bush's change of policy
By Leonard Doyle in Washington
Friday, 18 July 2008
Condoleezza Rice was George Bush's handmaiden for the war in Iraq but she
is now emerging as the best hope for avoiding a military conflict between
the United States and Iran.
The Secretary of State, who is one of the few people with the President's
ear, has shown the door to Vice-President Dick Cheney's cabal of war-hungry
advisers. Ms Rice was able to declare yesterday that the administration's
decision to break with past policy proves that there is international unity
in opposing Iran's nuclear programme. "The point that we're making is the
United States is firmly behind this diplomacy, firmly behind and unified
with our allies and hopefully the Iranians will take that message," Ms Rice
said.
Mr Bush's decision to send the number three in the State Department,
William Burns, to attend talks with Iran in Geneva at the weekend caused
howls of outrage that were heard all the way from the State Department's
sanctuary of Foggy Bottom to the White House on Pennsylvania Avenue. A
parallel initiative to reopen the interest's section of the American
embassy in Tehran, which would be the first return of a diplomatic presence
on Iranian territory since 1979, has also received a cool response from
neo-conservatives.
"This is a complete capitulation on the whole idea of suspending
enrichment," said Mr Bush's former UN envoy, John Bolton. "Just when the
administration has no more U-turns to pull, it does another."
In public, Ms Rice has been as bellicose as any neo-con when it comes to
Iran, calling dialogue with its leaders "pointless" and declaring: "For the
sake of peace, the world must not allow Iran to have nuclear weapons."
She had been the prime mover behind Mr Bush's disastrous policy of
"preventive wars" and cheerleader of his expansive plans to reorganise the
entire Middle East and to "export democracy". But with the rumblings of war
with Iran growing steadily louder, Ms Rice worked feverishly behind the
scenes to stop sparks from flying in the drive by the US and Israel to shut
down Iran's nuclear programme.
The breakthrough, if that is what it turns out to be, that persuaded Mr
Bush that it was time to end the 30-year boycott of high-level diplomatic
contacts with Iran, came from the simple act of Ms Rice signing her name to
a joint letter offering sweeter terms to Tehran than it had seen before.
The very act of putting her name to a package of incentives presented in
Tehran last month persuaded the Iranian authorities that there was movement
that would allow them to proclaim victory over the US, while ending their
nuclear programme.
When he saw Ms Rice's signature on the document, Iran's Foreign Minister,
Manouchehr Mottaki, was visibly stunned, according to those present at the
meeting. He formally responded to the offer with a letter addressed to Ms
Rice and the EU's foreign policy envoy, Javier Solana, as well as foreign
ministers of the five other countries at the talks.
His letter skirted around the hot-button issue of Iran's uranium enrichment
programme, but it contained an olive branch of an offer to "find common
ground through logical and constructive actions", according to reports.
Hearing of Mr Mottaki's reaction and then receiving a formal response
persuaded Ms Rice that Iran was finally willing to have meaningful talks
with the US that could avoid a war.
Before approaching the President with a plan to avoid war in the last six
months of his presidency, Ms Rice had to persuade Mr Cheney, chief among
those described as the "Vulcans" of his administration. She made her pitch
at a meeting that included Mr Cheney, Stephen Hadley, the national security
adviser, Joshua Bolton, the White House Chief of Staff, and Mr Burns, who
is heading to Geneva at the weekend to take part in the "one time only
deal". Iran welcomed the American change of attitude yesterday, but with
governments from France to China also welcoming the shift, Tehran also
signalled that there was a long way to go before the diplomats break out
the champagne. Iran's Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, declared that
there are still "clearly defined red lines", meaning that Iran is insisting
that it has the right to peaceful nuclear energy. This is a position that
Israel and the American conservatives still find unacceptable.
Thirty years on from the humiliation of the US embassy hostage crisis in
Tehran, the country's boycott of all high-level direct contact with Iran
has achieved little beyond making it impossible for the two sides to learn
to trust one another and employ diplomatic skills to avoid conflict.
But there are also doubts about the effectiveness of using sophisticated
weaponry against a nuclear programme that is secreted deep underground and
in multiple sitesacross Iran. The US administration was recently advised
that it would be folly to expect the regime to fall in Iran if it was
attacked. If anything, a US and Israeli attack would strengthen the rule of
the mullahs while causing further tension on the oil market.
>From hawk to dove
Condoleezza Rice may have a bright political future ahead, despite the many
roles she has played in the discredited Bush White House. Her soundbites
have often come back to haunt her. She wilfully distorted the truth while
pressing the case for the invasion of Iraq: "We don't want the smoking gun
to be a mushroom cloud." No one, she declared, "could have predicted" that
al-Qai'da would try to fly planes into buildings before 11 September 2001;
"I'm proud of the decision of this administration to overthrow Saddam
Hussein," she said. And when George Bush asked her about the looming war
saying: "Should we do this?", Ms Rice replied in a heartbeat "Yes." The
book Rise of the Vulcans, by James Mann, describes Ms Rice as a major
player in the Iraq war, detailing how she served as the White House
co-ordinator and as the President's closest adviser, throughout the entire
operation. Despite this, the future looks bright for the 52-year-old.
Stopping a war with Iran could even catapult her into the vice-presidency
under a John McCain presidency.
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