This means that:
- Whatever Iran policy the Cheney Neocon Administration had been running was a MASSIVE FAIL.
- Whatever the Obama Admnistration has been doing to repair our position in the world is working.
It must drive them nuts to see a clear, if limited, victory for a strategy that is diametrically opposed to their own. Their ideology being discredited by events, and so they characteristically fall back into blind fits of intransigence, like screaming, foot-stomping children.I'm looking forward to what happens next.
That Goldberg emailer fails to see what has happened. Obama has known about this facility from day one. At Cairo, he reached out the Muslim world, undermining the Iranian regime's ability to engage in arm-waving, fear-mongering anti-Americanism. He built himself a triumvirate with Brown and Sarkozy, who actually have an intelligence presence in Iran. He used that presence to build an airtight case. He cut a deal with the Russians. He reached out to Iran, knowing that they would likely reject or ignore his overtures. Then, when Ahmadinejad comes to New York, having to face Western journalists, Obama announces the the existence of the Qom facility, turning the spotlight on Iran when they are unable to hide behind state-controlled media. Obama, cool and calm, pulled off a near-perfect diplomatic pincer.
2 comments:
Netter,
The claim of the previous administration was that Iran was not being perfectly honest with their nuclear program?
I've been in Japan the last week and one of the quotes I heard over the weekend was: "God willing, this plant will be put into operation soon, and will blind the eyes of the enemies."
So what did you mean by massive fail? Did you mean that the previous administration didn't prevent this from happening?
Not only did all the hardline posturing of the previous Administration keep Iran from moving forward on the nuclear timeline, they rebuffed Iran's efforts after 9/11 to discuss it and took as a major lesson that you needed to have the bomb to stand-off the U.S. -- witnessing Iraq's failure and North Korea's success. Worse, though, by alienating the rest of "old Europe" to quote Rumsfeld and other potential allies with our Neocon "unipolar moment" hubris, we failed to build or maintain a coalition that could bring pressure to bear on Iran.
Witness Obama methodically building up positive relationships around the world with emphasis on Europe -- there was France standing with us against Iran on Friday, a 180 degree departure from the past -- and the moderate people of the Muslim world, i.e. with his speech at Cairo which emboldened the Iranian dissident movement and took away the regime's ability to blame America as usual.
Not to mention that the Cheney Administration removed Iran's main countercheck, Iraq, putting it into position as their satellite...
Then again, although they knew how to wield power like a sledgehammer, they ultimate weren't very bright.
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