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  2. IRAN: U.S. ponders diplomatic upgrade in Tehran
    Even as the Bush administration talks of tightening sanctions against Iran to increase its international isolation, it is also contemplating a move to bolster its own diplomatic presence in Tehran by expanding its puny office there into something more robust, according to news reports.
    The Associated Press today cited anonymous U.S. diplomats and officials saying Americans were considering setting up a diplomatic office in Tehran that could process visas and conduct cultural outreach but still remain short of a full embassy.
    A piece Monday in the Washington Post described a debate inside the administration about the wisdom of expanding the U.S. diplomatic footprint in Tehran. One official told the Post:
    It’s not a softening. It does allow us to reach out to youth groups, to talk to dissidents. It’s something the regime wouldn’t like.
    Initial Iranian reaction to the idea was frosty. « We do not trust the Americans, » Musa Qorbani, a politician close to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, told The Times. « After a few days, we may figure out their motivations and what their intention is, then we will give our comment. »
    Under the auspices of the Swiss Embassy, the U.S. currently operates an office off Africa Avenue, most commonly called Jordan Avenue, in north Tehran. Inside a villa, Swiss and Iranian employees conduct minor consular services for Iranian Americans. It’s well guarded, of course, given the fate of the last U.S. diplomatic mission in Iran, which in 1979 was overrun by radicals who took embassy officials hostage for 15 months.
    Unnamed U.S. officials told news agencies that Americans were unhappy with the Swiss, especially after they signed a huge gas deal with Iran over the objections of Washington and wanted to chart their own course with Iran.
    But the Swiss gas deal could just be a convenient excuse to correct a dramatic diplomatic imbalance between Washington and Tehran.
    Basically, Iranians have far more eyes on the ground in the U.S. than America has in Iran. And Americans know it. Officials at the State Department, the Pentagon and the White House are continually summoning the Tehran envoys of European allies to grill them for information about the political and social situation on the ground in Iran.
    The current U.S. interests section in Tehran falls far short of the Iranian interests section in Washington. Under the auspices of the Pakistani Embassy, Iranians have established something of a « consul-ette » on the second floor of an office building on Wisconsin Avenue in Washington.
    There, with portraits of Ayatollahs Ruhollah Khomeini and Ali Khamenei looming, patrons can renew passports or apply for tourist visas. Iranian newspapers are piled up while a huge television is tuned to an Iranian satellite channel. At least three Iranian officials work in Washington.
    Iranians also have a diplomatic presence at the United Nations, where Tehran’s envoy to the world body pens opinion pieces for American newspapers and appears at think tank forums.
    That’s not even to mention the tens of thousands of Iranian dual nationals or U.S. residents who travel regularly back and forth. Very few Americans without Iranian heritage travel to Iran.
    According to the Associated Press and the Washington Post, U.S. officials are envisioning something like the U.S. interests section in Havana, which processes visas for Cuban visitors to the U.S. and hosts dissidents during holiday fetes.
    U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice declined to confirm or deny the debate. But she told reporters traveling with her through Germany that she wanted more contacts between the U.S. and ordinary Iranians, who now must obtain visas at U.S. consulates in Turkey or in the United Arab Emirates city of Dubai.
    « We know that it’s difficult for Iranians sometimes to get to Dubai, » she told reporters Monday, the AP reported. « We want more Iranians visiting the United States…. We are determined to reach out to the Iranian people. »

  3. L’Editorial du Washington Post :
    —————————
    Toehold in Tehran?
    By Fred Hiatt
    Monday, June 23, 2008; A15
    A smart idea to shake up U.S. policy and reach out to the Iranian people is being debated in Washington, but the debate isn’t taking place within or between the presidential campaigns. It’s going on inside the Bush administration.
    Senior officials at the State Department and beyond are mulling a proposal to open an interest section in Tehran, similar to the one the United States has operated in Havana since 1977. This would fall short of full diplomatic recognition, but it would open a channel to the Iranian people and, maybe, eventually, to the regime as well.
    The idea has been under discussion for close to two years and could be adopted within weeks — though officials continue to worry about how to package such a proposal without having it appear, one said, « as a sign of weakness. » They worry about the effect of such a signal on Iran, on U.S. negotiating partners in Europe and on domestic politics, given the clash between Barack Obama and John McCain about the wisdom of negotiating with Iranian leaders.
    Beneath the debate is an effort by the administration to bequeath to its successor a foreign policy on something of an even keel, and a belief that Iran may be the relationship furthest from achieving that.
    Administration officials, not surprisingly, dispute the conventional wisdom that the next president will inherit a hopelessly losing hand in world affairs. Senior officials argue that they have managed well the most important relationships in Asia — the U.S.-Japan-China triangle — and that relations with Europe have improved since the first term, as President Bush’s recent tour confirmed. Leaders in Mexico and Colombia value U.S. friendship, while Venezuela’s anti-American president is on the defensive. The brightening outlook in Iraq has kindled a more optimistic outlook overall.
    But no matter how charitably one views the record (and that global roundup leaves out Zimbabwe, Darfur, Russia, Burma, Pakistan and Afghanistan, to name just a few challenges), Iran sticks out as an unsolved problem. Iranian proxies in Lebanon and Gaza are riding high, Iran’s nuclear program is steaming ahead, and last fall’s intelligence estimate — which misleadingly gave the impression that Iran had abandoned its nuclear ambitions — took the wind out of the administration’s campaign against it.
    So officials continue to explore the possibilities of new initiatives. They dispute the accepted view of Iran as « 10 feet tall and on a roll, » a senior official told me, given its recent setbacks in Iraq and its own internal divisions and economic troubles. « They are dangerous, and clever, and good at asymmetric warfare, » this official said, « but I think they have a lot of vulnerabilities — and I think we can exploit them. »
    It’s in that context that the administration would propose opening an interest section, maybe paired with new sanctions or some other sign of resolve. Many Iranians feel well disposed toward Americans but have no direct contact with this country. At the same time, policymakers here feel hobbled by having no diplomats in Iran to report on the mood of the country. A kind of « listening post » in Dubai handles visa requests and tries to monitor political developments from afar, but that’s no substitute for a mission on the ground.
    The Iranians might say no, though with difficulty, given that they already operate an active interest section of their own on Wisconsin Avenue in Glover Park. (Based on my experience, they are not yet, despite their presence here, wildly outplaying the United States in the outreach department. « There’s no one available at the time to answer your questions, all right? » I was told by someone who then wished me a fine day and hung up.) And if they did say no, administration officials argue, it would only enhance America’s image and make the Iranians seem scared of contact.
    That has been one Democratic argument in favor of seeking more engagement with the regime, of course, and administration officials worry that political opponents here, as well as the regime in Tehran, would portray a proposal to open an interest section as an easing of administration policy not to talk unless Iran suspends uranium enrichment.
    « It’s not a softening, » one official said. « It does allow us to reach out to youth groups, to talk to dissidents. It’s something the regime wouldn’t like. »
    Let’s hope that line can be sold inside the administration in time for useful action. President Bush would be doing his successor, whoever he is, a favor by putting this forward now and taking the political heat — which would probably turn out to be lukewarm in any case.
    fredhiatt@washpost.com

  4. La politique actuelle des Etats-Unis vis-à-vis du régime iranien à Téhéran aura presque certainement pour conséquence un Iran doté d’armes nucléaires. La combinaison apparemment astucieuse d’utiliser la « carotte » et le « bâton », incluant la référence officielle fréquente à une option militaire américaine qui « reste sur la table », intensifie tout simplement le désir de l’Iran d’avoir son propre arsenal nucléaire. Hélas, une telle politique autoritaire de la « carotte » et du « bâton » peut marcher avec les ânes mais pas avec les pays sérieux. Les Etats-Unis auraient une meilleure chance de réussite si la Maison-Blanche abandonnait ses menaces d’action militaire et laissait tomber ses appels à un changement de régime.
    Songez aux pays qui seraient devenus rapidement des Etats nucléarisés s’ils avaient été traités de façon similaire ! Le Brésil, l’Argentine et l’Afrique du Sud avaient des programmes d’armement nucléaire mais ils les ont abandonnés, chacun pour des raisons différentes. Si les Etats-Unis avaient menacé de changer leurs régimes au cas où ils n’auraient pas abandonné [leurs programmes d’armement nucléaire], il est probable qu’aucun d’eux n’eût obtempéré. Mais lorsque la « carotte » et le « bâton » ont échoué à empêcher l’Inde et le Pakistan d’acquérir des armes nucléaires, les Etats-Unis se sont rapidement arrangés avec les deux, préférant avoir de bonnes relations plutôt que des relations hostiles. Qu’est-ce que cela suggère aux dirigeants en Iran ?
    Abordons cette question dans un autre sens.
    Imaginez que la Chine, signataire du Traité de non-prolifération nucléaire [TNP], pays qui, délibérément, ne s’est pas engagé dans une course aux armements avec la Russie ou les Etats-Unis, ait menacé de changer le régime américain si ce dernier n’avait pas commencé une destruction graduelle de son arsenal nucléaire. Cette menace aurait été une base légale discutable, parce que tous les signataires de ce traité ont promis depuis longtemps de réduire, en fin de compte, à zéro leurs arsenaux. La réaction américaine aurait évidemment été une opposition publique explosive vis-à-vis d’une telle exigence. Les dirigeants américains auraient peut-être même singé la rhétorique fantaisiste du président iranien Mahmoud Ahmadinejad concernant l’utilisation des armes nucléaires.
    Une approche efficace vis-à-vis de l’Iran doit concilier ses intérêts et les nôtres en matière de sécurité. Ni une attaque aérienne des Etats-Unis contre les installations nucléaires iraniennes, ni une attaque israélienne qui serait moins efficace, ne pourraient faire plus que simplement retarder le programme nucléaire iranien. Dans tous les cas, les Etats-Unis seraient tenus pour responsables et devraient payer le prix résultant des réactions probables de l’Iran. Celles-ci impliqueraient presque certainement la déstabilisation du Proche-Orient, ainsi que de l’Afghanistan, et des efforts sérieux d’interrompre le flux du pétrole, générant au strict minimum une augmentation massive de son cours déjà très élevé. Le désarroi au Proche-Orient qui résulterait d’une attaque préventive contre l’Iran nuirait à l’Amérique et en fin de compte aussi à Israël.
    Etant donné les objectifs déclarés de l’Iran

  5. « Enfin et surtout, considérez que les sanctions américaines ont délibérément entravé les efforts de l’Iran d’accroître sa production de pétrole et de gaz naturel ! Cela a contribué à la montée des coûts de l’énergie. Une conciliation à long terme entre les Etats-Unis et l’Iran accroîtrait de façon significative le débit de l’énergie iranienne vers le marché mondial. Il ne fait aucun doute que les Américains préféreraient payer moins cher pour remplir leurs réservoirs d’essence plutôt que d’avoir à payer beaucoup plus pour financer un conflit élargi au golfe Persique. » : tout est là !

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