44's Persian Strategy

 

Beleaf it or don't, 44's Persian strategy is not in "Make it up as we go" mode...

 

 

Inexperience is a problem in this administration, but there is no lack of strategic vision. Quite the contrary: a strategy has been in place from the start, and however clumsily it may on occasion have been implemented, and whatever resistance it has generated abroad or at home, 44 has doggedly adhered to the policies that have flowed from it.

It's kinda all about the benefits of cooperating with Iran and Syria. Those two regimes, supposedly, shared with Washington the twin goals of stabilizing Iraq and defeating al-Qaeda and other Sunni jihadi groups. In turn, this shared interest would provide a foundation for building a concert system of states—a club of stable powers that could work together to contain the worst pathologies of the Middle East and lead the way to a sunnier future.

If, with 43, America had behaved like a sheriff, assembling a posse (“a coalition of the willing”) to go in search of monsters, 44 would disarm its rivals by ensnaring them in a web of cooperation. To rid the world of rogues and tyrants, one must embrace and soften them.

During the 43 era, an elaborate myth had developed according to which the mullahs in Tehran had themselves reached out in friendship to Washington, offering a “grand bargain”: a deal on everything from regional security to nuclear weapons. The swaggering 43, however, had slapped away the outstretched Iranian hand, squandering the opportunity of a lifetime to normalize U.S.-Iranian relations and thereby bring order to the entire Middle East.

44 based his policy of outreach to Tehran on two key assumptions of the grand-bargain myth: that Tehran and Washington were natural allies, and that Washington itself was the primary cause of the enmity between the two. If only the United States were to adopt a less belligerent posture, so the thinking went, Iran would reciprocate. In his very first television interview from the White House, 44 announced his desire to talk to the Iranians, to see “where there are potential avenues for progress.” Echoing his inaugural address, he said, “If countries like Iran are willing to unclench their fist, they will find an extended hand from us.”

The short lived bloody "Green Revolution" shows Iran's Supreme Leader used his clenched fist to smack democrazy fans

For their part, the protesters, hungry for democratic reform and enraged by government rigging of the recent presidential election, appealed to 44 for help. He responded meekly, issuing tepid statements of support while maintaining a steady posture of neutrality. To alienate Khamenei, after all, might kill the dream of a new era in U.S.-Iranian relations.

In fact a case is strongly made on everything from unassing Iraq, backing off Syrian Red Lines, intervening in Libya and semi sort not intervening against ISIS is all about and part of 44's Persian Strategy...

Pic - "44's big legacy may be empowering Iran..."