SPY EYES

First – There are reports that Satar Beheshti,the 35 year old Iranian blogger who was arrested last week has died in custody under interrogation (read torture). This you should read. When Obama came into office in ’08, he had a very small window in which he could maneuver and try to “reset” relations with Iran and move past the stalemate and animosity that had marked the relationship with Iran up to that point. But the hourglass had been turned and the sand was running out very fast.To succeed it required Iran to make very quick decisions (and no government works fast, especially Iran,with it’s rule by committee of old men having to digest what each move might mean). You can not sweep away decades of misunderstandings and suspicions and resentments in one fell swoop ’cause this new guy says so. What Iran’s leaders failed to realize was that Israel and the U.S. Congress were fast moving in to oppose such actions.In addition, Obama had set into motion the other pieces of the puzzle for ironclad sanctions if need be. Iran dithered…Russia and China agreed to the sanctions and Obama ran with what he had,because he would not be able to hold the coalition he had formed for ever while Iran made up her mind – opportunity lost. Add on top of that, the ’09 Iranian elections and protest afterwards took everyone by surprise. Obama and his team tried to carefully orchestrate their response to not obstruct the opposition in Iran,which specifically asked the US not to come out publicly with any pro Green Movement statements. Such statements would have forced the opposition to close ranks with the government in order to be not accused of being the United States’ lackey – a death knell to any political figure in Iran.But Obama stayed silent on the human rights abuses. Negotiations on the nuclear issue and taking a stand against human rights abuses are not tied together unless you allow it to be.A distinction someone in his administration should have realized.Opportunity lost… We now have a window of opportunity – but again a very small one. And we are once again back at an Iranian Presidential election in June. De’ja’ vue. Just as we were paralyzed during our Presidential campaigning,so too, the Iranians will not be able to make any moves without their opponents jumping on any statement and using it against them. Iranians start their campaigning in earnest in March right after their New Year – so we have from now until late March to change things around. And we have the same players in Congress and Israel who are once again going to be working against this scenario. (although this time there may be a chance that Israel will actually give it a chance, not so sure about the dogs of war in Congress though – we shall see).And this time Iran’s leaders realize Obama is not going to dally while they hem and haw and dance around – it’s @!$%# or get off the pot time.So while they will still give their rhetoric publicly(because you have to politically – just as our politicians have to give our “we’re going to be tough with Iran” rhetoric if they want to survive in our arena) ,behind the scenes we may actually get something done. Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak said in a television interview on Wednesday that the Jewish state would not oppose talks between the United States and Iran within strict parameters.- Reuters http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/11/07/us-usa-campaign-iran-opportunity-idUSBRE8A61P920121107?feedType=RSS&feedName=Iran&virtualBrandChannel=10209&utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter&dlvrit=59365 So here we are -an article offering opinions on what Obama might do with this opportunity. The bottom line is if we are going to get out of this mess,we will have to do serious negotiations – and negotiations mean each side has to compromise – ultimatums are not negotiations. Because the truth is – no one can actually stop Iran from pursuing nuclear weapons ultimately and the second part of that truth is that the United States will do what ever it has to militarily to prevent Iran from getting nuclear weapons. Both Tehran and Washington have realized that their opening offers this past summer were non-starters. Iran wanted all sanctions lifted before it would begin limiting its enrichment program. American sought Iranian concessions upfront only to offer sanctions relief at the very end of the step-by-step process. Moreover, “going small” — that is, demanding less of Iran in order to justify the absence of sanctions relief — was politically unfeasibly. This gave birth to the idea of ‘Going Big’ — circumventing the politically tricky sequencing and instead putting everything on the table. But somehow, ‘Going Big’ was mysteriously linked to an ultimatum. If the Iranians did not agree to our last (and first) big offer, there would be war. This would be a serious mistake that would guarantee war. While going bigger may be necessary to reach an agreement, we can’t get a big offer right through a single attempt. If the Iranians presented a big offer to the P5+1 — “or else,” the world would rightly reject it and see it as an attempt to justify Iranian intransigence. Similarly, Tehran — and the world — will view any US ultimatum as an attempt to create a path towards war. Diplomacy should help avoid war, not lay the groundwork for it.-huffington So the authors say that first the U.S. can not ask Iran to give up everything without giving something in return. If Iran accepts limits on their enrichment program - 1) Stop enriching uranium to the twenty-percent level; 2) Ship out Iran’s existing stockpile of enriched uranium; 3) Shut down its underground nuclear enrichment facility. And agreed to full transparency. Then Obama must lift the sanctions.Not just freeze them – lift them. Anything less on either side will probably not hold for long. A logistical restriction on our side is only Congress can lift the sanctions – see above to see where their interests lie. Most of the successful negotiations of the past have occurred outside of the limelight – plan B. Plan A was what happened in the public eye and went nowhere because of all the rhetoric each nation has to adhere to politically – and then plan B is where they don’t risk their political careers and they can actually get something done. Increasingly – we do not have a curtain to do backroom deals, so no plan Bs. So no non military solutions.So endless wars. The U.S. needs to meet with Iran in the backroom and just between the two of them. In addition to the P5 +1, but in the end – these two players have got to come to an agreement on issues. Coalitions are notoriously hard to form and harder to hold together. That Obama has pulled this diverse world group together for sanctions is amazing. But some of these nations are about to undergo changes in their political environment and they will be conducive to negotiations,but not continued hard nose sanctions. Others look as though they are rethinking their position, which they took reluctantly in the first place. Catch this wave while sanctions are still strong. Hopefully,it looks like the candidates that Tehran is trying to field for their Presidency in June may be open to working with the U.S. Rafsanjani, Velayati, and Larijani have all come out to some degree and stated publicly they favored some negotiations,which is all you are going to get them to say in an election year. senior figures are signalling that such negotiations are possible. “Talks with the US are not taboo, nor forbidden,” said Mohammd-Javad Larijani, the head of the human rights council in Iran’s judiciary.”If it benefits us, we can hold talks with America even at the bottom of hell.” Politicians who favour Obama avoided showing their support in public for fear of reprisals. However, many of them told the reformist Etemaad newspaper Obama would be a better choice for the future of Iran. http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/nov/07/iran-reaction-obama-election-victory?CMP=twt_gu U.S. allies (particularly the new slate of government officials who may soon come into power) will be more willing to continue with sanctions if they think Obama is actually working toward a solution with Tehran – that’s why they backed the sanctions for Obama and not previous administrations – they thought Obama was serious about keeping the world out of war. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/trita-parsi/obama-iran-second-term_b_2085937.html?utm_hp_ref=world - I highly recommend this article. And I am going to add a side note – don’t make the mistake of ’09. You can negotiate with Iran on the nuclear issue and still hammer them about their human rights abuses. You can still expose the fact that they are suffocating their people by not giving them any true voice in their government. Doing the one does not mean you have to stop asking the hard questions on the other. By Katheryn Brandy