Preventing disaster

Washington can give An Israeli attack on Iran the red light

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Preventing disaster
by Trita Parsi
30-Nov-2009
 

Only a few weeks after US-Iran diplomacy began in earnest, it seems to be heading towards a premature ending. Rather than tensions reduction, the world has witnessed the opposite. Iran is refusing to accept a fuel swap deal brokered by the IAEA, the IAEA has passed a resolution rebuking Iran, and Tehran has responded by approving a plan to build ten more nuclear facilities.

With the potential end of at least this phase of diplomacy, fears of a disastrous Israeli attack on Iran are on the rise once more. But contrary to Washington's official line, America is capable of preventing Israel from initiating a war that would further destabilize the Middle East.

Conventional wisdom in Washington reads that the United States has little influence over Israel, particularly on the issue of Iran's nuclear program, since Israel maintains that it is an existential threat.

Washington has utilized the perception of Israeli immunity to international pleas to pressure China to rebuke Tehran. According to the Washington Post, National Security Council officials recently traveled to Beijing and used the Israeli card to get the Chinese on board.

“The Chinese were told that Israel regards Iran's nuclear program as an "existential issue and that countries that have an existential issue don't listen to other countries," according to a senior administration official. The implication was clear: Israel could bomb Iran, leading to a crisis in the Persian Gulf region and almost inevitably problems over the very oil China needs to fuel its economic juggernaut.”

It is questionable that the Chinese were moved by the notion that Israel cannot be influenced by the international community on this issue. Mindful of the strength of US-Israeli relations, it is hardly convincing that Washington cannot influence Israel's actions towards Iran.

Indeed, there is an important precedent in which Washington successfully prevented Israel from taking military action even when Israel itself had been attacked.

On August 2, 1990, almost a year after the fall of the Berlin Wall and the end of the Iron Curtain divide, Iraq invaded Kuwait. Within months, the George H. W. Bush administration carefully assembled a coalition of states under the UN flag and defeated the Iraqi army and restored Kuwait's ruling family, the House of Sabah. The Bush senior administration saw particular value in ensuring that the international coalition contained numerous Arab states. But to get the Arab's to join a war alongside the US and against another Arab power, Israel needed to be kept out of the coalition.

This turned out to be a tricky issue, particularly when Saddam Hussein hurled thirty-four Scud missiles at Tel Aviv and other Israeli cities, in an obvious attempt to lure Israel into the war. Then-National Security Advisor, General Brent Scowcroft, told me in an interview that the United States told Israel "in the strongest possible words" that it needed to keep itself out of the Iraq operation because Israeli retaliation would cause the collapse of Washington's alliance against Iraq.

For the government of Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir, this was a very tough decision. Saddam's missile attacks damaged Israel's public morale; the country's otherwise lively and noisy capital quickly turned into a ghost town. Bush sent Undersecretary of State Lawrence Eagleburger to Israel to assure Israeli leaders that the United States was doing all it could to destroy the Iraqi missile launchers.

But neither the Israel Defense Forces nor the Ministry of Defense was convinced. Instead, a feeling prevailed among Israel's leaders that Washington was untrustworthy and that it could not be relied upon when it came to Israel's existence. Bad blood was created between Israel and the United States, according to Efraim Halevi, the former head of the Mossad. Washington's protection of Israel was ineffective, and the image that Israel was relying on the United States for protection was hard to stomach for ordinary Israelis. Shamir's decision to accommodate the Americans was extremely unpopular, because it was believed that it "would cause irreparable damage to Israel's deterrent capabilities," Halevi told me. To make matters worse, people around Shamir felt that the United States did not reward Israel for, in their view, effectively enabling the coalition to remain intact by refusing to retaliate against Iraq.

Just as Israeli retaliation against Iraq in 1991 would have been devastating for the US, an Israeli preventive attack against Iran today would spell disaster for US national security.

In July 2008, Admiral Mike Mullen, the Chairman of the American Joint Chiefs of Staff, warned against any Israeli military action against Iran, saying that the Middle East would become "more unstable" and that it would put US forces under much stress, indicating that an Israeli attack on Iran would inevitably suck the US into war with Iran. "From the United States' perspective, the United States' military perspective, in particular, opening up a third front right now would be extremely stressful on us," Mullen told reporters.

A year later, Mullen's line was echoed by Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, who warned that a military attack would only be a "temporary solution." "There's a lot of talk about a military effort to take out their nuclear capabilities, but, in my view, it would only be a temporary solution," Gates told reporters in September 2009.

Beyond the impact an Israeli attack on Iran would have on US national security, the first casualty of war with Iran would be the Iranian pro-democracy movement. Having shown great courage in challenging the Ahmadinejad government, the last thing Iran's pro-democracy activists need is for Iran to get embroiled in a military confrontation with Israel and the US. Their struggle for democracy will be infinitely more difficult in the midst of war.

Should diplomacy with Iran fail, and should Israel seek to attack Iran, America will have plenty of reasons to prevent such a disaster from taking place. And history shows that contrary to conventional wisdom, Washington has the ability to prevent Israel from taking actions that would endanger America.

AUTHOR
Trita Parsi is the author of Treacherous Alliance - The Secret Dealings of Iran, Israel and the United States (Yale University Press, 2007) and President of the National Iranian American Council, the largest Iranian American grassroots organization in the US. This commentary was first published inHuffingtonPost.com.

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Sargord Pirouz

show some courage, Trita

by Sargord Pirouz on

"Iran is refusing to accept a fuel swap deal brokered by the IAEA"- Trita Parsi

You've got to be kidding, Trita. Iran has offered many deals and compromises. But let's be clear, Iran isn't going to give up its rights to the nuclear fuel cycle. And take-it-or-leave-it ultimatums do not work on the Islamic Republic. 

Of course, Trita is smarter than this and he knows better. But his NIAC is backed into a corner by the Neocons, Zionists, MEK and monarchists, so he finds it necessary to publicly qualify the NIAC in anti-Iran terms.

Honestly, even GW Bush had the sense to red light a Zionist attack. 

A trillion dollars were lost in the US war against Iraq. Just imagine how much treasury would be lost fighting Iran, a much stronger and determined nation. With over 30,000 more troops being sent into Afghanistan in an operation that's risky enough, why would Obama add to that risk?

Come on, Trita. Show some courage and urge the US to accept one of Iran's compromise offers, to get the ball rolling toward real diplomacy.


oktaby

This is a redundant and flawed argument

by oktaby on

I do not believe rational or even semi-rational minds support war regardless of who is playing proxy for who. If the jist of your article is a warning of a danger from Israel and that U.S. could dissuade it, then what is new? If you are suggesting that we should all lobby hard against war and you are leading that front, then you may be seeing yourself or NIAC for more than either are.

Your assertion that "the first casualty of war with Iran would be the Iranian pro-democracy movement" is less than accurate because the Iranian pro-democracy movement has been under siege since the mutiny of 79 that stole the revolution and has peridically undergone massive, or persistent systematic attacks without any wars for the past 20 or so years. The current manifestation of democracy movement in Iran is a reaction to the islamic (and not just Ahmadinejad's) regime's koodetah and attemp at hijacking what little there was. While an attack on Iran will give the regime the justification to round up anyone even resembling opposition, it is also true that they are already doing that and have no intention of letting up with or without war.

Invoking Kuwait, Iraq and some other ghosts of recent past also serves a general overview but lacks any material relevance. Kuwait was a clear case of invading another country which does not apply here and Islamic regime will not attack first because they know better. Iraq shot some scuds up but that was just an act of desperation and patriot missiles were already in place by the time Saddam figured how to shoot straight. However, islamic regime will retaliate fiercely and aggressively because they know that would be the end game for their own survival.

The repetition of 'existential threat' is monotonous too and the former Mosad leader repeating it hardly gives that tune anymore play time.or credibility The 'temporary solution' is just another catch phrase as there will be no such thing and everyone knows it. Once a war starts it'll be hell with unpredicatable consequences across the region and the world.

Your last assertion is also yesterday's news. Diplomacy with islamic regime has failed, to the extent that there has been one. What has been going on in the past few years or even in the past few months barely qualifies as diplomacy other than in surface. At least, if by diplomacy you also mean what is good for Iranian people.

Discussing war or peace in bits and pieces makes for nice intellectual aerobics or self grandeur but barely amounts to much unless it addresses the structural problems including vulture culture, religious fascism, and extreme capital. Zionism and isalmic regime have served each other well and there is no reason to believe that both sides now do not see war as furtherance of that ongoing symbiosis. Breaking that relationship and mindset is the real challenge. Obama's troop increase annoucement which I'm sure will have some moving prose, is an expected subset of above. 

Lets condemn more than just war as your proposed alternative of 'diplomacy' with a murderous regime has had untold toll to body and soul of Iran equal or greater than any war. Diplomacy that results in an anti-human regime to further destroy Khake Pake Iran and its heritage is a war. Just a different kind of war that damages the region and the world also. 

Diplomacy that aligns with the interest of Iranian people will align well with American and global civil and progressive interests. Else, it is just another flavor of war.

Iranians only can save Iran and pehaps bring some sanity back to this messed up world, if they succeed. With or without war we will remember and honor all of those who help us in this path.

Oktaby


Fred

Short on solution

by Fred on

NIAC lobbyist is long on problem and short on solution. Islamists having rejected America’s stretched out hand of friendship and reneging on a deal made with the sane world leaves two options. His lobby is against sanctions which leave only the war option to confront the Islamist Rapists running amok.