Obama Strikes Better Tone Than Biden

Just a brief note on Obama’s response to foreign-policy questions at his first press conference tonight.

Give that he has been focused almost exclusively over the past week on getting his stimulus package through Congress, I thought his extemporaneous answers to the few foreign-policy questions he was posed were pretty impressive.

After the ritual denunciations of Iran’s support for Hamas and Hezbollah, “bellicose language …towards Israel,” and alleged pursuit of nuclear weapons, it seemed that Obama struck a much more positive note than Biden’s Munich speech by stating that his policy team “is looking at areas where we can have constructive dialogue, where we can directly engage with them” and “…looking for openings that can be created where we can start sitting across the table, face to face, diplomatic overtures that will allow us to move our policy in a new direction.” Similarly, his simple assertion that “…I think that there’s the possibility at least of a relationship of mutual respect and progress” were largely the words that should have been included in Biden’s speech. Same with “we want to do things differently in the region [emphasis added],” a phrase that goes far beyond what Biden had said about setting a new “tone” in U.S. foreignpolicy. None of this, of course, translates into policy, but the lack of any implied ultimatum or condescension is likely to be relatively well received in Tehran.

Also interesting was calling for Iran to “send some signals that it wants to act differently as well…” The use of the word “signals” was very intriguing in light of the Treasury Department’s announcement last week that PJAK will be considered a terrorist organisation and today’s report in the Wall Street Journal that Washington (via at least Richard Holbrooke) will seek to engage Iran on a range of issues regarding Afghanistan, including drug trafficking. It seems signaling may already be underway, despite the fact that the policy review that Obama referred to has only just begun. I have included his complete answer to the question about Iran below.

His remarks about Afghanistan (particularly a remarkably blunt appraisal of the Karzai government’s “detachment” from the general population) and Pakistan suggested that he is very focused on the degree to which the Pakistani army will cooperate with U.S. aims in the FATA and quite determined to redeem his campaign pledge to strike al Qaeda targets when possible. This no doubt is one of the messages that Holbrooke is conveying, probably even more bluntly, to his hosts in Islamabad this week.

But I was particularly impressed by the way he dodged Helen Thomas’ question about who possesses nuclear weapons in the Middle East by citing the dangers of nuclear proliferation and putting it in the context of reducing nuclear arsenals in the U.S. and Russia “so that we then have the standing to go to other countries and start stitching back together the non-proliferation treaties that, frankly have been weakened over the last several years.” By bringing the issue back to Washington’s own responsibilities to comply with and strengthen the non-proliferation regime, Obama is “disarming” — at least rhetorically — those overseas who are rightfully fed up with U.S. exceptionalism and double standards.

Again, if these were a prepared speech, it would have been much less impressive, even disappointing. But these were extemporaneous remarks at his very first White House press conference that was otherwise almost entirely devoted to the ongoing economic crisis.

This is the Q&A for the Iran question:

Q Thank you, Mr. President. I’d like to shift gears to foreign policy. What is your strategy for engaging Iran, and when will you start to implement it? Will your timetable be affected at all by the Iranian elections? And are you getting any indications that Iran is interested in a dialogue with the United States?

THE PRESIDENT: I said during the campaign that Iran is a country that has extraordinary people, extraordinary history and traditions, but that its actions over many years now have been unhelpful when it comes to promoting peace and prosperity both in the region and around the world; that their attacks or their financing of terrorist organizations like Hezbollah and Hamas, the bellicose language that they’ve used towards Israel, their development of a nuclear weapon, or their pursuit of a nuclear weapon — that all those things create the possibility of destabilizing the region and are not only contrary to our interests, but I think are contrary to the interests of international peace. What I’ve also said is that we should take an approach with Iran that employs all of the resources at the United States’ disposal, and that includes diplomacy.

And so my national security team is currently reviewing our existing Iran policy, looking at areas where we can have constructive dialogue, where we can directly engage with them. And my expectation is in the coming months we will be looking for openings that can be created where we can start sitting across the table, face to face, diplomatic overtures that will allow us to move our policy in a new direction.

There’s been a lot of mistrust built up over the years, so it’s not going to happen overnight. And it’s important that even as we engage in this direct diplomacy, we are very clear about certain deep concerns that we have as a country — that Iran understands that we find the funding of terrorist organizations unacceptable; that we’re clear about the fact that a nuclear Iran could set off a nuclear arms race in the region that would be profoundly destabilizing.

So there are going to be a set of objectives that we have in these conversations, but I think that there’s the possibility at least of a relationship of mutual respect and progress. And I think that if you look at how we’ve approached the Middle East, my designation of George Mitchell as a special envoy to help deal with the Arab-Israeli situation, some of the interviews that I’ve given, it indicates the degree to which we want to do things differently in the region. Now it’s time for Iran to send some signals that it wants to act differently as well, and recognize that even as it has some rights as a member of the international community, with those rights come responsibilities.

Jim Lobe

Jim Lobe served for some 30 years as the Washington DC bureau chief for Inter Press Service and is best known for his coverage of U.S. foreign policy and the influence of the neoconservative movement.

SHOW 8 COMMENTS

8 Comments

  1. Like all his predecessors, the choice before Obama now is between whether he adopts policies which will assure him a second term or which are, what he believes to be good for the American economy, the global and local environment and America’s international standing.

  2. Shireen appears to be retelad to the realist school of foreign policy, applying it to Iran. IOW, Iran needs to be realistic about its capacity to compete with the US and to a lesser degree, Israel, because of Israel’s US backing in the Middle East.This is a reasonable position. The only problem is the usual one that the end result will be the US and Israel continues to bleed the Middle East, and nobody can do anything about it. Shireen’s suggestion that Iran support a two-state solution is completely wrong. A two-state solution to the Palestinian problem is both a non-starter for Israel (unless extremely pressured by the US which isn’t going to happen) and will never work because of the fundamental problem that Israeli Zionism (as well as Hamas fundamentalism) will still be in place after the Palestinian state (however weak and impoverished) is established.As I’ve said before, five minutes after the Palestinian state is created, some Islamic militant will launch a rocket at Israel. Israel will use that as the excuse to literally DESTROY the Palestinians, and get away with it because it’s war between two states , not Israel behaving badly as an occupying power.Until you sideline the Zionist fanatics in Israel, and the Islamic fundamentalists in the Palestinian community, there can be no peace. And the ONLY way to do that is to de-legitimize the Israeli state, form a new bi-national state, sidelining the hardliners on both sides by means of a constitution created by persons outside the hardliner camp and elections which sideline the hardliners, and force the average Palestinian and the average Israeli to deal with each other as a fait accompli.The alternative is going to be either a genocidal or ethnic cleansing of Palestinians or somebody nuking Tel Aviv with one of Israel’s own nukes. Take your pick.A better solution is for the US to support the disarming of Israel’s nuclear arsenal, support a bi-national solution, and engaging Iran fully using these moves as a credible indication that the US is serious about normalizing relations with Iran.Not that I think ANY of this has the remotest chance of happening. Which means the situation will only get worse. There absolutely is NO chance of a solution based on current policies on all sides. The only guaranteed result over the new few years will be a war with Iran and continued wars between Israel and Lebanon and the Palestinians and continued terrorism everywhere else sparked by the US unconditional support for Israel and continued pointless hostility toward Iran.

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