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Yale’s Diplomat-in-Residence Charles Hill Denounces the Deal with Iran
In a video lasting not quite two minutes, one of the nation’s most accomplished diplomats tells us everything we need to know about President Obama’s deal with Iran.
The diplomat-in-residence at Yale and a fellow at the Hoover Institution, Charles Hill served in the State Department at the right hands of both Sec. of State Henry Kissinger and Sec. of State George Shultz, he has written important works such as Trial of a Thousand Years: Islamism and World Order, and he teaches “Grand Strategy,” a course that has become legendary among generations of undergraduates at Yale. As I say, one of the nation’s most accomplished diplomats.
This video comes from an episode of Uncommon Knowledge that Amb. Hill, Gen. James Mattis and I filmed late yesterday.
Published in General
Chilling, yawn.
Question for the Very Smart(tm) among us:
Did Obama just bumble into handing regional hegemony to Iran, or has he worked at it?
The GOP is a bunch of wussified men cowering in a corner each soothing another’s wounded pride saying “He can’t do that can he? No, darling, you were in the right.”
And for what? Mom-jeans.
Yes, this looks like a terrible deal. Worse than the one Clinton did that allowed North Korea to get nukes.
Serious question, other than writing my congressman and senators, what am I supposed to do about it?
Any Ricochetti besides me suffering from outrage fatigue?
Exactly. Passing ObamaCare without a single Republican vote in either the House or Senate; one aggressive, extra-legal action after another by federal agencies; the recent Supreme Court decisions that all but tossed the Constitution out the window; now this.
The Iran deal represents an outrage–but who isn’t already numb?
We have “handed over our leading role in the Middle East” to Iran. Dear Lord.
I have run out of words to express my anger and frustration.
And, I understand, Obama’s preempting Congress by seeking ratification of this arrangement at the UN first. Just whose interests does this president consider superior? (A rhetorical question…)
As long as conservatives continue to fund the leftwing hate machine by supporting its entertainment/celebrity component, I will blame conservatives for not being able to do anything about it.
This is my speculation based on what we see in the papers.
Iran is sufficiently close to acquiring deployable nuclear weapons that only a war can stop them. A matter of when, not if. And the actual value of when is sufficiently close to completely unnerve the administration. Both sides know that Iran’s weapon cannot be stopped while Obama is in office, and both sides know that Obama will not allow that headline.
So both sides know that the Obama administration in actuality has no limit, no “final offer”, no take it or leave it position. The Iranians got everything and then some. America got nothing. The Obama administration got let off the hook by a gracious and understanding Islamist dictatorship, for which the American people are supposed to be grateful. Or whatever. What we think does not matter to this government or to Iran’s, which increasingly resemble one another.
So if there are no limits to what Obama would give, then why did things stop where they were? Unlike Obama, the Mullahs and their lapdog president (of Iran) are not lame ducks. They have things to do that are measured in real-world deadlines, not arbitrary election dates. In 1939, Hitler went to war because despite many components of his war machine not being ready, the nominal allies of the time were ramping up to ramp up production. His war machine was the best it would ever be *relative to* its targets.
Iran can do basic math, even if Americans cannot.
What an absolute horror and don’t you find the crazy Chattanooga jihadist the punch that drives the point home!
Andrew McCarthy has written ” In the hours right after the shooting, local federal officials stated the obvious: the jihadist killing of our Marines was an act of “terrorism.” By nighttime, the government was walking that back. President Obama described the “assault” as a “heartbreaking circumstance.” Attorney General Loretta Lynch prefers “national-security investigation” to the word “terrorism.”
Read more at: http://www.nationalreview.com/article/421346/chattanooga-shooting-muslim-jihad-muhammad-abdulazeez
This deal has been negotiated by the duly elected President of the USA. If it is not stymied by Congress it will be America’s deal and- I’m very sorry to say- America’s disgrace. Other “powers” may have signed up too ( including the EU on my behalf as it were). And shame on them. But it is America which is abandoning its own exceptionalism. The shining city on a hill is getting shabby. It is facilitating the release of funds knowing that some of those funds will be used to kill and maim citizens of Israel, to ramp up Shia/Sunni antagonism, maybe to meddle in Venezuela and other parts of South America.
I wish I had a Congressman to lobby.
The big picture is, the US has switched sides, Israel is out. Iran is in. “Transforming” US policy is the goal. Formerly Israel was the US “asset” in the region. Now the president wants Iran… and, another counter balance asset… Judicial Watch has found that the US, “wanted to see the emergence of a “Salafist Principality” in eastern Syria to “isolate” the Assad regime.” They even knew beforehand the plan “could lead to the emergence of an ‘Islamic State’ in Iraq and Syria.” Not only did the US government at the latest by August 2012 know the true extremist nature and likely outcome of Syria’s rebellion” — namely, the emergence of ISIS — “but that this was considered an advantage for US foreign policy, calling the future ISIS a “US strategic asset.”
Here is the link to the document quoted above: http://www.judicialwatch.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/Pg.-291-Pgs.-287-293-JW-v-DOD-and-State-14-812-DOD-Release-2015-04-10-final-version11.pdf
Page 1: Every one knew what the strategy was, the distribution included: DIA, CIA, FBI, Homeland Security, Joint Staff, Sec. of State, US CentCom, and Sec. of Defense.
Bottom of Page 3: It is about getting the Sunnis to fight Assad because the Assad Regime is considered the “forefront of the Shiites”
Page 5, para C: Say the establishment of a “Salafist Principality” is “exactly what the supporting powers to the opposition want, in order to isolate the Syrian Regime.”
I know that President Obama said he wanted to initiate discussions with Iran with no preconditions, but I never expected he would pursue a strategy to change the American national security strategy in the Middle East with no public debate.
The deal Obama and Secretary of State Kerry struck with Iran is the shiny object. All of the discussion is on the agreement and its deficiencies, and not on the fact that he has reversed a long standing American Middle East policy with no public discussion and no agreement from Congress.
The reversal of this strategy results in
* Establishing Iran, an outlaw country, as the hegemon country in the Middle East
* Reducing the level of support for Israel by the American government, especially in the UN, and restricting Israel’s ability to protect itself from Iran.
* Encouraging a nuclear arms race between Iran and the Sunni countries in the Middle East
* Increasing the probability of the development of an Iranian ICBM which could reach the US
These are all significant setbacks to the security of the United States, and implemented unilaterally without Congressional consent, border on treason. Congress must reject this agreement.
Others have said it, Obama has been extremely successful at fundamentally changing this country, and, indeed, the world. Yes, Peter, I am numb and growing more so day by day. If there ever was an administration that deserved impeachment, this is it, and, yet, our legislators are neutered because they are afraid of the repercussions of impeaching the first black president. This is stunning.
Like your Mooj avatar.
Actually, my friend predates the Mujahadeen. He was a villager in Woma who hunted snow leopards. I met him in 1971 in Nuristan. The rifle was an 1867 Enfield. He offered to sell it to me for the equivalent of $20. With that he could buy a Russian shotgun. I considered it, but also considered what it would have entailed getting it back to the USA and passed on the deal.
As a fellow outrage sufferer, maybe this post from Laura Rosen Cohen will help
http://www.endofyourarm.com/2015/07/is-jihad-getting-you-down-need-break.html
Wiley:
Hi Wiley,
I think your interpretation of the document to which you’ve linked is a very big and improbable stretch. Large parts of it are redacted, which makes it impossible to draw firm conclusions about the document, but I’d encourage everyone here to read the whole thing, beginning to end, to make up their minds about what we can reasonably conclude from it.
A few things I’d point out:
It’s a DOD report from Iraq, not Syria, and “unfinished intelligence,” which means it was one of probably thousands of reports kicked up the chain that week.
More than half of it, including the introduction and many bridging sections, are redacted. Without them, it’s difficult if not impossible to know to whom phrases such as THE SUPPORTING POWERS OF THE OPPOSITION (in 7.A) refer. Large amounts of text have been redacted prior to that.
Note that 7.A and 7.A are both hypotheticals, they are under the sub-heading FUTURE ASSUMPTIONS OF THE CRISIS. The author seems to be saying that the two most likely (future) scenarios are 7.A., (regime survival), and/or 7.B, (the development of current events into a proxy war). Implied by this is that it is not yet a proxy war.
I think you’ve assumed that the phrase THE SUPPORTING POWERS OF THE OPPOSITION, used later in 8C, refers to 7C, where under the sub-heading THE GENERAL SITUATION, he writes, THE WEST, GULF COUNTRIES, AND TURKEY SUPPORT THE OPPOSITION; WHILE RUSSIA, CHINA, AND IRAN SUPPORT THE REGIME.
But given the amount that’s been redacted, I don’t think that’s an assumption in which you can be confident. The author is a careless writer, unfortunately, which along with the heavy redaction makes the challenge of interpretation particularly complicated. But note that directly above the above-cited sentence (7c, in THE GENERAL SITUATION) is section 7B, which says, THE SALAFIST, THE MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD, AND AQI ARE THE MAJOR FORCES DRIVING THE INSURGENCY IN SYRIA.
He uses the word “insurgency,” not “opposition,” which confuses things, but when he later says THIS IS EXACTLY WHAT THE SUPPORTING POWERS TO THE OPPOSITION WANT, IN ORDER TO ISOLATE THE SYRIAN REGIME, it seems likely to me that he means “the Salafists, the Muslim Brotherhood, and the AQI,” not “the West, the Gulf Countries and Turkey.”
I say this first because it’s common sense: Various members of the West, the Gulf Countries, and Turkey were at war with and remain at war with the Salafists, the Muslim Brotherhood, and AQI. The Saudis soon after sponsored a coup in Egypt to topple the Muslim Brotherhood; and we’d by that point been at war for years with AQI. It makes much more sense that the Salafists, the Muslim Brotherhood, and the AQI would be the “supporting powers” (presumably “supporting” the Free Syrian Army) that want “a Salafist principality in Eastern Syria.” For the West, the Gulf Countries, and Turkey, that would be (and is) a disaster, as the author clearly realizes: In 8D, he uses the phrase “dire consequences” to describe such a scenario.
Note also that he writes, IF THE SITUATION [on the Syrian-Iraqi border] UNRAVELS, THERE IS A POSSIBILITY OF ESTABLISHING A DECLARED OR UNDECLARED SALAFIST PRINCIPALITY IN EASTERN SYRIA. This is a very different thing from saying, “We have the possibility of establishing this,” as if this would be both under our control and desirable. He seems to me trying to be saying (unclearly) that if it unravels, this could occur: a warning, not a recommendation.
In the next section (D), he writes of THE DETERIORATING SITUATION. By this I suspect he means the UNRAVELING situation; nothing has been redacted between the paragraphs, so I think that’s the most likely antecedent. And far from describing this as an asset, he clearly says it will have DIRE CONSEQUENCES ON THE IRAQ SITUATION, and then warns, in sub-heading 1, THIS CREATES THE IDEAL ATMOSPHERE FOR AQI TO RETURN … ISI COULD ALSO DECLARE AN ISLAMIC STATE THROUGH ITS UNION WITH OTHER TERRORIST ORGANIZATIONS IN IRAQ AND SYRIA, WHICH WILL CREATE GRAVE DANGER [my emphasis] IN REGARDS TO UNIFYING IRAQ AND ITS TERRITORY.
I can’t see any reasonable way to read that as a policy prescription; it seems to be a warning, in strong language, of the consequences of “permitting the situation to deteriorate.”
Nowhere in the text are the words “but that this was considered an advantage for US foreign policy, calling the future ISIS a “US strategic asset,” or any words that in any way be could be confused with those. Those words are simply not in the document; they’ve been added by commentators.
There is no suggestion in this document of a plan to “get the Sunnis to fight the Shias.” There is a clear warning that if the situation deteriorates (See D), AQI could return to its old pockets in Mosul and Ramadi, and “this will provide renewed momentum under the presumption of renewed Jihad among Sunni Arabs and Syria, and the rest of the Sunnis in the Arab world under what it considers one enemy, the dissenters. ISI could also declare an Islamic State through its union with other terrorist organizations in Iraq and Syria, which will create grave danger [my emphasis] in regards to unifying Iraq and the protection of its territory.”
He’s describing this as the very opposite of a “strategic asset,” in fact.
The document has received a lot of attention as some kind of smoking gun, but as I think you’ll agree on careful reading, it’s not, and the interpretations widely assigned to it border on a conspiracy theory. By August 2012, the concerns he outlines (although not the interpretation that has been ascribed to his words) were widely known to anyone following open-source reporting, widely debated, and widely-discussed.
There’s much to criticize about the Obama Administration’s record in the Middle East, but I wouldn’t make an argument of the kind you’ve made based on this document.
Peter,
1) Iran is the new American ally. It is the dominant power in the middle east and a stabilizing influence.
2) Caitlyn Jenner, a man who’s every cell has an x and y chromosome, is now a woman.
3) The Supreme Court has ruled that the Law of Gravity is unfair to the physically challenged making obedience to Gravity a crime in the USA. Love has triumphed.
All in a days work.
Regards,
Jim
Claire, very thorough and good review of the DOD doc. I came to this conclusion by reading this article from the medium.com https://medium.com/insurge-intelligence/secret-pentagon-report-reveals-west-saw-isis-as-strategic-asset-b99ad7a29092. I then did my due diligence and downloaded the DOD doc and read it before I posted. I found the doc. generally supported the claim in the article. You seem to infer the opposite. I have not yet reviewed your specific comments, but your general claim, if I may generalize, is that missing context (mostly the redacted text) would make my thesis unlikely. I would suggest that redacted text is redacted exactly because it is more negative and more sensitive information. Such negative material is unlikely to cast a more positive interpretation on the unredacted text.
I will take at look at the doc again in light of your comments.
Claire, here is a reply to your comments
1) “report from Iraq, not Syria, and “unfinished intelligence,””
Perhaps you can read these better than me but there is no “from” notation. But does it matter if it is from Iraq, Syria, or DC? I believe the unfinished part is that it is not, as it states, “EVALUATED INTELLIGENCE.”
2) “thousands of reports kicked up the chain that week.”
I know you are referring to the thousands of reports the troop leaders and commanders are asked to create after EVERY event. That is not this report. The distribution of this report shows it is not a run of the mill report (DIA, CIA, FBI, Homeland Security, Joint Staff, Sec. of State, US CentCom, and Sec. of Defense).
3) “it’s difficult if not impossible to know to whom phrases such as THE SUPPORTING POWERS OF THE OPPOSITION”
You chose a bad example. The specific phase “SUPPORTING POWERS OF THE OPPOSITION” is well defined C page 3. They are “THE WEST, GULF COUNTRIES, AND TURKEY.”
Just above in B “THE SALAFIST, THE MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD, AND AQI” are specifically named as the opposition insurgency. Those are the guys the US is backing. There is no confusion.
4) “7.A and 7.B are both hypotheticals”
The report calls them “assumptions.” I believe they are not either/or, but both A & B are assumed to happen.
[until I get your Ricochet super powers I am limited to 250, continued in next comment]
Nowadays any rusted rake over there gets some wood putty and a placard says ENFIELD 1897 and an American buys it. It gets confixcated at customs, thrown out the back, and sold to the next dope.
Sigh.
I was given a pakol as a gift, but it’s too small. If I had one word to describe the cause of failure of the war there, I would say “contracting”.
5) “THE SUPPORTING POWERS OF THE OPPOSITION, used later in 8C”
There is no confusion in the text “THE SUPPORTING POWERS OF THE OPPOSITION” means the West and Gulf states want a “SALAFIST PRINCIPALITY IN EASTERN SYRIA.” It is even clearer now that I have read it again. For other Ricochet readers, here is the full text of section C:
6) “section (D), he writes of THE DETERIORATING SITUATION….” and “I can’t see any reasonable way to read that as a policy prescription;”
The report to me seems clear and the two sections are internally consistent. In section 8C, the report confirms that the US wants a “SALAFIST PRINCIPALITY IN EASTERN SYRIA”. In 8D the report warns this strategy has “dire consequences” if it expands into Iraq. After this statement, nearly the entire remaining document is redacted. It must be pretty bad.
ISIS is not tame and has escaped its US handlers by expanding its territory into Iraq as feared. This of course explains the half hearted effort to fight ISIS only in Iraq. The US wants to keep ISIS to do its bidding in Syria, but not overtake Iraq. US policy is failing and out of control.
For those who have not read the report, the US has been supporting Al-Qaeda in Syria too.
I think my read on the paper is correct. Let me know if you have further thoughts.
Amen to that, brother.
Additionally, although off topic, I’ve always wondered why we were hands off with Iran throughout the war in Iraq. We heard enough in the open press about Iran supporting al Qaeda with, amongst other things, IEDs and training. I know that America was tired of war and wasn’t sure we could “save” Iraq, but I always wondered why Iran didn’t get even a small whacking after Iraq settled down. Beyond the reasons above, I have always assumed that the lack of action was due to the fact that President Bush was so close to the end of his term in office and didn’t want to stir up anymore problems. However, I also wonder if there isn’t some Bush-era agreement squirreled away in Foggy Bottom, giving Tehran some space to maneuver for some type of non-interference with our war in Afghanistan.
Does anyone in the Ricofamily have an informed opinion about this?
I wonder if the moment of Iran’s greatest triumph isn’t also ultimately their undoing. The Turks, British and French pulled out of their Middle Eastern empires. The United States, or at least its president, but perhaps also its citizens, look prepared to pull back from the region as well. Perhaps the best way to defeat Iran is to let Iran defeat itself by attempting to establish its hegemony over a Middle East that cannot be dominated, at least not cost effectively (and I refer not only to the monetary cost, but to the price that must be paid in one’s blood and sense of decency – though the Iranian leadership has no sense of decency, they still have to deal with the monetary and sanguinary costs). I know this isn’t a very deep analysis, is probably beside the point in the near term, and I do not mean to suggest this was Obama’s plan all along, but the idea of Iran losing by winning is interesting to think about.