U-turn by White House as it blocks direct talks with Iran
The Bush White House has taken a bizarre back step away from negotiations with Iran regarding Iraq, a talk that most international observers hoped could be widened into a discussion of Iran's development of nuclear technology.
A White House official said that although the US envoy had originally been granted a mandate for talks with Iran, "we have decided not to pursue it."
Iran has been asking for talks for weeks to end the present stalemate, indeed Ahmadinejad has even written to President Bush, making him the first Iranian President to make such a move towards the US since 1979.
Bush however, continues to insist that Iran must take part in meaningful negotiations whilst, simultaneously, refusing to negotiate with Iran.
This is Bush doing "diplomacy".
In comments to CNN on Sunday, former US President Jimmy Carter’s national security adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski scathingly declared: “It’s really ironic. We are not negotiating with Iran, but we are negotiating. Who are we negotiating with? We are negotiating with the negotiators with Iran. And it’s an absurd situation.” He pointed to the double standards of the Bush administration’s willingness to engage in multilateral talks with North Korea, which claims to have manufactured nuclear weapons, but not with Iran.
Reflecting concerns in US ruling circles about the recklessness of the Bush administration’s actions, Brzezinski warned against “pumping up an atmosphere of urgency” when “the earliest, by most intelligence analyses, the Iranians will have nuclear weapons is approximately five years, more likely 10. Some even say 15.” He called for negotiations with Iran, but the appeal, like all the others, fell on deaf ears.
White House spokesman Tony Snow responded yesterday to the Iranian letter:
"Iran, in responding to pressure, is trying to change the subject and we won't let them change the subject," he said. He said the precondition for bilateral talks would be that Iran cease enriching uranium and did "nothing to build up its capacity to make nuclear weapons".
This is insanity. Iran are asking for a reassurance that they will not be attacked and the Bush administration's position is give up your strongest negotiating tool before we will even commence talking to you.
It is a US stance that is almost designed to be rejected.
It is impossible to work out what the Bush administration hope to gain through taking positions like this.
I've long argued that they don't appear to have a plan A, never mind a plan B.
As they engage in further acts of machismo and sabre rattling, that analysis is proven with each insane action and inaction taken - and not taken - by this administration.
Bush is leading us all to the edge, but he is very much mistaken if he thinks Ahmadinejad will blink first.
If Ahmadinejad blinks, he will be destroyed. Ahmadinejad knows this.
The reason that Bush is so bad at diplomacy is that he only ever thinks of what he wants and demands that all others bow before his superior military power. He rarely considers the position of his adversary, no doubt dismissing such thoughts as "weakness."
Ahmadinejad will have watched Saddam take part in the rather bizarre US prequel to the Iraq war, where the Bush - through the UN - demanded that Saddam destroy his most powerful missiles, and then went on to invade him anyway.
I thought at the time that this was a novel new concept of warfare, where you could demand that any nation you intended to attack should disarm in order to make your job easier.
The problem for Bush is that his foreign policy decisions do not exist in a vacuum. Previous behaviour will be taken as an indication of future intent. Bush attacked Saddam who disarmed, and backed away from Kim Jong Il who did not.
Ahmadinejad will not blink. And who could blame him? I wouldn't blink if I was him.
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