America Bares Its Foreign Policy Soul

Hillary Clinton, the one-time Obama opponent in the race for President, argued during the campaign that Barack Obama didn’t have the experience to control an emerging foreign or security policy crisis. Now they more or less sit beside one another and listen to administration critics accuse them both of being unable to cope with the unfolding Iranian presidential election.

The accusation that Obama’s belief in the symbolism of the outstretched hand and his trust in the efficacy of a dialog without preconditions are signs of his political naïveté and inexperience is one facet of the current Washington debate concerning Iran. The other and perhaps more important facet concerning the right approach to the Iranian situation now overshadowing all else is the apparent baring of the American foreign policy soul taking place in the post-Iraq war debate.

The difference, however, isn’t as great as it is believed to be.

The current arguments are variations on the well-known theme of the struggle between political realism and political idealism. In Obama’s Wednesday speech, he held fast to his offer to hold discussions with Tehran without preconditions in the hope of striking a “grand bargain” and finally thawing the political ice age that has existed between the two nations ever since the 1979 Islamic revolution. Beyond that, the President also stated in a CNBC interview that he felt “the difference between Ahmedinejad and Moussavi in terms of their actual policies may not be as great as has been advertised.” He added, “In any case, we were going to be dealing with an Iranian regime that has historically been hostile to the United States.” Obama also reiterated his deep sorrow over the bloodletting in Tehran and the repressive nature of the Iranian regime.

Obama stated, “it’s not productive, given the history of U.S.-Iranian relations, to be seen as meddling, the U.S. president meddling in Iranian elections.” In saying that, Obama was referring indirectly to the CIA-supported military overthrow of Prime Minister Mossadegh in 1953.

Critics like Republican Senator and former presidential rival John McCain criticized Obama saying, “We’re not meddling in any country’s affairs when we call for free and fair elections and the ability of people to exercise their human rights.” McCain called these “universal values” and called upon the President to speak out “loudly and clearly” about the election fraud.

While saying that there was nothing wrong with pursuing a diplomatic approach, he added the most important subject should be to bestow “free and fair elections” upon the Iranian people. House whip Eric Cantor raised America’s “moral responsibility to lead the worldwide protest against the brutal repression of democratic rights” rather than to limp along at the back of the pack like French President Nicolas Sarkozy.

Conservative commentator Robert Kagan wrote in Wednesday’s Washington Post that in abandoning the goal of regime change in Iran and offering to hold discussions without preconditions, the Obama administration lent legitimacy to Tehran’s regime. Obama’s widely applauded change to “realpolitik” is, in actuality, an alignment with Ahmedinejad and a flouting of the will of millions of Iranians now protesting for opposition candidate Moussavi and against the election fraud.

While Obama’s party colleagues and even some Republicans agree in principle to his soft words and wait-and-see approach to the situation in Tehran, there is a rising chorus on the other side for the same unlimited and voluble support given by Americans and their government to the Hungarian revolution in 1956, the Prague spring of 1968, Tiananmen Square in June 1989 and Rangoon in August 2007.

Behind this position lies the conviction that the United States, as the guardian of global freedom, has nothing in its past history that requires an apology. Not even the CIA’s super-secret operations at the height of the Cold War nor the most recent wars now taking place with Iran’s neighbors, Iraq and Afghanistan.