Check out this WaPost article on how the regimes in China, Cuba, and Burma are trying to prevent their citizens from learning about the events in Iran.

Discussing Iran is a way for citizens in these countries to talk about the problems they face in their country in a safer way.  One has to imagine that Burmese and Chinese activists especially must be living vicariously through the Iranians right now.

Evan does a great job of deconstructing the nonsensical criticism proffered by Salam in his article on Iran.  His objective seems to be to attack Obama first, and let the facts come later.  

I'd like to generalize Evan's comments to discuss one of my favorite topics: the utter uselessness of sanctions.  

Although this is rarely acknowledged, sanctions usually become policy by default. They are an implicit admission that America has failed to affect the behavior of a foreign country through traditional means, but at the same time is not prepared to go to war over the issue.

Far from demonstrating strength, this is in many ways a sign of weakness. Full isolation, including removing your diplomatic mission form the country, also removes your eyes and ears on the ground. With no presence in Iran, that U.S has to rely on the British and French for information, in addition to whatever meager tidbits it is able to gather from its outposts in the Gulf.

Even worse, sanctions often bolster the relative strength of the ruling class.  Nasty, authoritarian rulers always rely heavily on patronage to stay in power.  Sanctions simply make these patronage networks more valuable.  

Oh, and did I mention that sanctions aren't even enforceable?  They just aren't, and never will be, and when people say that we just haven't used every avenue, they're full of bullshit.  Sanctions mean that there is money to be made through smuggling. And where there is money, there are buyers and sellers.  And this is without accounting for China and Russia (both of whom rushed to congratulate Ahmadinjad on his "victory").

I'll never forget a story from a few years ago.  After the State department learned that Kim Jong Il was using iPods and other American luxury goods to buy off loyalists, the U.S. decided to slap on tighter sanctions to block the flow of these luxury goods.  This, of course, only made Kim Jong Il's iPods more valuable to his fellow North Koreans. One of the Economist's blogs cleverly pointed out that bombing North Korea with iPods would have actually made a lot more sense.

This week's 'What Not to Read' comes from The Daily Beast's Reihan Salam. Salam's articles are normally a blizzard of ersatz contrarianism (see "How Glenn Beck Saves Lives;" it's even worse then it sounds), but his recent article on Obama's Iran strategy takes the cake.

What make Salam's piece so galling is not his criticism of Obama--which is remarkably petty--but his ridiculous prescription for the current administration:

"Whether he likes it or not, his engagement strategy with Iran has been revealed as a hollow hope, one that rested on an overoptimistic interpretation of Iranian intentions. As former Bush foreign-policy adviser Peter Feaver has explained, Iran is far more likely to negotiate from a position of weakness than of strength. Rather than reassure the Iranians with a wink and a nod that we’re ready to do business, President Obama should be building an international coalition to isolate a recalcitrant Iran as thoroughly as the the West once isolated apartheid-era South Africa."

In the current geopolitical environment, this strategy will work as well as it has over the past 30 years, which is to say not at all. As long as Iran remains one of China's top crude oil suppliers and Russia continues to use Iran as a counterbalance to the expansion of Western influence, the international coalition Salam hopes Obama can build will remain a myth.

-Evan

Thomas Carothers (1999) Aiding Democracy Abroad: The Learning Curve. Washington DC: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Money Quote:

"Interests and power are almost always complex, even for programs with straightforward purposes. An undertaking to promote greater parliamentary transparency where the legislature normally operates behind closed doors, for example, may anger parliamentary leaders who fear a loss of control and perquisites. The opposition may favor greater transparency as a way to gain access to a process they are usually shut out of. Some officials in the executive branch may worry that they will lose privileged influence over the parliament if light is shed on that body's workings. Businesses that have cozy relationships with key members of parliament may be concerned about losing the ability to get their favors carried out quietly. NGO advocacy groups are likely to support increased transparency for the leverage it may give them. In short, some people will badly want reform to fail and some, equally determined, will want it to succeed, for reasons ranging from political interests to money, control, influence, personal reputation, or pure bullheadedness." (p. 105)

-Evan

I was going to write a post about why Ahmadinejad won't last three years. Bernard Henri-Levy, the French philosophe, beat me to it, with far more eloquence. Have a look.

One of the Indyk's questions at Brookings was whether the unrest in Iran had reached the beginning of the end, or, in Churchill's famous formulation, only the end of the beginning.  Maloney punted by saying "I'll split the difference," i.e. its impossible to tell.  True, nobody really knows, but people don't pay you to explain that-- I could've gotten the same basic response form my grandmother.  

I'll take the long view.  It's only the end of the beginning.  And this revolution, even if if the Ayatollah is able to hold it off temporarily, will have reverberations for years to come.  The Emperor has no clothes, and dictators everywhere are shaking in their shoes.

The State Department announced yesterday that the it is planning to send an American ambassador back to Syria.

The timing couldn't be better. Hezbollah failed to make gains in the recent Lebanese elections and by extending a hand to Syria the US further isolate Iran. Moreover, US influence could help to restart stalled negotiations between Syria and Israel later this year.

-Evan

While the popular press are busy comparing the current turmoil in Iran to the 1979 revolution,  John Ghazvinian makes a strong argument that we should really be looking back to 1908 for parallels.

-Evan

Today I went to the Brookings Institution to listen to their roundtable discussion on Iran.  To say I was underwhelmed would be an overstatement.

The event began with Kenneth Pollack giving a juvenile powerpoint presentation using some template from Office ’95.  C’mon Kenny, step it up.  Plus, it’s 2009.  Powerpoints don’t impress anyone anymore.  Prepare a speech next time.

Then, I listened to their five “experts”- Pollack, Riedel, O’Hanlon, Daniel Byman, and Suzanne Maloney talk for an hour and half, during which they managed to say NOTHING.  Oh, there were subjects and verbs.  But nothing that I couldn’t have learned from reading a stock AP filing on the subject.

I’m convinced that these prestigious senior fellow positions at Brookings are just sinecures, and these guys aren’t actually preparing for these meetings or doing much new research.  They just rest on their laurels, and this is probably why new foreign policy think tanks open up every month. 

Bruce Riedel (who I actually like a lot) and Kenneth Pollack (good writer, bad ideas; see “The Threatening Storm”) might have a million years of combined CIA experience on Iran, but I could have learned much more by spending five minutes reading Andrew Sullivan.  

Suzanne Maloney, one of the panelists, did seem to know her stuff. She also appeared to be fluent in Farsi.  Respect.  But then Martin Indyk, who moderated, asked the final question: Who will be president of Iran in 3 years? 

In the same unimaginative and drab fashion that characterized the entire affair, all of the of panelists said Ahmadinajad. 

Well, you heard it here first: Ahmadinejad WILL NOT still be president of Iran in 3 years.  More on that later.  

- Jon