Amidst the din of commentators calling for Obama to get tough with Iran, one unexpected voice is calling for the U.S. to push forward with negotiations. Canadian-Iranian journalist Maziar Bahari was recently released from Tehran's infamous Evin prison where were he was held and tortured by the Revolutionary Guard for 118 days. In one of his first articles after the ordeal, Bahari argues that now is the time to double-down on negotiations, not give up:

In Iran's triangle of power -- the Guards, Khamenei and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad -- the Guards are becoming stronger than the president and the supreme leader. Some Guards are devoted to Khamenei for religious reasons, but many of them use his status as a religious leader to legitimize their own actions. They also use Ahmadinejad, a former Guard, to increase their political power. The Guards have arms and money. They are the biggest industrial contractors in Iran. They have front companies all over the region and in the West and are involved in smuggling goods into and out of Iran. They answer only to Khamenei.

So can the West, especially the United States, have a dialogue with these people? Yes. Because there is no other choice. The West has to negotiate with Iran on the nuclear program and the stability of Iraq and Afghanistan. Not talking to Tehran doesn't work: The hostile rhetoric and actions of the Bush administration against even the reformist government of Mohammad Khatami helped the hard-liners to consolidate power. Only by engaging, even with a more radical regime, can the West force Tehran to measure the costs and benefits of dealing with the outside world.

I'm not sure if I agree with everything Bahari says, but his views are certainly compelling.
 

…Turkey has finally shrugged off the straightjacket of a tight U.S. alliance, grown virtually indifferent to E.U. membership and turned its focus toward its former Ottoman neighbors in Asia and the Middle East.

Though not primarily meant as a snub to the West, this shift does nonetheless reflect growing discomfort and frustration with U.S. and E.U. policy, from the support of Israel’s action in Gaza to Iran to the frustrated impasse of the European accession process. It also resonates more closely with the Islamic renaissance that has been taking place within Turkey.

- Alastair Crooke. His analysis is right on the money.

Western governments' attempts to halt Iran's nuclear program are often rebuked rhetorically by the argument of "double standards." Without forcing Israel to denuclearize, the argument goes, the West has no right to deny Iran the right to an atom bomb.

But on the international system differing standards exist everywhere--not all regimes are created equal. It's also not clear why Iran's denuclearization should be morally based on Israel's (opposed to Pakistan's, or even America's for that matter) denuclearization.

Nevertheless, the important point is that the ideal world is one without nuclear weapons. In the real world, a minority of countries have nukes. As that number increases, the chances of nuclear weapons falling into the wrong hands increases exponentially. The collective moral goal must be to stop this at all costs--lest we want to face a future of nuclear terrorism.

Thus, a universal standard for nuclear weapons is similar to Hammurabi's famous eye-for-an-eye penal code. On an individual level, it is certainly the most equitable--nothing is more fair. But on a collective level everyone goes blind. 

Few things irritate me more than the argument that the illegitimate regimes of the Arab world, namely Egypt and Saudi Arabia, are American puppets who exist only because of American support.

The argument, which has been repeated to me for what feels like a thousand times, is popular amongst the Arab street and assorted leftists. Yet, it does not stand up to any level of reasoning or comparative analysis. Let's take Egypt as an example.

Egypt currently receives $200 million in aid from the United States. Its ruler, Hosni Mubarak, is certainly nobody to be proud of. But he is in power because he was Sadat's vice president before Sadat died, and Sadat was in power because he was vice president when Nasser died. Nasser was a dictator who, just like Mubarak, imprisoned Islamists, tortured dissidents, and operated a secret police. But Nasser was not installed by the U.S., and neither was his security apparatus. But it is this same apparatus that basically sustains Mubarak.

What really happened was that the U.S., after failing to court and then fruitlessly opposing Nasser, decided during Sadat's reign that buying off Egypt's leadership was a better way to gain influence and reduce tension between Egypt and Israel. That plan worked quite well, and continued under Mubarak. But this hardly proves that American aid=Mubarak is in power. A quick comparative analysis suggests the American aid is neither necessary nor sufficient for Mubarak to stay in power.

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