[Peace-discuss] Change jumps into A. Lake

[C. G. Estabrook]

[Why we're crying up Seymour Hersh and the administration's enormities in Iran, 
note that the Prophet of Change has anointed as his foreign policy spokesman a 
stereotypical apparatchik who went to Foggy Bottom during Vietnam, worked 
for Kissinger and Carter, became Clinton's Condi Rice, and has written that the 
problem with foreign policy is that the old establishment isn't still in charge.  In 
fact his views on Iran et al. show little difference from those of he 
administration.  This is of course the liberal position. --CGE]

     Financial Times - July 2, 2008
     Obama camp signals robust approach on Iran
     By Daniel Dombey and Edward Luce

The prospect of a nuclear-armed Iran is the biggest threat facing the  
world, according to one of Barack Obama's senior foreign policy  
advisers.

He also signalled that the US Democratic presidential candidate would  
push Europe to agree tougher sanctions against Tehran.

In an interview with the Financial Times, Anthony Lake, a former US  
national security adviser who has worked with Mr Obama since the  
start of his campaign, also urged the US to learn lessons from its  
traumatic withdrawal from Vietnam regarding pulling out of Iraq.

"The most dangerous crisis we are going to face potentially in the  
next three to 10 years is if the Iranians get on the edge of  
developing a nuclear weapon," he said.

"If I were the Europeans I would much rather put on the table more  
sanctions, together with bigger carrots, and have that negotiation  
than I would face that crisis down the road."

In recent weeks, the issue of Tehran's nuclear programme has gained  
prominence as speculation has mounted about a possible Israeli strike  
on Iran's nuclear facilities.

But European countries have been reluctant to endorse new sanctions  
banning fresh investment in Iran's energy sector, an idea mooted by  
Mr Obama's supporters. Some European states are preoccupied by  
dependence on Russian gas and want to have Iran as an optional  
alternative.

European Union diplomats also reject suggestions that the world's big  
powers should water down their conditions for starting negotiations  
on Iran's nuclear dispute. Under current international policy, formal  
negotiations can begin only if Tehran suspends uranium enrichment,  
which can produce both civil nuclear fuel and weapons-grade material.

Mr Obama and his advisers stress the Democratic candidate's readiness  
to sit down with Iranian leaders without conditions.

"Unless you assume that [Iranian negotiators] have IQs less than  
those of eggplants, they are not likely to make major concessions for  
the privilege of speaking with us. So the question is: what is your  
strategy for the talks?" Mr Lake said.

"Do you believe that simply sanctioning them can drive them into  
concessions before you talk, or do you believe that you need to have  
the sanctions there as a stick at the heart of negotiations?"

Mr Lake depicted the Democratic candidate as a tough-minded realist  
rather than an anti-war politician. "When I joined the campaign, I  
remember asking someone at the very beginning: 'Is this a protest  
campaign or a presidential campaign?'" he said, before insisting that  
the answer was clearly the latter.

He stressed that Mr Obama, even after withdrawing troops from Iraq  
over 16 months as he has promised, would maintain "a residual  
presence for clearly defined missions". These would include military  
training, and "preparedness to go back in if there are specific acts  
of genocidal violence".

"That is not 'cut and run and let's just see what happens'," Mr Lake  
said. "It seems to me a very responsible strategy."

Highlighting a parallel with his first posting as assistant to Henry  
Cabot Lodge, a US ambassador in 1960s Saigon, he said: "It is common  
sense that we could not leave Vietnam successfully unless we left  
behind a government in Saigon that could govern successfully.

"It seems obvious in retrospect; it was not obvious enough to too  
many politicians at the time. In Iraq it's the same problem."

The target of his criticism is John McCain, Mr Obama's rival, whom Mr  
Lake accused of "saying we will win by 2013 without defining what  
winning is" – a reference to a speech in which the Republican  
candidate predicted that by that date the US would welcome home most  
of its soldiers from Iraq and Afghanistan.

Mr Lake was also markedly less enthusiastic than Mr McCain about the  
US's stricken civil nuclear deal with India, which has been hobbled  
by internal Indian opposition. "I don't know how you resuscitate  
something that is dead there [in New Delhi], if it is in fact dead  
there," he said.

On Pakistan, he said Mr Obama's statement last year about using force  
against al-Qaeda leaders in the country – even without Pakistan's  
permission – "is still relevant".

Mr Lake was sympathetic to aspects of Mr McCain's idea of a League of  
Democracies, one of the centrepieces of the Republican's foreign  
policy plans.

Stressing that he had not spoken to Mr Obama about it, he backed the  
general idea of a grouping that was "not an anti-Russian device but  
an effort to find ways for the democracies to act together on issues  
of defence of our common values . . . specifically on issues  
when the UN can't act".

Even that notion might be difficult to digest for European countries  
wary of offending Moscow or seeming to sidestep the UN. But as Mr  
Lake's words indicate, Mr Obama could yet be a demanding partner for  
the rest of the world.

     ###