Iran is a bigger threat than Islamic State. So what?

By the Pundit’s Law of Three, I hereby declare this observation to be a meme.

Now there are three appropriate reactions to these kinds of statements. The first is to nod one’s head and agree with Graham’s, Friedman’s and Petraeus’s assessments.

The Iranian regime controls vast energy reserves, some key geopolitical chokepoints, an actual government, a nuclear program, a regular military, a lot of not-so-regular militias and armed groups, a large number of young people and a proud civilization. The Islamic State controls some energy reserves, a few not-so-regular militias, a small number of young people, and a few parts of Syria and Iraq. One actor has vastly greater capabilities than the other actor. In other words, of course Iran is a bigger threat than the Islamic State to the United States and its interests in the region.

The second reaction is to ask what one should do with this observation. Contrary to recent rhetoric, it’s not as obvious as “end all cooperation with Iran.”

Indeed, if one reads carefully, Petraeus and Friedman are offering radically different prescriptions for U.S. policy. Friedman notes that the U.S. military has cleared out a lot of Iran’s enemies, and maybe that should stop. Petraeus is arguing for the exact opposite, urging the United States to get more skin in the game in Iraq. I’m not smart enough to tell you which of these policy prescriptions is correct, but I am smart enough to know that they’re very different even though they flow from the same assumption.

As both Friedman and Petraeus observe, there are and have been areas where Iranian and U.S. interests have coincided. Neither Tehran nor Washington wanted/wants a Taliban-controlled Afghanistan. This doesn’t mean that one thereby embraces a Grand Bargain with Iran. It does mean, however, that tactical cooperation — whether on combating the Islamic State or on the nuclear question — is an option that has to be on the table.

There are a lot of people in Washington right now who mimic the arguments above, asserting U.S.-Iranian relations should be viewed through a strict zero-sum lens. If Iran gains anything from cooperating, then the United States loses.

The theme of Netanyahu’s speech was that Iran is such a Bad Regional Actor that any deal that doesn’t contain Iran’s ability to make mischief in the Middle East is a bad deal. But this presumes that by agreeing to any deal, the United States somehow abdicates its ability to push back on Iran in Syria, Yemen, etc. It presumes that countries cannot reach agreement in one policy arena without agreeing about every policy arenas.

That’s just nuts. In fact, the smooth functioning of the U.S.-Iran Claims Tribunal during decades of Iranian-American hostility demonstrates this not to be true. No deal will preclude the United States from opposing Iran on the other issues that Netanyahu raised.

To be clear, I get the concerns that a real rapprochement with Iran poses to U.S. interests in the region. But there’s zero evidence that such a rapprochement is in the offing.
Saying that one actor is a bigger strategic threat than another actor cannot and should not rule out tactical cooperation as a policy option. If it does, then we’re living in a world where dumb political rhetoric trumps foreign policy analysis.

Being a liberal Zionist was always a tough thing to pull off, but it is becoming increasingly just impossible.  The intrinsic contradiction between wanting social justice and equity at home and supporting a militaristic and Apartheid Israel abroad produces what psychologists call cognitive dissonance.  It is hard to believe two opposite ideologies at the same time.  And the effort seems to have driven the New York Times‘s Tom Friedman bonkers.  Many otherwise sensible people who are strong supporters of Israel have concluded that Iran is so dire threat to it that extraordinary measures against Tehran are in order.  Friedman seems to have abruptly joined this group (he used to be more measured on Iran).  Now he seems to suggest that if the choice is between a US grand coalition against Daesh (ISIL or ISIS) that includes a de facto alliance with Iran, or a grand coalition against Iran that might include Daesh/ISIL, he actually favors the latter.  Well, he sidesteps his support by wondering why no one takes this position; but what else could he mean?

His rationale is that the US has removed Iran’s enemies twice before, overthrowing the Taliban in Afghanistan and then Saddam Hussein in Iraq, and making Iran into a regional hegemon.  If, he seems to say, the US crushes ISIL, it will be consolidating Iranian regional power.  He doesn’t bring up Israel, but his commitment to it must be driving this bizarre calculation that leads him to want to arm the beheaders and ethnic cleansers and traffickers of young girls.  (He doesn’t bring up that he was all for overthrowing Saddam Hussein in Iraq, which means he was part of the problem he is now describing).

But Friedman is not a Rubio.  What accounts for him being in this category of Daesh-supporters when he is not a conservative (in the American political sense of conservative)?  It is his Zionism.  For Israel, Daesh is just a manifestation of chaos and not threatening to Israel which has the best military in the Middle East.  But for many Israelis and supporters of Israel, it is the big conventional rejectionist states and armies with their potential for nuclear weaponry that are the real danger.  That is why Friedman supported Bush’s Iraq War, as well.  Apparently, for this strain of Zionism, the Middle East has to be in flames and broken up by constant American military invasions and special ops covert actions and coups in order to keep Israel from having any peer militarily in the region.  Daesh is just a set of gangs and aids in keeping Syria and Iraq in chaos, so from this point of view, it is a good thing and should be armed to cause more chaos.

It is a monstrous point of view that would come as a surprise to most Americans when put like this, but all Middle Easterners understand that it is exactly the kind of policy Israeli hawks pursue and urge the US to pursue.

I don’t think most Jewish Americans will be able to go along with Friedman on this one.  Mostly they are liberals or leftists.