Freedom Line Blog

From the people who gave you Syria and Zimbabwe on the Human Rights Commission, comes the latest piece of evidence that the UN is an institution dedicated to the social promotion of vice: Iran’s elevation to membership on the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women.

Though press coverage of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s speech at Turtle Bay on Monday largely focused on nuclear policy, Iran’s benevolence towards the fairer sex did come up yesterday. Per Fox News:

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on Tuesday appeared to defend his country’s recent re-election to a seat on the U.N. Commission on the Status of Women, arguing that Iranian women are “highly respected” in his country while 70 percent of European women are physically abused.

Speaking at a news conference in New York, Ahmadinejad said that a “woman is the symbol of beauty of God” in his country while there is “no dignity left for women in Europe.”

And how precisely is that dignity maintained in Persia? Just ask Tehran’s top cop:

Brig Hossien Sajedinia, Tehran’s police chief, said a national crackdown on opposition sympathisers would be extended to women who have been deemed to be violating the spirit of Islamic laws. He said: “The public expects us to act firmly and swiftly if we see any social misbehaviour by women, and men, who defy our Islamic values. In some areas of north Tehran we can see many suntanned women and young girls who look like walking mannequins.

“We are not going to tolerate this situation and will first warn those found in this manner and then arrest and imprison them.”

It’s a wonder that every feminist in the Western world isn’t a neoconservative.

Below is one of the latest cartoons from Pulitzer Prize-winner Michael Ramirez.

View more of Michael Ramirez’s cartoons on CFIF’s website here.

Columnist Mark Steyn points out that Obama may actually be more naive than British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain in 1938.  As Steyn notes, at least Chamberlain included the world’s greatest threat to peace at the time, Adolf Hitler, among the list of signatories to his ineffectual Munich treaty.  In contrast, Obama hosted a pointless nuclear summit last week that excluded the world’s most dangerous nuclear aspirant, Iran.

Congratulations, Mr. Obama.

Pulitzer Prize-winning cartoonist Michael Ramirez on President Obama’s 2010 Nuclear Security Summit in Washington, DC.

Following reports in Cosmopolitan, Field & Stream, Marvel Comics and My Weekly Reader, the U.N.’s IAEA yesterday issued a draft report allowing as to maybe, perhaps, possibly Iran is engaged in “past or current undisclosed activities related to the development of a nuclear payload for a missile.”

The existence of such “undisclosed activities” was first reported by Vogue nuclear fashion reporter Christine “Boogie” Boogle in the 2007 proliferation issue.

In response to the IAEA report, President Obama said that he hoped  a new U.S. National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) would be ready by 2012 and waiting for that document would be a really good reason to give him a second term.  In the meantime, Obama said that he would continue to press the “community of peace-loving nations” to impose sanctions on Iran, most likely consisting of bans on shipments of goats, Victoria’s Secret underwear, jello and sugared soft drinks.

Seriously, folks, there is just no meaningfully serious way to deal with some of this stuff.

Unfortunately, we all know a couple where at least one of the partners lashes out at others instead of manfully (or womanly) dealing with the relationship’s problems. For people like this, holidays like Valentine’s Day or anniversaries are no respite from the tension. If anything, they heighten it.

So it can be with nations. This morning brings news of a scheduled widening of the rift between Iran’s government and its people. Opposition leaders plan to stage massive protests on February 11th – the 31st anniversary of the Islamic Revolution that installed the current regime. The executions of two men accused of stoking earlier street protests were the straws that broke the camel’s back. In response, the ruling elite’s mouthpiece, er, president, said that on the same day the government would deliver a harsh blow to “global arrogance.”

Who are these “global arrogant”? Certainly not Barack Obama’s America, which has taken a decidedly hands-off approach to the internal affairs of its equal-in-worth-if-not-in-Security-Council-member-prestige UN partner. Also off the offender list must be China and Russia, two of the Iranian government’s biggest patrons.

No, it sounds like the mullahs who run the country are looking for a distraction from dealing with the widespread disgust of the people it claims to repress – I mean, represent. If anything, the harsh blow hurtling its way towards Israel, America, the West, etc. is the best confirmation that the people who run Iran are desperately trying to avoid losing power. But as bad relationships attest, failure to change in time almost always leads to being left behind.

If it isn’t careful, Iran’s government could bring a harsh rebuke not only from the globally arrogant, but also from its own people. This is one way to start a civil war.

It’s gallows humor, but there is something darkly funny about witnessing a Democratic president and his advisors get thoroughly mugged by reality and respond with denial. Domestically, President Barack Obama and his courtiers can’t bring themselves to acknowledge that good ole’ reliable Massachusetts just slapped them across the face in front of the whole country, knowing full well the sting would last until November.

Now, it looks like the engine powering the axis of evil is taking shots and looking for weaknesses. Apparently, after years of encouraging its citizens to hack into American mainframes, China is alleging cyber warfare from Uncle Sam. Of course, it just so happens that Google is leaving the country over concerns its system is under constant attack from inside China with government approval. For good measure, Chinese officials damned the United States for actively encouraging Iran’s pro-democracy movement. (In case you forgot, Obama’s official policy towards the protesters is to offer rhetorical support while they are shot and imprisoned.)

And all this comes after almost a month after Iran missed Obama’s “deadline” for halting its nuclear enrichment operation. When looking at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, is there anyone with Oval Office privileges that realizes foes think the president is weak and friends think him tone deaf? More importantly, does anybody in the room care?

One of the fundamental rules of negotiating is being able and willing to walk away without a deal. Apparently, during the make-or-break round of the Copenhagen climate conference only China remembered the rule. Of course, the “deal” it secured with Western countries was far less than Obama, Brown, Merkel, etc. wanted – but that was the point.

To be sure, Western leaders desperately wanted a deal, and kept larding on concessions. Take out previously agreed to emissions targets? Okay. Remove specific reduction deadlines? Fine. How about eliminating independent verification of compliance? Yes. Like a “moderate” Democratic Senator holding out for the sweetest deal possible, China played the world for stooges, and won.

China not only didn’t need a deal – it didn’t want one. But if the “international community” was going to insist on “something” to show for the two-week confab, China was happy to give next to nothing and make it look like the West failed to be serious. For eco-philes the dismal end to “Hopenhagen” shouldn’t be that surprising considering China’s position, though for some it is:

Why did China, in the words of a UK-based analyst who also spent hours in heads of state meetings, “not only reject targets for itself, but also refuse to allow any other country to take on binding targets?” The analyst, who has attended climate conferences for more than 15 years, concludes that China wants to weaken the climate regulation regime now “in order to avoid the risk that it might be called on to be more ambitious in a few years’ time”.

When considered in the context of China’s overall approach to foreign policy, the country’s obstructionism is not novel. Whether it’s protecting Iran from sanctions, propping up North Korea, or bankrolling Sudan, China is not a nation promising the kind of multi-lateral hope and change global government types are waiting for. For America haters everywhere, China’s rise to power does not portend a kinder, gentler world.

It turns out money can buy neither happiness nor certainty.  As information continues to leak out about the desert kingdom’s financial mirage, the overleveraged city state of Dubai is proving to be an object lesson in the importance of free markets.  In about five years’ time the second largest member of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) went from off the map to the center of attention for the world’s glitterati.  In the face of opulence, many disregarded obvious contradictions.

Neo-conservatives were willing to overlook its dictatorial government on the grounds that it promoted an alternative to political Islam.”

Also overlooked were the inhumane conditions inflicted on the hundreds of thousands of foreign workers, most from India and Pakistan, imported to construct the place to awe-inspiring effect. Nature was stage-managed at great expense, both financial and environmental: lush golf courses in the desert; a ski hill inside the world’s biggest shopping mall; sand rearranged on offshore islands that replicated a map of the world (with Israel notably absent). No expense was spared to bring celebrities to burnish the Dubai brand—among them Tiger Woods, Roger Federer, and Clinton. Dubai proposed a new oxymoronic economic model: state-owned capitalism. It was a trade-off: personal freedom for the promise of the best “quality of life on the planet,” like George Orwell’s 1984 with Gucci, McDonald’s, and a happy ending.

Yet, the end to Dubai’s financial crisis is far from happy; especially if negotiations with other UAE members stall, and Dubai seeks a bailout – and closer ties with – Iran.  Like security, many people (and nations) will trade their freedom for “guaranteed” prosperity.  Let’s hope that in the wake of Iran’s latest missile test-firing Dubai doesn’t increase the Islamic Republic’s sphere of influence any further down the Arabian Peninsula.

Foreign Policy Initiative’s Abe Greenwald does an excellent riff on President Obama’s Nobel Peace Prize acceptace speech today on National Review’s website. The upshot: Greenwald wonders whether Obama’s stark articulation of evil’s presence in the world (and its impact on international affairs) shows a president who’s starting to rethink some of the first principles of his foreign policy.

Greenwald sees some promising signs, but still wonders whether Obama can ever fully turn the corner. In one bravura passage:

“Irving Kristol said, almost too memorably, ‘A neoconservative is a liberal who has been mugged by reality.’ With that definition in mind, an eminent national-security personage put this perfectly phrased query to me over the summer: ‘Is Obama too arrogant to get mugged by reality?'”

“An excellent question. What the president calls his “philosophy of persistence” looks increasingly like the vice of conceit. The new White House imperiousness explains Obama’s inability to offer full-throated praise for the Iraq War — an undertaking he staunchly opposed. It also explains his devotion to de-fanging Iran through the voodoo of his personal allure (and to his correspondent obtuseness on Iran’s democrats).”

Today’s best piece on foreign policy (apart from this one). Read it here.

For those following the most recent Iranian hostage crisis involving British sailors, Meir Javedanfar has an interesting analysis in The Guardian.  Aside from Iran seemingly picking a fight with the lesser partner in the Anglo-American alliance, the mullahs who run the country may also be responding to a threat from a source they can’t easily control: a Persian language news station operated by the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC).

BBC’s Persian language radio service dates back to 1940, while its newly inaugurated TV service is now almost one year old. In this short space of time, the TV service has attracted large audiences in Iran, and the reason is simple: it is the most impartial Persian language broadcast available.

This has not been an easy endeavour as it has meant being subject to heavy criticism from both sides. For example, many anti-regime elements, especially monarchists, have at times accused it of being pro-Khamenei, because of its refusal to toe their line of attacking the regime at every opportunity. The fact that the service also looks at the positive aspects of the regime, and portrays the views of both sides has given it much credibility, as well as audience. So when it does broadcast about developments in Iran, especially those that cast the regime in a negative light, many more people are willing to accept its findings, thanks to its credibility and reputation for airing both sides of the story.

A government lashing out at a news outlet because of its fair and balanced reporting?  Only in Iran…

In his book “America Alone”, Mark Steyn discusses the “strong horse, weak horse” theory of foreign affairs. When terrorists like Osama bin Laden see a strong horse and a weak horse, they will necessarily like the strong horse. Traditionally, weakness was shown by the absence of power. Among many modern nations, it is evidenced by the refusal to use power. In either case, weakness is a provocation to those seeking to do harm.

And, as Ivan Krastev describes in today’s Washington Post, President Obama’s weakness on foreign affairs – silence on the killings of Iranian dissidents, making nice with dictators, bowing to the Japanese emperor – is signaling an over matched man in critical times. The Russians are familiar with a leader whose celebrity masks his country’s drop in prestige.

Obama himself is largely viewed in Russia as the American Mikhail Gorbachev, but Russians are less impressed than other Europeans have been with Obama’s brilliance and rock-star popularity. They remember the Gorbi-mania that conquered the globe at the moment the Soviet Union was about to crumble. Russians are tempted to view Obama’s global reformism and his progressive agenda as an expression of American weakness and not as an expression of America’s regained strength and legitimacy.

What does all this mean for the “reset” policy? First, it means that Russians will not be in a hurry to respond to the positive signals coming from Washington, and any perception of Washington weakness will diminish Moscow’s willingness to cooperate even in areas of common interest and common concern. It is not Obama’s deference but his strength that can persuade the Kremlin to cooperate with Washington. Simply put, to persuade Russians to join him, Obama must first demonstrate that he does not need them. He needs a clear victory, whether against the Taliban in Afghanistan, Iran’s nuclear ambition or Beijing’s habit of devaluing its currency. Obama must show strength for the “reset” policy to succeed.

Chances are Obama’s decision tonight to send less than the requested amount of troops to Afghanistan will do nothing to achieve either a clear victory in Afghanistan or more esteem for the Russians (or anyone else for that matter).

Apparently, Iran never received Barack Obama’s “Hope and Change” memo.  Or, more worrisome, they did and opted to play him for a Jimmy Carter-like fool.

Yesterday, the United Nations International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) announced that Iran may be constructing multiple covert nuclear facilities in addition to the Qom site disclosed two months ago.  Moreover, Iranian representatives have brazenly announced that they intend to commence operating the exposed Qom facility by 2011.  Making matters even worse, Iran is also wavering on its commitment following exposure of the Qom plant to ship its uranium to other nations for benign reprocessing.

The Obama State Department and IAEA reacted with their usual impotence, with the State Department saying that “now is the time for Iran to signal that it wants to be a responsible member of the international community.”  No, that time passed decades ago.

This endless cycle of Iranian duplicity and feckless response is beyond farce.  Obama brought false “hope” to international relations, but where’s the “change?”

True, February is still a few months away. When it comes to reporting the “news” in foreign affairs, however, there are some stories that just won’t go away.  Joshua Keating over at Foreign Policy has compiled a darkly humorous compilation of the stories that never seem to get old. (Or, at least never get a new angle.) Here are some of the headlines (see if you can pick the year): “North Korea to return to negotiating table”; “Pakistan finally getting tough with the Taliban”; “Israel preparing military strike against Iran”; “Dollar to be replaced as global reserve currency”; “Fidel Castro is dying”; and of course, “Israel and Palestinians reach peace deal.”

Sane observers knew instantly that Barack Obama and his substance-free diplomacy were undeserving of this week’s Nobel Peace Prize.  But who knew that the award’s absurdity would be confirmed this quickly?

This week, in a double shot to the Obama Administration’s chin, both the Russians and Chinese undermined calls for tough new sanctions against Iran.  This is particularly embarrassing for Obama because it comes on the heels of revelations that Iran has been completing additional secret enrichment facilities, as well as the supposed “breakthrough” meeting last week between American and Iranian diplomats on the issue.  Dumping icewater on Obama’s unfounded optimism, however, Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin flatly stated yesterday that it is “premature” to threaten Iran with sanctions.  And now, China has announced that it is strengthening, not reducing, its cooperation with Iran.

Russia and China constitute two of the United Nations Security Council’s permanent members, meaning that any substantive penalty against Iran for its continuing mendacity and misbehavior is unlikely.  Perhaps another Nobel Peace Prize next year will do the trick, though…

Esquire carries a piece by nationally-recognized strategist Thomas P.M. Barnett entitled “10 Reasons Why Sanctions on Iran Won’t Work”.  After my column earlier this week, it probably goes without saying that I agree with Barnett’s conclusion.

On top of being morally problematic (almost always doing more damage to a nation’s population as a whole than to the government), sanctions rarely achieve anything. The one exception I can think of in recent history was South Africa under apartheid, but that was essentially a western democracy with some illiberal policies — an atmosphere that is going to be more sensitive to economic downturns. Countries like North Korea and Iran don’t have the sense of economic entitlement that makes sanctions so painful in the West, and their undemocratic governments mean that there are only meaningful consequences to the government if the population is roused to revolt.

That being said, however, Barnett misses some key points. He compares Iran to 1970s China and notes that Obama doesn’t have Nixon’s ability to forge a diplomatic breakthrough (Michael Tomasky also entertains this notion in the UK Guardian today). But China was (and is) a conventional great power playing realpolitik games. Their interest was primarily strengthening their place in the international balance of power. But as I mentioned in my piece earlier this week, you can’t understand the regime in Iran without understanding their ideological motivations — something Barnett and Tomasky don’t factor in. That makes the regime in Tehran both more dangerous and less likely to soften than Mao’s China was.

In a column published today, CFIF Contributing Editor Troy Senik argues that the Administration’s response to a nuclear Iran must be more definitive.

Below are some highlights of the piece:

The die has yet to be cast, but when the history of the momentous changes that beset Iran (and with it the world) in the early 21st century is written, this may go down as the first time in our history when Americans – who often wait too long to respond to a crisis – failed to react whatsoever.
 
“Last week, as President Obama gathered with world leaders at a United Nations session in New York, Iran announced the existence of a second nuclear site on its soil, this one’s location obscured deep beneath one of the country’s mountain ranges.  For the second time in less than a year, a rogue nation was showing off its weapons capacities as the President held court about the need for a nuclear-free world.  The net effect was something like holding a gun control rally in the middle of a gang fight.”

Red the full column here.

The Wall Street Journal carried a superb op-ed this morning by Johns Hopkins professor Eliot Cohen on the growing dangers of Iran.

Cohen, who runs the university’s School of Advanced International Studies in Washington, is the author of “Supreme Command,” one of the seminal books on political leadership during wartime. He also served as a special advisor to Condoleeza Rice at the State Department during President Bush’s second term (though, from an outsider’s perspective, it seems as if Secretary Rice didn’t take nearly enough of his advice).

The whole piece is wonderful for its clarity, but the money quote is:

Pressure, be it gentle or severe, will not erase [the Iranian] nuclear program. The choices are now what they ever were: an American or an Israeli strike, which would probably cause a substantial war, or living in a world with Iranian nuclear weapons, which may also result in war, perhaps nuclear, over a longer period of time.”

Read it in its entirety here.

Mere days ago, Barack Obama stabbed our Polish and Czech allies in the back by scrapping plans to locate missile defenses on their soil (on the 70th anniversary of the Soviet Union’s invasion of Poland, no less).  Jan Vidim, a Czech legislator, reacted by saying that “if the (Obama) Administration approaches us in the future with any request, I would be strongly against it.”  Obama’s transparent rationalization was that his intelligence showed Iran’s long-range missile capabilities were not as advanced as previously thought.

Now, however, we receive word that Iran has test-fired its most advanced missiles yet, which are capable of reaching Europe.  Among other concerns, the missiles stand as a technological breakthrough because they are propelled by solid fuel, which allows for greater accuracy and potency than Iran’s liquid-fuel older models.   This comes on the heels of disclosure last week that Iran has been operating a covert nuclear enrichment site, despite a 2007 National Intelligence Estimate report stating that Iran halted its pursuit of nuclear development in the fall of 2003.

In other words, Obama the geostrategic genius has again threatened American security in his pursuit of personal popularity amongst global thugocracies.

In an interview this morning on Fox News Sunday, Senator Dianne Feinstein (D – California) gave Americans cause for concern by demonstrating a less-than-razor-sharp familiarity with a rudimentary element of national and global security. Senator Feinstein, who chairs the Senate Intelligence Committee, stumbled immediately out of the blocks when she appeared unfamiliar with the term “centrifuge,” a mechanism that plays an essential role in uranium enrichment and Iran’s pursuit of nuclear weaponry.

Chris Wallace:   Let’s start with Iran, and the disclosure that it has been building a secret nuclear enrichment facility.  Let me start with you, Senator Feinstein.  How strong is the evidence that this is to provide fuel for a bomb, and how sure are we that there aren’t other secret facilities in Iran?

Senator Feinstein:   Well, the evidence is strong that there was, that there is, such a facility, that it’s capable of about 3,000 various…  umm…  oh, what’s the word…

Chris Wallace:   Centrifuges.

Uh-oh…