via memeorandum
Lee Smith in TNR argues that talking with the bad guys isn’t a cost free exercise.
So, it was not doctrinaire anti-diplomatic tendencies that led the Bush administration to curtail relations with Syria. The administration’s outreach had done nothing to alter Syria’s behavior, and to keep talking would merely demoralize anxious American allies in Lebanon, which has become one of the U.S.’s most valuable assets. Not only has Lebanon been a key venue for taking on Iran by facing down its proxy, Hezbollah, but the pro-Western government there led by Christians, Druze, and moderate Sunnis represented precisely the sort of Middle East the administration’s democracy advocates had envisioned. An Obama White House may have no interest in “regional transformation,” but the delicate diplomacy required to support Lebanon still represents an almost insurmountable barrier if it chooses the road to Damascus.
The short version at Betsy’s Page:
What Asad wants is not acceptable. So how is Obama going to engage in a helpful dialog with Syria without giving in more than what any thoughtful American foreign policy should find insupportable. To engage Syria, President Obama would have to sacrifice Lebanon to Hezbollah so that Syria could have a base to keep attacking Israel. Is that what Obama’s idea of diplomatic engagement with our enemies?
Meanwhile the Powerline guys got Smith to expand his thoughts regarding Jimmy Carter:
Carter and his White House staff misunderstood the nature of the Khomeini government back in 1978 and it seems that he, like the incorrigible Brzenzinski, have learned little about Iran since then. It is, above all, a revolution and one of its goals is to overthrow the established order by routing the US and drive it from the region. In the Persian Gulf, Iran is bullying Washington’s Sunni allies and, as General Petraeus’s Senate testimony yesterday made plain, waging open war against the US in Iraq. In the Eastern Mediterranean it is fighting US allies in Lebanon and Israel and threatening Egypt, the largest Arab state and still in many ways the most influential.
But in general the issue is that the rogues attach importance to talks and require that the democracy grant them something in return. This means that the democracy either grants the wish or appears to be the unreasonable one. This happened throughout the Oslo process. Preconditions are always a part of dealing with the devil.
Crossposted at Soccer Dad.
