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| US President Barack Obama meets with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, Sept. 30, 2013. (photo by REUTERS/Jason Reed) |
“The question is whether the West is in
decline or just withdrawal,” a high-ranking Israeli security official told me
in a closed meeting on March 2, as Russian troops were heading out to Crimea, elevating the
crisis in Ukraine to global dimensions. My interlocutor was one of Israel’s top
decision-makers. “The whole world is talking about this,” he related.
“This is being broached at every meeting of
foreign ministers or defense ministers and at every forum where issues of
global balance of power, world order and global crises are being addressed. And
there are many such examples. Look at what’s happening with the Chinese. They
deliberately ratchet up tension with Japan, taking control over the South China
Sea, behaving as if the United States doesn’t exist. North Korea for a long
time has been slighting Washington, doing whatever it wants. In connection with
the Syrian crisis, US President
Barack Obama let Russian President Vladimir Putin take center stage. An
agreement was signed, but now it turns out that its implementation is
faltering, yet there’s nobody to talk to. The negotiations with Iran are
stymied. They won’t lead to an agreement but will give the West three years of
quiet. Meanwhile, Iran cements itself as a nuclear threshold state, continuing
to develop cutting-edge centrifuges and ballistic missiles and pursuing
weaponization. To me,” the source added, “it seems not a withdrawal but rather
a rapid decline.”
Israel is monitoring
these developments with concern. “Obama was elected president after two terms
by George W. Bush, who turned the use of US force into a kind of a regular
occurrence. The United States was entangled in two abortive wars, went broke
and grew weary,” said an Israeli defense official. “Obama pledged to fix that.
The problem is that he took the country from one extreme to the other. The fact
remains that throughout his entire presidency, Obama has not showed once a sign
of true resolve; there was not a single event in which he showed that he could
and that he was ready and able to use force when there was no other choice.
This makes him the weakest American president, as far as we can remember.”
“Even in Libya
— the only place where the West intervened in recent years and succeeded
in removing a ruling tyrant — Obama kept a low profile, coming up with the
concept of ‘leading from behind.’ Well, if you lead from behind you also
stay behind,” Israeli officials remark.
Israel’s defense and
political establishments believe that the events in Ukraine prove the overall
thesis, namely that the world is a jungle. If you show signs of weakness, you
end up being eaten up. There is no vacuum. When Putin understands that the West
is tired, beleaguered and inert, he acts accordingly. “Unlike Western leaders,”
says a high-ranking Israeli defense official, “Putin is determined. He has a
goal and he goes after it. He is willing to pay a price and is ready to use
force. Once you show readiness, half the job is done.”
A seasoned senior
Israeli officer compared the current situation in Europe and the West’s
weakness vis-a-vis Iran to when Hamas took over the Gaza Strip in the wake of
the elections in the Palestinian Authority in the last decade (2007).
“Even though [former
Fatah official] Mohammed Dahlan had security mechanisms in Gaza with ostensibly
thousands of trained and armed troops, the Hamas movement easily took control
over the Gaza Strip for one simple reason: It had thousands of people ready to
die for the cause. The Palestinian Authority did not have people who were ready
to fight, sacrifice their lives and be killed for the cause. Thus, what needs
to be measured is the degree of resolve. If you are resolved enough and willing
to pay the price, you end up winning, sometimes even without a fight,” the
officer said.
A high-ranking
Israeli defense official applies the above to the Iranian affair. “The
sanctions,” he noted, “brought Iran to the verge of collapse. The ayatollahs
were brought to their knees. Disgruntlement on the street grew to the point of
imperiling the regime. At that point, Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali
Khamenei decided to 'drink from the cup of sorrow' — which is the
term Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini used upon signing the cease-fire agreement
with Iraq — and start negotiations with the West. At the same time, he came to
terms with the election of the relative reformist Hassan Rouhani as president.
The situation in Iran was almost desperate. Diplomatically isolated, its economy
was collapsing. International pressure was brought to bear and unrest was seen
in the streets. Unfortunately, however, when the negotiations started, the
tables turned. At the outset, this was a negotiation between unequal parties.
The Iranians sat at the negotiation table as the party that had to have an
agreement, whereas the West needed it but could have done without it while
resorting to other options. Then, as noted, it became apparent that everything
was turned around. The West behaved as if it had to have an agreement while the
Iranians conducted the negotiations as if they could do without it. So that’s
why with regard to the issue of resolve, it was all upside down too.”
It is for a reason
that Israeli senior officials — from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to
Defense Minister Moshe (Bogie) Ya’alon and many others — view the conduct
vis-a-vis Iran as a “missed
historical opportunity” and “regret that it will last for generations to come.”
“Presently, Iran has
totally emerged out of its diplomatic isolation,” Israel’s defense
establishment asserts. “Foreign Minister [Mohammad] Javad Zarif is doing
his victory rounds across the capitals of the Middle East and Europe. Apart
from Jerusalem, Cairo and Riyadh, he has been everywhere, even in Amman, Munich and Davos. Although
the sanctions have not been officially lifted, the truth of the matter is that
they are no longer in effect. The Russians are conducting
advanced negotiations with Iran for a large petrol deal, worth billions of
dollars a year. The Chinese have long skirted
the sanctions. The same goes for Turkish banks. Though
showing resolve in the negotiations in Geneva, the French have already
dispatched a large delegation of
businessmen to Tehran. The Germans hesitated, so the
Iranians sent a large delegation of businessmen to Berlin. The Iranian stock market rises. Iran’s citizens have yet to feel
the upshot of this, but soon they will. The pressure on the regime has waned.”
“And this happened
without Iran having paid a significant price,” Israeli officials note. “Willing
to sacrifice the facility in Arak, they were not, however, required to do so.
They pursue their research and development. They no longer need 20%-grade
enrichment because the quantity and quality of the centrifuges have rendered
this unnecessary. Within a matter of weeks they can switch from minimal
enrichment to military grade, which is why the red line Netanyahu drew at the UN is less
relevant.”
So what’s next? Based
on assessments of the defense establishment and conclusions of recent cabinet
discussions, the following is Israel’s working premise: We are headed toward
three years of “quiet.” The West and Iran will not reach an agreement. The
Iranians will neither concede uranium enrichment nor make do with a token
number of centrifuges (1,000) nor agree to completely shut down the enrichment
installations and the reactor in Arak.
Starting to realize
the problem, the West will be unable to sign a “bad deal.” What will
happen therefore is that the negotiations will be extended over and over again,
lasting for at least the next two years. Israel is talking about the
possibility of Washington and Tehran reaching a tacit understanding. Don’t defy
us for the next three years — the Americans are telling Iran on the basis of
this understanding — so that the president will be able to stand by his word
that Iran will not become nuclear “on his watch.”
The problem, Israel
says, is that the president’s watch will be over in three years’ time and by
then Iran will be at the point where it could break toward a bomb within a
matter of weeks while having an arsenal of ballistic missiles that could reach
the US mainland — it is developing a missile with a 10,000-kilometer
(6,200-mile) range. Pursuing weaponization, Tehran is working on
miniaturizing nuclear warheads so that they could be mounted on ballistic
missiles.
It is possible,
Israeli officials are saying cautiously, that Iran has won. It is important
that Obama realizes that even if Iran’s nuclear military capability is
materialized a few years after his presidency is over, it could not have
happened if he had not given away the store to Iran, for almost
nothing, on his "watch."
Source: al-monitor.com
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