WarSclerotic

With Iran, watch the play away from the ball | Lenny Ben-David | Ops & Blogs | The Times of Israel.

Basketball mavens do take their eyes off the ball. A lot. In fact, 90 percent of a basketball game is played “away from the ball” on both defense and offense. Players’ movements and positioning on both sides of the court set up the actual shot at the basket. Coaches tell about a basketball star who scored 31 points in a college game despite possessing the ball for all of 48 seconds in the whole game.

In the international affairs arena today all eyes are focused on the forthcoming negotiations between Iran and the Western P5+1 in Baghdad on May 23. Will the Iranians and the Western nations continue to make nice as they did in Istanbul last month? Will the Iranians make concessions on their nuclear enrichment program (unlikely) or continue their successful tactic of stalling while the centrifuges whirl?  After the Istanbul meeting on April 14, Western diplomats felt optimistic, reporting that the Iranians were “engaged.”

But the real action is away from center-court in Baghdad, before May 23, and the players’ movements and positioning could determine the outcome of the diplomatic game. Here is a list of just some of non-diplomatic actions taking place, bearing in mind that some may be feints (as in any high-stakes competition, the field is loaded with “trash-talk”):

1.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad made political waves when he visited the tiny Gulf island of Abu Musalast month, the first time an Iranian leader set foot on the territory also claimed by the United Arab Emirates. He was followed to the four-square-mile crumb-on-a-map by more Iranian officials last week. The island is strategically located at one end of the Strait of Hormuz, and could be one of the many issues that ignites the next Gulf war.

If a war breaks out, it’s likely to start in the Strait of Hormuz, and not as the result of an Israeli bombing mission. A likely scenario: A big tanker or a US Navy ship hits an Iranian mine or an Iranian “fast boat” buzzing around US Navy ships gets a little too close.

It’s worthwhile, therefore, to remember the 1988 Operation Praying Mantis, a brief but full-scale naval war fought between the United States and Iran after a US Navy ship hit an Iranian mine and almost sank. Both sides sent aircraft into the air to attack the others’ naval vessels. When the smoke cleared, several Iranian ships, including fast boats, had been sunk and Iranian oil platforms destroyed. The naval forces and firepower available to both sides were tiny compared to today, as were the Iranian bravado and regional ambitions.

2.

Last month the Iranians announced that certain areas of the Gulf were off-limits to the US Navy. In recent months, since the Iranians threatened to shut the Strait of Hormuz artery, four US Navy strike groups have visited the Gulf. Strike groups consist of warships that accompany aircraft carriers. Two carriers are on station today, the USS Lincoln and the USS Enterprise (which was involved in Operation Praying Mantis). The USS Vinson, which defiantly sailed through the Strait of Hormuz in March, is not far away in the Indian Ocean, attached to the 7^th Fleet, according to the latest reports.

The USS Enterprise (public domain via Wikipedia)

3.

The US Air Force transferred last week an unknown number of its most advanced stealth fighter aircraft, the F-22, to the United Arab Emirates, probably to an airbase 300 kilometers from the Iranian border. An Air Force spokesman explained in diplo-military-speak that the deployments were meant to “strengthen military-to-military relationships, promote sovereign and regional security, improve combined tactical air operations, and enhance interoperability of forces, equipment and procedures.”

4.

The (Arabian) Gulf Cooperation Council just completed a major military exercise codenamed “Islands of Loyalty.” (What islands might they be talking about?) Abu Dhabi’s news agency reported that “successful amphibious operations were staged … under massive air cover in the war-game exercise.” The GCC’s Peninsula Shield forces are made up of personnel from Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar, Oman, Bahrain, and the UAE.

5.

Last month, Bahrain’s military announced that aircraft from the United States and “eight other countries [were] taking part in the Gulf nation’s largest air force exercise in more than two decades.” More than 100 planes were involved in the exercise. Bahrain is home to the US Navy’s Fifth Fleet.

6.

Two Saudi F-15s crashed in 2012, including one in a collision with a French Mirage fighter during joint exercises in Saudi Arabia. That’s an interesting pairing of French and Saudi forces, especially since both countries take the Iranian nuclear development very seriously. Joint exercises may mean they’re taking the military option up a notch. Will French policy change under the new government?

7.

The US Central Command (CENTCOM) told Al Jazeera last week that “There are about 125,000 US troops in close proximity to Iran: 90,000 soldiers in/around Afghanistan on Operation Enduring Freedom; some 20,000 soldiers deployed ashore elsewhere in the Near East region; and a variable 15-20,000 afloat on naval vessels.”

8.

Lt. Rebecca Rebarich, US Fifth Fleet spokeswoman, gave Al Jazeera a run-down of the fleet’s assets: “Aircraft carrier USS Enterprise (CVN 65) is operating in the Arabian Sea, conducting missions in support of Operation Enduring Freedom. Aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln (CVN 72) is conducting maritime security operations in the Arabian Gulf. There are approximately 16,000 personnel at sea aboard more than 40 US Navy, Coast Guard and fleet auxiliary ships in the US Fifth Fleet .”

9.

Where is the French aircraft carrier, the Charles de Gaulle? Several recent reports claim that it is moving toward the Gulf.

10.

According to news reports this week, Israel mobilized several reserve brigades to guard the Egyptian (that includes Gaza) and northern borders. On the other sides of those borders are Iranian allies.

11.

Meanwhile, Iran is complaining of tanks gathering along its border with Azerbaijan, an ally of both the United States and Israel.

12.

Is Mahmoud Ahmadinejad hatching naval mischief in the Red Sea as well? (illustration: Arie Katz/The Times of Israel)

Finally, a Bahraini politician close to the Iranians inserted Israel in the kerfuffle over the Abu Musa Island. An Iranian news agency reported that the Bahrain Freedom Movement’s Saeed Shihabi “censured the UAE for its irrational reaction to the Iranian president’s recent visit to the Persian Gulf island of Abu Musa, while leaving its crucial border disputes with Saudi Arabia.” Shihabi continued: “The Persian Gulf Arab states have various border disputes among themselves, and they had better have shown a reaction to the occupation of the Saudi islands of Tiran and Sanafir by the Zionist regime instead of waging a propaganda campaign against Iran.” (emphasis added)

Tiran and Sanafir are two islands in the Straits of Tiran at the mouth of the Gulf of Aqaba (Eilat) situated between the Sinai Peninsula and Saudi Arabia. The Straits are infamous after Egypt Gamal Abdul Nasser blockaded the waterway to Israeli shipping, sparking the 1967 Six-Day War. Today, a Multinational Force (MFO) is stationed on the island, observing and ensuring free passage.

But the Tiran Straits are not far from the Bab el Mandeb, the narrow gateway to the Red Sea and the Suez Canal beyond. In recent months, Iranian ships have been seen in the region, possibly involved with Eritrea or Djibouti, and sailing through the Canal to Syria. Clearly, Iran is checking out possible scenarios for mischief in naval chokepoints other than the Strait of Hormuz.

What do all the military movement, exercises, and activity portend? Maybe nothing. But 90 percent of the game takes place away from the ball, even weeks before the Baghdad diplomatic tip-off

Why Israel will strike Iran in October | Haviv Gur | Ops & Blogs | The Times of Israel.

It’s a foolish business, predicting when Israel might attack Iran’s nuclear program. Get it wrong, as most people do, and you’re left looking silly. And the only thing more foolish than a speculating pundit is the reader who believes him. As the Israeli saying goes, those who know don’t talk and those who talk don’t know.

Worse, even if your prediction is true to the current assessment of Israeli military planners, the timing of an operation is affected by factors that are not entirely in their control: the diplomatic and media environment, American preparations, Iranian countermeasures, Arab cooperation, the weather. Military strategy is not wedding planning. You don’t set a date and work backwards. Even if you were right when you made the prediction, you might turn out to have been wrong by the time the predicted date rolls around.

So what kind of idiot would take the plunge and make such a prediction? My only defense is that I think it makes sense. I’ve never offered a prediction for an attack in the past, because no single date ever made overwhelming sense. It does now.

So, caveats aside, here it is: Israel is preparing to deploy military assets to disrupt Iran’s nuclear program in October of 2012.

Consider the conditions.

The domestic situation is unusually stable, but only for the time being. On the one hand, the pundits are telling us, Netanyahu’s coalition is stronger than ever. It just grew from 66 MKs to 94, or 78% of Israel’s parliament.

But this narrative hides fragility. This coalition is about to consider very controversial legislation, including imposing national service on unwilling haredi and Arab populations, reforming the very electoral system that brought the current crop of parliamentarians to power, weakening the High Court’s oversight powers on other branches of government, passing a fiscally responsible and therefore politically unsatisfying 2013 budget, and more.

Netanyahu and Mofaz (photo credit: Miriam Alster/Flash90)

The legislative timing seems clear. Two of the most contentious issues will be resolved quickly due to High Court-ordered deadlines: the soon-to-expire Tal Law dealing with haredi military service, and the eviction of 30 Jewish families from private Palestinian land in Beit El. A 2013 budget must pass, and it’s hard to see the current coalition partners breaking up the government over the budget. While the haredi enlistment issue might drive either the haredi parties Shas and UTJ (16 seats combined) or Israel Beitenu (15) from the government, neither side’s withdrawal is a serious threat to the 94-seat coalition.

This brings us to the last weeks of 2012, when the agenda begins to unravel with complex and unpopular (among MKs) issues such as electoral reform. It is then that the coalition members will begin to feel the urge to distinguish themselves from their political fellow travelers ahead of the elections.

Kadima (with 28 seats) won’t survive as a distinct party if it cannot explain, come election-time, why it is an alternative to the Likud. Party chairman Shaul Mofaz does not see himself serving as Netanyahu’s loyal second-in-command forever, and already several up-and-coming Likud politicians and their party allies are agitating against a Kadima-Likud reunification that would push them down the party list. Mofaz initiated the new coalition deal as a way to give his own party, about to collapse to nine seats according to polls, time to rehabilitate its electoral prospects and rebuild its grassroots — not to rejoin the Likud.

This means that Mofaz will spend the next year looking for a plausible casus belli to rupture the coalition. Something big, something visceral, something that will drive the agenda of the elections. Something like a West Bank withdrawal or an electoral reform that would wipe out the smaller sectoral parties.

Israel Beitenu faces similar pressure to differentiate itself from the Likud, but for different reasons. It competes directly with the Likud for much of the same voter base. Even if it successfully pushes through its more aggressive version of national service enlistment for haredim, it will be looking for reasons to abandon the government in early 2013.

So yes, Netanyahu enjoys arguably the broadest and most stable coalition in Israeli history – roughly until the first quarter of 2013. Luckily, that domestic timing fits perfectly with the geopolitical window.

Diplomatically, the P5+1 group (made up of representatives from the US, Russia, China, France, Germany, and the UK) will meet in a couple weeks in Baghdad to launch a new round of discussions with the Iranians over their pursuit of nuclear arms. The talks aim at staving off a new round of sanctions set for July.

Israel cannot resort to military action while the entire Western world is committed to negotiating. If, however, nothing comes of new talks and sanctions by October, an assault becomes easier to explain.

From late September to early November, Obama’s decision-making will be driven by electoral needs — not diplomatic policy. (illustration: Arie Katz/The Times of Israel)

Which brings us to the most important factor in the October timing of an Israeli strike: the November 2012 presidential elections in the United States. Netanyahu sees a moment of opportunity that will likely not be repeated for years to come. From late September to early November, White House decision-making will be driven by President Obama’s electoral needs — not his diplomatic policy. The mullahs are unloved in America, and many American pundits and politicians are on record supporting Israel’s right to defend itself militarily against an Iranian threat. If Israel goes ahead with a strike, can Obama afford to be seen as trying to prevent it, effectively protecting the mullahs of Teheran in the process?

Israel might even hope that a credible Israeli threat of a strike just before the elections could lead to the best of all scenarios from Israel’s perspective – an American strike. While the White House seems to imply at regular intervals that Israel should not expect this (Biden’s recent advice to the Jews: “I would not contract out my security to anybody, even a loyal, loyal, loyal friend like the United States”), Obama is surely asking himself if he wouldn’t rather control the confrontation than be dragged into it. If he can achieve meaningful results without incurring heavy losses in American blood or treasure, he would go into election day a wartime president.

To be clear, I’m not arguing this is going to happen. The recent public denunciations of Netanyahu by ex-Mossad chief Meir Dagan and ex-Shin Bet head Yuval Diskin suggest Israel is planning to go it alone. All I’m saying is that if there is any chance at all of an American strike, it’s hard to think of a better moment for Netanyahu, and maybe also for Obama.

In the end, the logic is simple. Imagine for a moment that you are Benjamin Netanyahu. You believe the mullahs seek Israel’s destruction and are convinced an Iranian nuclear bomb is an existential threat to the strong, but tiny, Jewish state. You enjoy a vast but temporary domestic political coalition. Abroad, the American president will never need you more than during a brief six-week period in the fall.

What would you do?

Israel Hayom | Fight and flight: Israel gets new air force chief.

Israel Hayom | Analysis: Coalition now diplomatic force to be reckoned with.

Israel Hayom | Will the triumvirate attack?.

Ashton hopes new talks will end … JPost – Iranian Threat – News.

U.S. Concerned Netanyahu, Mofaz May Attack Iran – Defense/Security – News – Israel National News.

Netanyahu and Mofaz

Flash 90

The United States is worried that Shaul Mofaz and his Kadima party’s joining a unity government with Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu could result in an attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities at any given moment, according to a report on Channel 10 News on Thursday.

U.S. government officials told Channel 10 News that they believe a Likud-Kadima joing government could make a decision about an Israeli attack on Iran at any moment and perhaps even before the U.S. presidential elections in November.

The report said that when the Americans believed early elections would be held in Israel on September, they thought it meant the attack in Iran would be postponed at least until after the election. Now, with the stabilization of Israeli politics and the current government likely to end its term on schedule, the situation has changed and the Americans are concerned.

According to the Channel 10 report, in order to try and prevent or at least postpone the Israeli decision on the issue, the Americans recently held marathon talks with Israeli officials at all levels.

Israel – like the United States, its European allies, and Gulf Arab states – believe Iran is conducting nuclear work with military applications.

Defense Minister Ehud Barak recently warned that as long as Iran poses a threat to Israel with its nuclear program, all options are on the table.

“I believe it is well understood in Washington, D.C., as well as in Jerusalem that as long as there is an existential threat to our people, all options to prevent Iran from getting nuclear weapons should remain on the table,” Barak said.

“I have enough experience to know that a military option is not a simple one,” Barak added. “It would be complicated with certain associated risks. But a radical Islamic Republic of Iran with nuclear weapons would be far more dangerous both for the region and, indeed, the world.”

Recent reports indicated that President Barack Obama is prepared to make a major concession to Iran on uranium enrichment.

According to the reports, the Obama administration now is willing to allow 5 percent enrichment if Iran were to take other major steps to curb its ability to develop a nuclear bomb.”

DEBKA.

Binyamin Netanyahu and Shaul Mofaz

The possibility of an Israeli attack on Iran’s nuclear program fell back on the White House table with a heavy thud this week when Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu dodged around an early election in September by the stunning device of attaching the leading opposition party, Kadima to his government coalition.
Israelis woke up early Tuesday morning, May 8 to discover a smiling Netanyahu and Kadima leader Shaul Mofaz sitting pretty athwart a jumbo majority of 94 out of 120 MKs.
But it soon dawned on Washington and Brussels that the Israeli prime minister had also unlocked the wheel clamps constraining him from military action, which would have been the effect of a hotly-contested election campaign combined with a vocal opposition urging him to leave the job to America.
Instead, he had acquired a new partner for a preemptive attack simply by showing Mofaz, a former defense minister and chief of staff, updated intelligence on Iran’s nuclear progress and the scale of the threat to Israel and the Middle East. As newest member of the diplomatic-security cabinet, the forum which decides on key matters of war and peace, he could be counted on to vote for a decision to go to war on Iran.
By Wednesday, officials in Washington, Brussels and Jerusalem, were coming out of their daze over the rapid reversal of their plans and mulling new stratagems for holding Israel in check, a difficulty complicated by the fact that, in contrast to the prime minister, Barak Obama still had a reelection campaign to win.

Restarting US moves for holding Israel in check

Israel’s political turnabout was bad news for Obama in another sense too. If he returns to the White House in November, he will find Binyamin Netanyahu solidly entrenched in the prime minister’s office in Jerusalem for many a month to come.
In the meantime, the US president must brace himself for a nasty surprise or two – either from his Republican rival Mitt Romney, or Jerusalem or Tehran, during the crucial weeks of September or October 2012 leading up to voting day on Nov. 4.
From his point of view, all the efforts his administration invested in holding Israel back from military action against Iran had gone for naught and would have to be restarted.
One stratagem had been for top American military and other officials to interact non-stop with Israel’s top intelligence and military officers and officials and so keep a constant finger on the Israeli pulse in order to be forewarned of an approaching attack on Iran. The frequent visits back and forth had become the butt of jokes.
After six months during which US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak were meeting every two or three weeks, Barak proposed to Panetta: “I’ll tell you everything you want to know. “Why should Martin (US Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Martin Dempsey) have to keep on coming and dining at the same Tel Aviv restaurants? He deserves more variety.”
Another deterrent tactic used extensively by the Obama administration was a media blitz in the US and Europe based on contentions that Israel’s defense forces, IDF, lacked the weaponry and capacity to destroy Iran’s nuclear facilities – or even throw it off-balance for long enough to make it worthwhile. At best, said the editorials and the pundits, Iran would be delayed in its progress by no more than a year or less at the price of a regional disaster.
In early April, Obama’s advisers reported they had put dampers on plans which Netanyahu and Defense Minister Ehud Barak had brought close to realization in March. The US president ordered the media campaign cooled at that point.

Ashton tests the ground (for Obama) on an Israeli Iran attack

DEBKA-Net-Weekly’s intelligence and Washington sources expect it to be renewed in one form another quite soon.
The first harbinger of the pressure to come was an unscheduled visitor to Jerusalem Wednesday, May 9.
Catherine Ashton, the European Market’s foreign policy executive and coordinator of the P5 + 1 nuclear talks had come for a look at Netanyahu’s day-old unity government and, at the behest of the White House, a testing of the ground on which the new government stood on Iran.
Just a week earlier, the prime minister had sent his security adviser Maj. Gen. (res.) Yaakov Amidror on a tour of key European capitals and Moscow) to test the ground of the world powers on behalf of Israel.
When he asked what proposals would be put on the table at the Six-Power talks with Iran in Baghdad on May 23 and whether Israel’s positions would be taken into account, he was informed everywhere that it all depended on the secret dialogue afoot between Washington and Tehran. He was also told that this dialogue was progressing at a spanking pace and had reached accord on some of the fundamental issues.
In London, Amidror was even warned, “Obama may still stun Israel with an Iranian May surprise.”

No Israeli compromise on Iranian enrichment

Ashton’s visit gave the Israeli prime minister his chance to elucidate Israel’s position for the ear of the US president as head of a new formidable lineup.
He could have left her in the hands of her opposite Israeli number, Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman. Instead, Netanyahu not only received her himself, but made sure he was flanked by Lieberman, Defense Minister Barak, and his new acquisition, ex-opposition leader turned Deputy Prime Minister Shaul Mofaz.
The quartet informed the EU executive that Israel’s position on the Iranian nuclear issue was firmer than ever before. The world powers must confront Tehran with three requirements:
1. An immediate halt to uranium enrichment at all levels;
2. The shipment of all enriched uranium outside the country.
3. The immediate cessation of work at, and dismantling of, the Fordo underground nuclear facility.
To dispel any doubts about Israel’s resolve, Netanyahu broke with custom and instructed his spokespersons to issue a public statement on this position.
His message to Ashton and through her to Obama was crystal clear: If Iran can’t be pulled off its nuclear aspirations by diplomacy then Israel still held to its military option.

DEBKA.

President Barack Obama hoped to have foreign issues and any US military options kept firmly on a back burner for the next seven months so as not to distract the American voting public from his campaign for reelection on November 4. But Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is not playing.
The issues and administrative trivia he keeps on raising are buzzing past Obama’s electoral defenses. However much he would like to swat the nuisance away, the president must contend with almost daily feed from the Iranian ruler who is keeping their four-month old secret channel vibrating with an eagerness which stumps even those US officials with past experience of dealing with Tehran, DEBKA-Net-Weekly reports.
Iranian negotiators have an inexhaustible supply of surprises up their sleeves, including constant changes of venues for meetings – and now their team out front. They have advised the Americans that new faces will confront the Six World Powers at their coming session in Baghdad on May 23, different from the lineup at their first meeting in Istanbul. All the same, Tehran wants the next secret Iran-US get-together to take place as soon as possible to preserve continuity.
American sources suspect Khamenei’s bureau, the Nuclear Energy Agency and Intelligence Ministry are locked in a major battle over the choice of delegates – both to travel to Baghdad later this month and to negotiate with their opposite US numbers in the backdoor channel running through Gulf and European venues.

Obama must keep a nuclear accord with under his hat

Unless Tehran has another surprise in store, US officials expect the Baghdad talks to end on a positive note and set a date for a third round – or even a fourth. They drew this insight from the package of “proposals” suddenly turning up through one of the secret channels in the last few days. Khamenei seems to believe that his package is a good vehicle for carrying the dialogue forward to a breakthrough on their nuclear controversy – or even a final accord.
But he wants to persuade Obama to settle for this accord quietly and keep it under his hat for now. Iran would also delay implementation until the US president is free and clear into his second term. Obama would meanwhile proceed with his campaign with greater assurance, knowing he has a major achievement in his pocket ready to pull out and kick off his second term with a grand flourish.
Until then, if Obama falls for this tactic, he will be motivated by his future triumph to keep important concessions to Iran on stream and Iran may even be forthcoming with certain concessions in advance to help him beat back his Republican rival Mitt Romney’s charges of doing nothing to halt a nuclear-armed Iran.
A close look at the Iranian package, as disclosed here by DEBKA-Net-Weekly, not surprisingly, shows more demands and catches than “proposals:”

Access to nuclear sites – only if sanctions lifted

1. They stipulate that the Fordo (or Fordow) underground nuclear plant will not be closed down with or without an accord. Iran is willing to sign and uphold the Non-Proliferation Treaty’s additional protocol which permits spot checks of suspect nuclear sites without prior notice and, in general, accept substantially increased inspections. In fact, the International Atomic Energy Agency will be allowed to install cameras and monitoring devices in various parts of Fordo – but here comes the rub: All sanctions must first be lifted.
2. International watchdog visits to the Parchin military center – which Yukiya Amano, Director-General of the IAEA, called Friday, May 4 the agency’s first priority – will be allowed. But first a start must be made on removing sanctions. The areas of the site made accessible to inspection will grow in direct proportion to the number of sanctions withdrawn.
3. The US must halt its proactive military movements in the Persian Gulf because, the Iranians complain, they can hardly conduct serious negotiations when the Americans are engaged in hostile activity around their shores. They refer to US military exercises directed from command centers at the Pentagon, in Europe, in the Gulf and around the Middle East; the deployment of a F-22 Raptor squadron at a UAE base; and two aircraft carriers and their strike forces cruising around the Gulf (See DNW issues 538 and 539).
If the Americans want to continue negotiations and attain results, they need to put a halt to these military moves.

Iran will give up annexing Gulf waters if US brings emirates under control

4. Tehran asks Washington to smooth the ruffled feathers of the United Arab Emirates over their claim to Abu Musa, Greater Tanb and Lesser Tanb, the three islands controlling the entrances to the Strait of Hormuz. Otherwise, say the Iranians, if the UAE keeps pushing, matters could get out of hand and slide into a limited armed conflict which could drag in the GCC Gulf states and Saudi Arabia in support of Abu Dhabi.
5. If UAE tempers can be calmed, Tehran is willing to offer its first real concession for easing the mistrust of its Gulf neighbors: a commitment to refrain from extending Iranian territorial waters to include the disputed islands, the Strait of Hormuz and any part of the tanker route to and from the Persian Gulf. This would be offered as part of ongoing nuclear negotiations and entail withdrawal of the territorial waters annexation bill awaiting Majlis approval.
6. In our last issue, we disclosed exclusively that Iran had offered to help stabilize Afghanistan and Iraq as its quid pro quo for a nuclear deal with the Obama administration. (Iran’s Balance Sheet on Dialogue with US: The Tradeoff: US Eases Nuclear Demands for Iran’s Cooperation in Afghanistan and Iraq)
However, this week, the new proposals Tehran has relayed to Washington show umbrage over the new security pact President Obama signed with Afghan President Hamid Karzai in Kabul on May 2. The Iranians consider the pact not worth the paper it was written on. What concerns them most is the decision to leave a large number of American troops in Afghanistan on their eastern border until 2014.

Khamenei wants to be America’s strategic partner

Iranian foreign minister Ali Akbar Salehi said this week that the US-Afghan pact for keeping American troops in Afghanistan for years will increase instability in the country and is of concern to Tehran. Withdrawal of foreign forces is necessary for security.
What really miffed the Iranians is that despite their offer to be helpful to the Americans in the two war-torn countries, the US did not consult with Tehran before concluding his pact with Karzai. Being left out in the cold on key regional affairs is not part of Khamenei’s scheme of things. His eagerness to pursue back door diplomacy with Obama comes from his belief that he can squeeze from Obama not just acceptance of Iran’s nuclear program but also cooperation in regional affairs as a respected strategic partner.
It is hard to President Obama going for this sort of partnership with Tehran or risking any display of such relationship with the Islamic Republic to the American voter.