It's been aggravating enough coping with the whole Nixon went to China analogy, which is based on a lack of understanding of what allowed Nixon to go to China.
Now the party line is that a nuclear deal with Iran will pave the way for a grand bargain and renewed friendship between America and Iran:
If Iran and the P5+1 succeed in negotiating a robust agreement on the nuclear issue, then Iran will be less preoccupied with rebalancing its relationship with antagonistic western powers and its role in the Middle East and the wider region has scope for developing in many new directions. This could have significant impact on its approach to the conflict in Syria. This briefing looks ahead to a post-agreement environment and assesses where Iran might chose to concentrate its resources.
Why even bother going into questions of where Iran would choose to concentrate its resources?
I mean, I'll admit that if you assume that Iran concludes a real agreement with the West on making sure Iran doesn't get nuclear weapons, you could make the argument that such a major change in this policy would surely reflect such a major change in leadership that the Iranians might also then end their support for terrorism and efforts to extend their influence all the way to the Mediterranean Sea.
But the fact is, Iran's leaders are so invested in nuclear weapons that it is extremely unlikely that Iran will agree to a robust agreement that we can be sure prevents Iran from going nuclear.
Isn't this happy ending that hinges on Iran giving up nuclear ambitions like the joke about how an economist stranded on an island with canned food would open the cans and survive? ("Assume a can opener," the economist said.)
And the author's discussion of Iranian election results is almost cute the way it treats them as actual elections.
Look, if Paul Rogers was running Iran, I'm sure as a reasonably enlightened despot he'd lead Iran away from confrontation with the West just the way Rogers describes this fanciful cascade of rational decisions. But assuming Iran agrees to a real nuclear deal as the starting point for this path is ridiculous, and does require--if not a can opener--a Rogers regime in Tehran.
Sadly, Iran's mullahs are running Iran. They want nukes. They want terrorism. They want economic growth. So far they see no reason that they can't have all of that. It's Allah's will, after all. That's Iran's assumption.
We have no reason to assume that an agreement with Iran will be robust enough to justify any faith in its ability to denuclearlize Iran let alone lead the Iranians down a path of good global citizenship:
If we assume that negotiations do not collapse and some sort of long-term accord is struck, there will still be thorny questions. A preeminent one concerns Iranian compliance. How much confidence can we have that the ayatollahs will not press ahead with their nuclear program in clandestine facilities, as they have done in the past? And if they do press ahead, how much confidence can we have that our intelligence agencies will catch them?
Rogers' piece is supposed to be an argument for why a good nuclear agreement will flip Iran into a friendly state. But based on the fantasy level of assumptions and train of events, isn't this really an argument for regime change in Tehran if we truly want a friendly Iran rather than just try to contain them forever?
