Wednesday, March 14, 2012

War in an election year




War in an election year


Zalman Shoval

“This was an election-year speech,” was the common refrain sounded by those who listened to President Barack Obama’s address to AIPAC last week in Washington.

Well, so what? Even when President Harry Truman recognized the state of Israel, he did so in part because his aide and adviser Clark Clifford reminded him that 1948 was a presidential election year. Although Obama’s speech touched on some important points that indicate a commitment, at least on paper, to counter Iran, let us put this aside for now and focus on the speech’s domestic political implications. We would also be well-served by not dwelling on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s speech to AIPAC, except on the segment in which he mentioned Auschwitz (as you may recall former Foreign Minister Abba Eban also mentioned "Auschwitz borders" to paint the threat of withdrawing to the 1967 lines).

Netanyahu was highly criticized for equating the Iranian threat to Auschwitz, but the criticism misses the point, as he wanted to drive home the lessons from Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s inaction in the face of reports on the Holocaust and turning down the World Zionist Congress’ request to order aerial bombing of the extermination camp and the routes leading to it because this “would only make the Germans more extreme.”

Of course things have changed since. Israel is not the World Jewish Congress -- and the response of the 14,000 people in the convention hall made it abundantly clear that the U.S. Jewry of back then was worlds apart from contemporary American Jewry -- and no American politician will ever overlook this.

Obama does not seek war, period. He doesn’t even want to reach a point when he might have to make a decision on the matter, and if he becomes convinced that there exists another viable course of action to stop Iran’s march toward the bomb by means of diplomacy or economic sanctions he will almost surely opt for it, though he is most likely fully aware that Tehran may exploit diplomatic talks to further its nuclear program.

Presumably he is not blind to the fact that talks, because of the time they may take, may make a military strike unfeasible, whether it is the U.S. or Israel that launches it. For the time being, his people continue to make statements, some of which contradict each other: Some show a bellicose decisiveness and others are laden with rhetoric about world peace.

Obama's AIPAC statements were not merely directed toward the Iranians and Israelis, but also toward the American people and his Republican challengers. But, as it turns out, a majority of Americans do not approve his handling of the Iranian nuclear threat.

The “conventional wisdom” in the U.S. political class is that the economy will make or break Obama’s re-election prospects. On that front, although economic indicators have shown only modest gains, the economy as a whole is trending upward. However, a new poll shows that 59 per cent of the public disapprove of the president’s economic stewardship. Obama also polls below the Republicans’ Mitt Romney on this issue (by 2%).

Moreover, the premise that the entire election would be shaped by the economy may be challenged in the eight remaining months until the elections by an unforeseen event or some negative development on foreign policy. This could take place, for example, in Pakistan or Afghanistan. In this sense the president may face a dilemma: If he continues to pursue talks with Iran and gets what he wants, he will be at an advantage over his election rivals. But he knows full well that if it turns out that the ayatollahs had deceived him and crossed the necessary threshold for making a bomb under the guise of “negotiations,” he would be held accountable. The Republicans will exact the price.

The American people can be divided into those who support military action under certain circumstances and those who oppose it, the consequences be damned. The adverse effect the standoff with Iran has on the price at the pump should also be viewed in this context, as it serves as a key issue in any election campaign. Will voters do the math for their most immediate out-of-pocket expenses or will they consider the long-term policy aspects, namely, that eradicating the threat from Iran may bring about a long and uninterrupted supply of oil with a reasonable price range? On all theses issues, the president has very complex choices to make.

Even his most preferred course of action -- “crippling sanctions” alongside a real embargo on every possible transaction involving commodities and people, as proposed by Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Senator Carl Levin -- is no simple task. Will he make clear choices or will he prefer to walk a thin line until the elections are over?

http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_opinion.php?id=1538

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