Power Players

How should Washington react to Iran's controversial missile tests? Amitai Etzioni, a professor of international affairs at George Washington University, believes that the Bush administration should be willing to sit down and talk to Tehran's leaders--even without any commitment from them to stop Iran's nuclear program. That, he says, may make them feel sufficiently secure to stop the program of their own accord. Etzioni, the author of "Security First: For a Muscular, Moral Foreign Policy" (Yale University Press, 2007), says that this carrot approach worked on both Libya and North Korea.

NEWSWEEK's Daniel Stone spoke to Etzioni shortly after Iran released photographs showing that it had fired four missiles last week. As the firings helped drive up the price of oil and raised fears that they would further destabilize the volatile region, analysts established that the photographs had been doctored to make three firings look like four. In addition, Iranian statements about the range of the largest missile were exaggerated. Etzioni's view: that what Tehran really want is a promise from Washington that the United States will not attack Iran. Excerpts:
 
NEWSWEEK: How should America change its policy toward Iran and countries that sponsor terrorism?
Etzioni: Democracy and security can thrive once you provide basic security. When people don't have basic security, they're not interested in democracy or talking about peace. They want safety. When they have basic safety, then you can talk about the rest. Take the Muslim world. If you approach the Muslim world and say 'Are you with us or against us?' and your litmus test is whether they're for or against liberal democracy, you'll see that most of the Muslim world will not be on your side. If you ask them whether they're for or against suicide bombers and expansionism, most Muslims everywhere, even in places like Bang Indonesia, Morocco and Turkey will be on your side. Even the Palestinians. Of course they all have different motives. But if your litmus test is security rather than democracy, most of them will support you.
 
You're saying that in a country like Iran, political security is not their first priority, so it shouldn't be ours?
Exactly. It's not that they're not interested, but it comes second. There is a perfect example in Libya. Libya gave up support of terrorism. It gave up weapons of mass destruction. I think that if you can get Iran and North Korea a bit more to do the same thing, it would be dancing in the aisle. That doesn't mean we're not going to talk to Libya about human rights, which they're still not very good on, but we want them first to stop supporting terrorism and give up nuclear weapons. Now, that's something finally we've finally done with North Korea. We no longer talk about regime change. We give them food and fuel and talk about saving the regime. But what's most important is that they seem to be willing at the moment to stop the nuclear program. That's the right policy.
 
Iran would argue that its weapons are a means to increasing its own security.
No, they'd be willing to give them up--but only for their own security. Look, we've made it extremely clear that we'd like to attack Iran. They're scared. For a moment put yourself in their shoes. We have all those bombs and they have seen what we did in Iraq and we've effectively said, 'you're next on the list.' They're probably willing to say 'OK, if you promise not to bomb us, not to topple us, we'll be willing to talk about our nuclear program.' That's exactly what North Korea did. That they should give up their nuclear program because they won't need it because we're not going to attack them.
 
You think it would be enough if America politely asked regimes like in Iran to lay down arms in exchange for a promise not to attack?
With Iran, they offered it three times, according to several sources, and we refused to talk to them about it. I mean, put yourself in the shoes of religious fundamentalists. To go to them and say 'we want regime change, otherwise we won't talk to you' is really like going to Bush and saying 'I want you to give the keys of the White House to [former Vice President Al] Gore and go campaign for gay rights and abortion, then we'll talk to you.' A regime change for them means not changing just power, it means giving up the very command center of a certain religious regime. Most people in Iran don't want that kind of regime, but that's not our job. Our job is to make sure they will not have nuclear weapons.
 
Isn't that appeasement for regimes or organizations that sponsor terrorism?
On the contrary. If they want to stay in power, that's fine, but we want them to stop terrorism and stop being radicals. Hizbullah is now between being a very dangerous terrorist organization and a political party with all social services, which is about to be a major player in Lebanon. Appeasement means surrendering to them. I say this is defending them. If Hitler was willing to give up his military ambitions, then yes, I would have left it to the German people. If people are willing to give up their violence against others and their own people, we should let them sort out their lifestyle on their own.
 
Terrorism can often be fueled by religious fundamentalism, rather than security, like we say on 9/11.
There is no belief system which you cannot find in its most extreme version that will not turn to violence. But if you look at the numbers, the overwhelming majority of religious people are on the side of peace and security. So we have options. Either we can treat all Muslims as evil and push 1.2 billion into our enemies list, or realize that at least 1.1 billion Muslims are not violent. Eventually, we'll want the other 100 million to move into that other camp and we'll promise to stop attacking them in return.
 
Is that an offer they would reasonably accept?
They would get what they would really want most, which is a promise for us not to topple their regime, in exchange for them to discontinue their program. It's certainly a plausible deal that Libya made and it looks like North Korea is making. This is not some kind of liberal fantasy. It's happening, and I think at least we should offer it to them. And what would be the downside?

© 2008