One of the most glaring and deep-rooted characteristics of the American liberal-left is the ingrained tendency of many of its leaders to view the international arena through rose-tinted glasses and to expect their moderate, conciliatory approach toward radical, revolutionary tyrants to produce pragmatic and reasonable modes of behavior toward America. This approach, they believe, paves the path to trust-building, changing views, and abandonment of militant ideologies. Moreover, by inviting these radical actors to play by the rules of the existing world order, they essentially legitimize them.
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Thus, for example, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt believed his generous unilateral gestures toward Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin would lay the groundwork for a new, stable world order, in which the Kremlin would play a central role as an honest and credible partner. Thus Democratic President John F. Kennedy's strategy was to cajole Egyptian dictator Gamal Abdel Nasser with massive economic overtures, in the hopes that doing so would soften his anti-Western positions and encourage him to abandon his subversive aspirations, gradually disconnect from the Russian bear, and promote modernization and liberalization in the American spirit.
The same can be said about the array of beliefs of Barack Obama, who from the outset of his presidency never tired of trying to bring the ayatollah regime into the family of nations. It can't be disputed that all these cases were ongoing parades of foolishness and futility. Stalin wasn't moved one iota by the praises heaped on him by Roosevelt; Nasser persisted in his efforts to undermine the moderate regimes in the Middle East and their Western patrons, despite the hefty economic aid from the Kennedy administration; while Iran hasn't ceased its regional subversive endeavors, hasn't suspended its ballistic missile program and has methodically violated the 2015 nuclear deal.
It's no wonder, then, that despite the continual collapse of the "positive sanctions" doctrine, the current Democratic president, Joe Biden, has unflinchingly adopted the very same approach. Indeed, as Obama's dutiful deputy, he has brought the same pile of illusions back to the White House, along with more than a few of "Obama's people," who have continued to cling stubbornly to their original worldview of economic and diplomatic enticements as a means of moderating Tehran.
On Monday, November 29, another round (and possibly the last) in the asymmetrical dialogue between the global powers and Iran will commence in Vienna, yet the absurd irony is that the "weak" side, supposedly Iran, is the one dictating the terms. Indeed, it is Iran, stifled by sanctions, that continues to brazenly violate the 2015 nuclear deal and accelerate its uranium enrichment to levels dangerously approaching the nuclear threshold. It is the one the American hegemon is trying to appease and placate at any cost to secure a nuclear deal.
This deal, Biden believes, will allow him to maintain his original conception about regional stability, which is just around the corner once the deal is signed. Because the administration is completely preoccupied with domestic issues and has therefore started the process of disengaging from conflict zones around the globe, including in the Middle East – its fundamental instinct is to downplay the Iranian threat. This mitigating approach, from which it currently derives its strong desire to sign the fundamentally flawed nuclear deal with Iran, will make it easier to continue withdrawing from the region. This is based on the illusion that securing a deal will indeed lead to the longed-for regional tranquillity, thus granting the administration further legitimacy for America's abandonment of the area and its traditional allies.
The problem, however, is that these hopes and expectations do not coincide with the obstinate reality, which refuses to fall in line with the utopian visions of the White House. To be sure, the American president's mad dash toward a nuclear deal ignores the consequences such a move, if it indeed materializes, will have on the thoughts and actions of the key regional players. We must bear in mind that American policy is not devised and implemented in a vacuum, and Tehran's sworn enemies in the Arab world, chief among them Saudi Arabia, hear the voices and correctly identify the signs coming from Washington indicating weakness and a shirking of responsibility.
And yet, the accumulating evidence from the Gulf in recent days indicates that the process of evaluation and reassessment has already begun, as both Saudi Arabia and the UAE have launched diplomatic initiatives that can only be described as laying the groundwork for "jumping on the Iranian bandwagon." Thus, the contrarian strategy toward Iran that has been adopted by the Gulf states – with Israel's support under the auspices of the Abraham Accords and American backing, which sought to create a balance of deterrence against the Iranian threat – could very well be replaced by an opposite strategy, anchored in the recognition that the US has become an unreliable ally. These countries, therefore, have no recourse but to team up with the dominant player in the region, despite the perils and risks involved in partnering with an ideologically fanatical, subversive and ambitious adversary.
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Under these global and regional circumstances, Israel has no choice but to adopt the "rationality of irrationality" strategy, as described by the great scholar Thomas Schelling. In other words, Israel must do everything in its power to convince the administration – through words and deeds – that it is dead set on preventing the ayatollah regime from acquiring a nuclear weapon no matter the cost.
The promises made by Biden administration officials, as if the military option against Iran is still on the table, are just empty rhetoric. Hence Israel's efforts in Washington, designed to convey a determination and willingness to cross the Rubicon against a tangible and existential nuclear threat from Iran, are of utmost importance in ultimately forcing the indolent American partner to intensify sanctions instead of easing them, and to condition a deal – any deal – on meticulous and invasive oversight mechanisms that ensure – unlike the original deal – that Iran doesn't cross the nuclear threshold. The question, of course, is who will blink first in this stand-off and whether the American hegemon will finally wake up from its slumber and shed its illusions.
