10/1/08

Last week, Secretary Rice and other State Department officials held direct high level talks with their Syrian counterparts. After initially refusing to deal with Syria, Iran and North Korea, the Bush administration has completely reversed course on its “not talking to our enemies” policy. After six years of failure, the administration reversed course on North Korea and Ambassador Chris Hill is currently in Pyongyang negotiating. This summer, Ambassador Bill Burns, the third-ranking U.S. diplomat, attended talks with Iran. Moreover, a bipartisan consensus supported by five former Secretaries of State and the bipartisan Iraq Study Group has also emerged.

In fact, the only person who refuses to accept this reality is John McCain. McCain criticized Barack Obama harshly at the first Presidential debate for being willing to hold talks with Iran. His advisors continue to push for a policy of no engagement with Syria. And he maintains a hard-line policy on North Korea that the Bush administration gave up on two years ago.

The McCain camp continues to voice opposition to talks with Syria, despite the fact that Secretary Rice met with the Syrian Foreign Minister last week. The McCain campaign has suggested that engaging in diplomacy with Syria would be naïve. Last month, McCain advisor Max Boot speaking on behalf of the campaign “cast Israel's talks with Syria as betraying the stake that the United States has invested in Lebanon's fragile democracy,” saying that “John McCain is not going to betray the lawfully elected government of Lebanon." Yet, this spring, Israel and Syria announced that they “were engaged in negotiations through Turkish mediators,” talks which are likely to continue with Tzipi Livni in charge of the Kadima Party. Furthermore, in a dramatic shift for the Bush Administration, “Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Moallem met with US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice last week” on the sideline of the U.N. General Assembly meeting. [NY Times, 5/22/08. Haaretz, 9/20/08. Time, 9/23/08. Max Boot, 9/22/08. Jerusalem Post, 9/30/08]

John McCain has vigorously condemned engaging Iran through tough diplomacy, but reality is undermining his approach. McCain has accused Obama of showing “inexperienced and reckless judgment,” for wanting to hold talks with Iran, which in his mind would only empower “an implacable foe of the United States." However, a consensus has emerged among the foreign policy community that the McCain approach is unworkable, and that only Obama’s strategy stands a chance of succeeding. In 2006, the bipartisan Iraq Study Group came out in favor of talks “without preconditions.” More recently, 5 former secretaries of State expressed approval for a strategy similar to Obama’s, including McCain advisor Henry Kissinger, who believes that talks without preconditions can begin at the Secretary of State level. The Bush administration has also come around. This summer, the third-ranking U.S. diplomat attended talks with Iran, aimed at persuading Iran to halt activities that could lead to the development of atomic weapons. It was “the first time such a high-ranking U.S. official has attended such talks.” [Washington Post, 5/19/08. Iraq Study Group, 12/06. Former Secretary of State, Henry Kissinger, 9/15/08. CBS, 7/15/08]

In North Korea John McCain is determined to continue the no diplomacy policies that Bush administration gave up on two years ago. Today Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill arrived in North Korea in an attempt to rescue the negotiations over Pyongyang’s nuclear program. The Bush administration’s original policy of not talking to North Korea failed as Kim Jong Il quadrupled his nuclear weapons arsenal between 2000 and 2006. President Bush, who once advocated the same approach as John McCain, now seeks a diplomatic solution. McCain, however, continues to advocate a hardline approach. Columnist Nicholas Kristof writes that “President Bush recognized the failure of his first term’s hard-line policy and abandoned it, instead pursuing negotiations and diplomatic solutions with North Korea. Mr. McCain fumes that this is accommodation and seems to prefer the first-term fist-waving that was emotionally satisfying but failed catastrophically. A McCain administration would thus apparently mean no more diplomatic track with North Korea.” [CNN.com, 8/1/08. New York Times, 9/27/08]

Quick Hits

There are conflicting reports that the leader of the Pakistani Taliban, Baitullah Mehsud, died of kidney failure.

In a leaked report, the British Ambassador to Afghanistan asserted that the “US strategy [there] is wrong and the war is as good as lost," adding that the "American strategy is destined to fail."

A missile strike by a suspected U.S. drone killed at least six in the tribal areas of Pakistan. While there are new stories that Karachi, Pakistan’s largest city and far from the Afghanistan/Pakistan border, is becoming increasingly “Talibanized.”

EU monitors are moving into buffer zones around the breakaway Georgian territories of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, but some are being turned away by Russia troops for “security reasons.”

Fallout from the U.S. financial crisis continues to be felt in Europe. Hedge funds may be the next sector to fail.

The Senate will vote tonight on a revised version of the $700 billion bailout plan.

France and India signed a landmark civil nuclear cooperation deal yesterday. A similar deal between the U.S. and India is up for vote in the Senate later today.