American Enterprise Institute

October 21, 2008

[Edited transcript from audio tapes]

8:45a.m.	Registration and Breakfast
9:00	Panelists:	Jon Alterman, Center for Strategic and International Studies
		Reuel Marc Gerecht, AEI
		Martin Indyk, Brookings Institution
		Vance Serchuk, Office of Senator Joseph Lieberman
	Moderator:	Danielle Pletka, AEI
10:30	Adjournment

Proceedings:

[Start of audio.  Conference in progress]

 Danielle Pletka:  . . . of an Iraq that is on its way to provincial elections and new presidential elections, and a possible drawdown, either rapid or slow depending on who is elected here in the United States. We will have perhaps a little further afield, but still a great challenge, growing problems in Afghanistan, which we have yet to figure out how to contend with.  And the coming years will also bring change in Saudi Arabia, in Egypt, and of course the ever-constant challenge of the peace process.  Am I still allowed to call it the peace process?  I’m not sure. Then, of course, Lebanon, Syria, Algeria, not to speak of a likely, in fact, I would say, ongoing, resurgence of al-Qaeda, which has perhaps not earned as much comment and note as it should have in the Middle East and throughout the world. 

 It’s not going to be an easy time for our next president, no matter who he is.  And there remains the additional question: Are the nominal priorities of the Bush Administration, democratic reform, political, economic reform in the Middle East, is that all under the bus?  Not entirely clear, I think, from either candidate, frankly.  And then there’s the last issue, how do regional actors see the next president of the United States, how do they see the next administration, how do they see change, how do they see themselves positioned to either benefit, take advantage of, or potentially lose from that change? 

 We have four wonderful speakers and good friends to address these issues today.  I hope that they will cover those topics and more, as well as your questions afterwards.  In alphabetical order, Jon Alterman is joining us.  Jon Alterman is the director of the Middle East program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. Reuel Marc Gerecht is a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and one of our experts in Middle East issues.  Martin Indyk is currently the director of the Saban Center for Middle East policy at the Brookings Institution, former U.S. Ambassador to Israel, assistant secretary of Near East National Security Council, senior director for Middle East and more.  Vance Serchuk is a foreign policy adviser to Senator Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut, Independent-Democrat, I should say, just in case anybody didn’t know. 

 None of the speakers here today represent or are surrogates for any particular campaign, so let me underscore that, in every instance other than that which they may note.  They speak for themselves, and that’s a good thing, frankly. 

 If I may ask Martin to begin today, let me turn it over to you.  Thank you, Martin. 

 Martin Indyk:  Thank you very much, Dany, and thank you for the opportunity to speak at the American Enterprise Institute.  It’s been a while.  Good morning ladies and gentlemen.  I’ll move very quickly through my points.  But, first of all, a disclaimer.  I speak for myself here, although I’m a supporter of Barack Obama, I am not, by any means, a surrogate for him or his campaign.  I just want that to be understood from the outset. 

 As Dany has already indicated, the next president is going to face a bleak horizon when it comes to the Middle East.  He will inherit a fragile situation in Iraq, a war that, by all accounts, from the practitioners of that war in particular, we are losing, a failure to achieve President Bush’s stated objective of a peace treaty between the Israelis and Palestinians by the end of this year, a failure to isolate and prevent serious breakout or preserve Lebanon’s independence, a failure to open political space in Arab countries ruled by authoritarian regimes, and, most importantly of all, a failure to contain Iran’s hegemonic ambitions across the Middle East, and of course it’s nuclear program at home. 

 Compounding all of this is an anti-American anger that is deeply felt, particularly in the Arab and Moslem worlds, and something that the Iranian leadership, Ahmadinejad in particular, has been able to take advantage of at our expense.  And all of this is against the backdrop of a resurgent Russia, a global economic crisis, and a recession here at home. 

 So what all this adds up to is a diminished influence for the United States, a tarnished reputation for the American brand, and a strain both on our hard power, given the way in which forces are now tied down in Iraq and Afghanistan, and a strain also on our soft power because of this tarnished reputation and because of the strain on our economic capabilities as well. 

 So, given all of that, it’s a very difficult situation that the next president is going to inherit.  But, with everything in the Middle East, there’s for every dark cloud there’s a silver lining, and I think it’s important to note what these are because in them inherently lies the opportunity for the next president. 

 First of all, the surges success in Iraq will allow for the gradual draw down of American forces over the next two years.  It’s clear that they will still be needed in the short-term for a range of important tasks from overseeing the absorption of the sons of Iraq, the awakening movement into the Iraqi security forces, the completion of the effort to rebuild the Iraqi army, the other side of elections, both municipal and then national elections, backstopping the political reconciliation that will need to take place and an understanding on fair distribution of oil revenues amongst the different communities in Iraq, and, of course, to help take care of any attempt by al-Qaeda in Iraq to reestablish itself effectively and to deal with hot spots like Kirkuk. 

But, having said all of that, in other words, the tasks are still quite significant, I do think that it’s possible for the next president to begin the process of drawing down the troops in a responsible way so that we could well be down to half our present force deployment by the middle of the year after next, by the middle of 2010. 

 That will have two important effects.  Number one, it will free up forces for Afghanistan.  That won’t solve the problem in Afghanistan, but it will help.  And number two, it will reduce the vulnerability of the United States in Iraq to any potential Iranian efforts to punish us, or, to deter us in the first instance and punish us should we wish to or need to take action against Iran.  Iranians watch our deployments very closely.  They’re very familiar with how tied down we are in Iraq.  It’s, I think, in part because of that that the Iranians feel they can act with gay abandon across the region.  Reducing our profile in Iraq will help to concentrate their minds and worry them a little bit more about what we might be able to do that could trip them up or inflict pain for the defiance of the international community. 

 The second silver lining is the threat from Iran, and its proxies, Hezbollah and Hamas, has become so troubling to others in the region who live in that part of the world that they are not waiting for the United States to take the lead in terms of dealing with this, and are acting together to calm the situation down and to contain the threat. 

 There is, emerging from this, a common interest generated by the rise of Iran and its efforts to assert its dominance in the region, a common interest between the Arab states, particularly Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordon and the GCC states, and Israel, and Turkey, and we see them acting, Israel and Turkey, to try to find ways to bring Syria out of its alliance with Iran, create a strategic realignment through a peacemaking process between Israel and Syria, Israel and Egypt working together to contain Hamas and Gaza through the informal ceasefire that has been negotiated.

 And we saw this similar phenomenon in Iraq itself where you had leaders of both the Shia and Sunni communities deciding that they would act against Iranian backed forces, insurgency forces, and terrorist forces that threaten their own communities as well.  As Iran approaches the nuclear threshold, which it will do by the end of next year, that threat, too, is concentrating the minds of those in the region who will be more supportive of coordinators and international action to try to cope with that threat. 

 In addition, the drop in the price of oil, it’s now probably around $75.00, but headed south, has a quite dramatic impact on the Iranian economy, and Ahmadinejad’s ability to fund his populous exercises domestically and fund his troublemaking abroad.  I’m sure Reuel can speak more to this subject, he knows more about it than I do.  But, the drop in the price of oil, below $80.00 a barrel, essentially anything below $90.00 a barrel puts the Iranian budget in deficit.  Ahmadinejad has already spent the oil windfall, or, almost all of it, and he so mismanaged the economy that this, the net effect of all of this will be to turbo charge the sanctions that are already beginning to bite, and that, too, will concentrate the minds of the Iranians. 

 On the Arab-Israeli front, the next president will actually inherit two functioning negotiations between the Israelis and the Palestinians, they’ve been negotiating for the last year, they don’t have any tangible progress to show, but, they are essentially back at the point where the negotiators were at the end of the Clinton Administration, and those gaps are really no different to the gaps that existed back then.  We can certainly get into talking about those, but, Tzipi Livni is about to form a government in Israel; she, of course, was directly involved in the negotiations and intends to continue them. 

 And, so, the Israeli-Palestinian negotiations is something that the next president can pickup quite, I think quite easily, and it’s a framework that consists of final status negotiations on one level, the effort to implement roadmap commitments on the second level, where the Palestinians are supposed to be fighting terror and the Israelis are supposed to be phasing out settlements--that isn’t working so well on either front.  But at least they’re beginning to get some traction, and Arab state involvement on a third level, through the Arab League Initiative, and, on a fourth level, the efforts by Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad and Quartet envoy Tony Blair to move the Palestinian economy forward in the West Bank, which is also beginning to get trashed.  So, in effect, I think Condoleezza Rice actually deserves some credit for putting this structure in place, but it is something that the next president can pickup and move forward in, I think, the way that can produce positive results over time. 

 On the Israeli-Syrian front, the Israelis and Syrians under Turkish mediation have reached the point where the trade has shifted from what it used to be.  It used to be essentially a trade of territories for peace, not something that attracted the Israeli public very much because they never thought they were going to get much peace out of Syria, and the Golan Heights was a very attractive piece of territory that they weren’t that keen to give up, even though their prime ministers were willing to commit to give it up. 

 But the trade has changed now.  The trade is now territories for strategic realignment.  Whether the Syrians will actually go through with such a strategic realignment, that is to align with the United States rather than with Iran, it remains to be seen.  It’s an untested proposition partly because the Bush Administration refused to get involved in those negotiations.  But, territory for strategic realignment is something that I believe is far more sellable to an Israeli public than the previous trade, and that’s where the negotiations have reached right now. 

 In making that point, one can see the strategic advantage to the United States from such a trade, particularly given the need to address the threat from Iran.  And that, I think, will constitute low-hanging fruit for the next president, if he engages in the Israeli-Syrian negotiations.  The issues are far less complicated and emotionally wrought than on the Palestinian track.  There is a capable partner in the Syrians to implement it.  And, there is a way forward in that context as well. 

 The paradox in all of this is that as the United States influence is diminished, it becomes less threatening, and that makes all of these players more interested in America’s leadership, rather than deterred or put off by it.  And, so, paradoxically, we may actually find ourselves more influential in these circumstances.  And that leads me to my last point, which is that -- and this is and will be understood as a partisan point -- is, that, if Barack Obama is our next president, as now seems likely, the reaction in the Arab and Muslim world, just as in Europe and elsewhere, will be overwhelmingly positive because it will be seen as a reassertion of the values that so many people in the rest of the world admire in the United States.

 The idea that an African-American could rise from his humble beginnings to become the president of the United States is a revolutionary idea in most of the societies, but one that will be greatly admired.  It will, immediately, I believe, take away that anti-American anger, that wave of anti-American anger that Ahmadinejad and others, like our great Venezuelan leader, have been able to ride on, and take advantage of, and that will make it, the diffusion of that anger, and the admiration for this new president, I think, will make it a lot easier for him to gain the support of leaders around the world, but, particularly, in the Middle East, that will make it possible for him to deal with what will be a very complicated agenda.  Thank you. 

 Danielle Pletka:  Thank you very much, Martin.  I only want to correct you on one point, and that is to say that a gay abandon does not exist in Iran, as we heard from Ahmadinejad at Columbia.  I’m sorry.  Let us next turn to Reuel for the good news. 

 Reuel Marc Gerecht:  I was barring to make a digression there, with that one, but I think I’ll pass.  I have to say, I’ll talk as if Senator Obama is the next president of the United States, and not Senator McCain, which I think is, we have to say, more likely.  I don’t know what the Middle East is going to -- what direction it’s going to go in the next few years.  I can make guesses.  But for the United States, I think really the critical issue is, as it has been since 2003, is Iraq.  And, if Senator Obama doesn’t begin a rapid withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraq, then I think its centripetal imminence on American foreign policy is going to be rather profound and it will become the cornerstone of President Obama’s foreign policy in the Middle East, as it’s been the cornerstone of the Bush foreign policy in the Middle East.  It will, in fact, I would say, keep President Obama honest. 

What I mean by that is that if Iraq continues to improve, it is going to become progressively more difficult not to call it a success.  If the provincial elections, which are very, very important, in January, turn out the way I suspect they will, where you have a substantial number of people, millions, turn out to vote, particularly in the Sunnis, the situation is going to be a little bit more complex with the Shia, and that then leads on to the national elections, you will see, I think, fairly easily, an Obama Administration refer to Iraq as a democracy. 

You will note that Senator Obama has rarely ever referred to Iraq as a democracy.  That may be because he doesn’t think it is one yet.  I actually suspect that’s not the case.  I think he doesn’t do that, because, by doing that it sort of sets in a certain chain reaction.  Americans are very good about supporting democracies, and they are loath to abandon them.  As Iraq becomes more of a democracy, and it becomes undeniable, then I think the relationship with the United States will cement itself, and it will cement itself largely on Iraqi terms. 

The most important thing to remember about Iraq is that there’s no 1920 parallel, at all.  There have been numerous times for the clerical establishment in Iraq to rise up and say, get out.  They have not done so.  Sistani, once again, Grand Ayatollah Sistani once again made it very, very clear that he doesn’t have a big problem with the Americans in Iraq, and that whatever timetable the Iraqi government works out is fine, he’s not in a rush.  I suspect most Iraqis really aren’t in a rush, even though if you go and do a little quick public opinion survey, and I just say, this is a digression, please, let us not spread to the Middle East public opinion surveys the way we use them in the West.  I mean, the opinion that you receive from an Iraqi cleric in the first one-half hour that you are with them, and the opinion that you receive in the next six hours, and the opinion that you receive 24 hours after that are not the same, usually.  So, I suspect it will hold. 

If this happens, then I think the Obama Administration is going to look upon Iraq--and, Senator McCain, please forgive me if you win--that the Obama Administration is going to look upon Iraq as a success story.  I hope, with great irony, they claim credit for it. 

And then you will then see a lot of other things sort of come into play.  Iran is going to be a big mess.  I actually think us being in Iraq it strengthens our position with, vis-à-vis, the Iranians, it doesn’t weaken it, particularly as Iraq becomes more and more successful, particularly as the Shiites gain greater and greater confidence.  And, trust me, anyone who knows anything about the history, for example, of Malawi and the Dawa, know that they don’t like the Iranians.  Anybody who had to do any time in Iran who is part of a Dawa will usually tell you pretty quickly that their life in Iran was not a happy one.  Do not expect, I mean, stay away from this notion that the Shia are blood brothers and the Iraqi Shia are sort of this on a puppet string of the Iranians.  Do not believe it. 

And as this grows, I think the ability for the Iraqis to withstand shocks that the Iranians might give them, which are largely shocks that will come about through violence, what you’ll likely see the Iranians do to cause mischief is reactivate the special groups, try to take out specific people.  You’ve got to always think about that.  Iranians are always thinking charismatically.  They don’t think in the mass terms.  They are going to go after specific individuals, particularly on the Shia side, that are going to cause them problems and stand in the way, and they’re going to try to kill them. 

So the Iranian way is to not try to sabotage the provincial elections, they’ll try to jerry-rig them whichever way they can, flood money, and then do all those things, but probably what they’ll go after, if they can’t achieve success, is they’ll find the individuals who stand against them on the Shia side and they’ll shoot them. 

 Now, if that -- as the Iraqi side gains strength, I think the ability as the Iranians to use assassination as a tool to hurt the system and to create stress points is going to go down.  That’s not to say they cannot bring severe pressure on the Iraqi political system through assassination.  They can.  But I think their ability to do this will be limited as the Iraqi political system gains strength. 

The Iraqi political system is going to, if it gains strength, is going to keep an Obama Administration talking about democracy in the Middle East, because the Iraqis are going to keep talking about it.  This is going to have an effect.  Now it’s not going to have a tidal wave effect.  And those in the Bush Administration, there really weren’t that many, since democracy promotion for the Bush Administration was primarily a rhetorical exercise; it is still going to keep us more or less honest.  And that is, there’s still going to be tension, for example, in our dealings with the dictatorships in the region.  Again, it’s not going to be a revolutionary event. 

I would expect an Obama Administration to more or less continue what the Bush Administration has, and that is sort of status quo foreign policies towards other regimes in the region, the Arab regimes.  I would think that would continue.  But, if an event were to happen in Egypt, for example, which is not impossible, if you were to see big riots in Egypt--and God knows, riots in Egypt can start for a whole variety of reasons-- if you were to see riots in Egypt and you were to see the system politically challenged and you were to see the Muslim Brotherhood come forward and demand a more representative government, it would be interesting to see what the United States would do.  I suspect they would side with the Mubarak regime, but it could become more complicated.  It could become a lot more complicated.  The status quo anti of a pre-9/11 world doesn’t exist anymore.  The reflex is there, we’ll all have Khomeini-esque fears of what might happen in Egypt if the Muslim Brotherhood [indiscernible].  Those fears are still there.  However, it’s a much more complicated situation. 

And Iraq keeps it that way, because if Iraq continues to go forward, those who have argued or essentially suggested that the notion of democracy in the Arab world, particularly a democracy that is brought about by a helpful hand from the United States is impossible or bad idea, becomes less.  And I suspect a lot of people on the left, and the right, because the doubts exist on both sides, will start to dissipate rather quickly when President Bush leaves office.  I think a lot of this discussion has been distorted, distempered, because of President Bush, because the distaste for the President is so high that one becomes allergic to almost everything that he speaks in favor of.  I suspect that Iraq and democracy in Iraq and democracy in the Muslim world is one of those things. 

 On the other issues, again, we’ll have to see, both an Obama presidency and a McCain presidency are going to probably have to figure out what to do.  Can you contain a nuclear-armed clerical regime?  Because, neither one of those gentlemen I think is inclined to preemptively strike their nuclear weapons facilities.  Unless the Iranians do something stupid, which, of course, they’re entirely capable of--just imagine what would an Obama Administration do if we had a Khobar Towers two?  What would they do, if, in fact, you had three or four hundred Americans killed, and we knew that the Iranians had done it?  Would we not strike back?  And if you strike back, and you think they haven’t developed nuclear weapons yet, are you going to let them continue to develop nuclear weapons?  Are you going to strike those nuclear facilities? 

 I think the Iranians are going to play it safe here.  If I had to bet money on that, they’re aware of that, and I would argue, there’s a long historical discussion of why Iranians changed their way they handled assassination abroad in the 1990s, and I think one of the big reasons for that was actually the nuclear program, but, I think they’ll try to behave until they -- probably until they get nuclear weapons. 

 But, again, the temptation is there.  All you have to do is go back and look at the 9/11 Commission Report, and I can’t remember the exact pages, I think it’s like 241 to 243, and you will see where we see the Iranians giving lesse passé  at least to members of al-Qaeda after the attacks in Africa.  Now why did they do that?  Now I think the reason they did that is temptation.  They really do hate us, though, and when they have the opportunity to strike it is very difficult for them not to take it. 

 So it’s entirely possible that something dumb will happen and the Obama administration will actually have to do something that it doesn’t want to do and that it’s made fun of Senator McCain for “bomb, bomb, bomb Iran,” that it might actually get into a position that it will have to do something like that.  But it will try to avoid it, as I think a McCain administration would too.  And, so, everybody will start to scratch their heads and say, oh my goodness, how do we contain a nuclear-armed clerical regime that has lots of oil and gas, even if the price continues to drop?  No one has a good answer to that.  So that’s going to remain constant. 

 On the Israeli-Palestinian issues, I don’t see that going anywhere.  The Clinton Administration, as Martin can talk much better than I can, I mean, tried mightily, and it really didn’t get anywhere with a Fatah that was increasingly Islamist.  Now you’ve got Hamas.  I’m willing to bet a small amount of money that Hamas is going to become more powerful, not less, and there’s nothing that Fatah can do about it.  I think the situation there will just drag on.  We can’t let go of it because it’s sort of in the bloodstream of us all now, that we have to keep going with peace process, but I think that’s more or less going to be a dead end, it’s not going to be terribly happy, the Obama Administration may throw more into it, but, again, it’s not really going anywhere. 

 I don’t think Syria is going to go anywhere.  I don’t think there are going to be any great openings here.  The only place that’s really, really, interesting, particularly for an Obama Administration, is Pakistan, because, one, Senator Obama has been fairly forthright about supporting democracy in Pakistan, but, at the same time, he also has eluded several times, if he’s serious, about having a more aggressive military posture vis-à-vis raids inside of Pakistan using U.S. forces.  Now, one may be forced into doing that if MI5 lets somebody through.  And, again, I wish to repeat, we are deeply, deeply in the debt of MI5.  If MI5, if they can’t catch everybody, and we do get a Pakistani al-Qaeda team get through, and it has a major terrorist strike inside of Europe or the United States, then I think we will be morally obliged to engage in military action, a military action in Pakistan that which will be quite aggressive and long-term.  But, remember, if that happens, it’s entirely possible that the Pakistanis will not tolerate it, and they will shut down the Port of Karachi, and then our goose is cooked in Afghanistan, since we do not have enough, and the Europeans do not have enough, air lift to supply Afghanistan.  So, we have an enormous conundrum here, that could be coming our way, and all we need is a reasonably-sized terrorist strike somewhere in Europe, it doesn’t even have to be the United States, before we’re looking at that scenario.  So that’s going to be a mess. 

 So the area that isn’t a mess, the area where you look at that actually is possibly happy, is Iraq.  It’s the one area that everybody thought was the darkest is actually going to turn out to be the lightest.  It’s the one area that the discussion of democracy in the region is real.  I’ll just end by saying, I certainly look forward and pray for the day when President Obama takes credit for the success of democracy in Iraq.  It will be a wonderful day. 

 Danielle Pletka:  On that ironic note, Jon Alterman. 

 Jon Alterman:  Thank you very much.  Thank you, Dany, for the invitation to come back to AEI, it’s a pleasure to be here, pleasure to see you all.  I think Martin and I agree sort of basically where we are in the region, we’re weaker, we’re less persuasive, and we’re facing stronger foes.  Our experience in Iraq has not only drained our blood and our pockets, but it has led to deep questions about the credibility, commitment and capacity of the U.S. government.  We are also less central to regional diplomacy, and countries such as Qatar and Saudi Arabia are stepping in to fill the vacuum we’ve left.

 The administration’s strategy starting in 2002 was based on the idea that governments in the region are the problems, and they in turn nurture the non-state actors who pose the greatest threat to American national security.  The strategy the Bush administration adopted was to reach around governments and to seek to reach liberal-leaning publics seeking freedom and liberty.  But, over time, the U.S. government came to realize that it really needed governments for counterterrorism, and the publics turned out to be less friendly to our ideas than the Bush administration had assumed. 

 The centrality of non-state actors in general, and of terrorism in particular, to the two national security strategies that the Bush Administration has issued, it strikes me as just unsustainable.  While such groups may threaten Americans, they cannot threaten the United States.  They are infinitely weaker, and consequently they can only destroy, they can’t build.  While catastrophic terrorism remains a threat, it is not a sufficient one to be the focus of U.S. defense strategy.  The administration has belatedly come around to a more balanced view of U.S. relationships with governments, with non-state actors and publics in the Middle East, but I think it comes around, and now the next president inherits a situation in which all view the United States more warily and more skeptically than they did before. 

 Looking forward, the next president has a weakened toolkit to deal with serious problems in Iraq, Iran, and in the Arab Israeli conflict, problems which I would argue are all much more serious than when the Bush Administration came into office.  In addition, as Reuel suggested, Pakistan and Afghanistan are in a far more precarious position than they were eight years ago, creating a string of five major crises, all of which could erupt with little notice, and suck all the oxygen out of any presidential attempt to impose a strategy toward the Middle East. 

 It’s not worthwhile, it seems to me, to dwell not on the Bush administration’s unforced errors in Iraq, but the strategy of seeking to give Iran, Syria, Hamas and Hezbollah the diplomatic equivalent of the silent treatment hasn’t caused them to cower.  Indeed, each has enjoyed a steady rise in power and influence in the face of U.S. opposition.  The U.S. strategy of pursuing a mixture of diplomatic disengagement and sanctions has enabled these countries and groups to skirt hard choices rather than force them to make them.  They determine the pace and direction of their relationship with the United States, and they have been satisfied to settle into a position in the twilight between peace and war. 

 To be meaningful, engagement has to be directed to some purpose other than just engagement itself.  I agree, but, at the same time, disengagement has a way of sustaining itself, diminishing U.S. influence over targets because no assets of value are at risk.  Some in the United States seem to feel that this country has taught these other countries a lesson, but if there is a lesson to be gleaned in all of this, it seems to me that the principal lesson that countries have learned is that they can defy the United States with relative impunity. 

 None of this is to say that the next president should hurdle into negotiations with America’s foes.  Those most opposed to the United States will scrutinize the next president for any sign of desperation or weakness.  He will surely strike a better deal later in his term than in the beginning.  America’s friends will have a close eye out for the president’s resolve.  All of this will likely take place in an environment in which at least one foe will seek to test the mettle of the next president with some sort of limited confrontation.  I think Reuel suggested Iran, and I think that’s the right place to look. 

 It seems to me the next president’s strategy needs to be focused on rebuilding confidence and faith in American power.  In this, as Reuel suggested, he will enjoy an initial honeymoon, because President Bush is so deeply unpopular among both leaders and publics in the Middle East, although I think for very different reasons.  The next president should do two things with this honeymoon.  The first is setting out to accomplish something and doing it with effectiveness and efficiency.  I think it matters less exactly what that thing is than the next president establish a pattern for how the U.S. will deal with issues in the Middle East.  Right-sizing American actions and pronouncements is an urgent need and one that has been missing from American diplomacy for too long. 

 Second, in his first six months in office, the next president should lay out a vision for the nature of U.S. relations in the Middle East based on a clear-eyed assessment of where we agree, where we differ, and what we are going to do about it.  To our closest friends, we have to prepare the way by making serious demands that require them to take responsibility for their actions.  Martin suggested that there’s already some movement going toward containing Iran.  I think we have to be much clearer on that.  For our foes, we need to be clear that there is a positive way forward, but we have other tools of persuasion as well.  The act of respectful consultation will send its own message, and occur at a time of maximum target-country curiosity as to what the new president is up to.  Such conversations are best handled quietly, with the resultant statement reflecting the partnerships that will grow in the next administration, those that will wither, and the priority and energy that will be put into exploring reducing tensions with individual hostile states. 

 I say reducing tensions because it seems to me that while the abject surrender of one’s foes is a lovely aspiration, it is not always a useful goal for policy.  We should not shrink from managing the hostility of other countries, rather than resolving it, especially with countries that are so much weaker than we are.  The key issue is the United States reasserting control over those relationships, after a good deal of time in which control has been ceded to them. 

 As I suggested earlier, the string of crises in the arc from Israel to Afghanistan contain enough uncertainty that at least one, and perhaps several, will require sustained high-level attention in the first year of the next president’s term.  A collapse in any of them would be hugely consequential for U.S. interests in the Middle East and South Asia.  It perhaps reflects my biases as a Middle East specialist, that it seems to me that the United States has more tools to deal with the Middle East problems than the South Asia problems, I don’t know if Reuel agrees, and that they should take precedence in planning.  I think we may have to deal with South Asia, in terms of planning we should plan on dealing with the Middle East. 

 On the Arab-Israeli front, it seems to me that the principle problem right now is a political problem, rather than a diplomatic one.  When the politics are right, I think we know what the diplomatic solution will look like.  The politics aren’t right on either the Palestinian or the Israeli side.  It seems to me that what we have to do is work on the politics, work on trying to create the political shift that creates confidence that this could be negotiated, rather than emphasizing a diplomatic track that I think ultimately will get us into a dead-end, where the diplomats may agree what needs to happen, but the politicians won’t give the diplomats the authority to make the deal. 

 In Iraq, realistically we are negotiating our way out the door, and we become less and less consequential with each passing day.  While we shouldn’t abandon Iraq in haste, I agree with Reuel, we can’t abandon Iraq in haste, neither can we stay until the danger has passed.  I disagree a little bit with Reuel’s depiction of Iraq as sort of this binary, you know, we can have success, and there’s the option of failure, and it seems to me there’s an awful lot of grey area in there that the next president is likely to have to explore. 

 It seems to me that the most important goal in all of this is to leave in place a positive dynamic not only internally, but also in terms of the region’s relations with Iraq.  Although it has gotten relatively little attention in the press of late, the recent trends have been good.  A number of regional states have sent ambassadors to Iraq.  We’ve seen the [indiscernible] of Abu Dhabi show-up unexpectedly in Iraq.  I think we’ve seen an awful lot of signs in just the last five or six months that Iraq is integrating more into the region.  I think we have to encourage that along.  Ultimately, it seems to me, figuring out Iraq’s relationship with Iran, with the Arab states, is a vital thing that ultimately will put in place what we need to have in place to create stability as we leave. 

In Iran, as Martin said, we face a tremendous threat to regional security, and also I think the country most likely to threaten the next U.S. president.  I don’t think the Iranians are going to be willing to make a grand bargain with the United States until they have a nuke in their pocket.  I don’t think that big deal is out there until they think they’re in their position of maximum strength.  And I don’t think they think they’re there yet.  But that is not to say that we can’t negotiate effectively with Iranians to curtail some of their most hostile actions.  The recent drop in oil prices makes them far more vulnerable to pressure than they had been, and their energy industry is in true crisis.  I mean, completely absent from how much revenue they garner, their oil production industry, and their gas production industry is in crisis.  That gives us leverage to deal with the Iranians.  The goal of our Iranian diplomacy should be to reestablish the upper hand in our relations and to set clear limits on Iranian behavior. 

All of this has to be done in a domestic environment that is tired of the Middle East and preoccupied with challenges at home.  Indeed, we may come to see sustained public focus on the Middle East, everybody buying books on the sectarian, tribal and interstate conflicts that have we’ve seen so much of in the last decade.  I think we may come to see that as a sort of period piece, the diplomatic equivalent of a 1970s leisure suit.  But the lack of public attention in no way undermines the centrality of the Middle East to a whole range of vital U.S. strategic interests. 

A key task for the next president will be finding a way to be more effective in the region while seeming to emphasize the region less in his thinking.  After the Bush administration, many in the region will be eager for less overt attention.  Using that desire in order to establish a new basis for interaction in the region, among friends and foes alike, will be the next president’s first great test.  Thank you. 

Danielle Pletka:  Vance batting clean-up.  I want you to clear up all of these questions. 

Vance Serchuk:  Dany, thanks so much.  Absolutely.  It’s disappointing to discover at the very dawn of one’s career that you’ve already become obsolete, equivalent to the leisure suit, but, there we have it.  I knew I should have studied economics instead.  First, Dany, thank you so much for inviting me to be here today, it’s a pleasure to be back here at AEI.  I should preface my remarks by the same disclaimer as others, which is to say that although I’m Senator Lieberman’s foreign policy person, I’m here strictly in my personal capacity, and not as a spokesperson or as the representative of any of the presidential campaigns.  Like my fellow panelists, I’m also not going to offer any detailed speculations as to exactly how either Senator Obama or Senator McCain might act towards the Middle East if elected.  Their campaigns, and they, themselves, speak for themselves. 

I would begin, though, with just making one note, which is that the first President Bush, when he entered office in 1989, I don’t think expected to be fighting a war in the Persian Gulf.  President Clinton entered office in 1993, not particularly focused on the Balkans.  And, certainly, the current President Bush entered office eight years ago, not anticipating many of the challenges that we confronted.  My point is really just very simple.  There are many things we don’t know about the next four years, January 2009 until January of 2013.  One thing that I would be willing to bet on, though, is that we will be surprised, once again, by events.  That does seem to be a relatively constant variable in American foreign policy.  One of the tests of whoever wins on November 4th, arguably the most important task, will be how his administration responds to the surprises that history throws its way.  And, I would also be willing to venture a guess that some of the people who will occupy senior positions in that administration will themselves be somewhat surprised by what their response is. 

That being said, there are, of course, challenges that we know that the next president will inherit in the Middle East, and I’d like to focus my remarks on a couple of them, beginning with the place that always seems to attract our attention first, which is Iraq. 

I think that, on the one hand, all of my fellow panelists have evinced a certain kind of optimism about the trajectory that Iraq is on, and there’s no question that because of the shift in strategy, begun in early 2007, we now find ourselves in a much better place.  Speaking, coming from the Congress, the vast partisan divide that separated Democrats and Republicans 12, 18 months ago, has narrowed.  And, consequently, there seems to be a consensus forming that the next president of the United States, regardless of who it is, will be constrained to a relatively narrow bandwidth of policies, vis-à-vis, Iraq. 

And, taken to its logical extreme, I think you can end up where Reuel is saying, that you end up with President Obama applauding the success of Iraq.  I would just inject a note of caution to that.  It seems to me that there are, as General Petraeus put it a couple of weeks ago, still a number of storm clouds on the horizon, and that the gains that we have achieved in Iraq remain incredibly fragile.  I think that we make a mistake if we think that this is on autopilot.  And, if there’s one thing that we’ve learned, it’s that Iraq has a way of confounding the expectations of smart and reasonable people on both sides of the partisan divide. 

I think that we also know that the phenomenon of insurgency is fundamentally political, and that Iraq’s politics are still very much up in the air.  I think Martin mentioned a couple of the factors between provincial and national elections, the uncertainty of the integration of the sons of Iraq, Kirkuk, Kurdish expansion in the north.  To say nothing of the genuine spoilers that are out there, Iran and al-Qaeda both of which are adaptive and smart and absolutely committed to our failure, there are a lot of ways that this can still get blown off course. 

Now, my own view is that none of the problems that we face in Iraq is insurmountable, but all will require careful management and engagement on the part of the next administration, including the attention and energies of high-level decision-makers.  And I do think that there’s a tension, and I think we, to some extent here today, to put it in the most exaggerated form, between those who believe that the next administration should really look upon Iraq as, in some sense, a distasteful legacy project that needs to be wrapped up as quickly as possible in order to move on to more important things, and those who really do view this as something which we should tolerate less risk on because it’s extraordinarily important. 

Iraq has consumed considerable attention from the last three presidents.  My own sense is, like it or not, it will probably do the same for the next one.  The only question is whether it will come at the beginning or at the end of the process because any attempt to disengage or even the appearance of such is going to carry costs and consequences for the region, but not just in Iraq, that we will not be able to escape. 

Let me also just add a word about Afghanistan.  I disagree with Jon that we are in a, that these states are in a more, that Afghanistan and Pakistan are in a more precarious position than eight years ago.  I will be the first person to be credited with alarmism about both places, but, nonetheless, the fact is that eight years ago the Taliban was in control of Afghanistan, you had Pakistan which was on the verge of being actually labeled as a state sponsor of terrorism that was unambiguously aligned.  A lot of history has passed in South Asia in the last eight years, and I think we are at least in a better position than we were in October of 2000. 

That being said, I think that in Afghanistan, in particular, there’s at least the outward appearance, as in Iraq, of a certain growing consensus.  Both candidates have expressed concern about the deterioration and security, they both pledged to send more troops.  I think actually even more importantly, though, behind the scenes in just the last two or so months, there is compelling evidence that the U.S. government, including parts of the U.S. government that will not be going anywhere in January, has really begun to come to grips with some of the hard realities in Afghanistan that, for the last couple of years, we have been reluctant to acknowledge. 

I think that there’s now a quiet acknowledgment, a quiet recognition that our European friends in NATO are not going to be riding to the rescue anytime soon, no matter how much we hector them.  That the Afghan security forces are far too small and need to be expanded dramatically, and that the command structure that we put in place really after 2005 is borderline dysfunctional and also needs a pretty serious rethink.  All of these were fairly controversial things to say a year ago.  They no longer are.  And, that, on the one hand, looks like you’re going to be in a position for a smoother transition. 

My sense is also that the strategic reviews that are now taking place are likely to put a spotlight, a squirrelly on another cardinal failure in Afghanistan, namely the absence of a nationwide civil military campaign plan for actually defeating the insurgency.  If you go to Iraq, you’ll find that there actually is a plan that both the U.S. Embassy and MNFI have bought into for how we should actually run this campaign.  If you go to Afghanistan, there isn’t one. 

Although I personally believe that additional troops are needed in Afghanistan, it’s important to recognize that no number of additional forces will be sufficient to turn the tide there, unless there is that kind of nationwide plan that actually rationalizes their use and synchronizes military operations with the other instruments for a national power.  And, as I said, right now we’re definitely not there. 

But I’d also add, and this is where I think the consensus begins to fray a bit, is that if we continue on the path that we appear to be on, we are going, and neither candidate, obviously, puts it in quite these terms, we’re on the path to a significant escalation in Afghanistan, and, in all likelihood, that means that over the next four years we will see more casualties, higher costs, it will be in the news a lot more, and some of our allies are almost certain to leave.  Doubts as to whether or not this is really a doable enterprise will intensify.  I think we’re going to begin to hear more and more of the, no one has ever really conquered Afghanistan, how can we possibly think that we’re going to be able to get away with this, and the next administration is really going to be put to the test. 

In that vein, I think that there’s probably also an overarching challenge, particularly as we face this economic crisis, but, for a variety of reasons that we as a nation begin to fall prey to this and the fatalism and hopelessness that the Middle East is known to inspire.  In particular, I think that there’s a seductive myth that the problem in the Middle East to some extent is us, and that the solution, therefore, is for us to do less.  It’s the idea, for instance, that if only we pull back the Iraqis will step up and only then take responsibility for their own lives.  I think it’s a temptation that both parties have succumbed to.  I do think that, at the moment, though, it’s an impulse which is much more deeply routed in the Democratic Party, although that may change in the event that there is an Obama administration and the Democratic Party finds itself with the reins of power. 

Likewise, I think whenever I hear someone ask whether the Iraq war was a mistake, I think of the, probably apocryphal Chou En Lai line when asked about the impact of the French revolution, namely that it’s too soon to tell what exactly the impact of the French revolution was.  He, of course, said it about 200 years later.  In the case of Iraq, we’re very much in the thick of this thing.  In our case, however, it’s in large measure the policies and decisions that we’re making right now that will determine the answer as to how it comes out. 

Two years ago, because of the Bush administration’s bungled handling of post-war Iraq, al-Qaeda was able to rush into the vacuum and was well on its way to establishing a safe haven in the heart of the Middle East.  Had we let that happen, I think the war could rightly be described today as something which was not only a mistake but a true disaster for our national interest.  But that’s obviously not what we did.  We adopted a counter insurgency strategy that, among other things, empowered Sunnis who were willing to rise up against al-Qaeda, and, as a result, Iraq today is really the first place in the Middle East where there has been a large scale grassroots mobilization against al-Qaeda, a place where Sunni Arabs have literally taken up arms to drive al-Qaeda out of their communities.  And that’s a huge win for us in my view.  The fact that it happened is a product of, first, of things that we did wrong, but, second, of the things that we got right.  And that is, in many respects, the messiness of history, and the extent to which things don’t necessarily move in a straight line. 

In conclusion, then, I would just hope that our next president, whoever it ends up being, is cognizant not only of the danger of hubris, and our capacity to get things wrong, but our capacity to get things right in the Middle East, and indeed our capacity to do good by virtue of our intervention, to win the wars that we’re in, to defeat the enemies that we face, and, yes, still, finally, to promote the values and the ideals we believe in.  Thank you.

 Danielle Pletka:  Very good.  Thank you very much, Vance.  I have to say, having listened to all of you, I am not entirely envious of whoever the next president is going to be.  These are some significant challenges and as Vance nicely said, likely some surprises ahead that will bring all of the carefully laid plans of transitions to naught. 

 Let me open the floor to questions, and you’ll be first, let me open the floor to questions and just remind our audience, if I might, please wait for the microphone to ask a question, not make a statement, to identify yourself first and to keep your question to one.  Thank you very much.  Yes, young lady. 

 Female Audience Member:  Thank you, this is [indiscernible] with The Washington Times.  My question is to Jon Alterman.  If I had heard you right, you suggested that until the Iranians have the nuclear weapon in their pocket, they will not be interested in engaging in a grand bargain.  With that, are you also somehow hinting that Senator Obama’s willingness to engage in direct talks with the Iranians has substantially no meaning? 

 Jon Alterman:  There are reasons to engage in talks other than to strike a bargain, as I tried to emphasize.  The question is what we’re trying to do and what we think we can get.  It’s my sense that while the Iranians are interested in the idea of being in play, the idea of a grand strategic realignment, addressing of all the issues between Iran and the United States, for an Iranian calculation it would at this point be done under a position of tremendous Iranian disadvantage.  My own reading of Iran’s actions and statements is that they don’t see a particular urgency to do this, and were they to contemplate doing it, they’d do it at a time where that disparity is less and where they have more power, more to play with in that negotiation.  That is a personal assessment, it’s not the view of the Obama campaign, the Obama administration, anything like that.  It’s just my assessment, looking at what they’ve said, what they’ve done, and where we could go. 

 That’s not to say we shouldn’t be engaging in negotiations with Iranians.  But I think we have to be careful about how far we think it can go because I think one of the problems with negotiations sometimes is people say, well you didn’t get them to turn around on a dime, they didn’t cry uncle, they didn’t surrender, so, therefore, negotiations failed.  And there are lots of ways to have incremental progress in negotiations that require something less than the Iranians saying, you know, we’ve been wrong all along, and you’re right, and now we’re going to be your best friends in the Middle East. 

 Male Panelist:  Just quickly on this, the Iranians are going to face a technical decision very early on.  If Obama becomes president he will have a mandate to engage in direct negotiations without preconditions with the Iranians and would expect that that would be an early initiative on his part.  They’re going to have to decide how they’re going to respond to that.  So, leaving aside the question of what the outcome might be from their point of view, they’ve got to decide whether they’re going to play for time, which is how they’ve dealt with the latest offer from the six powers, or whether they’re going to enter the negotiations. 

 Ahmadinejad, who has an election coming up of his own in June of next year, is also going to have to decide.  Is he going to continue to defy the United States and try to build his reelection campaign on that defiance, or is he going to seek to kind of get a -- ride a different wave, which is ride the wave of Obama’s popularity by embracing him.  In other words, what I’m suggesting is that the Iranians may decide for tactical reasons to engage with the United States and in those circumstances then Obama will face a challenge because the clock will be ticking on the Iranian nuclear program. 

 By the end of 2009, his first year in office, the Iranians are likely to be well on their way to having a breakout capacity, and, therefore, there’s going to be very little time to actually put a cap on that program, most particularly to get the suspension of Iran’s enrichment program.  If Jon is right, as I suspect he is, that they will try to play for time until they reach that point, then the Obama Administration is going to have to decide how long they can afford to play this game.  That’s where the crunch is going to come on a tactical question.  Not setting a precondition for going into the negotiations means that suspension of Iran’s uranium enrichment is going to have to be a condition for progress in the negotiations.  And, so, the grand bargain issue is not going to be the issue that holds this up at all, it will come back to the question of whether Iran is prepared to suspend its enrichment program while the negotiations go on. 

 Danielle Pletka:  Can I just -- I’m going to give you the panel, I just want to press everybody on a question.  Of course presidential campaigns have a tendency to put everything in black and white, but I guess we can try and inoculate ourselves from that a little bit.  There has been a suggestion, I think that’s been swallowed in many ways in the public, that talks are an unmitigated good, as not talking is an unmitigated mistake.  I just wonder, given the scenario that Jon laid out, which I agree with, I think the Iranians absolutely want to bargain from a maximalist position for a whole variety of reasons, which makes sense for them, I think.  But thinking that through, have we also thought through the costs of sitting down to, as you say, with a mandate, negotiate without preconditions should Senator Obama become president, and what will that mean? 

 And, of course, another part of the problem, and I’m very interested to hear what you all think about this, another part of the problem is that we have talked only about Iran and its nuclear program, but, of course, sitting down to talk on the nuclear program kind of sweeps aside what, in many ways, is not equally, but certainly an extremely authority challenge, which is Iran’s sponsorship of Hezbollah, Hamas and other groups.  Hezbollah being, and no one has actually I think mentioned this as prominently as it deserves, Hezbollah being probably one of the most powerful, well-organized terrorist groups in the world today.  When we look at the example of North Korea, and we say, hmm, well you get off the terrorism list pretty easily if you’re willing to shut down something, these are all things that are going to enter in, and I just wonder what you all think.  So, Reuel, you have the floor. 

 Reuel Marc Gerecht:  I think it’s probably a pretty good bet that very quickly after Obama becomes president that the Obama administration will look back at the negotiations undertaken by Nick Burns during the Bush administration, was where the halcyon days of American-Iranian negotiations that when Khamenei refers to the United States, which he did almost immediately after this whole -- Obama came up with the idea of direct talks with somebody, I assume him-- when he referred to the United States as satan incarnate, you should take the man at his word. 

 I mean, one of the oddest things I have to say about Iranian studies in the last few years has been as the Iranians have become ever more hardcore in the West there is a greater, greater desire to believe that possibilities of compromise exist.  It’s bizarre, actually.  I mean, in the mid-1990s, it was conceivable, I’m not sure it was recommended, but it was conceivable that you could look at the movement of clerical dissidence and say that you had a real way that was beginning inside of the Iranian clergy that was fundamentally objecting to some of the primary tenants of the revolution, and you saw very famous disciples of even Khamenei taking issue with a whole host of sacred holies, first and foremost, maybe not first and foremost but certainly up at the very top of the list would be the United States, and probably the most, the bravest of those was a fellow by the name of Abdul Nouri, who was the Interior Minister under [indiscernible], and certainly a very beloved child of Khamenei.  That doesn’t exist now.

 And, I mean, one of the most surreal things I’ve seen recently, it’s now sort of past, was when the Europeans were negotiating with the Iranians and you had the Europeans really hopeful that someone like Ali Larijani would, in fact, bring Iran to the table and all the rest.  No one who knows his background, who has actually read his words and believes them, unless you just think he’s lying, could possibly believe that.  He’s one of the hardest of the hardcore, yet you had people out there saying, oh, no, he’s a moderate.  He’s not, in a Western definition of pragmatism, he’s not pragmatic.  He and his brothers are amongst the horsemen of the apocalypse.  These boys are hard.  They make Khamenei look soft.  Yet, we have often looked at what they’ve written and we’ve sort of suspended judgment.  I suspect that when Obama becomes president--if Obama becomes president, please forgive me Senator McCain--that if Obama becomes president we will discover, well, wow. 

 At Brookings recently, and I’ll end on that, they had a very well-known French intellectual, Telez del Pesch [ph.], come and give one of the [indiscernible] lecture, and I think she put it very well, she said, if the Americans actually can find somebody in Iran to talk to, they’re going to discover, quickly, what the Europeans have discovered, is, that, it doesn’t take you anywhere, and that the Iranians consistently take advantage of you because the only thing that the Iranians truly do respect that has to be somewhere in the negotiation process is hard power.  You’ve got to have some means to threaten them.  They respond to that.  That’s how they handle internal politics.  You cannot take a regime that lives and breathes hard power at home and expect to win abroad using soft power.  You must, somehow, introduce a military element, which is credible. 

 Danielle Pletka:  Completely lost control of the Q&A section. I’m sorry.  Let me let Vance have a quick wrap-up to this, and then I’ll turn to our next audience member. 

 Vance Serchuk:  Just a brief point that I would make is that, and this goes without saying, there’s obviously, also, there’s the regional dimension of it.  Jon eluded to this when he said that, look, particularly if it’s an Obama administration this is someone who during the course of the campaign made statements about being willing to negotiate unconditionally with Iran, embraced at least in the campaign rhetoric at a very, very ambitious plan for pulling out of Iraq.  And, so, there’s going to be a fairly deep impression, I think, among many of the regional elites about a question as to the U.S. commitment to the region, and it’s going to be extraordinarily important for that administration, then, to reaffirm it.  For that very reason, Jon, you mentioned, you need to be sort of cautious initially. 

 But the problem is, in the case of Iran, the timeline is cutting in the other direction, just as Martin mentioned.  The clock is ticking on the nuclear program.  And, so, if you’re going to engage, you better engage pretty quickly.  These two things seem like they cut against each other pretty hard.  That’s the simple point that I would make. 

 Danielle Pletka:  If you would wait for a second. 

 Joel Cabot:  This is Joel Cabot with [indiscernible].  I would like to ask you why you are so confident that Barack Obama is going to be elected? 

 Danielle Pletka:  Are you asking Reuel that question?  Are you speaking for the McCain campaign? 

 Joel Cabot:  I would like to hear from Mr. Indyk and Mr. Alterman, what will happen on the Iranian issue if McCain is going to be elected? 

 Reuel Marc Gerecht:  Because my mom and dad are voting for him.  [Laughter]. 

 Danielle Pletka:  And they live in Missouri. Martin, Jon, do you want to answer that question, because it is an interesting one. 

 Male Panelist:  Well, I think Vance should answer it, but, since I’ve been asked to he can comment on what I have to say.  Look, I think that McCain, too, will be focused on Iran, precisely because the clock is ticking there in Iran with a nuclear capability or approaching it, as Senator Obama said, the game change is on.  But I think that McCain’s approach is going to be a little different, a little more difficult, let’s say.  One of the challenges, if one accepts, and I do, Reuel’s point that there’s going to be a need for this diplomacy to be backed by hard power, then it’s going to be essential to try to line up an international coalition behind the effort.  That will require bringing Russia on board, which is something that I think Senator McCain does not see as part of his approach to the process, the whole notion that he puts forward of the league of democracies designed in many ways to exclude countries like Russia and China, which are going to be very important to the effort to make diplomacy work in that regard. 

 And, the other dimension of this, which I think is very important, is the Syrian dimension, precisely because it can influence Iran’s calculations.  The Iranians do think strategically, and to make an effort to pull the Syrians out of their alignment with Iran will effect Hezbollah ability to operate, will effect Hamas’ ability to operate, and the one thing for sure it will do, is, concentrate the minds of the Iranians.  They understand very well that their ability to project their influence and power into the Middle East heartland depends on the Syrian conduit. 

 And, so, thereto, I think that John McCain is going to be reluctant to pick up the Israeli-Syrian negotiations; he sees Syria through the lens of Lebanon and is much less inclined to see it as a peace partner and much more inclined to see it as an adversary.  And, so, that to will reduce his options.  If we accept the point that both Reuel and Jon have made, that I agree with, that the Iranians are bound to try to play out the clock so that they can acquire the nuclear weapons, that diplomacy is far less likely to get off the ground under McCain, let alone succeed, and, therefore, we’re going to, the McCain Administration, would be faced with a much tougher decision about whether to use force to prevent Iran from crossing the nuclear threshold, or whether to go to a deterrent and containment policy with all of its intended risks. 

 Male Panelist:  Joel, let me first say I didn’t assert at all who is going to win the election.  I don’t know.  And I think that actually they have mirror issues.  That what Obama has to do, if he were to be the president, is to persuade Iran, and other adversarial countries who is for negotiating, that there is hard power behind American determination.  But I think a McCain administration would have to do is persuading adversarial countries that there’s actually a positive pathway and that in fact effective diplomacy requires presenting that choice. And that the Obama side would have to stress that there really is muscle, and the McCain side would have to stress that there really is a positive pathway out.  

 Danielle Pletka:  Right over here. 

 Barry Jacobson:  Barry Jacobson, the American Jewish Committee, and I’m a retired foreign service officer.  I did four tours in NEA, including four years in Israel.  I didn’t hear all of Ambassador Indyk’s talk because I came in a little late, but [inaudible, static].  This question that we all know what a Israeli Palestinian peace will look like, I don’t know what it will look like, and I don’t think when you look at the actual realities we coalition governments no matter what happens internally in Israel, Palestinians split, continual settlements on the West Bank basically because no government is going to be strong enough in Jerusalem to stop it, whatever settlement there will be will not allow Palestinians to come work in Israel, which is the only [inaudible, static] certainly no Israeli government able to allow any significant numbers of Palestinians to [inaudible, static] Israel, and yet that still remains, as far as I know, immutable position of the Palestinians.  If you guys see something there that I don’t see, I would like to hear about it, but I don’t see any [inaudible, static] between the Israelis and the Palestinians for the next 15 years, for the next foreseeable future.  Do you know something I don’t know? 

 Male Panelist:  I think you make a good point.  I think that there is a lack of capacity on both sides to implement a deal that could be agreed on.  The gaps that have emerged in these negotiations has gone on for the last year, this is what I was saying, are essentially the same gaps that existed at the end of the Clinton Administration after eight years of pushing a process, although there was only final status negotiations in the last year.  It comes down to, what do you do about the holy slats in Jerusalem?  What do you do about the size of the settlement blocks?  The settlement blocks have been accepted by the Palestinians, the argument is over whether they should exist on 8.5 percent or whether they should exist on 2 to 3 percent.  That’s quite a big gap, but it’s not an unbridgeable gap.  And there is the issue of refugees, which you mentioned, which also is complicated, but not without a solution. 

 In other words, diplomats, through a sustained effort, can come up with compromises that will look awfully like the Clinton parameters that could be acceptable to negotiators and could produce an agreement.  The problem is how you implement it.  That’s where I think your points are correct.  There’s a real problem with how do the Israeli and Israeli government deal with the challenge of evacuating large numbers of settlers from the area that they regard as the land God gave to Israel.  And how do the Palestinians deal with opposition from Hamas and their supporters and terrorists in their midst and demonstrate an ability to actually take control of territory that Israel would withdraw from in a responsible way that would make it possible for the Israelis to withdraw. 

 Those are the two challenges.  They don’t lend themselves to immediate solutions, but that doesn’t mean that through a concerted effort you can’t build the capacity on both sides to deal with it, and the effort to try is very important.  In other words, you’re not going to get a peace between Israel and the Palestinians, but you can get movement in that direction both in terms of a final status outcome that’s acceptable to both sides, and a process that leads to the implementation of it in phases, and that that’s what we need to try to do, at the same time as we need to try to get an Israeli Syrian deal, which will have a positive effect on all of those fronts. 

 Danielle Pletka:  We’re going to have time for one last quick question.  Howard right here? 

 Howard LeFranke [ph.]:  Howard LeFranke with Christian Science Monitor.  Martin, sorry to make you continue talking, but, this question is for you.  I’m wondering what leads you to say that you expect to see this great swelling of enthusiasm if there is an Obama presidency right away, because I think we saw after his trip, brief trip to the region, and then to Europe, although there was this great enthusiasm in Europe, it seems to me there was a lot more skepticism in the Middle East region, and I was think about even before that trip, when I was in the region and just a Jordanian I was talking to was very proud that he knew, he said, yes, I know that this Mr. Obama, his middle name is Hussein, but I think he talks just like other presidents we’ve had before.  And I’m wondering what tells you there’s going to be this outpouring of enthusiasm? 

 Martin Indyk:  Well, it’s equally anecdotal.  I spent a lot of time in the Arab and Muslim world, and I see an enthusiasm and a wonderment, and it relates to what I said, very simply, that the idea that through a democratic process somebody like them, that is, somebody whose middle name is Hussein, they consider him a Muslim even though he obviously is not, just like they considered Madeline Albright Jewish, [laughter], even though she is not. 

 So, the narrative, the story of his rise to become the president of the United States is a very powerful one in that part of the world, precisely because they would hope that such a thing can happen, but they know that it can’t.  By the way, I think it makes the regimes quite nervous because of that example.  What comes with that, though, that enthusiasm and kind of reassertion in their own minds of the value, the American values that they admire, comes with high expectations of what it is he will do.  And that’s going to be Obama’s problem if he becomes president, is how he manages the expectations because they’re going to be far higher than he can possibly fulfill. 

 Jon Alterman:  I think the expectations are actually a source of strength as Obama deals with these countries.  I think Martin’s right, that a lot of the leaders are looking for a U.S. president who demonstrates resolve.  They want to be the ones demonstrating conciliation against the backdrop of a more threatening U.S.  I think that’s going to require some adjustment.  But I think there’s something about Senator Obama’s style which resonates with Middle Eastern audiences in that he tries to emphasize issues of commonality and inclusion.  One of the complaints you constantly get in the Middle East about the Bush Administration is this insistence on dividing us and them.  The instinct, especially in the Gulf, but really throughout the Middle East, is about building connections of interest, of shared interests, of shared investments, and all those kinds of things, and I think that there is just basically an aspect of his style, of the way he speaks, the way he approaches issues, which, I think, is going to give him a leg up because it’s going to resonate with these audiences.  Again, I think there’s going to be a huge amount of scrutiny, is this guy soft, can we take advantage of him, but, at the same time, there’s going to be a level of comfort that’s going to be a tremendous advantage as we work forward and really try to reassert a lot of the preeminence that the U.S. has had in the Middle East and I think doesn’t enjoy right now. 

 Reuel Marc Gerecht:  One of the most astonishing things I’ve ever seen in the Middle East was at a Brookings event in Doha when President Bill Clinton gave a true tour de force speech.  It was an astonishing speech.  I happen to be at a table where everybody at the table except me was Syrian.  President Clinton was actually being very tough in this speech.  This was not -- it was post 9/11, and he was actually giving a very, very rough speech, very diplomatically and elegantly and extemporaneously put, but it was a tough speech that substantively everybody at the table, I think, would have found very objectionable.  But, Clinton was able to give it in this way that by the end of the speech -- I mean everybody at my table was just, wow, I mean they were going nuts. 

 However, it is good to remember that Islamic radicalism went into overdrive during the Clinton years in the Middle East, and I strongly suspect that with Senator Obama, perhaps soon to be President Obama, that his glow will last a very short period of time, and if you look at the most important Arab country, Egypt, I suspect if the Senator says, President says one nice thing about Hosni Mubarak, assuming he is still with us, I suspect that fondness for President Obama will dissipate almost immediately with the Egyptian population. 

 Danielle Pletka:  Vance, I want you to at once inaugurate President Obama and kill off President Mubarak, as Reuel has so tactfully done in his last sentence.  Do you have a last word? 

 Vance Serchuk:  [Inaudible] that my parents, by contrast to Reuel’s, will be voting for Senator McCain.  I would simply emphasize that, I mean, I think that right now to all of us Senator Obama remains very much a blank slate, and over the course of this campaign he has, I think, admirably, from a political perspective, at least, managed to be many things to many people; on the one hand, vocally opposing the designation of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Qods Force before revealing that, in fact, he supported the designation of the IRG’s Qods Force.  So, in the event that he wins, or, for that matter, in the event that Senator McCain wins, you actually then actually have to begin to have policies. 

 I think that Reuel is right, that ultimately Middle Eastern audiences judge presidents of the United States not for solid points, but for their policies and for what they actually do in the region.  I’ll conclude with actually a story.  I was recently in Afghanistan, with Senator Lieberman, and he was doing an interview with Tolo TV, which is one of the independent stations there.  He asked, so, you know, how are people in Afghanistan thinking about this election?  And the correspondent said, oh, you know, everyone in Kabul here is actually very, very much in favor of Senator Obama.  Okay, well, why is that?  Is that because of his cosmopolitan background, the fact that his middle name is Hussein?  No, no, it’s because he said he would bomb Pakistan.  So, you know, on that closing note, people will get judged by their policies I think more than for style points at the end of the day. 

 Danielle Pletka:  Let me thank, first and foremost, our terrific panelists, notwithstanding our sudden emphasis on style I think they did brilliantly on substance on all fronts, and our audience for your patience and participation.  It’s a pleasure to have you here.  Next time we all talk about this we’ll know.  So, thank you very much.