The Obama administration is trying to press and bribe Russia to get further sanctions on Iran. That has not worked at all in the first try. But the U.S. still thinks it can get their, simply by raising the price.
On March 3 the New York Times reported:
President Obama sent a secret letter to Russia’s president last month suggesting that he would back off deploying a new missile defense system in Eastern Europe if Moscow would help stop Iran from developing long-range weapons, American officials said Monday.
While Obama called the NYT report inaccurate he essentially confirmed the pressure tactic.
The Russian President Medvedev welcomed the letter, but dismissed the connection the U.S. tried to make between missile defense directed against Russia and Iran's nuclear program.
If Russia would agree to such a deal, it would look in the eyes of the world like a tiny little state that can be pressed or bought off. There is no way the Russians will allow that to happen. If the U.S. really builds the missile defense in eastern Europe, the Russians have effective ways to respond to that. There is no need for them to bow before Obama. It is principal raison d'état for them not to bow and not to give in to such extortionary deals.
But it seems that the Obama administration does not understand that principle. It seems to think that Russia is some dirty bazaar haggler that simply wants a higher price. Writes Swoop:
With new ideas being in short supply regarding Pakistan and Afghanistan as well as toward the Middle East peace process, we are hearing that one major new idea under consideration focuses on Russia. As explained to us, this involves a “grand bargain” between Moscow and Washington. The essence is that, in exchange for Russian pressure on Iran to give up its nuclear weapons program, the US will both abandon its proposed ballistic missile defense installations in Eastern Europe and will soft-pedal its efforts to gain NATO entry for Ukraine and Georgia. This idea is still under review but we understand that it received a tentative airing at the May 7th meeting between Secretary of State Clinton and Foreign Minister Lavrov. The rationale behind this idea is that if US relations with Iran can be stabilized, then interesting new options may become available regarding the Middle East, Afghanistan and terrorism. In the words of a National Security Council adviser: “We have come to realize that the road to Tehran may lead through Moscow.”
So to get Russia to do what the U.S. wants it to do the Obama administration has now simply raised the bribe. Additionally to the BMD issue it now offers to 'soft-pedal' NATO enlargement in eastern Europe.
The Russians will laugh about that. NATO enlargement in eastern Europe is already dead. The Western European NATO members have seen how Saakashvili started his disastrous tiny little Georgian war last year. They will not commit their children to fight for such Caucasian lunatics as they would have to do if Georgia and the Ukraine would be accepted into NATO.
The 'rational' that 'the road to Tehran may lead through Moscow' is simply nuts. What Swoop characterizes euphemistically as 'stabilized relations with Iran' are harsher sanctions on Iran through blackmailing Russia. By the way – didn't the National Intelligence Estimate on Iran say that Iran has no current nuclear weapons program?
The Obama administration wants a bowing Russia and a bowing Iran. Both will not bow unless the U.S. bows itself and accepts them as equal in rights and honers their national pride.
The arrogance expressed in the idea Swoop reports on is again breathtaking. Has anything changed with the Obama administration taking over?