{"id":6785,"date":"2013-11-25T09:54:08","date_gmt":"2013-11-25T17:54:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/?p=6785"},"modified":"2013-11-25T09:54:08","modified_gmt":"2013-11-25T17:54:08","slug":"peace-for-our-time","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/peace-for-our-time\/","title":{"rendered":"Peace for Our Time"},"content":{"rendered":"

by Victor Davis Hanson \/\/\u00a0National Review Online<\/a>\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

The Iranian agreement comes not in isolation, unfortunately. The Syrian debacle instructed the Iranians that the Obama administration was more interested in announcing a peaceful breakthrough than actually achieving it. The timing is convenient for both sides: The Obama administration needed an offset abroad to the Obamacare disaster, and the Iranians want a breathing space to rebuild their finances and ensure that Assad can salvage the Iranian-Hezbollah-Assad\u00a0axis. The agreement is a de facto acknowledgement that containing, not ending, Iran\u2019s nuclear program is now U.S. policy.<\/p>\n

After all, to what degree would an Iranian\u00a0freeze really\u00a0retard development of a bomb, or simply put it on hold? In other words, has Iran already met some of its requirements for weaponization, and now simply wishes to take a breather, rebuild its economy, and strengthen its image in the West \u2014 before the final and rather easy development of a deliverable bomb? If the sanctions are not only lifted, but incentives are added in place of them, why then would Iran not agree to dismantle completely elements of its program that exceed domestic energy purposes? (Or for that matter, why would a nation with among the world\u2019s largest reserves of gas and oil feel the need to fund an expensive nuclear energy program in the first place?)<\/p>\n

Aside from the details of this new Sword of Damocles pact, one wonders about the following: In the case of violations, will it be easier for Iran to return to weaponization or for the U.S. to reassemble allies to reestablish the sanctions? Will Israel now be more or less likely to consider preemption? Will the Sunni states feel some relief or more likely pursue avenues to achieve nuclear deterrence? Will allies like Japan or South Korea feel that the U.S. has reasserted its old global clout, or further worry that their patron might engage in secret talks with, say, China rather than reemphasize their security under the traditional U.S. umbrella?<\/p>\n

The president\u2019s dismal polls are only a multiplier of that general perception abroad that foreign policy is an auxiliary to fundamental transformation at home, useful not so much to create international stability per se, as to enhance Obama influence in pursuing his domestic agenda. Collate reset, lead from behind, \u201credlines,\u201d \u201cgame-changers,\u201d\u00a0\u201ddeadlines,\u201d the Arab Spring confusion, the skedaddle from Iraq, Benghazi, the Eastern European missile pullback, and the atmosphere is comparable to the 1979\u201380 Carter landscape, in which after three years of observation, the opportunists at last decided to act while the acting was good, from Afghanistan to Central America to Tehran.<\/p>\n

There is not a good record, from Philip of Macedon to Hitler to Stalin in the 1940s to Carter and the Soviets in the 1970s to radical Islamists in the 1990s,\u00a0of expecting authoritarians and thugs to listen to reason, cool their aggression, and appreciate democracies\u2019 sober and judicious appeal to logic \u2014 once they sense in the West greater eagerness to announce new, rather than to enforce old, agreements.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Victor Davis Hanson \/\/\u00a0National Review Online\u00a0 The Iranian agreement comes not in isolation, unfortunately. The Syrian debacle instructed the Iranians that the Obama administration was more interested in announcing a peaceful breakthrough than actually achieving it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[124,116,393],"tags":[12,1039,442,169,1041],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p466Sb-1Lr","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":8311,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/tom-cotton-tragic-hero\/","url_meta":{"origin":6785,"position":0},"title":"Tom Cotton, Tragic Hero","author":"victorhanson","date":"March 26, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"Despite the value of his open letter, he will become Obama\u2019s scapegoat when the Iran negotiations inevitably fail. by Victor Davis Hanson\u00a0\/\/ National Review Online The snarky quip attributed to 19th-century French foreign minister Charles Maurice de Talleyrand \u2014 \u201cIt was worse than a crime; it was a blunder\u201d \u2014\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Mainstream Media"","block_context":{"text":"Mainstream Media","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/american-culture\/mainstream-media\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"images (1)","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/03\/images-1.jpeg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":9325,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/a-year-after-the-iranian-deal\/","url_meta":{"origin":6785,"position":1},"title":"A Year After the Iranian Deal","author":"victorhanson","date":"May 27, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"By Victor Davis Hanson \/\/ Strategika \u00a0 Image credit: Poster Collection, IR 180, Hoover Institution Archives. The July 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action to limit Iranian nuclear proliferation is now nearly a year old. Until recently, the urgency to complete the \u201cIran deal\u201d had been explained by the Obama\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Strategika"","block_context":{"text":"Strategika","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/strategika\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":6584,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/game-changers\/","url_meta":{"origin":6785,"position":2},"title":"‘Game Changers’","author":"victorhanson","date":"October 3, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson \/\/\u00a0Tribune Media Services\u00a0 When -- not if -- is the only mystery about an Iranian nuclear bomb. All the warning signs are there. 'Game changers' In 2008, presidential candidate\u00a0Barack Obama\u00a0on two occasions went out of his way to warn the Iranians that the development of a\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Punditry"","block_context":{"text":"Punditry","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/opinion\/punditry\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":969,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/iran-1-0-2-0-3-0-4-0\/","url_meta":{"origin":6785,"position":3},"title":"Iran 1.0, 2.0, 3.0, 4.0","author":"victorhanson","date":"February 14, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson Tribune Media Services On the campaign trail, presidential candidate Barack Obama once called for a \u201creset\u201d policy with Iran. Supposedly, the unpopularity of the Texan provocateur George W. Bush and his administration\u2019s inability to finesse \u201csoft power\u201d had needlessly alienated the Iranian theocracy. After all, the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Iran"","block_context":{"text":"Iran","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/the-world\/the-middle-east\/iran\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":8300,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/at-the-white-house-theres-nobody-home\/","url_meta":{"origin":6785,"position":4},"title":"At the White House, There\u2019s Nobody Home","author":"victorhanson","date":"March 19, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"The absence of true leadership has created chaos at home and abroad. by Victor Davis Hanson \/\/ National Review Online What has gone wrong with the U.S. government in the past month? Just about everything, from the fundamental to the ridiculous. 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Thornton FrontPage Magazine Iran announced Sunday that it was cutting off crude oil sales to France and England, a mostly symbolic act given that Iran provides England less than 1% of its crude, and France claims that it \u201cpractically stopped importing Iranian oil,\u201d according to the head\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Iran"","block_context":{"text":"Iran","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/the-world\/the-middle-east\/iran\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6785"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6785"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6785\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6786,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6785\/revisions\/6786"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6785"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6785"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6785"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}