Maurizio Geri

The gulf in the Middle East: a peace to end all wars?

The case for an American-Iranian rapprochement

“Enduring security and lasting peace do not require perpetual war…We are also heirs to those who wonthe peace and not just the war; who turned sworn enemies into the surest of friends – and we must carrythose lessons into this time as well” (Obama, Inaugural address, January 21, 2013)

Introduction

The next few years will be of fundamental importance to the

future of the Middle East, the ‘pivotal region’1 for the US and world

order in the XXI century. At the beginning of XX century nobody would

have thought that Europe was going to have the worst first half

century of its history, even if followed by probably the best second

half century. Today it is difficult to imagine how will be the XXI

century for the Middle East: could be catastrophic or surprisingly

idyllic, but probably will be neither one. Both historian and

political scientists have difficulty to predict the future everywhere

and in the Middle East even more: while the firsts today need to avoid

easy analogies the latters need to build a new paradigm for

understanding the current mutating international system. In our era of

globalization, complexity and mutation it is difficult to reach the

goal of reducing the uncertainty of the future, and the Middle East is

one of the most difficult regions for such objective.

1 Simon Serfaty. Shaping things to come: America’s role. The National Interest, April 22 2014

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Admittedly, the Middle East has always been one of the world’s

crucial regions and, for the past several decades, for the United

States as well. Notwithstanding a reported US “pivot” to Asia, the

Obama administration has recently been pulled back into the Middle

Eastern quagmire. This was already true after the dramatic events of

9/11 and the subsequent Iraq war; but it is even clearer today, in the

context of the civil wars and the new terrorist groups that have been

born since the Arab Spring. Faced with lesser domestic and political

pressures during the last two years of his second administration,

Obama is at a crossroad: will he end his mandate with some positive

achievement that would confirm he deserved the Nobel peace prize and

that his new approach to American foreign policy, based on dialogue

and non-intervention, was really effective and not a waste of time?

Will the Middle East be the region where he will show his skills of a

transformational leader?

This paper is based on the premise that, even in a so called

‘post-American/post-Western’ world, the United States will still play

a fundamental role as the ‘international leader’ in the region. The

future of the Middle East (as the future of the world) may well be

post-American and post-Western but it will not become non-American and

non-Western as the United States remains a crucial actor. But this

paper argues that the US will not be able to play their role

effectively without the support of new regional powers. This means

that Israel and Saudi Arabia cannot remain the only countries that the

US feel comfortable to cooperate with, and more partners and allies

will be needed for the United States to recuperate the efficacy and

legitimacy lost in Iraq, to help solve the Middle Eastern conflicts.

More specifically, two other regional powers should be included by the

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US in the Middle East chessboard, in order to build in the future a

‘peace to end all wars’, to paraphrase the sentence of Wilson one

century ago2 -- two non-Arab Muslim countries that have millenary

civilizations and recently re-emerged as significant regional powers:

Iran and Turkey. To that end the paper analyzes especially the

preconditions of a future rapprochement between the US and Iran,

following in particular the theoretical approach of Charles Kupchan3,

and the policy suggestions of Kenneth Pollack4, ceteris paribus. Therefore

the paper doesn’t take into account other intervening factors, like

the role of world superpowers, China and Russia in primis (even if it

touches on Chinese relation with Iran) who could affect this possible

future rapprochement, the role of other regional powers (a part the

one of Israel and Turkey) or the role of international organizations,

non-state actors etc., that could also have their effects on this

issue.

While the US and Iran have been bitter rivals in the Middle East

for 34 years their conflictual relationship is increasingly difficult

to sustain. A possible rapprochement tentatively announced with the

recently-launched nuclear talks will not be easy, but will not be

impossible. It will require, among other things, also to convince

Israel that a deal will be sooner or later make, and that the case of

a future nuclear Iran would be manageable, allowing Iran’s return to

the international community but at the same time guaranteeing the

protection of Israel. In order to reach this goal the US might need2 And also to paraphrase the book of David Fromkin, regarding the splitting upof Ottoman Empire by European powers one hundred years ago (A Peace to End AllPeace: The Fall of the Ottoman Empire and the Creation of the Modern Middle East. Holt Paperbacks.2009) 3 Kupchan, Charles. How enemies become friends. Princeton UP, 2010. 4 Pollack, Kenneth. Unthinkable: Iran, the Bomb, and American Strategy. Simon & Schuster, 2013.

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the support of other regional powers, including one – Turkey – that is

a NATO ally and could become the second stronger US ally in the Middle

East after Israel.

1. Is there a role for the US in the Middle East?

The US declared ‘pivot’ or ‘rebalancing’ to Asia, announced by

then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, now looks out of date. The

Middle East is too crucial, too instable, and too decisive to be left

to itself: the energy resources, the presence of Israel, and the

geopolitical situation make this region central to the US and the

international community for a new world order in the future. The

Middle East has historically been an important area of world rivalry,

as the connection among three continents. Cyrus, Alexander the Great

or Cesar all attempted to control the region, which has been the

cradle of great civilizations, at least until the Western powers

arrived to conquer or dismember them, from Napoleon’s invasion of

Egypt to the Sykes-Picot agreements that divided the Ottoman Empire in

sphere of influences. For at least one century, the interest of

Western powers in the Middle East has been for the good and for the

worse, with territorial fragmentation and sectarianism created or

aggravated along illegitimate colonial lines.

Leading historian Bernard Lewis argues5 that the ‘modern’ (and

Western) history in the Middle East started exactly with the

Napoleonic campaign in Egypt and Syria at the turn of XIX century.

What those campaigns showed, Lewis argues, was that even a small

Western force could conquer and rule a Muslim land, and that only

5 Lewis, Bernard. The end of modern history in the Middle East (Hoover Institution Press,2011).

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another Western power (in that case the UK) could get it out. Even if

the view of ‘modernity’ could have been influenced by the

“orientalism” of historians like Lewis (as Edward Said argued) it is

sure that since Napoleon’s invasion the ultimate power over the Middle

East has been always outside. From the Anglo-Russian entente of 1907

for the control of Persia and Afghanistan to the Sykes-Picot

agreements of 1916 that ended the Ottoman Empire and created two

“spheres of influences” for France and Great Britain, to the Mandates

of the League of Nations, the Middle East has always been controlled

by a European power, with the American involvement coming later, after

World War II, and in particular in relation with a few regional

powers: Israel, Iran, Saudi Arabia, and Egypt.

Today Europe has neither the power nor the will to play an

important role in the Middle East, but looking at the US presence in

the region, it seems that effectively only another Western (or, maybe,

Eastern) power could pull the US away from the region. In theory the

US should have done its pivot to Asia already (in the sense of ‘East

Asia’ as Middle East is also part of Asia, the ‘Southwest Asia’ as

China defines it) but in practice the US cannot leave the Middle East

quite yet. After the Arab Spring, the American wars of 9/11, the

Syrian civil war, and the rise of new terrorist groups like the

“Islamic state” the instability, insecurity, and precariousness of the

region is clear to all. For these reasons the US cannot leave the

Middle East until the regional powers find it possible to cooperate

and solve their conflicts (often caused by Western interventions

anyway). For now at least, the US presence as the only major

superpower able to act as a referee or international protector is

still a necessity.

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So who could exclude the US from being the last decision maker in

the Middle East in the future? China? It doesn’t seem quite ready yet.

The end of oil dependency? The US has quite a long path ahead for

that. Or will the regional powers ever be strong enough to deal with

their conflicts by themselves? When Napoleon arrived in Egypt there

were only two sovereign states in the Middle East: Turkey (with the

Ottoman Empire) and Iran (with the Persian Empire). After two

centuries, is it time for them to take back their historic role as the

two major powers of the region? The future will tell, but one thing is

sure: the US involvement in the Middle East is still high, with the

impact of its post-9/11 military operations still unpredictable. And

the US know that disengagement, retrenchment or isolation will just be

to increase their decline. In a ‘post-American’ but not ‘no-American’

world6 the US needs to renew its engagement with the Middle East.

Nevertheless the US cannot do it alone anymore: it is still the

world’s preponderant power but cannot act everywhere its leadership is

required. This would cause an “imperial overstretch” impossible to

overcome, besides being the unipolar moment ended leaving space to an

increasingly multilateral world. Therefore in the Middle East the US

will have to look for partnerships not only with the European Union

(which is still too divided and frail to be a real leader) and with

Israel and Saudi Arabia (which are just a part of the Middle East

multilateral conundrum) but also with new regional powers, in

particular Iran and Turkey, as this paper argues.

6 In the sense that American power remains superior, and thus indispensablethough no longer decisive. See: Simon Serfaty. A world recast: an American moment inthe post-Western world (Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2012). Fareed Zakaria. Thepost-American world (W. W. Norton & Company, 2009).

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2. The US in the Middle East: how to increase efficacy

It has been said7 that the US failed in Iraq because of a lack of

contextual intelligence8 and an inability to foresee the consequences

of its actions: George W. Bush lacked them. Obama, too, seems to lack

the contextual intelligence, with little experience and an inability

to predict the consequences of some of his actions (like his

resistance to intervening in Syria, even if Syria crossed the red line

of chemical weapons that Obama had set). As Vali Nasr argues9 the US

failed in Iraq because of the same mistakes made in Vietnam: a set of

false assumptions, exaggerated perception and description of threat

and intelligence mistakes. And the legacy of the Iraq war, as Nasr

again remembers10, has been not only the chaos of a failing state, with

the birth of new dangerous actors like ISIS, but also the increased

sectarianism between Shia and Sunni, facilitated by the ‘Shia

revival’, that started to pose a threat to the Sunni Arab domination

of the Middle East. The US failure in Iraq was also based on a lack of

historical knowledge: history should have reminded the Bush

administration that Middle Eastern conflicts are not easy to solve, in

particular for Western powers.

Today it seems that there is no winning strategy in the Middle

East, and the task for the President is not easy. But a final nuclear

deal with Iran next June 2015 could open a door for a new strategy, a

7 Simon Serfaty. Class notes. A post American, post-Western world? Research Seminar, GPIS/ODU, Fall 2014. 8 The ability to understand changing environments, capitalize on trends, anduse the flow of events to implement strategies, so the ability to understandthe issues in context. See: Joseph Nye. The powers to lead. Oxford UP, 20109 Vali Nasr. The dispensable nation: American foreign policy in retreat. Doubleday, 2013. P. 95 10 Vali Nasr. The Shia revival. Norton and Company, 2006

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“second chance”11 for a nation that cannot be “dispensable” in the

Middle East, as Nasr argues12. According to Zbigniew Brzezinski the new

Obama administration should have demonstrated leadership in the Middle

East, especially with regard to the Israel-Palestine conflict, and

formulate a more efficient strategy in the region as America will not

get a ‘third chance.’ Other scholars13 believe that Obama has

repeatedly lacked the courage of his convictions, is a politician but

not a statesman and has been also trapped by history. Six years after

Obama entered the White House he does not seem to have a clear

strategy yet, not only because of the chaos in the Middle East but

because the US finds it difficult to deal with a multipolar world,

being much more at ease with the bipolar system of the Cold War. But

if the US wants to retain its leadership in the Middle East and also

‘soft power’ in the world needs to have a clear strategy and efficacy

in implementing it, and the last two years of the Obama administration

(with a majority of the Congress in the hand of Republican opposition)

could force the President to take bold actions in this direction.

In a post-Cold War world – globalized and increasingly post-

Western – alliances have become often temporary, shifting from one

country to another depending on the issue and the context. Arguably

now ‘the enemy of my friend is still my enemy’ (if we look for example

at the NATO position in Ukraine and the American support for Israel in

Gaza) but ‘the enemy of my enemy is not necessarily my friend’

anymore14, as was often the case during the years of Cold War11 Zbigniew Brzezinski. Second Chance: Three Presidents and the Crisis of American Superpower. Basic books, 2008. 12 Nasr, 2013, Op. Cit. 13 Gerges, Fawaz. Obama and the Middle East. The end of America’s moment? Palgrave MacMillan, 2011. 14 Simon Serfaty. Class notes. A post American, post-Western world? Research Seminar, GPIS/ODU, Fall 2014.

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containment (from the mujahidin in Afghanistan to the dictators in

Latin American or Middle East). Today, that the US doesn’t need to

compromise with its principles and values of democracy and freedom to

win a bigger battle, the alliances with ‘incompatible’ countries could

be just temporary to increase the efficacy of American presence.

The post-Cold War world has been defined in several ways:

sometimes scholars (like Ian Bremmer15) defined it “zero-polar” world,

others (like Richard Haas16) “no-polar world”, others (like Fareed

Zakaria17) multipolar world. According to Bremmer18, the current G-Zero

world, where there is no single country or durable alliance of

countries that can meet the challenges of global leadership, will

require more adaptability, skills of cooperation, and temporary

alliances to manage crisis. An example of this today is the fight

against ISIS for which the US is supported by the Gulf countries, an

alliance that was not taken for granted, given the fact that the Sunni

radicalism has been supported often by these same countries today in

the alliance. And more countries could be added in the future against

this specific threats, including Iran as recently a secret White House

letter demonstrates19. Therefore a future multipolar world could offer

different arrangements, temporary alliances, and a shift of balancing

depending on the contingent need. This approach could become more and

more difficult, as there could be too many conflicting interests to

juggle. The Sunni states, for example, don’t want the US to make a

deal with Iran, but a deal with Iran would be important to avoid a15 Bremmer, Ian. Every Nation for Itself: What Happens When No One Leads the World. Portfolio Trade, 201316 Haas, Richard. The age of nonpolarity. Foreign Affairs, May/June 2008. 17 Zakaria, Fareed. The Post American world. W. W. Norton & Company, 200918 Bremmer, 2013, Op. Cit.19 Francis, David and Yochi Dreazen. Secret White House Letter Highlights Iran’s Importance to Islamic State Fight. November 6, 2014.

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preemptive attack from Israel. Neither does Israel want the US to do a

deal with Iran, as it doesn’t want a powerful and recognized Iran, but

Iran back in international arena could balance the Arab countries of

the Gulf that supported uncontrollable terrorist groups. Therefore the

US will have to learn how to deal among different and swinging

alliances if they want to increase their efficacy in the Middle East,

this is the reality of our complex world and also the tool for new

regional orders, as also Kissinger remembers in his last book20.

3 US-Iran: is it wise and possible a rapprochement?

Following the proposition of Stephen Kinzer21, this paper argues

that the US should do a kind of ‘reset’ in its foreign policy towards

the Middle East and start to think about new partnership in particular

with two countries: Iran and Turkey. These countries have many more

things in common with the US than many other countries in the Middle

East, first of all their democratic tradition, and after WWII, they

have been America’s partners against Soviet Union during the Cold War.

Turkey and Iran actually, were the reasons why Truman started his

doctrine of containment (with his speech to the Congress in March

1947) as Kennan in his famous “long telegram” from Moscow warned the

President that the Soviets had their eyes on these countries22. As a

consequence Turkey entered in NATO in 1952 and Iran suffered the

British-American coup in 1953, to avoid the risk of spreading

communism in that country. 20 Henry Kissinger. World Order. Penguin press, 2014. 21 Stephen Kinzer. Reset. Iran, Turkey and America’s future. Times books, 2010.22 George Kennan. The Sources of Soviet Conduct. Foreign Affairs Vol. 25 Is. 4 (1947),p. 575-576

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But the US had already two main allies in the Middle East since

WWII, that would have affected its relation with Turkey and Iran in

the decades to come: Israel and Saudi Arabia. President Roosevelt,

just two months before he died, met King Abdul Aziz ibn Saud on the

American navy warship, Murphy, in a secret meeting right after the

Yalta conference, and promised him that the US would never do

something hostile to Saudi Arabia. President Truman had been convinced

that the Zionist state was a rightful thing to do and became the first

to recognize Israel independence few minutes after the proclamation,

the 14th of May 1948 (one year after the first Muslim country to

recognize Israel surprisingly will not be Saudi Arabia but Iran,

followed by Turkey)23. During the Cold War these alliances obviously

were not static (like the twin pillar of Nixon doctrine, including

both Iran and Saudi Arabia as partners, demonstrates) but broadly

speaking the pillars of American foreign policy in the region in the

second half of the XX century have been Israel and Saudi Arabia.

Recently though these alliances started to slightly mutate. The

incompatibility between the American values and the extreme Wahhabism

supported by the Saudi monarchy, for example, came out with 9/11

attacks and since then the deeply entwined relation between the two

countries started to ebb (even if the kingdom was exonerated and

Islamic extremism was considered the real perpetrator). Also the

cooperation on oil have its moment on crisis, as we saw also recently

with the ‘oil price war’ of Saudi Arabia, not so happy with the new

American energy revolution24. Nevertheless Saudi Arabia is still a

faithful ally as the recent coalition against ISIS demonstrates. As

23 Kinzer, 2010, Op. Cit., P. 145-155. 24 See on this: OPEC price war fears evokes ugly memories of 1986 oil bust forU.S. drillers. Financial Post, 26 of November, 2014.

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Lippman argues25, both the US and Saudi Arabia remain invaluable to

each other’s need and a rupture between them is unlikely in the near

future. The American initial idealization of Israel also began to fade

in last decades, since the war in Lebanon and Sabra and Shatila

massacres in 1982 to the recent wars in Gaza (even if the US

unconditional support to Israel didn’t change obviously) and the

American recent harshly judgment of Netanyahu government26 also

demonstrates that the US started to feel comfortable to criticize

Israeli policies. Nevertheless Israel remain the most important US

partner in the world, and the US cannot act without thinking to the

opinion of Israel. Therefore the US could take actions in the Middle

East that Saudi Arabia and Israel may not necessary completely like,

such as including other regional powers in his chessboard of

alliances, but the US will have to think on how to make this new

alliances acceptable for them, in particular the possible

rapprochement with Iran. It is not out of mind to think about a new

revival of the Nixon doctrine of twin pillars between Saudi Arabia and

Iran, but the first guarantee should be than the protection of Saudi

Arabia in case of an Iranian threat. The same should be done, even

more so, for Israel.

I will be back later on these issues, but for now let’s try to

analyze if it is wise and possible a rapprochement with Iran. The US

and Iran have been enemies for about 35 years now, but in politics

nothing is forever. The US didn’t recuperate its trust to Iran since

the Iranian hostage crisis in 1979, while Iran had a bitter relation

with the US long before 1979. The Iranian coup d’état of 1953 crushed25 Thomas Lippman, Saudi Arabia on the edge: the uncertain future of an American ally, Potomac Books, 2012. 26 Daniel Drezner. Why are US officials trash talking Netanyahu. The Washington Post, October 29, 2014.

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not only an independent government but a long democratic tradition

based on elections, parliament, and the Majlis.27 Iran’s first

Parliament emerged in 1905, at about the same time as Turkey, with the

Persian Constitutional Revolution. The Shah Reza Pahlavi whose rule

began in 1925, followed by his son Mohammed in 1941, could not

suppress this tradition, but the 1953 coup succeeded in overthrowing

democratically elected President Mossadegh and gave the Shah complete

power for the next twenty five years – until the revolution of 1979.

The analysis of these events is important to understand Iran’s

hostility to and mistrust of the US today.

Yet, as argued by Kinzer, Iran is “a nation that has more in

common with the US than almost any of its neighbors”28, in particular

because of its democratic values. Has the moment now come, then, for a

rapprochement between the two countries? And what will it take to

seize the moment and change this relationship? We know that diplomatic

relations exist also between countries that are not friends so long as

there are things to talk about. Long periods without diplomatic

relations are rare, and relations with Iran are one of the longest of

such periods for the US, apart from North Korea and Cuba (even with

China, diplomatic estrangement lasted ‘only’ 23 years between 1949 and

1972). Nevertheless, American presidents often fear the initiation of

a rapprochement with countries that are not embraced by the American

public and could raise difficult political issues. This seemed the

case in 2003, when Iran, scared by the reactions of the US after 9/11,27 Majlis is an Arabic term meaning "a place of sitting", to describe varioustypes of special gatherings among common interest groups in Islamic countries,for discussing different issues, as some kind of ‘salon’. 28 See: Kinzer. Op. Cit. P. 6. In 1911 in order to save the Parliament Iranturned to the US, and a young American lawyer, Morgan Shuster, was appointedTreasurer General of the Persian Empire, to force the Russians and British tosubmit to Parliament’s will (Kinzer, P. 9)

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was willing to put its nuclear program under monitoring, end support

to Hamas and Hizbullah, give full collaboration against any terrorist

group including Al-Qaeda, and even accept the Saudi plan for Israeli-

Palestinian peace (that meant recognize a two state solution and

normalizing relations with a Jewish state)29. However President Bush,

through Cheney and Rumsfeld, said: “we don’t speak to evil”30. As Haas

argues31, leader’s ideological beliefs have strong effects on their

perceptions of international threat, and if Bush and Ahmedinejad had a

big ideological distance (and actually Bush aggressive policies toward

Iran played a role in undermining reformers and pragmatists in favor

of ideological conservatives in Iran) Obama and Rouhani don’t seem to

have it as much32.

But what are the most important American strategic interests

today in the Middle East? May they be compatible with a rapprochement

with Iran? First of all the US have energy interests: even if the US

is becoming more and more independent with the fracking and shale gas

revolution, it will still need to maintain oil prices at a reasonable

level unless it reduces consumptions in the future, and as oil prices

are decided on global markets the US cannot leave the Middle East to

decide the price by itself. The US grand strategy needs also to deny

29 Parsi, Trita. A single roll of the Dice: Obama’s diplomacy with Iran. Yale UP, 2012. P. 1/530 The excessive fear from 9/11 had made George W. Bush define “axis of evil”all the countries accused of helping terrorism and seeking weapons of massdestruction, including Iran. See: State of the Union address, January 29 2002.31 Haas, Mark. The clash of ideologies: Middle Eastern politics and American security. Oxford UP,2012. P. 66/12332 Without forgetting that in the Rouhani government there are more memberswith PhD degrees from American universities than in the government of Obama,and so we should look close to the new technocrats and scholar-diplomats tosee what they can do to reduce the power of the theocrats, as Moises Naimargues: The Case for Giving Iran's Scholar-Diplomats a Chance, The Atlantic, December 3,2014.

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control of the region by any other global power, for geopolitical

reasons going back to the Mackinder’s concept of heartland33. In the

Cold War the rival power was the Soviet Union, in the future it could

be China. Then there is the US interest in supporting democracy, its

main political and identity value, in a region that started to

democratize late, and with much difficulty, as we have seen since the

Arab Spring. But the first and most important US interest in the

Middle East is to protect Israel, America’s main partner in the region

and probably in the world.

The energy interest for now is satisfied by the Gulf countries

but in the future to have a partnership with Iran could also be a

benefit, as Iran, even if is not a swinger producer like Saudi Arabia,

is the 6th world producer with 3.5 billion barrels34. Regarding the risk

of China taking over as leader of the Middle Est, until now she showed

mostly a free-rider attitude, and even if she has many interests in

the region she is too far from it geographically and in term of

capabilities she has not at all the power projection of the US.

Nevertheless China has a strong relationship with Iran, actually it is

the main trading partner of Iran: 35% of Iranian exports are directed

to China and 21% of Iranian imports come from China (19% from

Turkey)35. China provided military equipment to Iran and Iran and China

seem to even start a ‘blue water’ friendship36, in the sense of a

maritime cooperation and naval alliance. But the differences between33 Mackinder, H.J., The Geographical Pivot of History, The Geographical Society, Vol. 23, No.4, (April 1904), 421-43734 Data CIA World Factbook, from: https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/rankorder/2241rank.html?countryname=Iran&countrycode=ir&regionCode=mde&rank=6#ir35 Data: Observatory of Economic Complexity. From: http://atlas.media.mit.edu/profile/country/irn/36 Brian Murphy. Iran and China deepen a ‘blue water’ friendship. The Washington Post, 10/28/2014.

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Chinese navy and its regional presence in the Middle East, and the

ones of the US are still enormous. Besides this, the American and

Chinese interests could converge as some scholars argue37, because both

countries need a stable and safe Middle East for their energy

resources, and Iran could play a role in permitting exactly a

convergence between the two superpowers. Some scholars go even further

saying that as long as the US make China, “more than counterterrorism

and nuclear fear, the bedrock of America’s Middle East strategy in the

twenty first century”38, encouraging China to become international

rather than allowing the Middle East to become Chinese, the risk of

China taking over will be avoided. Therefore even if we don’t know

what will be the reaction of China to a possible American

rapprochement with Iran it seems that it will not necessarily opposed

by China. Finally democracy is not something that can be created by

external forces or in short times, as failing states like Iraq and

Libya and in general Arab Spring demonstrated, and, as previously

argued, democracy is not unknown for Iran neither, where democratic

traditions run deep and which sooner or later the theocracy will have

to take into account. Even if years of international sanctions didn’t

promote a regime change the fact remains that Iran anticipated the

Arab Spring with its own Green Movement in 2009. It is true, the

movement was repressed but the desire for change remains in the young

generations, and will not die. It will just take time. Therefore the

American strategic interests in the region could converge with the

ones of Iran, may be not now but more probably in the future. However

Iran’s growing power (including the acquisition of nuclear

capabilities) and its interest to cast its influence in the Middle37 Alterman, Jon and John W. Garver. The Vital Triangle: China, the United States, and theMiddle East. Center for Strategic & International Studies, 2008. 38 Nasr, 2013, Op. Cit, p. 249

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East, clash with Israel’s wish to remain the only great power in the

region and existential need for security and protection. This is the

most urgent dilemma the US needs to solve if it wants to try a

rapprochement with Iran. Even if the US and Israel may diverge in the

future if the US doesn’t guarantee Israel security there is no role

for the US in the Middle East and as a matter of fact as a trusted

leader in the world.

The bilateral agenda between the US and Iran today for a possible

reconciliation is significant. The nuclear issue is first, to be sure,

but there are other issues too, related to stability and peace in the

Middle East, which cannot be postponed much longer as time is running

out, from the ISIS war to the Arab-Israeli conflict. The factors of

mistrust have not changed between the US and Iran for 34 years, but

Obama seemed to wish to abandon this road to nowhere. From his

speeches in Cairo and Oslo (where he received the Nobel Peace Prize)

in 2009 it took 5 years to arrive to the ‘Geneva interim agreement on

the Iranian nuclear program’ at the end of 2013, the first treaty

between US and Iran in 34 years (even if inside the P5+1, that are the

five permanent members of the UN Security Council plus Germany). But

the negotiations with Iran in reality started with France, Germany and

the UK (called the EU-3) already in 2003, after we discovered in 2002

that Iran had two nuclear sites secretly under construction: a uranium

enrichment facility in Natanz (part of which underground) and a heavy

water facility in Arak.

Therefore the so called “Joint Plan of Action” of 2013, the

Geneva interim agreement, stipulating that Iran cannot enrich uranium

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beyond 5%39 is already a breakthrough in the relation between the West

and Iran. Besides this it is also a new experiment in the nuclear

proliferation around the world, as it is the first time that there are

such type of constant negotiations on limits to a country nuclear

program, and this could also set a useful precedent for other cases.

Today nobody seems to want to break this agreement, as confirmed by

the second extensions of the deadline until July 2015. Diplomacy needs

time and patience and today may be there is time and patience from

both sides. As Trita Parsi argued40 Obama didn’t have neither one nor

the other in his first mandate and the diplomacy with Iran was a

gamble like a single roll of the dice: it had to work immediately or

not at all. Neither the US nor Iran had persistence in 2009, mostly

for domestic reasons, but today the tools of diplomacy seem to be back

between the two countries: the ability to listen, to be patient and

persistent and to use the language carefully and without Manichean

characterization of “good” and “evil.” As Kupchan argues41, skillful

diplomacy is what transform enemies to friends and engagement needs

not be considered as appeasement: it is diplomacy. Will Obama be able

to become the transformational leader that he wanted to be with the

Iranian détente? Or will he fail allowing Iran to cross the red line?

This is the test of US power and effectiveness today in the Middle

East, so let’s see what should take for diplomacy to prevail and,

following the theoretical framework of Kupchan, “stop being enemies

and become friends”.

39 Besides blocking new centrifuges, freezing some of the others and notallowing other uranium enrichment or nuclear reprocessing facilities (Iranreceived $7B in the first 6 months and now $700M per month in sanctionsrelief)40 Parsi, Op. Cit. 41 Kupchan, Charles. How enemies become friends. Princeton UP, 2010.

18

3.1 US-Iran: how to stop being enemies and become friends

Kupchan argues that states can stop being enemies and become

friends creating three possible scenarios: a ‘rapprochement’, a union

or a security community. The ‘rapprochement’ is the easiest one

because it doesn’t mean that the states will necessary become allies

but that “long-standing adversaries, stand down from armed rivalry,

agree to settle their disputes amicably, and ultimately develop mutual

expectation of peaceful coexistence”42. Therefore they stop to be

enemies. To do that the countries have to follow a path of four steps

according to Kupchan: unilateral accommodation to create ‘hope’,

reciprocal restrain to create ‘confidence’, social integration to

create ‘trust’ and generation of new narratives and identities to

create ‘solidarity’43. Kupchan uses in particular as example of

successful rapprochement the case of UK and US, at the turn of the

twentieth century.

Could these steps be used today for a rapprochement between US

and Iran? Let’s analyze them one by one to see if they could be

applied to this case. The first step happens when a state, confronted

with multiple threats makes a strategic restraint to remove one source

of insecurity. The UK for example, after more than one century of open

rivalry, tried to accommodate the US on a number of different issues

(like for example accepting the Monroe doctrine in Latin America44). In

the case of US and Iran today, and in particular in relations with the

42 Kupchan, Op. Cit., P. 943 Kupchan, Op. Cit., P. 35/52 (all the steps for rapprochement)44 Kupchan, Or. Cit., P. 77

19

nuclear negotiations that is the most urgent issue today, a unilateral

accommodation from the US side could be to send its top negotiator,

the Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs Wendy Sherman, to

Teheran for an informal talk as a sign of distension (as Kissinger

went to China in the secret visit). Or a meeting between President

Obama and his counterpart Hassan Rouhani, as David Cameron did in

September 2014 at the UN headquarters (for the first time since the

Islamic Revolution) would represent an important step towards that

direction. For Iran, on the other side, a unilateral accommodation

would be an action like accepting stronger restriction on its nuclear

program. A real striking unilateral accommodation from the Iranian

side would be the recognition of the existence of Israel, which would

represent a real shift in the Iran-US relationship and in general in

the Iranian role in the Middle East. But with the Ayatollah regime

this seems quite improbable yet, unless a much more moderate ayatollah

respect to Khamenei will substitute him sooner or later. Anyway, there

are different possible actions that these two states could do as

unilateral accommodations. At the end of the day creativity is an

important tool of diplomacy and the two countries should try to think

about new things as first steps of rapprochement.

The second step is a reciprocal restraint, that happens when

states trade concessions stepping away from rivalry towards

cooperation: both parties practice accommodations and expect

reciprocity. In the Middle East an example of reciprocal restrain was

the Egypt-Israel peace treaty of 1979, in which the two countries

agreed to mutual recognition, cessation of the state of war and

normalization of relations. An important policy implication of this

second step is that a real rapprochement requires programmatic (not

20

temporary) practice of strategic restrain. Therefore the US and Iran

should really make all efforts to make a lasting deal, after the

Geneva interim agreement. This will be the reciprocal restrain

necessary to stop to be enemies. For now, as I said, the deadline of

the interim agreement has been extended because of differences mostly

over the future size of Iranian enrichment program45, but a stable

agreement should be signed in the next year or at the latest before

the end of the Obama administration, as the new administration, in

particular if Republican instead of Democratic, could be much less

interested in diplomatic means and temporary agreements could be

overturned very quickly.

The third step, defined by Kupchan as ‘social integration’,

happens when transactions increase and diplomatic relations are the

norm, resulting in more contacts among officials, elites but also

ordinary citizens (with common forum and institutions for example).

This is still far from being implemented between Iran and US but in

case of a nuclear deal the space for restarting diplomatic relations

will be open again. In the meantime exchanges of students, workers and

citizens should be increased among the two countries, using also

forums to create trust among the two nations, like the American-

Iranian council. Finally the last step towards rapprochement is a

generation of new narratives and identities, happening through elite’

statements, popular culture and political symbolism, embracing a new

domestic discourse in which distinction between self and other erode.45 Over the four months of the extension, Iran received $2.8 billion inpreviously frozen oil revenue held in banks abroad, in addition to the $4.2billion it got already. In exchange, Iran agreed to take some additionalnuclear steps, besides to halt the enrichment of uranium at more than 20%,including diluting a large amount of low-enriched uranium. IAEA confirmeduntil now that Iran is respecting the deal. Source: IAEA report, September 5,2014. From: http://www.iaea.org/newscenter/focus/iaeairan/iaea_reports.shtml

21

An important policy implication of this is that political discourses

and foreign policy language should be taken more seriously into

consideration given their effects. As we saw with the US and Iran this

step actually has been starting already, at least in part with the

change from stigmatization of the other (evil or Satan) to new

narratives of moderation and dialogue. But it needs to keep changing,

in particular from the Iranian side, as if Iran still talk about

eliminating the presence of Israel from the Middle East for example,

this will not help the rapprochement between Iran and the US (actually

with the violent narrative of Ahmadinejad, negating also the Shoah,

the increased fear of Israel made a possible Israeli preemptive strike

very close).

One final important thing to underline in Kupchan model is that

democracy is not a necessary condition for stable peace, even if the

Democratic Peace Theory may have good insights the reality is that

lasting peace is not unique to liberal democracies. Therefore, if we

follow this model, democratization process in Iran is not necessarily

a condition for the rapprochement between Iran and the US. In reality,

as Nasr argues46, the Obama administration, even if it put aside the

idea of George W. Bush of regime change in Iran, still hope that in

the long run the sanctions will be able to facilitate a popular

movement against the regime47. But until now the sanctions just made a

change in the leadership (with Rouhani instead of Ahmadinejad) not in

the regime, also because ultimately the sanctions were not against

human rights violations but against what is considered by Iran a

legitimate goal, largely supported by the population, of becoming a46 Nasr, 2013, Op. Cit., p. 13647 The sanctions made the Iranian economy shrank by 5.8% in 2012/2013, after adecade of growing over 5% a year. Data: World Bank. From: http://www.worldbank.org/en/country/iran/overview

22

nuclear power (even if not necessarily with nuclear weapons48). This is

important in order to understand the differences between Iranian

population and the regime on having a nuclear program: at the end of

the day Iranian regime priority is the survival of the Islamic

Republic and the US represent a threat to it. That is why Teheran

started since the revolution its strategy of deterrence against the

American policy of containment, as Milani argued49. Deterrence based on

the ability to fight asymmetric low-intensity war, modernization of

weapons systems, but also the nuclear program (that even if violate

the Islamic law, as Teheran says, could be the secret arm of Iran, in

the same way that Israel has it with the policy of ‘nuclear

ambiguity’).

Concluding this chapter we can say that a rapprochement between

Iran and the US is possible (and according to some analyst already

happening50) but the two countries will have to make a lasting deal on

the nuclear issue. This is the most important question right now to

arrive to a détente between them and therefore to stop being enemies,

and it seems that a possible deal is supported also by the American

48 According to a RAND 87% of Iranians favor the development of nuclear energyfor civilian use (98% believe that is a national right) while for thedevelopment of nuclear weapons 46% oppose and 43% favor it (RAND, What DoIranians Think? A Survey of Attitudes on the United States, the Nuclear Program, and the Economy,2011, p. 11) 49 Mohsen Milani. Tehran’s take. Understanding Iran’s US Policy. Foreign Affairs, July/August 2009, P. 46-6250 Jay Solomon and Maria Abi-Habib. US Iran relations move to détente. Washington Post, October 28, 2014.

23

population51, besides the Iranian population52. But a deal could still

find a strong opponent, which the US have to take into account, an

opponent that has the most capacity to affect the success (before and

after) of a possible deal and that the US cannot leave aside: Israel.

Will the US be able to convince Israel of the necessity of a

rapprochement between the US and Iran? And furthermore will the US be

able to convince Israel to accept Iran in the long run even as the

tenth nuclear power in the world and second in the Middle East, to be

contained and deterred without fear of an Armageddon, as scholars like

Pollack argue53? This is one of the crucial questions today for the

starting of the solution of the Middle East conundrum.

3.2 US-Iran: Israel and the nuclear issue

51 According to a recent study 61% of American people favor a deal with Iranthat would limit Iran’s enrichment capacity and impose additional intrusiveinspections in exchange for the lifting of some sanctions. See: World PublicOpinion, Large Majority of Americans Favor Making a Deal with Iran on its Nuclear Program, July15, 201452 According to a 2012 poll 63% support a deal to remove sanctions (see: LosAngeles Times, Iranians want end to sanctions, short-lived poll finds, July 4, 2012). Andaccording to a 2014 survey by the University of Tehran Center for PublicOpinion Research (UTCPOR) and the Center for International and SecurityStudies at Maryland (CISSM) a majority said that four concessions in the dealcould be acceptable: 1) giving the P5+1 assurances that Iran will neverproduce a nuclear weapon (79% acceptable); 2) allowing current internationalinspections to continue (76%); 3) permitting more inspections (62%); and notenriching any uranium above 5% for an agreed-upon period (57%) (See Iranianattitudes on nuclear negotiations, CISSM, September 2014)53 Pollack, Kenneth. Unthinkable: Iran, the Bomb, and American Strategy. Simon & Schuster,2013 (p.103). See also earlier articles: Fareed Zakaria. History could be a deterrentto Iranian aggression. Washington Post, 2/15/2012. Lindsay and Takeyh. After Iran getsthe bomb: containment and its complications. Foreign Affairs, March/April 2010.

24

The first thing to answer these questions is to see if the

Israeli perception of Iran as a potential great power with hegemonic

possibilities is correct. If we follow the definition of Ray Cline54,

who devised a formula for its measurement, the perception of power

should be based on the sum of military capability, economy and mass of

a country (including territorial size and population) multiplied by

the sum of strategy and political will (which are intangible factors

and thus difficult to measure)55. With a population ten times that of

Israel, a land mass almost 80 times, a GDP three times larger and

manpower available for military service 13 times the one of Israel56,

Iran can already be considered as a great power in the Middle East,

more than a potential one. And even if military wise Israel is still

superior in conventional capabilities57 if Iran will obtain nuclear

weapons the military gap will be reduced and Iranian threats will make

Israel’s fears understandable, given also the fact that nuclear

deterrence not necessarily would work in this conflict as a first

strike against Israel would hurt much more than a second strike

54 Cline, Ray. The Power of Nations in the 1990s: A Strategic Assessment. University Press OfAmerica, 1993. 55 Today, however, we could say that the elements of power are not cumulativebut multiplicative, in the sense that if a country lacks any one of them itsfinal power will amount to zero, as there is no possible real power withoutone of its three elements: military, economy and mass. 56 DATA (2013) Population: Iran 80,840,713, Israel 7,821,850. Area: Iran1,531,595 sq km, Israel 20,770 sq km. GDP (purchasing power parity): Iran$987.1 billion, Israel $273.2 billion. Manpower available for military service(both male and female): Iran 46,247,556, Israel 3,511,190. Source: The WorldFact Book, 2014. From: https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/57 Iran is in the 22nd position while Israel in the 11th in the list of militarystrength based on conventional war-making capabilities across land, sea and air. Data from the Global Fire Power and FAS/Military Analysis Network. See: http://www.globalfirepower.com/countries-comparison-detail.asp?form=form&country1=Iran&country2=Israel&Submit=Compare+Countries

25

against Iran (because of the small size of Israeli population respect

to the Iranian one).

But, as argued, domestic policy and leaders have also an

influence in the perception of a threat58. And if in the US and Iran

Obama and Rouhani have substituted Bush and Ahmadinejad (even if the

Ayatollah Khamenei remains the Supreme leader of Iran) in Israel

Benjamin Netanyahu is still prime minister. Netanyahu strongly

believes that Iran is a real threat to Israel and, according to who

knows him well, ‘he sees his place in history to defend Israel and the

Jewish people from Iran’59. Therefore if the US want to strike a deal

with Iran, first need to take into account the Israeli leadership,

trying to reassure and restrain it at the same time, convincing it to

avoid a preemptive strike in case a lasting deal will not be reached

or what Israel may consider a ‘bad deal’ will be done. But how to

convince Israel that a war with Iran would be much worse than a

nuclear deal even if it could lead in the long run to a nuclear Iran?

How to address the Israel’s sense of vulnerability reducing the

potential for unilateral Israeli actions? To try to answer these

questions I will follow the argument of Kenneth Pollack60.

According to Pollack61 there are four options for American

policymakers today: redoubling efforts at a carrot-and-stick approach

that combines negotiations and sanctions (aiding the Iranian

opposition to bring about a popular form of regime change), a plan for

a regime change, an Israeli military strike, and containing a nuclear

58 Haas, Op. Cit. 59 Danahar, Paul. The New Middle East: The world after the Arab Spring. Bloomsbury Press, 2013. P. 26460 Pollack, Kenneth. Unthinkable: Iran, the Bomb, and American Strategy. Simon & Schuster, 2013. 61 Pollack, Op. Cit. p.103/104

26

Iran. Pollack opts for the last one in case the carrot and stick

approach fails or the regime change proves impractical, as he excludes

the attack as a wise option62. Iran has already enough uranium

enrichment capacity, missile technology and nuclear skills that cannot

be erased completely and even a perfect attack would just delay the

program of few years, while the regime would try a new program,

stronger and less vulnerable. The complexity and duration of such

military operation are too high, as there are hundreds of targets to

destroy and Iran may be already in the ‘zone of immunity’63. Besides

this, the preventive war would require too big efforts without

guarantees of success, as the Iraq disaster already demonstrated.

There is no possible easy scenario for a conflict of such proportions

and the spillover could be uncontrollable. This should convince Israel

to live with a nuclear Iran allowing the US just to contain it. The

containment, as Pollack argues64, should be done similarly to what the

US has done since the Islamic revolution, and similarly to the one

done with the Soviet Union, that is to use all tools necessary to

limit the power and influence of the hostile nation until it implodes.

It would mean mostly economic sanctions and support to internal

political opposition to the regime, the same things that the US has

done with a non-nuclear Iran already.

Even if Pollack doesn’t believe in the risk of nuclear

proliferation in the area if Iran gets nuclear weapons (similarly to

62 Pollack, Op. Cit. p. XX63 Zone of immunity was defined by Israel’s defense minister, Ehud Barak, as the point when the accumulated know-how, raw materials, and equipment is such that an attack could not derail the Iranian nuclear project64 Pollack, Op. Cit., p. 370/391

27

Waltz65) others disagree: Cirincione66 for example, argues that the

world cannot go back to a nuclear arms race now that the states with

nuclear weapons or research programs went down from 23 in the 1960s to

9 of today. The same position is maintained by Kroening67 who makes the

case that the time to attack Iran has arrived, as we need to avoid a

nuclear Iran by any means. Two years ago scholars and politicians

alike thought that time was running short, actually Netanyahu drew his

red line across a cartoon bomb at the UN General Assembly in September

2012, saying: “that's why everyone should have a sense of urgency.”68

Some scholars even argued that we were in a slow motion Cuban missile

crisis69, even if the two cases cannot be compared as history is always

different (not for nothing an interim agreement has been signed last

year).

Anyway if a lasting deal will be done a new opening with Iran

will be possible. Today it is the moment to roll the dice either to

create a ‘peace to end all wars’ or to open space for world

uncertainty, but it seems that nobody would chose the second and so

there is not a sense of urgency anymore, at least not so much as two

years ago70. Scholars and policy makers alike understand that diplomacy

takes time and the fact that the deadline for a comprehensive

agreement, has been postponed for the second time demonstrates it.65 Kenneth Waltz. Why Iran Should Get the Bomb. Foreign Affairs, July/August 2012. 66 Cirincione, Joseph. Nuclear Nightmares: Securing the World Before It Is Too Late. Columbia UP, 2013. 67 Kroening, Matthew. A Time to Attack: The Looming Iranian Nuclear Threat. Palgrave Macmillan Trade, 201468 Netanyahu speech at UN General Assembly. From: http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=43088&Cr=general+debate&Cr1#.VFLg-hbIrd469 Graham Allison. Will Iran be Obama’s Cuban Missile Crisis? The Washington Post, March 8 201270 See also on this the changes in the Iranian society: The revolution is over, The Economist, November 1, 2014.

28

Actually an interim agreement is better than no agreement, as it

pauses the nuclear program giving more time for negotiations and

avoiding both a possible attack on Iran and a reactivation of Iranian

nuclear program for the bomb. The P5+1 should be patient and Israel

too: a deal is always behind the corner but diplomacy takes time, and

may be the interim agreement could remain for a long time. Nobody

seems to want to break an agreement made between the US and Iran after

34 years of no talks.

But if a nuclear deal will arrive what will be the consequences

of it? Would that make the case for a rapprochement as Kupchan would

say? Or will not be able to change the rivalry between US and Iran as

others argue71? I believe a nuclear deal would profoundly change the

dynamics of the Middle East, probably not as much as an Arab-Israeli

deal, but it will anyway represent an important shift in the Middle

Eastern order. Not so much for the deal in itself but because it would

bring back Iran to the international arena, opening in this way space

for a future rapprochement also between Israel and Iran (even if not

probably before than the Ayatollah regime would be gone). An effective

rapprochement of the “West” with Iran though, could benefit from the

support of another regional rising power, who always represented the

bridge between the West and the East, and that could play today an

important role not only helping to bring Iran back to the

international system, but allowing the US to retain an efficient role

of external leadership, and help the new Middle Eastern order to

unfold. This country is Turkey.

71 Kevin Sullivan. A nuclear deal with Iran won't end the Middle East's big cold war. The Week, October 13, 2014.

29

4. A possible Turkish role in the US-Iranian rapprochement

In this final chapter I will argue, along with several scholars72,

that in the new American approach to the Middle Eastern quagmire

another rising power apart Iran should play an important role: Turkey.

Turkey is a Sunni country, like Saudi Arabia, and has a democratic

government, like Israel; it’s a powerful and stable country, similarly

to Iran, and its regional role has been growing since its own ‘pivot

to East’ (and the first country that Turkey meet pivoting to the East

is Iran); Turkey is a stable member of NATO and an ‘eternal’ and

frustrated candidate for the EU (that to increase its legitimacy and

power and to demonstrate coherence to its pluralistic approach, should

include a Muslim country in its border, but this is another issue).

All this besides other elements makes of Turkey a front runner for the

future stability in the Middle East, and also in the post nuclear deal

with Iran, in order to facilitate a possible American alliance with

Iran after stop being enemies to become friend.

Turkey and Iran have common (even if not equal) strategic

interests in the region, besides having similar values and principles,

rooted in their identity, and a strong economic and energetic

interdependence that make the two countries quite intertwined73. This72 Stephen Kinzer, Trita Parsi, Graham Fuller, Vali Nasr, Einat Wilf. See in the works cited. 73 Trade between Turkey and Iran rose from $1 billion in 2000 to $10 billionin 2010 and the two sides plan to triple the volume of trade to $30 billion.Iran is the second-largest supplier of natural gas to Turkey, behind Russiaand also provides close to 40 percent of Turkey’s imports for crude oil. Non-energy trade between Iran and Turkey is also substantial: in addition to oiland gas, Iran exports industrial products to Turkey. Turkey is the fifthbiggest destination for Iran’s nonoil exports and Iran is Turkey’s thirdlargest export market. From: RAND, Turkish-Iranian Relations in a ChangingMiddle East, 2013. P. 31-32

30

doesn’t mean that there are not differences between them: Turkey and

Iran have historically been rivals rather than close partners, but the

Western idea of Iranian-Turkish rivalry based on different political

identities and ideologies, Sunni/Shia divide or secular/religious

regime, falls short in deeply understanding their relationship today.

It is true that Turkey chose to rely on economy and GDP growth to

increase its influence in the region, instead than on ideology as

Iranian regime did, but Turkey lives between the Western model and the

Middle Eastern values, representing a balance between the two, and

since a decade, with the new moderate Islamist party in power, it

started to pivot to Middle East after a century of absence

(practically since the Ottoman Empire collapsed after WWI).

All this makes of Turkey a power that could really become a

crucial player in the region, as Kinzer74 and Fuller75, among others,

argue. Trita Parsi76 even argues that Turkey could be a key player in

the US-Iran rapprochement because it has been able until now to

control the Iranians attempt to become the leader in the region

through agreements instead of isolation. This ability of Turkey to

elicit Iranian cooperation should be used by the US to have a

rapprochement with Iran and later may be even to include Iran in a

possible future regional security community, Parsi states. I don’t

know if at this point Turkey could become a determinant player to make

a rapprochement with Iran more possible even if Turkey made already a

nuclear agreement with Iran (with the help also of Brazil) in 201077.

But I think that the role of Turkey would be more useful in a post-

74 Kinzer, Stephen. Reset. Iran, Turkey and America’s future. Times books, 2010.75 Graham Fuller. The new Turkish republic: Turkey as a pivotal state in the Muslim world. US Institute of Peace200776 Parsi, Op. Cit., P. 239-24077 Parsi, Op. Cit., P. 123

31

nuclear deal with Iran, in order to become a stabilizer together with

Iran in the chaos of the Middle East.

Turkey today, with the new presidency of Recep Erdogan (president

after 8 years as Prime Minister) is a growing country, economically

and politically, that wants to use better his very important

geostrategic position as the joining link between Europe and Asia.

This country seems to wish to project its power again, after a century

of hibernation, to try to resolve regional conflicts in the Middle

East with dialogue, and even, as Fuller argues, to become the pivot

state in the Middle East78. The current group of leaders at the

beginning of this century has taken the end of cold war as stimulus

for redesign Turkish approach to the world, and funded the Justice and

Development Party (or AK party) in 2001 as a social conservative

political party, developed from the tradition of Islamism but

officially abandoning this ideology in favor of ‘conservative

democracy’. Both Erdogan and Ahmed Davutoglu, the current Prime

Minister, today have a strong mandate from their people that they

seems wanting to use to give back Turkey some of the big power it had

in the past. And this seems to pass from a recuperation of the Turkish

Islamic and Middle Eastern identity, and also from a new alliance with

Iran, first of all because of its geographical, political and

religious affinity.

Fuller79 also remembers how before the Arab Spring Turkey could

have been considered as the only Muslim country in the Middle East

that achieved real prosperity, democratic depth and social stability.

During Arab Spring other countries seemed to open to new developments,

78 Fuller, 2007, Op. Cit. 79 Fuller, Graham. Turkey and the Arab Spring. Bozorg Press, 2014.

32

but after almost three years we have again uncertainty, instability

and the possible leadership for a political order in the Middle East

is unsure and more complex than ever. Therefore Turkey and Iran could

really become the “pace-setters”80 for the future Middle East given the

fact that their relationship has been stable for hundreds of years

(even if not necessarily in an alliance, having the Sunni Ottoman

Empire and the Shia Safavid Empire been in a “cold war” for long

time). Also, their potential rivals as regional leaders, Egypt and

Saudi Arabia, have domestic difficulties today and not similar

potentialities for leadership in the near future. Furthermore, the

current situation with ISIS could represent a reason for collaboration

between the two countries, and a future settlement of the Syrian

crisis could also ease quite a lot Ankara’s relations with Teheran81.

Even an ex member of the Knesset, Einat Wilf, argues that Turkey, Iran

and Israel represent today the most stable regional powers and in the

future could build together the architecture to deal with the current

dis-order of the Middle East82.

Therefore the US should think about a stronger partnership with

Turkey, not only based on NATO membership, but may be involving Turkey

in new bilateral agreements, recuperating the closeness lost in part

with the Iraq war (opposed by Turkey also for the Kurdish issue) and

building a cooperative approach that could have beneficial effects in

the region. To say it with Kinzer, the US should do a ‘reset’ today in

the alliances of the Middle East. Would a new partnership among the US

Iran and Turkey in the future really create for the Middle East the

80 Fuller, Op. Cit., P. 28281 Fuller, Op. Cit., P. 304/31882 Wilf, Einat. The new dis(order) of the Middle East. Turkish Policy Quarterly, Spring 2014.

33

new “power triangle of the twenty-first century”83 as Kinzer argues?.

We don’t know yet as such partnerships will not be born overnight but

Obama seems to see the relationship with Turkey as very important,

having conferred with Erdogan probably more than with any other world

leader84, and if a nuclear deal with Iran will be done next year, the

first stone towards a new regional order will be put.

Conclusions

In this paper I argued that to face the conundrum in the Middle

East and create the shared leadership that the region needs, the US

will have to think to new alliances, in particular with a

rapprochement with Iran and a new partnership with Turkey. Will the

last two years of Obama administration, and maybe the new

administration in the future, be able to foster a foreign policy based

on dialogue towards such new alliances in the Middle East? Only the

future will tell us but a deal with Iran, which could represent a

‘peace to end all wars’ in the Middle East, even if it is hard it is

not impossible. The US, Israel and the West know that politics and

regimes are temporary and they change but nations don’t, and if the US

wants to continue to have an efficient role of external leadership in

the region, they have to look beyond the current regimes and draw new

policies for new collaborations. Iran is a great nation that could

contribute to the stability that the Middle East desperately needs,

and Turkey too, representing the only actor able to build the bridge

between the West and the East in the region. Israel will benefit from

this rapprochement too in the long run, and may be it could also find

83 Kinzer, Op. Cit., P. 1284 Nasr, 2013, Op. Cit., P. 197

34

the legitimacy that it never had to the eyes of the regional powers,

to become a legitimate state for the new order in the Middle East.

It took 7 years after the visit of Nixon to Beijing to

reestablish diplomatic relations between the US and China. The US

didn’t wait for the change of the regime and didn’t punish China for

the actions of its past. Obviously different geographies and different

eras cannot be compared, but rapprochements, as we saw with Kupchan’s

scheme, always need time, and diplomatic engagement with rivals, far

from being appeasement, is critical to stop being enemies, opening

space for starting to become friends. A comprehensive nuclear

agreement with Iran next first of July or first of March would be a

breakthrough and a great occasion, as it could start a positive

rapprochement with spillover effects for the stability of the region that

we cannot even imagine right now. If it will not be done by Obama than

may be the first woman president of the US, already a great diplomat

when Secretary of State, will be able to do it.

35

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-Lewis, Bernard. The end of modern history in the Middle East, Hoover InstitutionPress, 2011.

-Thomas Lippman, Saudi Arabia on the edge: the uncertain future of an American ally,Potomac Books, 2012.

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-Nasr, Vali. The dispensable nation: American foreign policy in retreat. Doubleday,2013.

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-Nye, Joseph. The powers to lead. Oxford UP, 2010.

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Articles

-Allison, Graham. Will Iran be Obama’s Cuban Missile Crisis? The Washington Post,March 8 2012.

-Francis, David and Yochi Dreazen. Secret White House Letter Highlights Iran’sImportance to Islamic State Fight. November 6, 2014.

-Lindsay James and Ray Takeyh. After Iran gets the bomb: containment and itscomplications. Foreign Affairs, March/April 2010.

-Mohsen Milani. Tehran’s take. Understanding Iran’s US Policy. ForeignAffairs, July/August 2009

-Murphy, Brian. Iran and China deepen a ‘blue water’ friendship. The WashingtonPost, 10/28/2014

-Naim, Moises. The Case for Giving Iran's Scholar-Diplomats a Chance. The Atlantic,December 3, 2014.

-RAND, What Do Iranians Think? A Survey of Attitudes on the United States, the NuclearProgram, and the Economy, 2011.

-RAND, Turkish-Iranian Relations in a Changing Middle East, 2013.

-Ross, Dennis. How to muddle through with Iran. The Washington Institute,October 13, 2014.

-Serfaty, Simon. Shaping things to come: America’s role. The National Interest,April 22 2014

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-Solomon Jay, and Maria Abi-Habib. US Iran relations move to détente. WashingtonPost, October 28, 2014.

-The Economist, The revolution is over, Report, November 1, 2014.

-Wilf, Einat. The new dis(order) of the Middle East. Turkish Policy Quarterly,Spring 2014.

-World Public Opinion, Large Majority of Americans Favor Making a Deal with Iran onits Nuclear Program, July 15, 2014.

-Zakaria, Fareed. History could be a deterrent to Iranian aggression. Washington Post, 2/15/2012.

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