Diplomacy & Statecraft, 26:294–321, 2015Copyright © Taylor & Francis Group, LLCISSN: 0959-2296 print/1557-301X onlineDOI: 10.1080/09592296.2015.1034570

Engaging Adversaries: Myths and Realitiesin American Foreign Policy

JEFFREY R. FIELDS

American policy-makers and politicians present specious rationalesfor abjuring diplomatic engagement with adversarial regimes andactors. The conventional wisdom is that negotiating with adver-saries is futile and a form of reward that the enemy will exploit.This tool of statecraft, therefore, should be avoided. However, manyof the objections for avoiding diplomacy are suspect when exam-ined closely. In addition, though prominent adversaries like Iranhave generally shunned the United States, it has regularly engagedother hostile and adversarial regimes and non-state actors. Theselective use of specious reasons contributes to an American foreignpolicy that often prefers the isolation and containment of ‘roguestates.’ Additionally, myths like the futility of appeasing adversarieshave taken hold, and practitioners rarely question it. The post-ColdWar American ‘diplomacy allergy’ is often counter-productive andstands in contrast to Cold War pragmatism.

American diplomacy with adversarial states has had a paradoxical naturehistorically. The United States has often been reluctant directly to engagediplomatically with its adversaries, especially so-called rogue states likeCuba, Iran, and North Korea. What reasons lie behind this foreign policystance? Despite diplomatic engagement sometimes being the only viableoption for dealing with a security threat, policy-makers often avoid andnot infrequently disparage it. The United States has no official diplomaticrelations with the three countries just mentioned, two of which presentseemingly intractable nuclear threats.1

Policy and academic circles debate the wisdom and utility of diplo-matic engagement.2 Nonetheless, perhaps unconsciously, feelings of self-righteousness, moral superiority, and American exceptionalism drive UnitedStates policies that spurn or restrict constructive engagement and find gen-eral basis on myths and narratives. Rather than delve into the sourcesof those ideological or emotional drivers, it is important to focus on the

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misperceptions, many of accepted as truth and conventional wisdom.3 Thesemyths are specious and selectively applied as rationales used to support iso-lationist policies. Diplomatic engagement or constructive engagement—thecentral focus here is but one amongst many tools of statecraft employed bygovernments to help achieve their foreign policy objectives.4 In this analy-sis, ‘engagement’ means a ‘continuous—sustained—dialogue, conducted bydiplomats’ to foster co-operation, build confidence, reduce tensions, or cre-ate a space for further interaction.5 In this sense, the terms ‘engagement’ and‘diplomatic engagement’ are synonymous.

Though rhetorically demonising adversaries is not new in Americanforeign policy, holding those adversaries at arm’s length as a consistent,practical policy is a more recent phenomenon. Throughout the Cold War andpost-Cold war period, prominent statesmen from George Kennan to James A.Baker III have advocated and pursued diplomacy with adversaries. The puz-zle in American foreign policy is why diplomatic engagement is frequentlyavoided. Making the question more confounding is the observation that theUnited States does engage adversarial actors, but policy-makers and pun-dits often ignore this reality.6 Domestic politics, ideology, and reputationalconcerns drive selective isolationist policies. Moreover, whilst policies ofisolation can be politically palatable and ideologically satisfying, they sel-dom achieve desired ends or further American foreign policy interests asthe literature on sanctions illustrates.7 The focus of this assessment centreson specious and selective rationales employed by practitioners to abjurediplomatic engagement.

American policy-makers and practitioners once promoted the merits ofengaging adversarial regimes—for instance, Communist China and the SovietUnion—to maintain strategic and regional balances of power. In the post-Cold War world, ideology has begun to supplant pragmatism and realpolitik.For example, former Vice President Dick Cheney allegedly once proclaimed,‘I have been charged by the President with making sure that none of thetyrannies in the world are negotiated with. We don’t negotiate with evil;we defeat it.’8 Referring to North Korea, and along with a number of high-ranking George W. Bush Administration officials, he was adamantly opposedto a negotiated solution with Pyongyang to resolve the nuclear crisis thathad vexed the Administration almost from its first days in office. Cheney’santipathy for negotiating with adversaries is not unique amongst Americanforeign policy elites. In a surprising revelation, the Obama Administration hasbeen secretly engaged in negotiations with Cuba over normalising relationssince 2013.9 However, several Republican legislators on learning of the WhiteHouse’s intent to re-establish diplomatic relations with Havana vowed toobstruct the deal.10 One expert frames the dynamic aptly:

Containment is the easy answer but it is also the wrong one becauseit is based on flawed and simplistic assumptions about how to deal

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with rogue regimes in the post-cold war era. In short, these assumptionsare that such regimes cannot be engaged and by virtue of their inter-national isolation they should be left to collapse of their own accord.Moreover, if action must be taken, then what worked and won the coldwar—containment—should work and win again. Finally, engaging rogueregimes is reprehensible. It sets bad precedents in terms of rewardingdeviant behavior and in the end only prolongs the problem rather thansolves it.11

Others have written about the utility and under-appreciation for engage-ment and positive inducements in theory and practice. Understandingwhy engagement is not a preferred policy with some adversaries is anunder-explored question in international security—the observation that thisdynamic exists is, however, prevalent. The exploration also has policy impli-cations. The United States maintained diplomatic relations with the SovietUnion during the Cold War. As Senator Arlen Specter noted ‘we have seenthat President Reagan identified the Soviet Union as the ‘evil empire’ andshortly thereafter engaged in direct bilateral negotiations and very, very suc-cessfully.’ That contact was crucial in resolving crises and, amongst otherthings, reaching landmark arms control agreements.12 Additionally, if thereis any merit to the notion that negotiating with enemies is wrong-headed,a second puzzle emerges about why the United States is selective in apply-ing this principle.13 Table 1 illustrates notable cases of American diplomaticengagement with ‘rogue’ regimes and actors. As a further illustration of theparadox, the United States maintains official diplomatic relations with other‘problematic’ regimes like Venezuela and Syria and with many repressive,authoritarian states like Burma, Uzbekistan, and Zimbabwe—see Table 2.

Some might argue that the answer to the question of why Americanpolicy-maker preferences are often for isolating rogue states is obvious. It isone simply of domestic politics: either fearing allegations of weakness andappeasement and subsequent political repercussions or promulgating poli-cies that satisfy domestic lobbies.14 Still, whether the policy-maker genuinelyholds a perception of appeasement as a reason to abjure engagement islargely irrelevant because political rivals and the public will interpret the tac-tic as one of weakness and capitulation. This is a valid but also incompleteexplanation. It also does not explain the central paradox. When domesticpolitics is not the primary factor, why employ engagement with some outlierstates and problematic actors?

Realist International Relations theory suggests that when states cannotachieve their desired foreign policy objectives by coercing weaker ones, theymay turn to positive incentives or engagement so long as ‘they believe thatthis will have no adverse reputational consequences.’15 An important issueis, then, to explore the role reputation plays in weighing the benefits ofengagement strategies.16 Concerns about reputation are the basis, even when

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TABLE 1 US Engagement with Rogue Actors

Entity Dates

OfficialDiplomaticRelations Details

USSR 1933–1991 Yes The United States maintained diplomaticrelations with the USSR throughout the ColdWar, concluding 23 president/premier levelsummits and arms control agreements.

PRC 1972–present Yes (1979 topresent)

President Nixon’s visit to China in 1972 ledthe way to restoration of official relations in1979. Nixon was an advocate of diplomacyin the region even before becomingpresident.

South Africa 1948–1994 Yes The United States maintained diplomaticrelations with the Apartheid governmentthroughout its existence. Only in 1986 didWashington join in imposing economicsanctions on South Africa.

DPRK 1989–present No The United States has never had diplomaticrelations with Pyongyang. The ClintonAdministration concluded the landmarkAgreed Framework with the regime. TheBush Administration initially favouredisolation but eventually agreed tomultilateral talks on the nuclear issue.

Libya 1992–2003 No Beginning in 1992, the United States quietlyengaged with Libya resulting in a2003 agreement by Tripoli to renounce allWeapons of Mass Destruction programmes.Diplomatic relations with the United Stateswere restored 1994.

Iran 1985–1986 No Washington sold TOW missiles and parts toTehran in exchange for hostage releases inLebanon.

Iran 2001 No US officials secretly meet with Iranian officialsto discuss unseating the Taliban. Talksculminated with Iranian participation at theBonn conference.

Syria 1974–present Yes Three presidents met with former PresidentHafez al-Assad. The United States maintainsdiplomatic relations with Syria thoughWashington designates it as a state sponsorof terrorism. The United States suspendedembassy operations in February 2012, butdiplomatic relations remain unsevered.

FARC 1998 N/A High-level American governmentrepresentatives met with representatives ofthe Revolutionary Armed Forces ofColombia [FARC]—the oldest guerrilla groupin the Americas. FARC was listed on theState Department’s list of Foreign TerroristOrganizations.

Taliban 2013 N/A The United States began direct talks with theTaliban in Qatar with the aim of ending thewar in Afghanistan.

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TABLE 2 United States Diplomatic Relations with Selected Repressive Regimes

CountryFreedom

StatusFreedom HouseCountry Rating

US DiplomaticRelations

Burma Not Free 6.0 YesLibya Not Free 6.0 YesIran Not Free 6.0 NoBelarus Not Free 6.5 YesChad Not Free 6.5 YesChina Not Free 6.5 YesCuba Not Free 6.5 YesLaos Not Free 6.5 YesEquatorial Guinea Not Free 7.0 YesEritrea Not Free 7.0 YesNorth Korea Not Free 7.0 NoSomalia Not Free 7.0 NoSudan Not Free 7.0 YesTurkmenistan Not Free 7.0 YesUzbekistan Not Free 7.0 YesSaudi Arabia Not Free 7.0 YesSyria Not Free 7.0 Yes

See: Freedom House, “Freedom in the World 2015”: https://freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-world/freedom-world-2015#.VQw-7-HMJWA.

unstated, for many arguments against diplomatic engagement and especiallynegotiations with states of concern.

Open debate on this issue occurred in the 2008 presidential election.When Barack Obama remarked in 2007 during the Democratic presidentialprimary that he would meet with American adversaries like Iran withoutprecondition, he was characterised as an appeaser and naïve on foreignpolicy. He faced the question about whether he would be ‘willing to meetseparately, without precondition, during the first year of his administration,in Washington or anywhere else, with the leaders of Iran, Syria, Venezuela,Cuba and North Korea in order to bridge the gap that divides our coun-tries.’ Obama replied that ‘the notion that somehow not talking to countriesis punishment to them, which has been the guiding diplomatic principleof [the Bush] administration, is ridiculous.’17 Over the course of the nextyear, Obama’s words suffered derision on the campaign trail. His oppo-nent, Republican Senator John McCain, remarked, ‘Such a statement betraysthe depth of Senator Obama’s inexperience and reckless judgment.’18 Aday later, McCain told an audience of Cuban-Americans that Obama’s pre-sumed stance toward diplomacy with Cuba ‘would send the worst possiblesignal to Cuba’s dictators: There is no need to undertake fundamentalreforms; they can simply wait for a unilateral change in U.S. policy.’19

Addressing the Israeli parliament a week before McCain’s comment, Bushissued the ultimate and most enduring condemnation of negotiating withadversaries:

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Some seem to believe that we should negotiate with the terrorists andradicals, as if some ingenious argument will persuade them they havebeen wrong all along. We have heard this foolish delusion before.As Nazi tanks crossed into Poland in 1939, an American senator declared:‘Lord, if I could only have talked to Hitler, all this might have beenavoided.’ We have an obligation to call this what it is—the false comfortof appeasement, which has been repeatedly discredited by history.20

The president’s remarks articulated the most persistent argument againstdiplomatic approaches to adversaries: it ignores the lessons of history, whichfrequently means the lessons of British and French failure to appease AdolfHitler before the Second World War.21 The president’s remarks also high-lighted one of the curious aspects of this current debate—the charge isselective. Relenting on its stance of not talking directly to North Korea dur-ing six-party negotiations over Pyongyang’s nuclear programme, the BushAdministration continued on this diplomatic path even after a Syrian facilitybombed and destroyed by Israeli jets in 2007 was believed to be a NorthKorean-supplied nuclear reactor still under construction.

Whilst isolationist policies tend to be preferred, coercive measures haveyielded little progress in curtailing nuclear ambitions, and military options areunattractive despite ‘all options are on the table’ rhetoric. Both the Iranianand North Korean nuclear situations are exemplary. The Bush Administrationchose a strategy of engagement with Pyongyang and negotiations—only afterearlier rejecting this path. However, it refused to engage with Iran, continu-ing an American policy in place since 1979. After taking office, the ObamaAdministration’s initial approach, whilst continuing to profess openness tonegotiations with Iran, were in the context of a series of multilateral talksthat included Britain, China, France, Germany, and Russia.22 Only in Obama’ssecond term did secret, bilateral negotiations begin.23

This dynamic persists because American administrations often have irra-tional, ideologically, and politically-driven motivations for not engaging indiplomacy and negotiations; this is demonstrated by weak rationales putforth for isolationist policies—rationales that do not stand up to scrutinyand belied by contradictory behaviour toward other states and even pastbehaviour toward the states in question. The journalist Mike Chinoy citesAmerican State Department officials characterising the Bush Administration’sposture toward North Korea as ‘blinded by ideology and unreceptive torational argument.’24 Regional and country experts within government oftenadvocate diplomacy but, driven by ideological motivations, the elites over-ride them.25 Political calculations affect policy, as one would expect. TheBush Administration undertook a policy review in 1992 with prominentexperts who advocated engaging Iran. The Administration, however, ruledout the possibility in part fearing domestic political fallout in a presidentialelection year.26

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Domestic politics may be one explanation for isolationism. Through thefallacious rationales outlined below, policy-makers routinely rely on them asforeign policy truths. Whether that reliance is genuine is a separate issue.Still, much of practitioners’ reasoning is inconsistent and illogical. But thenarratives have the combined effect of stifling and subverting rational policydiscussions about the merits of direct engagement. There are obviously dif-ferent formulations of the arguments with overlap amongst them. However,these generalisations capture the overall sentiments.

One argument is that however well-meaning America’s or any Power’sintentions are, an adversary with no objective of following through on anynegotiated deal will waste them. As foreign policy hard-liner, John Bolton,wrote in the Wall Street Journal, engagement policies ‘consume time, anotherprecious asset that terrorists and rogue leaders prize.’ As he appropriatelyobserved:

Whilst the diplomats of European democracies played with their umbrel-las, the Nazis were rearming and expanding their industrial power.In today’s world of weapons of mass destruction, time is again a preciousasset, one almost invariably on the side of the would-be proliferators.Time allows them to perfect the complex science and technology nec-essary to sustain nuclear weapons and missile programs, and providesfar greater opportunity for concealing their activities from our ability todetect and, if necessary, destroy them.27

Bolton served as undersecretary of state for arms control and internationalsecurity and, later, ambassador to the United Nations [UN] in the BushAdministration. As under-secretary of state, he proved a vocal opponent ofdiplomacy with North Korea.28

Thus, engagement is a not a power-based tool to explore solutions but,rather, a toothless, feel-good measure so transparent that negotiating part-ners will easily see through it and use it to their advantage. Patrick Clawsonof the Washington Institute for Near East Policy contends, ‘The problem withtalking to rogue states is that we don’t get anywhere with them. . . . We go,get a promise, and then nothing happens.’29 Accordingly, the adversary seesnegotiating not as a means to an end but, rather, a device to delay whateverpunitive measure possibly levied on it for the actions that brought the twosides together in the first place. It has been the charge levied against Iran inits negotiations since 2003 with the so-called EU-3 and, later, with the UnitedStates on the periphery. By agreeing to participate in negotiations over thedisposition of its uranium enrichment programme, and subsequently negoti-ating in bad faith, Iran is able to continue expanding its nuclear programme,whilst its naïve negotiating partners sit at the negotiating table. In 2008, theAmerican undersecretary of state, Nicholas Burns, went to a Geneva meetingwith European and Iranian officials to move negotiations along. The outcome

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exemplified these arguments against direct engagement. When the Iranianswould not give a direct answer to American demands for a freeze on ura-nium enrichment in exchange for a suspension of new sanctions, Secretaryof State Condoleezza Rice remarked, ‘They can’t go and stall and make smalltalk about culture, they have to make a decision. People are tired of theIranians and their stalling tactics.’30

When under-secretary of state for arms control, Bolton espoused a sim-ilar view regarding North Korea’s nuclear programme: ‘I think, given NorthKorea’s 65-year-plus record of mendacity, that the odds of their ever fol-lowing through on a commitment like that is zero. This is a trump cardfor Kim Jong-Il. It preserves his regime in power. He’s not going to giveaway his nuclear capability.’ In the end, dismissing negotiations often hap-pens because they may yield a lengthy process of fits and starts. Adversarieswill not negotiate in good faith, the argument goes. They will simply usenegotiations to waste time and avoid the real issues. Whilst negotiationsdrag on, the adversary continues its bad behaviour. Ultimately, nothing maycome of the negotiations. This line of reasoning finds particular currencyregarding nuclear non-proliferation. The time that an adversary gains throughprolonged negotiations could further its progress in a weapons endeavour.A senior Bush Administration official remarked about Iran, ‘Think about it.While we’re talking, the clock ticks. The Iranians can drag this out for years.But while the talks are on, no one is willing to invoke real sanctions.’31

Because engagement strategies are an alternative to coercive mea-sures or military options, policy-makers fear that adversaries will perceivethem as lack of resolve. Once the United States engages, the adversarywill use it for domestic consumption thereby bolstering the regime’s stay-ing power. Negotiating with Washington confers legitimacy on the regime.As Bolton asserted, ‘When the U.S. negotiates with terrorists and radicals,it gives them legitimacy, a precious and tangible political asset.’32 As FredIkle, an American defence expert, wrote in the 1980s, negotiation involvescompromise—or willingness to compromise—and an American compromiseis in essence a victory for the adversary because it reveals the United Statesto be a paper tiger.33 The United States cannot allow victories that strengthenthe domestic position of adversarial regimes, especially those Washingtonwould rather see replaced. Besting Washington in a test of wills, resistingAmerican coercion until carrots are offered instead of sticks, will providepowerful political messages that the adversarial regime can use domestically.

The most pervasive narrative that militates against engagement is the‘Munich analogy,’ engagement viewed as submission to blackmail, signallingits weakness, vulnerability, and lack of options. An added implication isthat other states will take note, compromising credibility in future crises.As the political scientist, Richard Payne, writes, ‘Munich’s major lessons arethat appeasement results in devastatingly costly wars, and that negotiatingwith evil leaders in not only useless but dangerous.’34 The Munich analogy

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is the most insidious concerning the engagement of adversaries. It impliestactical impropriety as well as naïveté. Appeasement today as many authorshave noted has lost its original diplomatic meaning and almost exclusivelyrefers to the French and British dealings with Hitler before 1939.35 It hascome to mean a weak and naïve tactic pursued by statesmen who possesslittle strength and resolve. The consequence of such statesmanship will berepetition of what happened in 1939. The appeasement narrative is actu-ally multiple arguments related to others here presented. Primarily, the termhas gained a definitional status that equates it with capitulation rather thancircumscribing it as a tool of diplomacy. One definition is ‘the policy ofreducing tensions with one’s adversary by removing the causes of conflictand disagreement.’36 When many detractors use the term, they do not meanit in its true sense, but often imprecisely employ the word for its powerful,if inaccurate, connotation relating to Munich. When Bush’s national securityadvisor, Condoleezza Rice, told a UN Security Council meeting in 2003 beforethe war in Iraq: ‘We do need to remind everybody that tyrants don’t respondto any kind of appeasement. Tyrants don’t respond to negotiation. Tyrantsrespond to toughness. And that was true in the 1930s and 1940s when wefailed to respond to tyranny, and it is true today.’37 Then Secretary of DefenceDonald Rumsfeld remarked, ‘America has learned important lessons duringthe past 200-plus years. . . . One is that weakness is provocative; it temptspeople. [Another is] that appeasement is dangerous and that military strate-gists and war fighters need to always be prepared for the unforeseen and theunexpected.’ In essence, isolationists equate engagement with appeasementand capitulation, which signals lack of resolve.

Thus, negotiating with rogue states would be difficult and ultimatelypointless because they act in bizarre, unpredictable, and irrational ways. Thelogic extends beyond the negotiating table. Alarmists worry that rogue states‘may not be as deterrable as the Soviets and the Americans were during thefirst nuclear age. Their leaders may not be rational; they might value humanlife so little that they would be willing to use nuclear weapons despite thethreat of retaliation.’ The logic is consistent when applied to engagementand negotiations—it is impossible to count on rogue states to act as sensi-ble, rational negotiating partners. Hugh Gusterson, an International Relationsexpert, points out that the American media both reflect and promote narra-tives involving countries like North Korea as led by crazed, maniacal villains,who are unpredictable and bent on doing crazy things.38 Much of the rhetoricthat has come out of successive American presidential administrations reflectseither this belief or a willingness to appear to believe it. President RonaldReagan referred to Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi as the ‘mad dog of theMiddle East.’ Bush characterised Iran, Iraq, and North Korea as constitut-ing an ‘Axis of Evil.’ Much of the fear of nuclear weapons in the hands ofadversaries like Iran or North Korea, or even allies like Pakistan, stems notfrom a perceived threat or even a capability to deliver them on the American

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homeland; instead, it is because of views that the leaders of these countriesare unpredictable. A rational actor assumption is not a given. President BillClinton’s national security advisor, Sandy Berger, illustrates the characterisa-tion, positing that states like Iran and North Korea ‘may not be as susceptibleto deterrence as the Soviet Union was.’39 Based on security concerns, anotherformer Clinton Administration official, Robert Einhorn, implicitly dismissedNorth Korean desires for nuclear weapons: ‘Whenever the North Koreans actup, one has to assume in part at least that they are trying to get the world’sattention.’40 Religious fanaticism gets frequent mention regarding Iran. DanielGallington, a former special assistant to Rumsfeld, wrote:

Most dangerous, of course, is that radical Islamic clerics really run Iran.Once they develop a nuclear capability, they are very likely to use theseweapons—either directly or through a surrogate—to threaten or actu-ally attack us. Traditional deterrence doctrines during the Cold War don’tapply to such radical religious fanatics—their approach to terror hasalways been to use whatever weapons they have, targeted indiscrimi-nately to inflict the greatest possible death and destruction, and alwayson civilian populations.’41

Characterising the government in Tehran, Burns pointed to ‘the radicalnature of Iran under [President] Ahmadinejad and its stated wish to wipeIsrael off the map of the world. . . . it is entirely unconvincing that wecould or should live with a nuclear Iran.’42 The logic implicitly and explicitlyextends to negotiations. If rationality is suspect, there is little chance of theseactors negotiating in good faith. Additionally, negotiations could be furthercomplicated because of difficulties discerning true motives and desires fromfanatical rhetoric and posturing. This sentiment is endemic. As recently as2013, in a hearing of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, Republicancongressman, Peter King, asked Director of National Intelligence JamesClapper:

does deterrence work with a country like North Korea or Iran? And sortof the same question, do they care? Mutually assured destruction, are theyresponsive to that kind of rational thinking that has guided U.S. policyfor 50 years? Are these countries, like the Soviet Union, that we can havesome confidence that they’re going to make a rational decision, knowingthat if they do something crazy, that they’re going to be wiped out?43

Negotiation with bad actors—proliferators, supporters of terrorism, andviolators of human rights, for example—sends the wrong message to theAmerican public, the adversary, and the international community. It alsocompromises American values. The precept is that a set of ‘uniquely’ liberalAmerican values underpins American foreign policy, including support for

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democracy and respect for human rights and the rule of law. If Washingtonopenly negotiates or compromises with governments that do not share thesevalues or demonstrate little respect for individual liberties, it sends the wrongmessage not only to those countries. It does so to other countries that sharethese values as well as to the American public, which will disapprovinglyquestion why Washington is taking such an approach with an adversary.Payne surmises that for ‘a number of American politicians, the purpose of adiplomatic encounter is to persuade a foreign leader or government of thecorrectness of the U.S. view of an issue.’44 The thinking is that ‘from time totime . . . Americans need to be reminded of what they stand for.’45 As such,‘evil’ regimes are unworthy of negotiating with the United States; therefore,avoid engagement, which sends an implicit message of approval. ‘I havebeen charged by the president with making sure that none of the tyranniesin the world are negotiated with,’ Cheney said. The highest levels of theBush Administration dismissed Iran’s 2003 propitious offer to negotiate on arange of issues including its nuclear programme with the same retort: ‘Wedon’t speak to evil.’46 In sum, ‘compromise with countries that are inherentlyless virtuous is seen as a violation of American principles and a nationalhumiliation.’47

The United States often wants to set preconditions for engagement andnegotiations and, when not accepted by the adversary, become a sign of theseriousness of the situation created by the adversary. Refusal to meet thepreconditions in turn supposedly demonstrates the lack of sincerity of thepotential negotiating partner. The American response is thus, ‘So why shouldwe try?’ Obama’s statement in the 2008 presidential campaign about sittingdown with leaders of Powers like Iran and Cuba ‘without precondition’ wascontroversial—the implication being that the previous Administration usedpreconditions as an artificial obstacle to negotiations. Not to be forced intosomething it did not want to do by an unexpectedly compliant adversaryensured that even entering into certain negotiations would be very difficultby setting preconditions that were almost certain to be rejected.

The Bush Administration used this line of reasoning for a considerabletime with Iran, steadfastly arguing that it would be happy to take a greater,bilateral diplomatic role but, for that to happen, Tehran first must stop atleast temporarily enriching uranium—the goal of the negotiations in the firstplace. In late winter 2006, Rice approached Bush with the idea that directtalks with Iran were something he should consider or risk dividing the coali-tion of European Powers dealing with Tehran. The result of Rice’s advocacywas a proposal drafted by the multilateral coalition that ‘reaffirmed Iran’sinalienable right to nuclear energy for peaceful purposes,’ offered to allowconstruction of light water nuclear reactors, and, amongst other incentives,supported ‘full integration into international structures’ including accessionto the World Trade Organisation. The proposal also detailed sanctions andpunishments if Iran did not co-operate. Nevertheless, there was one large

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precondition before any of the incentives could be realised by Iran: imme-diate suspension of all uranium enrichment efforts. Rice said at the time,‘we have made clear that we believe that the offer to join the EU-3 talks,should Iran verifiably suspend all of its enrichment-related activities—thatthat offer gives the negotiating track new energy.’48 After considering theproposal for most of summer 2006, Tehran balked at the precondition. TheUnited States then rejected a 21-page Iranian counter-proposal offered asa ‘springboard’ to further negotiations—but with no suspension of uraniumenrichment. Even concerning North Korea, the precondition for engagementhas become engaging in negotiations in a pre-determined format—the sixparty talks.

Examining some cases in which the American and other governmentshave engaged adversaries provides evidence that many of the publicly statedreasons for abjuring these tools of statecraft are suspect even on a superfi-cial level. Some of the arguments against engagement superficially seemreasonable and logical. However, in practice many of them lack carefulconsideration. Often they obscure ideological opposition and short-terminstitutional memory regarding this particular element of statecraft. In gen-eral, the rationales for abjuring engagement rely on demonising adversariesand misusing history. It is important to examine some of the faulty logicbehind these rationales. Demonstrating the fallacious reasoning gives greaterinsight to how myths and ideology operate as an intervening domestic levelvariable.

Detractors of engagement do not even have to use the word‘appeasement’ to signal their message and warning. They caution of thelessons of Munich. Today’s detractors of engaging adversaries argue fromthe traditional or orthodox appeasement camp.49 According to the tradi-tional interpretation, a naïve and weak British government led by NevilleChamberlain underestimated Hitler’s territorial ambitions and emboldenedhim through concessions at the Munich conference in September 1938.That naïveté sent Hitler on to aggrandise Germany in Eastern Europe. Therevisionist line of thinking says that appeasement was neither naïve normisguided. The British were fully cognisant of whom they were dealing.However, they needed time to rearm—incorrectly assessing relative weak-ness vis-à-vis Germany—stabilise a domestic economy, and prepare a warypublic for the idea of war. Appeasement was a strategy that bought time forBritain to rearm and prepare for war. The outcome, of course, is well known.Hitler was not placated, occupied all of Czechoslovakia in March 1939, andsubsequently invaded Poland initiating the Second World War. However,even if one accepts the traditional interpretation, critics of negotiating withadversaries draw the wrong conclusions and use specious reasoning tobolster their claims of not negotiating with rogue states and other adversaries.

Critics of negotiating with adversaries often focus solely on outcome—Hitler initiated the war in Europe. Yet, for this line of reasoning to bolster

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an argument against negotiating with adversaries, one has to ignore sev-eral matters. First, even accepting the traditional line of thinking, there arestill problems applying this particular analogy to the present. Many BushAdministration officials invoked the spectre of appeasement without draw-ing any further, deeper parallels. The issue is not simply being cognisantof repeating what the traditionalists view as British and French mistakes ornaiveté, but determining if there are significant similarities. That is to say,engaging with adversaries today does not automatically equate to Britishappeasement simply because Chamberlain negotiated with Hitler, an adver-sary of Britain and France. This line of reasoning likens every adversary—orat least the one in question—to Hitler and every situation as one with equalstakes and similar circumstances.50 Accepting the traditionalist interpretationthen is a critique of appeasing Hitler. Doing so is only instructive today ifevery potential adversary rises to the level and ambition of Hitler—in otherwords, if making a genuine comparative case. This is far from the realitywith any of the United States’ most powerful adversaries and competitorseven if one excludes strategic competitors like Russia or China. North Korea,Iran, Syria, and Venezuela—to name but a few adversaries that the UnitedStates isolates—have no nefarious ambitions remotely akin to Hitler’s in thelate-1930s. Jeffrey Record, a defence policy critic, correctly asserts, ‘Hitlerremains unequalled as a state threat. No post-1945 threat to the United Statesbears genuine comparison to the Nazi dictatorship.’51 Whilst their behaviourshave implications for American interests, it is difficult to draw parallels. Whenextensive parallels do not exist, opponents of engagement casually use theterm ‘appeasement,’ relying on the resultant effect of its now negative con-notation. McCain’s derision of the ‘false comfort of appeasement’ relies noton a sound assessment of negotiating but rather on a direct comparison,fitting or not to Hitler and Germany in the 1930s, and an inaccurate readingand incomplete understanding of the episode.52

Adversaries whose perceived values are antithetical to America’s some-times force practitioners away from diplomacy. The political sociologist,Seymour Lipset, famously wrote, ‘Americans are utopian moralists whopress hard to institutionalize virtue, to destroy evil people, and eliminatewicked institutions and practices.’53 As discussed earlier, Washington hasfrequently negotiated with adversaries and authoritarian regimes. Indeed,the United States maintains diplomatic relations many abusers of humanrights, yet, there are four such states lacking formal diplomatic relations withWashington: Cuba, North Korea, Iran, and Bhutan.54 Thus, the issue is notreally one of utility or appropriateness in negotiating with regimes that donot share American values. Rather does it hold up to cursory examination ofthe empirical record? The exceptions are a diverse set of cases. The UnitedStates generally chooses to negotiate under two circumstances: when thestakes are very high and/or the adversary is powerful—the Soviet Union—and when there is little chance of charges of appeasement or blackmail and

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the stakes are low—Libya.55 Over time, cases of success, however, do notseem to temper the unattractiveness of negotiations to solve problems withadversaries. Payne attributes the enduring reticence to the role of ‘society’sdominant values.’56 Hence, the greater the cultural differences between theUnited States and a target/recipient country, the less likely Washington is toprefer diplomatic solutions to problems.57

The values argument is paradoxical because Washington maintainsdiplomatic relations with authoritarian regimes. Stephen Walt, a politicalscientist, aptly notes:

the double-standard at work: we recognised China whilst Mao Zedong—amurderous despot—still ruled there and maintained relations with it afterTiananmen Square. We cut various strategic deals with Uzbekistan after9/11 despite its lamentable human rights record and we had numerousdirect dealings with the Soviet Union throughout the Cold War. We remainclosely allied with Saudi Arabia despite its treatment of women and thecomplete absence of democracy, and we subsidise Israel generously eventhough it denies political rights to millions of Palestinians living in theoccupied territories and killed more innocent civilians during the Gazaoperation than Iran’s ruling authorities have done since last Friday.58

The historian, Francis Gavin, echoes this point:

Contemporary analysts often forget that two of the United States’ com-munist adversaries whose ‘rogue’ status, by current definitions, wasunparalleled in the atomic age, pursued nuclear weapons: the SovietUnion and the People’s Republic of China (PRC). The United Statesdreaded the Soviet Union’s acquisition of the bomb. Joseph Stalin’sRussia was both a murderous and secretive regime; it violated inter-national norms and pursued aggressive foreign policies even before ittested an atomic bomb. . . . In 1964, when the PRC tested its first nucleardevice, China was perhaps the most ‘rogue’ state in modern history. MaoZedong’s domestic policies caused the death of tens of millions of China’scitizens. Moreover, he had pursued an aggressive foreign policy beforethe atomic test.59

The values argument is logical to a certain extent. States often demonisethe ‘other’ and prefer not to have any relations, diplomatic or otherwise, withthem—’otherness’ in this context deriving from deviant, ‘rogue’ behaviour.60

Payne contends that ideology and values not only locate actors’ role in theworld but also influence the ‘choice of strategies for accomplishing foreignpolicy objectives.’61 American exceptionalism often precludes diplomacy and‘[b]ecause American values are perceived to be natural, universal in appli-cation, and superior to those of other nations, compromise with countriesthat are inherently less virtuous is seen as a violation of American principles

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and national humiliation.’62 American exceptionalism and the experience thatscholars attribute to its origins explains the attitude. However, the appli-cation of it in practice is selective, and American policy is inconsistent asTable 1 illustrates to an extent. Washington may wish to signal displeasureover human rights and promote its liberal values by abjuring diplomacy with‘rogue’ states. But the course of policy has also shown a willingness to sac-rifice core values abroad in exchange for furthering strategic interests—asrealists would expect.63 A firm, values-based foreign policy might at timesundermine interests if consistently applied. However, America does notconsistently apply this precept. Therefore not only is the underlying prin-ciple violated when non-liberal values are subjugated to strategic interestsin certain cases, but achievement of objectives and interests is potentiallyundermined when the values rationale is used to circumscribe policy options.

Citing the perceived irrationality of adversaries sometimes proves anobstacle to negotiation. Proponents of this line of thinking denigrate nego-tiation along two lines of reasoning. The first is that an adversary will notnegotiate in good faith because its decision calculus does not conform torational thinking. The second, related to the first, is that any agreementreached will be worthless because of this irrationality factor. Negotiations,agreements, and upholding those agreements not taken seriously by irra-tional, rogue states will be a waste of time in pursuing these efforts in thefirst place. In 1979, former President Richard Nixon said the United Stateswas dealing with an ‘irrational people’ in Iran and that Ayatollah Khomeiniwas ‘an irrational leader.’64 Nonetheless, Nixon’s argument boiled down todistaste for the regime rather than an analysis of its rationality. Typifying theirrationality argument is the popular notion that a nuclear-armed Iran wouldshare nuclear weapons with a terrorist organisation—something with thepotential to harm Tehran’s own interests in the end. Former Clinton defencesecretary, William Cohen, outlined his views on the rationality of the regimein Tehran in a 2009:

Some insist we could deter Iran much as we deterred the Soviet Union.This is far from clear. The leaders of the USSR dreamed of establishing aglobal communist empire, but they were also rational pragmatists whosefirst priority was survival in this world. The hard-line elements in Iraninclude religious fanatics who speak of ushering in the end of this worldby hastening the arrival of the 12th Imam. Whilst few Iranian officials aremillenarian radicals, the existence of even one is too many.65

To be clear, critics of engagement do not speak generally of rationalityin the strict definition of the word. Whereas game theorists define rationalbehaviour as that which selects the best means to achieve a predeterminedobjective, critics of engagement strategies often forget or ignore the ideathat what is rational for an actor, in this case an adversary, depends on

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its preferences.66 Adherence to international non-proliferation norms maymake no strategic sense for a Power that has a sense of vulnerability likeNorth Korea or a history of foreign intervention like Iran. However, Americanpolicy-makers often characterise leaders of adversary states as irrational sim-ply because they threaten American interests. Rejection of norms, however,does not itself demonstrate irrationality.67 Berger illustrates this tendency:

President Reagan’s global shield (SDI) has evolved into a more limitedsystem aimed at defeating long-range missiles launched not by a majornuclear rival but by an irrational leader of a hostile nation, particularlyNorth Korea, Iraq, or Iran. . . . But why do we believe Saddam or hismalevolent counterparts would be less susceptible to deterrence thanStalin or his successors? Indeed, dictators such as Saddam tend to stay inpower so long because of their obsession with self-protection.68

And abandoning agreements for domestic political reasons or for greaterstrategic manoeuvrability—say North Korea withdrawing from the Non-proliferation Treaty—does not suggest irrationality, rather the opposite. Forexample, the Bush Administration concluded that adherence to the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty was no longer in the interest of the United States andabrogated it in 2002. An adversary’s behaviour or foreign policies may beanathema to the United States, but generally those policies are rational andin the service of survival of the regime. Pursuing a foreign policy meant toensure regime survival does not indicate that an adversary is irrational andthus will not negotiate in good faith.

Whilst politicians may be playing on public fears to achieve politicalends, measured analysis often finds adversaries rational. According to the2007 National Intelligence Estimate: ‘Our assessment that Iran halted theprogram in 2003 primarily in response to international pressure indicatesTeheran’s decisions are guided by a cost-benefit approach rather than a rushto a weapon irrespective of the political, economic, and military costs.’69 Onewould expect Iran at a minimum to explore a nuclear weapon option givenits experience in its war with Iraq and neighbouring that country whilstthe United States occupied it. Clapper responded unequivocally to King’squestion about the rationality of Iran and North Korea: ‘Well, I do think theyboth understand that. . . . they certainly respect the capability of our military.They’ve gone to school on what we’ve done starting with Desert Storm.I know that for a fact. So I think deterrence in this broadest context doeswork and does have impact on the decision-making calculus of these twocountries.’70

Critics of engaging adversaries are generally conflating the rationality ofan adversary with behaviour and foreign policies that are antithetical to theirown interests. As Ray Takeyh, a former State Department official, testified toCongress in 2006:

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From the outset it must be emphasised that for all the factions involved inthis debate the core issue [for Tehran] is how to safeguard Iran’s nationalinterests. The Islamic Republic is not an irrational rogue seeking suchweaponry as an instrument of an aggressive, revolutionary foreign policydesigned to project its power abroad. This is not a [sic] ‘Islamic bomb’to be handed over to terrorist organisations or exploded in the streetsof New York or Washington. For Iran this is a weapon of deterrenceand the relevant question is whether its possession will serve its practicalinterests?

Indeed, most recent scholarship on Iran and North Korea finds bothcountries rational and predictable.71

‘Benign neglect’ is sometimes the preferred tactic by some who do notwant to engage.72 Underpinning this is the belief or hope that over time,a regime will simply collapse because it is already on shaky ground, likeNorth Korea, or that it will eventually succumb to outside pressure levelledthrough sanctions, like Iran. This may drive policy-makers to put onerouspreconditions on engagement—conditions almost certain to invite refusal.Still, as engagement may help hasten the demise of a regime, exposure toliberal, outside forces may instigate, foster, and nurture internal processesthat demand political reform. In the realm of proliferation, neglect may serveto isolate the adversary to some extent, or at a minimum isolate it from theUnited States; but the absence of progress or even token diplomatic effortsalso can mean the state is ‘free’ to pursue activities related to proliferation andmore. As was noted earlier, North Korea and Iran have made strides in theirrespective nuclear programmes over the last eight years whilst Washingtonhas wavered on direct negotiations.

These activities and the knowledge gained may be difficult if not possi-ble to roll back in the end. It has been the case with Iran and North Korea.Additionally, both regimes have weathered storms of American and interna-tional community isolation and sanctions. Unpalatable preconditions beforeengagement can take place have only helped preserve the status quo. Thishas generally been the position concerning Iran—for instance, when theBush Administration demanded that Tehran cease its uranium enrichmentprogramme to begin negotiations on that programme. As a number of ana-lysts and diplomats have pointed out, it is in essence requiring what theAmericans want out the negotiations as a precondition for beginning negoti-ations. As Colin Powell, Bush’s first secretary of state, aptly put it ‘You haveto talk to folks that you may not necessarily like, and you can’t put downimpossible preconditions for conversations . . . You can’t say, ‘Give me whatI want before I will talk to you. That doesn’t work. It won’t work with Syria;it won’t work with Iran.’73 Senator Specter concurred:

Now the position taken by the Secretary of State has been ‘we won’t talkto Iran unless, as a precondition, they stop enriching uranium. It seems

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to me that it is unrealistic to try to have discussions but to say to theopposite party, ‘as a precondition to discussions we want the principalconcession that we’re after.’ Do you think it made sense to insist on aconcession like stopping enriching Uranium, which is what our ultimateobjective is, before we even sit down and talk to them on a broaderrange of issues?

The precondition issue is transparent, but enduring. For GeoffreyWiseman, a public diplomacy scholar, ‘refusing to engage in diplomatic dia-logue with adversarial states until they meet specified conditions’ squandersopportunities and in the context of proliferation, may decrease Americansecurity.74 Without irony, Einhorn lashed out at Iran for using the same tac-tic, ‘Iran refused to discuss these or any other substantive issues. Instead, theyset forth two preconditions. One was that the P5 countries had to publiclyand explicitly acknowledge an Iranian right to enrich uranium.’75

Preconditions are an obstacle to beginning diplomacy and often signalof impatience. The United States issues them as a catalyst to more rapidlymeeting objectives. Negotiations often take time, however. The SALT I agree-ments took almost three years to negotiate and included long impasses. TheSoviet-American START I agreement took even longer. The time argument isone devoid of recognition of the sometimes-slow pace of the diplomatic pro-cess.76 Even after Nixon’s 1972 trip to China, relations between Washingtonand Beijing were not normalised until the Carter Administration in 1979.Denigrators of engagement often ignore a crucial downside. Isolation pro-vides space for deleterious behaviour. Negotiations take time but an activeengagement policy maintains open avenues to communicate. If the UnitedStates, however sceptical of Qaddafi’s sincerity, had refused to engage diplo-matically with Tripoli, the disarmament deal struck in 2003 likely would nothave been realised.

In many ways, the issue of reputation underlies all of the argumentsagainst engagement and is implicit in the appeasement argument. Choosingto negotiate will weaken the credibility of American coercive threats in thefuture. Viewed as acquiescence and a reward for bad behaviour, the targetstate as well as other states will see engagement as embodying a lack ofresolve. There is a burgeoning literature on reputation in international poli-tics, much of it concerning crisis, deterrence, and the reputations states mayor may not get for issuing credible threats or backing down in conflict situ-ations.77 There are limits to using this literature as a guide as much of it isconcerned with crises. By a strict definition, most of the cases and episodesexplicitly discussed and alluded to here do not constitute crises generallybecause there is little threat of military hostilities—despite political rhetoricsuch as ‘all options are on the table.’78 Additionally, the arguments con-cern overall diplomatic strategies and posture rather than crisis bargainingsituations.

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The findings of literature on reputation should reassure practition-ers, policy-makers, and diplomats. For example, one argument is thatactors/states understand situational aspects of decisions that other statestake. Thus, a state backing down in a confrontation in one situation willnot be a good indication that the state will do so in the future. The spe-cific circumstances matter—and other states understand this. Going further,‘Although adversaries can get reputations for having resolve, they rarely getreputations for lacking it.’79 This is because adversaries distinguish betweendecisions made because of disposition and those made because of situationaleffects. Accordingly, the United States is unlikely to get a reputation for beingirresolute even if it pursues diplomatic approaches to address issues of con-cern. Observer/target states understand and take into account context anduniqueness of individual situations. Adding to this line of reasoning finds thatactors will more carefully examine the circumstances in which an adversaryis making decisions when the stakes are high. Credibility is a function of thebalance of power and ‘level of interests at stake.’80 The ‘Current Calculus the-ory’ posits that states are cognisant and cautioned by specific situations andnot totally consumed by assessments of adversary behaviour based on previ-ous behaviour, denoted as ‘Past Actions Theory.’81 Again, these conclusionsarise through empirical examination of crises.

Although studies of reputation tend to focus on reputation for resolvein conflict and threats to use force, extending the logic helps. An adver-sary should not view the American decision to engage or negotiate in onecircumstance as illustrative of lack of American resolve or a preference fordiplomacy over force in all situations. Indeed, critics of engagement contra-dict themselves on this point. Whilst the United States during the ClintonAdministration negotiated with North Korea, several figures in the sub-sequent Bush Administration still maintained that fear of American forcebrought Libya to heel. Why would Libya fear force if the United States hadgained a reputation for being irresolute by negotiating with North Korea andnot using force during the Clinton and early Bush administrations?82

The reputation literature is suggestive and reassuring, but its whole-sale application impossible. It is useful to examine the logic. According toboth theoretically and empirically grounded probes, states are far more dis-cerning when assessing the intent and resolve for which their adversariesrather than opponents of engagement would give them credit. Politiciansand policy-makers make two erroneous assumptions. First, reputation con-cerns are a priori akin to Hitler, the origins of the Second World War, andthe ‘lessons’ of appeasement. Second, and related, that adversaries and tar-get states have an ahistorical view of the situation through this lens. Bothassumptions are dubious. Even if one accepts the Hitler/appeasement anal-ogy at face value, further, closer examination reveals that even Hitler wascautious and circumspect because he did not absorb a lesson of British andFrench irresolution based solely on their past behaviour.83

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Both pundits and practitioners assert that target states will view diplo-matic engagement strategies with adversaries as signs of weakness and areward for bad behaviour. Related to other rationales, the contention is thateither they will then be more likely not to take diplomacy seriously or holdout for better terms for negotiation because of perceived weakness and irres-olution on the part of the United States. However, if one accepts ‘Past Actions’theory in this context, then what are adversaries to think of American will-ingness to engage states of concern? A multitude of examples exist thatcritics of engagement ignore. Why have states then not learnt lessons fromChina, South Africa, and North Korea to name but a few examples alreadydiscussed?

The issue regarding diplomatic engagement or not is one aboutwhether Washington will be viewed as preferring diplomacy to contain-ment, sanctions, or other coercive measures. In other words, whilst criticsof engagement fear that threats of sanctions or coercive actions will be lesscredible in the future, the historical record does not support them. Followingthat erroneous thinking, then, should lead the United States to isolate all itsadversaries if reputation is a concern.

Critics view engagement and negotiations as a reward for bad behaviour.They then reason that diplomatic entreaties in turn will bolster the domes-tic standing of rogue regimes. This is a common line of reasoning amongstboth pundits and policy-makers. McCain once remarked, ‘The President ofthe United States sitting down across the table from Ahmadinejad wouldincrease his influence and his prestige . . . and would probably scare thedaylights out of other countries in the region.’84 The first issue to addressis conceptual. Negotiation and diplomatic engagement are tools of statecraftthat critics often disregard. And as this analysis has illustrated, the charge isselective as is the application of the ‘rogue’ designation.85 The logic hereinis flawed. Most so-called rogue regimes are authoritarian and repressive.Domestic popularity is hardly necessary for regimes willing to use force tostay in power. The purported ‘legitimacy’ conferred by offers of diplomaticrelations and negotiation with Washington may indeed reward individualdecision-makers, who enjoy the perception of improved status. But this doesnot necessarily translate to strengthening the regime because of a perceivedvictory over the United States. Most policy-makers and diplomats wouldprobably argue that a government should not reward bad behaviour.86 Criticscontend that engaging adversaries is a reward rather than a tool of statecraft.The United States deals diplomatically with many repressive regimes—seeTable 1. Former Bush Administration official, Richard Armitage, summarisedthe counter argument: ‘Some people say talking [to Iran or North Korea]would legitimise the regimes. But we’re not trying to change the regimes,and they’re already legitimised in the eyes of the international community.So we ought to have enough confidence in our ability as diplomats to go

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eye to eye with people—even though we disagree in the strongest possibleway–and come away without losing anything.’87

As with many of the other arguments against diplomatic engagement,one can attempt to address them analytically using various InternationalRelations approaches. However, it also assumes that empirically, the assump-tions of critics are valid. This is questionable. For example, there isno evidence that political engagement gained any domestic benefit fromconcluding a deal with the United States. Indeed, fuelled by domestic dis-content, rebels overthrew the Qaddafi regime in 2011. In the end, he wasforced to give up something in the short run—his unconventional weaponsprogrammes—for the promise of long terms gains—removal of sanctions andnormalised relations with the United States and Britain. Even if he viewedthis as a reward and an American defeat, it seems to have done nothingto endear him to the Libyan people. After former president Clinton visitedNorth Korea to gain the freedom of two arrested American journalists in2010, the North Korean Central News Agency apparently distorted the mes-sage Clinton gave to Kim Jong Il. Why would this be necessary if a mere visitconveyed such a tremendous reward?88 What critics implicitly are warningagainst is that ‘rewarding’ bad behaviour will lead to more bad behaviour.The Clinton-North Korea episode is telling. After the visit, American offi-cials viewed Pyongyang as being more receptive to bilateral nuclear talks.89

As the emerging reputation literature also suggests, adversaries likely viewepisodes like these as one-offs and not indicative of lack of American resolve.The empirical record shows little evidence of serious American diplomaticconcessions followed by emboldening provocative actions by the recipient.In the case of North Korea, Pyongyang’s behaviour seems quite the opposite.Lack of sustained diplomatic engagement appears to encourage provocativebehaviour with the intention of remaining on American radar screens.

Often high-level American practitioners view diplomacy as a rewardinstead of a tool. It is much harder to compel an adversary to changebehaviour if governments do not talk directly. Whilst Washington refusedto do so with North Korea, Pyongyang made strides with its nuclear pro-gramme, ultimately testing two nuclear devices. During the period the UnitedStates has refused to talk to Iran over its nuclear programme, Tehran hasachieved measurable success in uranium enrichment. Yet, when Obamaaddressed the Iranian people directly, explicitly ruling in direct talks, therewas little to indicate adverse geopolitical change.90 From a realist perspective,ruling out options that have the potential to improve the security environ-ment is foolish. It worsens when nuclear proliferation is involved as theIranian episode has proven.

From a policy perspective, isolation is equally counter-productive. Whenthe United States isolates a country, it diminishes its capacity to gatherintelligence on it and better know it politically and culturally. Amongstpolicy-makers, it is one of the most under-appreciated consequences of

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diplomatic isolation. Often when a crisis erupts or has the potential to do so,Washington faces a dearth of information about its potential adversary. In themonths following the Iranian revolution, American policy not to engage theregime presented problems. Indeed, the United States was ignorant of manyessential issues necessary to construct a new policy toward the revolutionaryregime:

In the State Department and in the intelligence community, Americanprofessional policy-makers began immediately to attempt to develop anew policy toward revolutionary Iran. Several formidable obstacles con-fronted them. First, the United States was surprisingly ill-informed aboutIran; the government did not know the players, nor did it have even aprimitive understanding of the dynamics of the revolution.91

Lack of information helps perpetuate myths, creates confusion, opensadditional space for policy disagreements, and militates against riskystrategies like engagement.92 The issue of ignorance is particularly acute con-cerning rogue states. The United States does not have diplomatic relationswith most of the countries it views as rogues. From a proximity standpoint,this means that government officials have limited contact with these tar-get governments. This limits insight into the thinking of the adversary andinformation on internal deliberations. There is also limited contact betweengovernment officials and diplomats. Lack of contact may contribute to mis-trust because of unfamiliarity. During extended periods of diplomatic andcultural isolation, the United States loses access to and knowledge of keyinterlocutors who may be crucial for resolving crises or communicatingimportant information. Iran had to deliver its 2003 letter to the White Housevia the Swiss Embassy. In interviews, high-level American officials reportedthat they were often unsure whom to contact within the Iranian governmentto begin a dialogue; nor were they certain of the internal political powerstruggles and dynamics in Iran. Isolating Iran has damaged policy:

To appreciate the gravity and significance of this three-decade-long exclu-sion, it is worth pondering the implications of the fact that virtually noone in today’s American policymaking community has ever even been topost-revolution Iran. There are of course exceptions, but no amount ofarea studies instruction or Persian language study, both important in andof themselves, is a substitute for actually spending time in Iran on theground. Americans have been denied this to a degree that has provendamaging not only for Washington but also for Tehran. Iran, however,has had and continues to enjoy significant access to the United States.93

The Iranian situation is exemplary. Even during the days of the shah,the United States so neglected intelligence gathering and learning about Iran

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that after the revolution, it had little information about the internal politicalsituation.94 Washington made no corrective moves. The State Departmentdid not create an Iran desk until March 2006. According to the WashingtonPost, prior to the creation of the desk, only two people in the previous yearworked full time on Iran.95 Whilst uncertainty regarding Iran has been mostlya function of American apathy, the North Korean situation has been less so.Even though Washington has never had diplomatic relations with Pyongyang,the closed, secretive nature of its government precludes learning much thatwould be useful to policy-makers other than that gleaned from other sources.Nevertheless, information gaps make/made American decision-makers morecautious and risk averse.96

As the argument above emphasises, ignorance is self-perpetuating asinformation gaps contribute to continued policies of isolation. That in turncontinues to be an obstacle to better understanding, both culturally andfrom a strategic intelligence standpoint.97 This cycle is particularly acutewhen the internal political dynamics of a state of interest may be in fluxas they were during the Iranian revolution. Isolation inhibits the receptionof new and better intelligence that may be helpful in future situations orcrises.

Even if the rationales for abjuring engagement with adversarial states arevalid, their selective violation has occurred with strategically important stateslike China and Syria. The Obama Administration has had direct talks with theTaliban, Cuba, and Iran. Critics of engagement ignore dissonant information.For example, Reagan is often cited for his tough ‘no negotiating’ with terror-ists policy. However, often forgotten is that the Iran-Contra scandal was hisattempt to reach out to the Islamic Republic by selling Tehran American mis-siles in exchange for help releasing American hostages in Lebanon. Reagan,as realism would suggest, did this for pragmatic reasons to further Americannational interests.

This exegesis has shown not necessarily under what circumstancesdirect engagement will yield positive results. Rather, it has demonstrated theweakness of arguments typically used to denigrate negotiations with someadversaries. Despite rhetoric from previous administrations, the United Stateshas engaged many of the adversaries that it publicly denounces as unworthyof such diplomacy. Engagement and incentives seem to work. Whilst someaversion to diplomatic engagement is ideological, much is political. Obamabacked away from his negotiating without pre-condition stance after he wascriticised on the campaign trail. Later he was critical of former PresidentCarter for meeting with officials from Hamas. Cheney was vociferous in repu-diating diplomatic engagement with adversaries, including Iran. However, inthe mid-1990s, he criticised unilateral American sanctions against Iran as anAmerican assumption that ‘we know what’s best for everybody else’ anddeclared that they were ‘in fact self-defeating.’98

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Two aspects bear on the issues here—a scholarly one and a practicalpolicy element. Does ‘Past Actions’ theory hold and therefore validate politi-cian and practitioner concerns about negotiations with adversaries sendingwrong and detrimental signals?99 On the other hand, does that really matter?Does a particular policy pursuit hold promise despite ideological proclivitiesthat militate against it? These questions can be at odds. Policy-makers have totake decisions based on the here and now. But whatever the answers, thereis further research to be done on how ‘Past Actions’ theory might apply.Policy-makers and pundits use the appeasement narrative freely. As such, itis useful for scholars to continue to point out when it is misapplied.

With little systematic work done on the efficacy and success of engage-ment and positive incentives as tools of foreign policy, how engagementand incentives work in the contexts of problematic states needs morework. Anecdotal cases show that it has been successful a number of times.Engagement holds promise and ideological reasons disguised as legitimateforeign policy concerns are problematic. If the nuclear alarmists characteriseone set of isolationists as correct, then their own logic should dictate engage-ment by necessity for nuclear restraint, rollback, and furthering Americansecurity interests. However one characterises the arguments made here, theempirics are clear. Little progress has occurred on the Iranian nuclear front.Very little has happened regarding North Korea, though it seems that themaintenance of a low-intensity situation is directly due to American willing-ness to keep the diplomatic door ajar. Conversely, though the United Statesused diplomacy to achieve a breakthrough with Qaddhai’s Libya and itsWeapons of Mass Destruction programmes, that regime proved as ruthlessan abuser of human rights as the regimes the United States isolates purport-edly on the same grounds. The same holds for other situations involvingadversaries.

George Kennan advised that just ‘because the leaders of another regimewere hostile and provocative and insulting . . . in their approach to the coun-tries of the West, that did not mean that one could afford the luxury of havingno dealings whatsoever with them or that there was nothing to be gainedby meeting them fact to face and talking about this question or that. . . .’100

What Kennan wrote over 50 years ago would seem still to apply today.

NOTES

1. At the time of writing, the United States is re-establishing diplomatic relations with Cuba.2. On this debate, see Miroslav Nincic, ‘The Logic of Positive Engagement: Dealing with

Renegade Regimes,’ International Studies Perspectives, 7/4 (2006), 7; Bertram I. Spector, ‘Deciding toNegotiate with Villains,’ Negotiation Journal, 14/1 (1998), 43–59; Geoffrey Wiseman, ‘Engaging theEnemy: An Essential Norm for Sustainable US Diplomacy,’ in Costas M. Constaninou and James DerDerian, eds., Sustainable Diplomacies (Basingstoke, 2010), 213–34; Nicholas Burns, ‘We Should Talk toOur Enemies,’ Newsweek (25 October 2008); John W. Limbert, Negotiating with Iran (Washington, DC,2009); Leslie H. Gelb, ‘In the End, Every President Talks to the Bad Guys,’ Washington Post (27 April

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2008); ‘McCain Assails Obama over Willingness to Talk to Hostile Foreign Leaders,’ Washington Post(21 May 2008); David E. Sanger, ‘Deciding on the Enemy Worth Talking To,’ New York Times (18 February2007); Nicholas Kristof, ‘Talking to Evil,’ New York Times (13 August 2006); Helene Cooper, ‘Dissent GrowsOver Silent Treatment for ‘Axis of Evil’ Nations,’ New York Times (27 October 2007); Laura Rozen, ‘Bush’sDiplomacy Allergy,’ Salon (25 July 2006); Wendy Sherman, ‘Talking isn’t appeasement,’ Los Angeles Times(2 July 2008).

3. For discussions of these motivators, see Richard J. Payne, The Clash with Distant Cultures:Values, Interests, and Force in American Foreign Policy (Albany, NY, 1995). On rogue states and AmericanManichean views, see Robert Litwak, Rogue States and U.S. Foreign Policy (Baltimore, MD, 2000); WilliamO. Beeman, The Great Satan Versus the Mad Mullahs: How the United States and Iran Demonize EachOther (New York, 2005).

4. Nincic, ‘Logic of Positive Engagement.’5. Wiseman, ‘Engaging the Enemy,’ 215. I emphasise direct contact as states isolated diplomati-

cally by the United States, such as Iran, often still engage regularly through track two diplomacy.6. Litwak, Rogue States; Mary Caprioli and Peter F. Trumbore, ‘Human Rights Rogues,’ in Robert

Rotberg ed., Worst of the Worst: Dealing with Repressive and Rogue Nations (Washington, DC, 2007), 61.Caprioli and Trumbore note ‘the criteria that American policy-makers have adopted and unevenly appliedto brand a limited set of actors as rogues fail to capture either the identity of real rogues or the scope ofthe threat rogue states represent.’ See also David F. Schmitz, Thank God They’re on Our Side: The UnitedStates & Right-Wing Dictatorships, 1921–1965 (Chapel Hill, NC, 1999).

7. See for example, Gary Clyde Hufbauer, Jeffrey J. Schott, and Kimberly Ann Elliott, EconomicSanctions Reconsidered, 2nd edition (Washington, DC, 1990); Richard Haass, Economic Sanctions andAmerican Diplomacy (New York, 1998); Daniel W. Drezner, The Sanctions Paradox: Economic Statecraftand International Relations (New York, 1999).

8. Warren P. Strobel, ‘U.S. acting tough with N. Korea,’ Philadelphia Inquirer (21 December2003).

9. Peter Baker, ‘U.S. to Restore Full Relations With Cuba, Erasing a Last Trace of Cold WarHostility,’ New York Times (17 December 2014).

10. Ashley Parker and Nick Madigan, ‘In a Political Gamble, Marco Rubio Sticks to His Tough Lineon Cuba,’ New York Times (18 December 2014).

11. Victor Cha, ‘The Rationale for ‘Enhanced’ Engagement of North Korea: After the Perry PolicyReview,’ Asian Survey, 39/6(1999), 846.

12. The United States and Soviet Russia negotiated the Limited Test Ban Treaty, SALT I and II, theABM treaty, and the START I agreements.

13. For example, the United States has quietly talked with Iran on regional security issues overthe years. Maggie Farley, ‘U.S. and Iran Have Been Talking, Quietly,’ Los Angeles Times (9 March 2007).

14. For example, the Obama Administration received a letter from Hamas urging direct engage-ment. The White House, however, apparently never responded. Ethan Bronner and Taghreed el-Khodary,‘In a Letter, a Leader of Hamas Makes an Appeal to Obama,’ New York Times (21 February 2009).

15. Yoav Gortzak, ‘How Great Powers Rule: Coercion and Positive Inducements in InternationalOrder Enforcement,’ Security Studies, 14/4 (2005), 668. On reputation, see Jonathan Mercer, Reputationand International Politics (Ithaca, NY, 1996).

16. Most of the literature on reputation in international security focuses on crises. However,considerations of diplomatic engagement even with rogue states does not always take place duringcrises. Mark J. C. Crescenzi, ‘Reputation and Interstate Conflict,’ American Journal of Political Science,51/2 (2007); Mercer, Reputation; Daryl G. Press, Calculating Credibility: How Leaders Assess MilitaryThreats (New York, 2005).

17. Fourth Democratic Presidential debate (24 July 2007): http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/24/us/politics/24transcript.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all.

18. Senator John McCain, remarks to the National Restaurant Association (19 May 2008): http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2008/05/mccains_remarks_to_the_nationa.html.

19. Glenn Kessler and Juliet Eilperin, ‘McCain Assails Obama Over Readiness to Talk With HostileForeign Leaders,’ Washington Post (21 May 2008).

20. ‘President Bush Addresses Members of the Knesset’: http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2008/05/20080515-1.html.

21. Richard Neustadt and Ernest May, Thinking in Time: The Uses of History for Decision-Makers(New York, 1988).

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Myths and Realities in American Foreign Policy 319

22. The White House, Office of the Press Secretary, ‘Statement by the Press Secretary onthe Election in Iran’ (15 June 2013): http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2013/06/15/statement-press-secretary-election-iran.

23. Mark Landler, ‘How Obama’s Undercover Statecraft Secured Three Major Accords,’ New YorkTimes (18 December 2014).

24. Chinoy, Meltdown, 60.25. David C. Martin and John Walcott, Best Laid Plans: The Inside Story of America’s War against

Terrorism (New York, 1988).26. Elaine Sciolino, ‘After a Fresh Look, U.S. Decided to Still Steer Clear of Iran,’ New York Times

(7 June 1992).27. John R. Bolton, ‘Bring on the Foreign Policy Debate,’ Wall Street Journal (19 May 2008), A15.28. An excellent account of Bolton’s and other hard-liners’ opposition to diplomacy with North

Korea can be found in Chinoy, Meltdown.29. Quoted in Rozen, ‘Bush’s Diplomacy Allergy.’30. Ramin Mostaghim and Borzou Daragahi, ‘Rice says Iran stalling on nuclear freeze proposal,’

Los Angeles Times, (22 July 2008). Burns, however, remains an advocate of engagement strategies. SeeBurns, ‘Talk to Our Enemies.’

31. Sanger, ‘Deciding on the Enemy.’32. Bolton, ‘Foreign Policy Debate.’33. Fred Charles Ikle, How Nations Negotiate (New York, 1987), 1.34. Payne, Distant Cultures, 68–70.35. See Stephen Rock, Appeasement in International Politics (Lexington, KY, 2000), esp. 3–9.36. Ibid., 12.37. BBC News (17 November 2004): http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4019395.stm.38. Hugh Gusterson, ‘Paranoid, Potbellied Stalinist Gets Nuclear Weapons: How the U.S. Print

Media Cover North Korea,’ Nonproliferation Review, 15/1 (2008). Scott Snyder, Negotiating on theEdge: North Korean Negotiating Behavior (Washington, DC, 1999), 143, points out that ‘North Korea’snegotiating style and objectives have conformed to a consistent all-too-predictable pattern.’

39. Steve Mufson, ‘Threat of ‘Rogue’ States: Is It Reality or Rhetoric?’ Washington Post (29 May2000).

40. Quoted in Gusterson, ‘Potbellied Stalinist.’41. Daniel J. Gallington, ‘Iran’s Nuclear Notion’s,’ Washington Times (1 September 2005).42. David E. Sanger, ‘Suppose We Just Let Iran Have the Bomb,’ New York Times (19 March 2006).43. ‘Worldwide Threats Briefing Highlights,’ Council on Foreign Relations (13 March 2013): http://

blogs.cfr.org/zenko/2013/03/13/worldwide-threats-briefing-highlights/.44. Payne, Distant Cultures, 83.45. Gelb, ‘Every President.’46. Trita Parsi, Treacherous Alliance: The secret dealings of Israel, Iran, and the United States (New

Haven, CT, 2007), 248.47. Payne, Distant Cultures, 85.48. ‘Rice’s Remarks on Iran,’ New York Times (31 May 2006).49. Sidney Aster, ‘Appeasement: Before and After Revisionism,’ Diplomacy and Statecraft, 19/3

(2008), 443–80; Norrin M. Ripsman and Jack S. Levy, ‘Wishful Thinking or Buying Time? The Logic ofBritish Appeasement in the 1930s,’ International Security, 33/2 (2008), 148–81.

50. Litwak, Rogue States, 12, contends that labelling states as rogues leads to a constrained ‘falsecontainment-engagement dichotomy.’

51. Jeffrey Record, ‘Appeasement Reconsidered: Investigating The Mythology of the1930s,’ Strategic Studies Institute (August 2005): http://www.strategicstudiesinstitute.army.mil/pubs/summary.cfm?q=622; see also Justin Logan, ‘It’s Past Time to Bury the Hitler Analogy,’American Prospect (6 November 2007): http://www.prospect.org/cs/articles?article=its_past_time_to_bury_the_hitler_analogy; Anne Applebaum, ‘The Hitler Analogy,’ Washington Post (20 May 2008).

52. Flawed analogies of the Munich episode are not new. Decision-makers have invoked thecase concerning the Suez crisis and the Vietnam War. See Yuen Foong Khong, Analogies at War: Korea,Munich, Dien Bien Phu, and the Vietnam Decisions of 1965 (Princeton, NJ, 1992); Levy and Ripsman,‘Wishful Thinking?’

53. Seymour Martin Lipset, American Exceptionalism: A Double-Edged Sword (New York,1997), 63.

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54. The United States has operated an Interests Section in Havana since 1977.55. Jeffrey Fields, Adversaries and Statecraft: Explaining U.S. Foreign Policy toward Rogue States

(Ph.D. Dissertation, University of Southern California, 2007); Payne, Distant Cultures. Libya is often her-alded a success because Qaddafi agreed to dismantle his nuclear weapons programme. In reality, theLibyans had little interest in pursuing a nuclear weapon option.

56. Payne, Distant Cultures, xiv.57. Ibid., xvi, 92.58. Stephen Walt, ‘Realism and Iran,’ Foreign Policy (July 2009): http://walt.foreignpolicy.com/

node/28989.59. F.J. Gavin, ‘Same as it Ever Was: Nuclear Alarmism, Proliferation, and the Cold War,’

International Security, 34/3(2009), 15–16.60. Beeman, Great Satan.61. Payne, Distant Cultures, 19.62. Ibid., 85.63. Schmitz, Thank God They’re on Our Side.64. ‘Nixon Calls Ayatollah ‘An Irrational Leader’,’ Associated Press (26 November 1979).65. William S. Cohen, ‘What to Expect from a Nuclear Armed Iran,’ Washington Times

(17 December 2009).66. Patrick M. Morgan, Deterrence Now (Cambridge, 2003), 65.67. A working group report from the Institute for the Study of Diplomacy suggested that the issue

of norm adherence and rationality was a key question yet to be answered regarding Iran. See Institutefor the Study of Diplomacy, ‘Iran: The Struggle for Domestic Consensus,’ Working Group Report, No. IV(20 June 2008), 5: http://isd.georgetown.edu/research_reports_Security_21st_Iran.pdf.

68. Samuel R. Berger, ‘Is This Shield Necessary?’ Washington Post (13 February 2001).69. Unclassified excerpts from the National Intelligence Estimate (2007): www.dni.gov/

press_releases/20071203_release.pdf.70. ‘Worldwide Threats Briefing Highlights.’71. For example, on North Korea, see Snyder, Negotiating on the Edge.72. Cha, ‘Perry Policy Review,’ 860.73. ‘Bush to help if McCain’s nominee’ (11 February 2008): http://articles.latimes.com/2008/

feb/11/nation/na-bush11.74. Wiseman, ‘Engaging the Enemy,’ 219–20.75. Carnegie International Nuclear Policy Conference, ‘Taking Compliance Seriously: Iran

and the Next Iran,’ (March 2011): http://carnegieendowment.org/files/Taking_Compliance_Seriously-Iran_and_the_Next_Iran.pdf.

76. Payne, Distant Cultures, 90–91.77. See for example Anne E. Sartori, ‘The Might of the Pen: A Reputational Theory

of Communication in International Disputes,’ International Organization, 56/1(2002); Crescenzi,‘Reputation and Interstate Conflict,’ 382–96; Mercer, Reputation; Press, Calculating Credibility; Anne E.Sartori, Deterrence by Diplomacy (Princeton, NJ, 2005).

78. Employing the conception set out by the International Crisis Behaviour Project, a foreignpolicy crisis contains a threat to one or more basic values, a finite time for response, and a heightenedprobability of military involvement. An international crisis is defined as ‘a change in type and/or anincrease in intensity and disruptive, that is hostile, verbal, or physical, interactions between two or morestates, with a heightened probability of military hostilities; that in turn destabilises their relationship andchallenges the structure of an international system—global, dominant, or subsystem.’ See Michael Brecherand John Welkenfeld, A Study of Crisis (Ann Arbor, MI, 1997), 3–5.

79. Mercer, Reputation, 212–13.80. Press, Calculating Credibility, 20–31.81. Ibid. Cf. Mercer, Reputation.82. A stronger argument is possible by asserting that Libya continued to desire a negotiated

solution because of what it had observed from the North Korea situation. See Crescenzi, ‘Reputation andInterstate Conflict.’

83. Press, Calculating Credibility, 60–63.84. Jay Salomon, ‘Obama Qualifies Stance on Iran Diplomacy,’ Wall Street Journal (24 May 2006).85. Litwak, Rogue States.

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86. Sherman, ‘Talking Isn’t Appeasement.’ Sherman was advisor to President Clinton and policyco-ordinator on North Korea from 1997–2001.

87. ‘Why Not Talk,’ Time (14 May 2006).88. ‘Clinton expressed words of sincere apology to Kim Jong Il for the hostile acts committed by

the two American journalists. . . . Clinton courteously conveyed to Kim Jong Il an earnest request of theU.S. government to leniently pardon them.’ However, American officials denied Clinton’s remarks. GlenKessler, ‘North Korea Releases U.S. Journalists,’ Washington Post (5 August 2009).

89. The guilt or innocence of the journalists for illegally crossing into North Korea was neverdetermined.

90. Jason Solomon and Carol E. Lee, ‘Iran’s Ayatollah Sends New Letter to Obama Amid NuclearTalks,’ Wall Street Journal (13 February 2015): http://www.wsj.com/articles/irans-ayatollah-sends-new-letter-to-obama-amid-nuclear-talks-1423872638.

91. James Bill, The Eagle and the Lion: The Tragedy of American-Iranian Relations (New Haven,CT, 1988), 276.

92. Most decisions in international relations occur under conditions of uncertainty. Here I referto ‘uncertain’ in terms of self-imposed or self-inflicted information gaps that are a product of neglect ofintelligence gathering or apathy.

93. Jerrold Green, ‘Negotiating with Iran,’ in Jerrold D. Green, Frederic Wehrey, and Charles Wolf,Jr., eds., Understanding Iran (Santa Monica, CA, 2009), 79.

94. Bill, Eagle and the Lion.95. Peter Baker and Glenn Kessler, ‘U.S. Campaign Is Aimed at Iran’s Leaders,’ Washington Post

(13 March 2006).96. Amos Tversky and Daniel Kahneman, ‘Advances in Prospect Theory: Cumulative

Representation of Uncertainty,’ Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, 5/4 (1992), 297–323; Rose McDermott,Risk-Taking in International Politics: Prospect Theory in American Foreign Policy (Ann Arbor, MI, 1998).

97. In a number of interviews with me, policy-makers prefaced pronouncements about rogue stateintentions with admissions of a lack of deep understanding and knowledge of the counties in question.As Wiseman ‘Engaging the Enemy’ points out, perhaps the best example of ‘on the ground reporting’ inan adversarial state is George Kennan’s famous ‘Long Telegram.’

98. Gary Sick, ‘Better for Business,’ The Iranian (3 August 2000): http://www.iranian.com/Opinion/2000/August/Cheney.

99. Press, Calculating Credibility, 8–41.100. George F. Kennan, Russia and the West Under Lenin and Stalin (Boston, 1961), 63.

Jeffrey R. Fields holds a Ph.D. from the School of International Relations at the University ofSouthern California. His work focuses on the international security environment and long termplanning for combating weapons of mass destruction. His current research projects deal with statedecision-making on non-proliferation issues, failed states, and ‘rogue’ regimes. He is now Professorof the practice of international relations and Director of the Dornsife Washington, DC program atthe University of Southern California.

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