At the same time as he prods the stubborn mule that is China, however, Mr Obama is also struggling to curb the angry stallion that is Congress. Anti-Iranian sentiment on Capitol Hill was already inflamed by the Holocaust-denying rhetoric of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad but has reached fever-pitch since the regime’s clampdown since June on the pro-democracy green movement.

Democrats and Republicans alike are champing to tighten America’s own sanctions on Iran. The White House has been pleading for time—first to give engagement a chance and lately to avoid complicating efforts in the Security Council. Now the Hill’s patience has run out.

Although the White House denies that it is out of sync with Congress, Kenneth Katzman of the Congressional Research Service said this week that Congress was in a “ferment” to find “every which way” to squeeze the Iranians. The pressure is bipartisan: sponsors of sanctions resolutions include John McCain, a Republican senator, and Howard Berman, a House Democrat. One pair of bills would punish all firms, including foreign ones, that sell petrol or refining equipment to Iran (Iran is short of refining capacity). Other proposals range from targeting individuals involved in human-rights abuses to making regime change official policy.

Blunt instruments like this could shatter Mr Obama’s careful efforts to corral foreign allies and show Iranians that America is worried about their regime’s nuclear delinquencies, not hostile to Iran itself. But Mr Obama faces a tricky calculation. Some State Department advisers tell him that too much pressure will provoke Iran to retaliate in Afghanistan (which Mr Ahmadinejad visited this week), with troubling consequences for the war on which the fate of his presidency may ultimately hang. But even friendly pollsters such as Stanley Greenberg and James Carville are picking up signs that the president is becoming vulnerable on national-security issues. Sarah Palin has helpfully urged him to “toughen up” and declare war on Iran.

Karim Sadjadpour of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace has been dusting down the article George Kennan wrote from Moscow under the pseudonym X in 1947, calling for “patient but firm and vigilant containment” of the Soviet Union. One unintended consequence of Mr Obama’s extended hand was to aid the rise in Iran of a resilient democracy movement. Better now to encourage the opposition and wait for the regime to implode, says Mr Sadjadpour (he doesn’t expect to have to wait 40 years), than to concentrate only on the centrifuges spinning in Natanz. Mr Obama might think so, too—if only he could live with the idea of Iran going nuclear on his watch.

Go to Economist.

Free Iran:  I received the following email from someone I know and trust in Tehran.

The executive branch of  Iran has increased its power and grip over the administration of state institutions (economic and political) since the June Presidential election. They have made new appointees from the Revolutionary Guard and it is planned that the number two position in any state institution will be a Guard’s man!  The civil servants know this and are extremely upset with that and with the way politics and economics are being managed. The Guard appointees have no knowledge ,experience, and expertise about the organization they are being assigned to. There is a tremendous amount of dissatisfaction within state institutions, but they do not dare say or do anything. The Guard is spreading its tentacles. The civil servants, like ordinary people, have to deal with low income, huge inflation (the government says it is now lowered to 11.4% -???), lack of job opportunities for their children, social restrictions, etc. Hence, this element of society is very angry.

As for the ordinary people, nothing has improved except for more unemployment!! (the private sector laying off people – from bazaar to retailers to contractors to small industries and many other entrepreneurs). New high school and college graduates will not find jobs.  Petrol rations have been slashed for all – private users, taxis, van and truck drivers. People in the transport business now have to buy about 50% of their monthly needs based on open market prices. Inflation is still increasing, govt figures not withstanding.

Moral is very, very low. There is an amazing sense of pessimism every where, even among the more affluent people who live in northern Tehran. Why? People with successful companies cannot get paid by their customers. The government has reduced its budget payment to state organizations which are its biggest clients. State organizations (ministries and others) award contracts to and buy goods and services from the private sector. So, when the government does not pay the state institutions, they, in turn, cannot pay their contractors and suppliers. The private sector is squeezed badly for liquidity. Shareholders and loans from banks can only carry them so far. After that, they have to reduce operations or close shop. Liquidity squeeze on a macro and micro scale is choking business and the economy. Customers owe so much money to their suppliers but cannot pay them.

One does not see large gathering of people any more. People do not feel like having parties in their homes. Many are scared to go to parties. Their moral is low. It is really a terrible feeling. Gatherings have been reduced to a few people. The traffic in Tehran has gotten worse since last year and the pollution was awful this winter. Therapist and psychiatrists say because of the enormous amount of stress and pollution, many people are developing severe psychological and emotional problems.

As for within the system, the split is widening. Almost all those who were part of the ‘reformist’/’liberal’ elements of the Khatami era and part of the system are now in opposition to the system. That split has spread to Qom and among the prominent ‘leaders’. The religious talk is all a facade. There are whispers that  about 2,000 Guardsmen were just arrested! The executive branch has become an absolute military dictatorship. Their ruthless responses have scared people from challenging them in the streets. One can witness sporadic challenges on certain dates but it is not widespread. In the short term, people are gripped with the vicious response from the guards.  The number and type of people who were released after their arrests is staggering. Most are educated and professional people. At the 22nd of bahman demonstrations, ( about a month ago)  at least over 100 thousand militia forces were on all corners of the streets in city Tehran center with about 5,000 motor bike militias dressed like soldiers of darth vader. As for corruption,  think Nigeria , Russia , Uganda , etc. They approach one with no shame and very openly state their outlandish demands.

All of the above is nothing really new. In summary, conditions are getting worse. No one knows what the hell is happening to the $4 billion of oil income Iran receives every month. One can only guess that the state expenditure is huge- that there is not sufficient money to even cover the current account. The trend is very very alarming and open dissatisfaction has really grown.

In the longer term, the  regime is paying a heavy price in terms of their legitimacy and people’s support.

Mr. Thomas Friedman writes in today’s NY Times:

.

And how about you, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran? How are you feeling today? Yes, I am sure you have your proxies in Iraq. But I am also sure you know what some of your people are quietly saying: “How come we Iranian-Persian-Shiites — who always viewed ourselves as superior to Iraqi-Arab-Shiites — can only vote for a handful of pre-chewed, pre-digested, ‘approved’ candidates from the supreme leader, while those lowly Iraqi Shiites, who have been hanging around with America for seven years, get to vote for whomever they want?” Unlike in Tehran, Iraqis actually count the votes. This will subtly fuel the discontent in Iran.

Yes, the U.S.’s toppling of Saddam Hussein helped Iran expand its influence into the Arab world. Saddam’s Iraq was a temporary iron-fisted bulwark against Iranian expansion. But if Iraq has any sort of decent outcome — and becomes a real Shiite-majority, multiethnic democracy right next door to the phony Iranian version — it will be a source of permanent pressure on the Iranian regime. It will be a constant reminder that “Islamic democracy” — the rigged system the Iranians set up — is nonsense. Real “Islamic democracy” is just like any other democracy, except with Muslims voting.

Former President George W. Bush’s gut instinct that this region craved and needed democracy was always right. It should have and could have been pursued with much better planning and execution. This war has been extraordinarily painful and costly. But democracy was never going to have a virgin birth in a place like Iraq, which has never known any such thing.

Some argue that nothing that happens in Iraq will ever justify the costs. Historians will sort that out. Personally, at this stage, I only care about one thing: that the outcome in Iraq be positive enough and forward-looking enough that those who have actually paid the price — in lost loved ones or injured bodies, in broken homes or broken lives, be they Iraqis or Americans or Brits — see Iraq evolve into something that will enable them to say that whatever the cost, it has given freedom and decent government to people who had none.

Free Iran:  It is unlikely that we’ll see a stable democracy in Iraq before Iran.  For a democracy to take root, it first needs a fertile environment.  It’s difficult to impose democracy by invasion and occupation.  Iran, far more than Iraq and certainly Afghanistan, is the candidate for a genuine democracy in the Middle East.  Having gone through the trial and error of experimenting with Islamic fundamentalism, the Iranian people are now far more open to pluralism than their neighbors in the region.

Free Iran:   It’s most reassuring to read about someone like Mr. Lubrani advising the Israeli defense department.  He understands the negative consequences of an Israeli attack.  What’s surprising is that given his good track record at predicting events, how come the Israeli defense department shut down his office and that he is not listened to more often?  This is a must read.

Israel’s oldest civil servant, 83-year-old Ministry of Defense adviser Uri Lubrani, has spent his career defying conventional wisdom on Iran.

Today, Israel’s political and military establishment appears to be tilting toward one of his long-ignored views: Israeli support for Iran’s opposition movement—and not a miltary strike—is the best way to combat the regime in Tehran.

Israeli officials have regularly suggested the country is ready to attack Iran to curb its nuclear program, which some Israelis view as a threat to the country’s existence.

After the rise of the Iranian protest movement following disputed elections in June, Israeli leaders toned down the rhetoric. In February, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, visiting Moscow, said Israel wasn’t “planning any wars” against Tehran.

Instead, U.S. and Israeli officials are pushing for tough economic sanctions they hope will drive a bigger wedge between President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and the opposition.

“A military strike will at best delay Iran’s nuclear program, but what’s worse, it will rally the Iranian people to the defense of the regime,” says Mr. Lubrani, who was ambassador to Iran from 1973 to 1978 and is now a special adviser to Israel’s minister of defense. “We must do everything possible to help (the protest movement) do the job.”

Rafi Eitan, an adviser to Mr. Netanyahu, says the protests “changed people’s attitudes here. They started to understand that this should be done the way Lubrani has been saying it should be done.”

The Israeli defense establishment includes those who favor a more aggressive posture toward Iran, including a military strike if necessary, and those who oppose the military option. But even hawkish officials interviewed in recent months stressed they were aware of the risks of military action. Officials expressed support for sanctions, and said they weren’t eager to attack.

Mr. Lubrani has for four decades been on the front lines of Israel’s evolving relationship with Iran—from close ally to bitter foe. For much of that time, he warned that Iran’s theocratic regime posed the Mideast’s biggest threat, a view overlooked for years. Go to WSJ.

More than 100 dissidents and journalists faced vague antistate accusations during a mass judicial proceeding in August. (AP)

More than 100 dissidents and journalists faced vague antistate accusations during a mass judicial proceeding in August. (AP)The number of journalists in jail rose in February as a relentless media crackdown continues in Iran. Authorities are now holding at least 52 journalists in prison, a third of all those in jail around the world, according to the latest monthly survey by the Committee to Protect Journalists.

“Iran is entering a state of permanent media repression, a situation that is not only appalling but also untenable,” said CPJ Executive Director Joel Simon. “The Iranian government will eventually lose the war against information, but we are saddened every day that our colleagues are paying such a terrible price.”

Twelve journalists were imprisoned in February alone, although seven were released. The January census recorded 47 in jail. CPJ has joined forces with leading press freedom organizations from around the world in a campaign to win the release of journalists jailed in Iran. An online petition that will be sent to Ayatollah Sayed Ali Khamenei later this month is available on the site.

In light of the Iranian government’s ongoing crackdown, CPJ has been conducting a monthly survey of journalists imprisoned in Iran. (CPJ normally conducts a worldwide survey of jailed journalists each December.) The survey, conducted on the first of each month, is a snapshot of those incarcerated on that date. It does not include more than 50 other journalists in Iran who have been imprisoned and released on bail over the last several months. Five of those now in jail were detained prior to the 2009 crackdown. Go to original article.

Iranians who work for foreign media come under threat.

The United Nations should focus on pressing the Tehran regime to restore democracy and human rights rather than imposing economic sanctions on Iran for its nuclear programme, says Shirin Ebadi, the Iranian opposition activist.

“A military attack or economic sanctions would be to the detriment of the people of Iran,” she said, adding that the government of President Mahmoud Ahmadi-Nejad had ways to circumvent further economic measures and their unintended impact might be to rally people behind the regime.

She called, however, for action against western companies that she said were supporting actively the censorship and repression of the opposition movement.

The UN Security Council should focus not only on the nuclear programme “but also put human rights and democracy on your agenda. Non-democratic countries can be as dangerous to world peace as an atomic bomb.”

Ms Ebadi, who has been travelling abroad since leaving Iran for a conference on the eve of last year’s presidential election, said western states should put as much effort towards restricting companies that help the regime repress the opposition as they do into tracking down banks doing business with Iran.

Tehran should be obliged to abide by international obligations to protect human rights as well as by its nuclear commitments, said Ms Ebadi. “Assuming Iran agrees on the nuclear programme, will the west worry about what happens to the people of Iran?” she asked.

The human rights lawyer, awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2003, named Nokia-Siemens and France’s Eutelsat as among a number of companies she said were helping the regime. A Nokia-Siemens spokeswoman was quoted last week as denying opposition claims that telecoms technology it supplied to Iran could be used to monitor internet traffic.

Ms Ebadi said Eutelsat was continuing to supply satellite communications to Iranian government broadcasters while cutting services to western organisations broadcasting into Iran, including the BBC, that were being jammed by the Iranian authorities.

As the US Senate and House of Representatives prepared to discuss combining their own legislation on Iran sanctions, the US Government Accountability Office last week criticised flaws in US statistics that are intended to keep track of trade with Iran.

It noted inadequacies in the Treasury’s filings and said: “Treasury’s information systems weaken the ability of the government to assess compliance with Iran sanctions.” Go to Financial Times.

Video hat tip to GeenQuran

Politico: CENTCOM commander Gen. David Petraeus took several hard shots at Iran on Sunday, saying the country was becoming a “thugocracy” and calling President Mamoud Ahmadinejad “our best recruiting officer.”

Iran’s security forces are playing less of a role in Iraq now, since they “have had to focus a great deal more on internal security challenges than they did in the past,” Petraeus told Fareed Zakaria on CNN.

“Iran has gone from a theocracy to a thugacracy,” he said, “because of the citizens who are outraged by the hijacking of the election that took place last June.”

Saying that Iran has rejected the open hand that the Obama administration extended, Petraeus said, “The result is the transition by not just the United States — France the U.K., even Russia are all seeing the need to transition to the so-called pressure track, with much stiffer sanctions and so forth.”

Asked whether a nuclear Iran could be contained, Petraeus said, “First of all you have to ask the country that is most directly concerns about this, and that would be Israel.”

In the gulf states, Petraeus said, “There’s almost a slight degree of bipolarity there at times. On the one hand there are countries that would like to see a strike – perhaps Israeli– there’s the worry that someone will strike. And then there’s the worry that someone won’t strike.”

“President Ahmadinejad is often our best recruiting officer,” Petraeus said, because his actions and his rhetoric are causing much more embrace of CENTCOM and other activities than would otherwise be the case.”

AFP: General David Petraeus, the head of US Central Command, warned Sunday that Iran is becoming a “thugocracy” in attempts to suppress popular anger over last year’s contested presidential vote results.

“I think you’ve heard it said by pundits that Iran has gone from being a theocracy to a thugocracy,” Petraeus, whose command stretches from Egypt to Pakistan and includes Iran, said on CNN’s “Fareed Zakaria GPS.”

“And that is again because of the emergence of this reform movement of the citizens who are outraged at the hijacking of the election that took place back last summer.”

Iran has executed protesters who took to the streets to demonstrate against the presidential election in June 2009 that saw Mahmoud Ahmadinejad returned to power despite widespread allegations of fraud.

The use of force against activists as well as Tehran’s continued enrichment of uranium in defiance of international entreaties have isolated a regime that has repeatedly spurned offers of engagement from President Barack Obama.

Petraeus said it was not clear whether Tehran had definitively decided to pursue nuclear weapons, as many Western nations fear.

But he said such a decision was “a little bit immaterial at this point in time, because all of the components of a program to produce nuclear weapons… have been proceeding.”

The United States is working with its UN Security Council veto-wielding partners — France, Britain, China and Russia — as well as Germany, to come up with new sanctions against Iran. Tehran maintains its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes only.

In the past, Washington has struggled to convince Russia and China to back sanctions, but Moscow switched course recently after a new Iranian nuclear site was revealed.

Petraeus said Iranian actions were making it easier for the United States to build a coalition and added: “President Ahmadinejad is often our best recruiting officer.”

The federal government has awarded more than $107 billion in contract payments, grants and other benefits over the past decade to foreign and multinational American companies while they were doing business in Iran, despite Washington’s efforts to discourage investment there, records show.

That includes nearly $15 billion paid to companies that defied American sanctions law by making large investments that helped Iran develop its vast oil and gas reserves.

For years, the United States has been pressing other nations to join its efforts to squeeze the Iranian economy, in hopes of reining in Tehran’s nuclear ambitions. Now, with the nuclear standoff hardening and Iran rebuffing American diplomatic outreach, the Obama administration is trying to win a tough new round of United Nations sanctions.

But a New York Times analysis of federal records, company reports and other documents shows that both the Obama and Bush administrations have sent mixed messages to the corporate world when it comes to doing business in Iran, rewarding companies whose commercial interests conflict with American security goals.

Many of those companies are enmeshed in the most vital elements of Iran’s economy. More than two-thirds of the government money went to companies doing business in Iran’s energy industry — a huge source of revenue for the Iranian government and a stronghold of the increasingly powerful Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, a primary focus of the Obama administration’s proposed sanctions because it oversees Iran’s nuclear and missile programs.

Other companies are involved in auto manufacturing and distribution, another important sector of the Iranian economy with links to the Revolutionary Guards. One supplied container ship motors to IRISL, a government-owned shipping line that was subsequently blacklisted by the United States for concealing military cargo.

Beyond $102 billion in United States government contract payments since 2000 — to do everything from building military housing to providing platinum to the United States Mint — the companies and their subsidiaries have reaped a variety of benefits. They include nearly $4.5 billion in loans and loan guarantees from the Export-Import Bank, a federal agency that underwrites the export of American goods and services, and more than $500 million in grants for work that includes cancer research and the turning of agricultural byproducts into fuel.

Free Iran:  A moving and inspiring letter by a political prisoner…

Parisa Kakaee is a women’s and human rights activist and a member the Committee of Human Rights Reporters. She was arrested on November 3, 2009 and detained for a month and a half. The following is an article written by Parisa Kakaee Mr. Interrogator! Please read it!

The conversation began with the subject of “Equality” and your questioning that why it is that when the best people who were the frontline warriors (during the Iran-Iraq war) are being atrociously assassinated in Sistan and Baluchistan1, why is it that we – the social activists – who are bragging about human rights, have not even made a single statement in support of the martyrs; why it is that we do not protest against the bombing that happened in Shiraz.

Then I told you about Hamed3 and his disease; about execution, torture, and human rights; about equality and that there is no difference for me that whose human rights with what social status are violated. What is significant is that a right from a human being is violated. What is significant is the pain that a human being suffers.

And this is the point upon which I cry. I shout loudly against a history whose values were those of blinding eyes, mocking, scalding, flogging, and castrating men. A history that now celebrates executions and shooting of its arrows in our chests.  This is where I stop shedding tears. I gaze into a space and ask you, Mr. Ebrahimi, a question: When you talk about your friends being killed in Sistan and Baluchestan, I do feel pain, but have you ever, just for a second, tried to imagine the pain Ehsan’s mom has been suffering?

Have you ever wondered how easy you make the killing when you kill someone’s beloved ones so easily and without giving them a chance to defend? Mr. Ebrahimi! Violence has a strangely vast domain. There is always someone with a reason to kill and the one who is killed is the next reason. The enemy is not far away as you say.
The enemy is right here, sitting in our heart, flying like a hyena over the minds of those who kill your people, and over the minds of you who kill theirs.

You see Mr. Ebrahimi! Even when we are sitting next to each other on a same table there is a distance between us. What keeps you there is your power, and what keeps me here are the victims of your power.

Go to original article.

The cynical (and usually correct) critique of economic sanctions was summed up this way by a retired US diplomat named Douglas Paal: “Sanctions always accomplish their principal objective, which is to make those who impose them feel good.”

The Obama administration is now struggling to craft a new round of United Nations sanctions against Iran that achieves more than this feel-good impact. The ambitious goal is “to cut off the revenues that fund Iran’s nuclear and missile programs,” says a senior administration official.

“We are going to put as tight a squeeze on Iran as we possibly can,” adds a diplomat from one of the members of the US-led coalition that is beginning to discuss a new sanctions resolution at the UN Security Council. The resolution will target the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and its vast network of companies, which the United States estimates may include up to one-third of Iran’s total economy.

One focus of the proposed sanctions may be the Islamic Republic of Iran Shipping Lines, a 115-vessel fleet that analysts believe has carried cargo for the country’s nuclear program. Another target might be the IRGC-owned construction company Khatam al-Anbiya and its network of subsidiaries.

To provide economic muscle for the new push against Iran, the Obama administration is working closely with Gulf oil exporters, such as Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton visited Saudi Arabia last month to enlist its help in the sanctions campaign – and, in particular, to lobby China to back the new UN sanctions resolution.

China is vulnerable to Iranian oil pressure because it imports about 540,000 barrels per day from Iran. So the Saudis and Emiratis have been assuring Beijing that they would be prepared to offset any shortfall in Iranian crude shipments.

The UAE has already boosted its oil exports to China as part of this pressure campaign. Shipments have increased from about 50,000 barrels per day last year to 120,000 now, with a goal by year-end of up to 200,000 barrels. Over the next few years, the UAE is offering to increase that export volume to China to about 500,000 barrels per day, which would nearly equal the current Iranian total.

The trick for the Obama administration is to craft a sanctions plan that hurts the Iranian government without causing too much pain for the Iranian people. That’s one reason the administration is wary of a congressional proposal for sanctions against Iran’s imports of refined petroleum products – a step that would probably hurt the public more than the regime.

Officials talk about “targeted” sanctions that focus on the Revolutionary Guard Corps and its military-industrial complex of companies. But this effort is the diplomatic equivalent of “precision bombing” – in practice, some collateral damage is inevitable, which could help President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad rally support for his hardline government.

What’s certain is that the Iranian nuclear issue is heading into a more intense phase of confrontation – starting with the push for tougher United Nations sanctions. The Gulf countries have been asking what the Obama administration plans to do if the sanctions don’t work: That’s the big foreign policy question of 2010, and Washington is beginning now to think about the answer. Go to original article.

Free Iran:  Trying to persuade Brutus to join him in order to stop Julius Caesar from becoming a dictator of Rome, Cassius said to Brutus:  “The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in ourselves.” (William Shakespeare)   Truer words have never been spoken.  No matter where we live and irrespective of our socioeconomic background and educational level, too many Iranians have a fatalistic political outlook wrapped in projection and  conspiracy theories.  As such, seldom do we challenge our beliefs and  engage in self-criticism.  This problem is so pervasive that I have given up conversing in politics with most Iranians above 55.  They always claim: it’s the work of the British or the CIA – NEVER our own fault.  The implication of their outlook is that we are just bunch of sheep – incapable of changing our destiny. Fortunately, the younger generation seems to appreciate the meaning behind Cassius’ statement and that’s what gives Iran hope.  The following speech from the film Good Night And Good Luck makes this point beautifully about Senator McCarthy.

We must not confuse dissent with disloyalty. We must remember always that accusation is not proof and that conviction depends upon evidence and due process of law. We will not walk in fear, one of another. We will not be driven by fear into an age of unreason, if we dig deep in our history and our doctrine, and remember that we are not descended from fearful men — not from men who feared to write, to speak, to associate and to defend causes that were, for the moment, unpopular.

This is no time for men who oppose Senator McCarthy’s methods to keep silent, or for those who approve. We can deny our heritage and our history, but we cannot escape responsibility for the result. There is no way for a citizen of a republic to abdicate his responsibilities. As a nation we have come into our full inheritance at a tender age. We proclaim ourselves, as indeed we are, the defenders of freedom, wherever it continues to exist in the world, but we cannot defend freedom abroad by deserting it at home.

The actions of the junior Senator from Wisconsin have caused alarm and dismay amongst our allies abroad, and given considerable comfort to our enemies. And whose fault is that? Not really his. He didn’t create this situation of fear; he merely exploited it — and rather successfully. Cassius was right. “The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in ourselves.”

Good night, and good luck.

Tehran’s master of clandestine operations, Qassem Suleimani, could hold the key to Iraq’s future—if he were not so busy back in Iran.

The text message was cryptic and sent through an intermediary, but its spookiness has become legendary among the Americans tasked with trying to stabilize Iraq. The moment was May 2008, and once again all hell was breaking loose. Shiite militias had gone to battle against each other. The fighting threatened to spread to Baghdad. Gen. David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker were scrambling to find somebody to broker a truce. Then the text message was passed to the American commander. “General Petraeus,” it began, “you should know that I, Qassem Suleimani, control the policy for Iran with respect to Iraq, Lebanon, Gaza, and Afghanistan.” Within days it was Suleimani who brokered the truce.

What surprised Petraeus and Crocker was not the Iranian’s role. They knew that already. It was the blunt confidence with which Suleimani stated it. As the head of the infamous Quds Force, he commands all the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) operations outside Iran’s borders—whether covert, overt, or outright terrorist. In the fractious politicking almost certain to follow Iraq’s parliamentary elections on Sunday, this 53-year-old Iranian general could pull the strings that make or break the new government in Baghdad.

Long before America’s troops occupied Iraq, Suleimani’s forces occupied the shadows. In the buildup to the U.S.-led invasion, he was the go-to guy for much of the Iraqi Kurdish and Shiite opposition to Saddam Hussein. Suleimani’s networks of agents, collaborators, military advisers, client militias, and secret informers give him a degree of power that is difficult to gauge, but it often seems proconsular: “I, Qassem Suleimani,” his text read, like an emperor’s decree. And his real message in 2008 was that he could turn up the heat, or turn it down, at will.

Crocker often used to tell his colleagues that what Suleimani probably wanted to do in Iraq was to “Lebanonize” it. The idea would be to build up as many networks and agents in Baghdad as Iran has in, say, Beirut, so that it could create a crisis—and then solve it, at a political price. As Petraeus described it, Suleimani might say, “We’ll stop the crisis immediately, but of course, you know, we’d like to have one more vote in the council of this and that.” A talented extortionist knows how to set a price that will be met. Through the accretion of such little victories, the Iranians can eventually gain a veto over everything from economic policy to foreign alliances. In the case of Iraq, they also want to make sure that Baghdad will never again challenge them as a regional power.

But today Suleimani doesn’t seem to be paying as much attention to Iraq as he once did. For the last nine months, ever since apparent election fraud in Iran sparked mass protests and continuing unrest, the head of the Quds Force has been drawn back into the treacherous politics of his own country. And what he tries to do in Iraq—indeed, the success or failure of its democratic experiment—may well be a factor of his success or failure in Iran.

Petraeus, who painted this picture when speaking in January to the Institute for the Study of War in Washington, said the unrest following “the hijacked elections” in Iran last year has forced Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei to rely on the IRGC and its Quds Force internally as well as externally. “That has enabled them to then expand their already considerable influence beyond just the security arena, but ever more greatly into the economic arena and even into the diplomatic arena,” said Petraeus, who now heads the U.S. Central Command, the military body focused on the region.

According to people who have followed Suleimani closely and prefer to remain anonymous, the spymaster and many other senior figures in the Quds Force actually supported the presidential challenger, Mir Hossein Mousavi, against incumbent president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the Supreme Leader’s anointed favorite. But because of Suleimani’s record fighting the regime’s enemies abroad, he still has Khamenei’s confidence, and he has a demonstrated range of skills, whether persuasive or coercive, that are useful in squelching protests and more subtle kinds of dissent. Go to Newsweek.

Frum attended a debate on Iran between Michael Ledeen and Flynt Leverett:

[Leverett] acknowledges past attempts at engagement – but those attempts narrowly focused on some specific tactical issue. Leverett claims Iranians have in fact cooperated on the issue on which engagement was sought. They thought by doing so they might prompt us to rethink our willingness to live with the Islamic republic. The historical record: typically its the American administration that pulls the plug on tactical cooperation, either because of domestic political blowback or in reaction to some other Iranian provocation unrelated to the area of cooperation.

Leverett claims this is what happened in 2002: The Iranians were helpful on Afghanistan – their reward was to be labeled part of the axis of evil – and to see Afghan cooperation cut off.  Leverett argues that no president has ever proposed a “grand bargain.”  He asserts that Iranians would accept such a bargain – but his evidence for this proposition is lacking.

Full transcript of the debate here. Michael Ledeen’s outlook is that every “American president has eventually come to the conclusion that we could make a grand bargain with Iran and has tried to do it.” Ledeen:

What has changed?  Why would you think you could get a deal today when you couldn’t get a deal for 31 years?  I mean, surely none of us – even though everybody in Washington is famously egotistical – I doubt that anybody here thinks that he or she is more brilliant, more profound, more talented and so forth than all of the people who, for the past last 31 years, have tried to do this.

So why?  That’s my rhetorical question to the people who only want to engage or negotiate or try to strike a deal.  And, as I say, I’m not opposed to trying to strike a deal.  And if you can get one, god bless you.  I’m pessimistic.

Go to Atlantic.