TEHRAN, Iran - Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's abrupt dismissal of a letter from Iran's president might only strengthen hardline attitudes and mistrust of America, some Iranians warned Tuesday.
As President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad began a high-profile visit to a key Muslim country, Indonesia, a former top Iranian official said Rice's response will give new justification to those who oppose ties with the U.S.
Iran's former ambassador to France, Sadeq Kharrazi, said the letter — the first from an Iranian head of state to an American president in 27 years — "could have been a turning point in relations." But he said Rice squandered the opportunity with what he called a "hasty reaction."
"This gives a pretext to those in Iran who oppose re-establishment of ties with America," he said.
Ahmadinejad's 18-page letter to President Bush touched only indirectly on the hottest dispute between the two countries — Iran's nuclear program. Instead, it focuses on a long list of grievances against the United States and seeks to build on a shared faith in God to resolve them.
Rice told The Associated Press the letter "isn't addressing the issues that we're dealing with in a concrete way."
What can I say? The Bush administration completely blew it! This is the first letter from an Iranian head of state to an American president in 27 years--the Iranians were making an overture towards opening direct negotiations with the United States! This was a huge concession from Iran. It opens direct talks between U.S. and Iranian officials. Granted, there was enough rhetoric and a list of grievances the Iranians had against the U.S. in the letter, and that the Iranians conveniently never mentioned their own nuclear program. But the important fact was that the Iranians were willing to sit down in direct negotiations with the U.S. towards ending these disputes. In other words, this was a diplomatic opening towards normalizing relations between the United States and Iran.
And President Bush screwed up! Secretary of State Condi Rice's dismissal of this letter tells me that the Bush neocons have no intention resolving this Iranian nuclear dispute in a diplomatic or political way--the PNAC neocons would never allow diplomatic negotiations to interfere with their dream of American imperialism in the Middle East. The Bush administration has set their own deadline against Iran for ending their nuclear program, or the U.S. will attack Iran. This deadline will be around the middle or end of October, before the midterm elections in which the Republicans are hoping that a U.S. attack against Iran will cause Americans to "rally around the flag and their president," and thus ensuring that Americans will vote to maintain Republican control of Congress. Any direct negotiations between the U.S. and Iran, six months before the midterm elections, will negate this White House political deadline for an American attack against Iran, considering that direct negotiations between the U.S. and Iran could take at least a year or longer to resolve these disputes.
But there is more. Consider this from the story:
Iranian political analyst Saeed Leilaz said Rice's quick brushoff would fuel anti-American feelings in Iran.
"It could have been the beginning of a new process," he said. Rice's response "strengthens the suspicion (inside Iran) that the U.S. is thinking of a military option only and not a political solution" to the standoff over Iran's nuclear program, he said.
That is the real problem here. The Bush administration's dismissal of this letter will only harden extremist views in both Washington and Tehran. This brush-off simply reinforces Iranian's beliefs that the U.S. will attack Iran, and it will only fuel the anti-American hatred of hard-lined extremists in Iran if the U.S. does attack. The Bush administration's attitude also tells the Iranian government that the U.S. is not interested in talking with Iran, and Iran is not going to make any more concessions to the U.S. The Iranians will go to war with the United States if the U.S. does attack Iran. The Bush administration's dismissal of this letter also hardens extremist views in Washington. The PNAC neocons in the Bush administration looked at this letter, saw that it listed Iranian grievances against the U.S., and felt that a state-sponsored terrorist nation in the Middle East has no right to kick an imperial superpower of the United States around. Got to teach those Iranians a lesson now! The Iranians certainly have a list of demands to present to the United States--just as the U.S. has a list of demands to present to the Iranians. The key here is that the Iranians were providing an opening for negotiations in resolving the problems between the U.S. and Iran. The PNAC neocons of Cheney, Rumsfeld, and even Rice probably knew that this letter would have thrown the Bush administration's planned attack against Iran in the trash. That is why Condi Rice dismissed this letter.
You can expect the United States to go to war with Iran in mid-October.
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