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Ilan Berman's Blog

On ElBaradei, Egypt and the Muslim Brotherhood

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By Ilan Berman  |  Wed, April 14, 2010 12:00 PM  |  Permalink

Refocusing U.S. Policy On The War On Terror

The near-disaster that took place in the skies over Detroit on Christmas Day has refocused domestic attention on an issue that has dominated headlines for much of the past year. That issue is the state of U.S. counterterrorism strategy, and the picture isn't pretty.

Since taking office last January, Team Obama has focused extensively on the most obvious battlefields in what was once known as the "War on Terror." It has moved ahead with its pledge to draw down troops in Iraq, where stability is slowly but surely returning. And it has bolstered its commitment to Afghanistan through a significant troop surge and a new policy approach that takes a more holistic view of the causes and consequences of conflict there.

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By Ilan Berman  |  Wed, January 6, 2010 1:16 PM  |  Permalink

Iran's Month Of Living Dangerously

You might have missed it, but the past month has opened a new page in Iran's confrontation with the West.

On November 28th, the Iranian government dramatically upped the stakes in the international standoff over its nuclear program when it approved a plan to build ten new uranium enrichment facilities in the near future. Never mind that the plan is much more rhetoric than reality. (In the six-and-a-half years since Iran's nuclear program became public, the country has managed to amass less than 10,000 centrifuges. At this rate, gathering the 500,000 units that Iranian officials desire could literally take hundreds of years.) What is important is that Iran has directly repudiated the IAEA's call, issued two days earlier, for it to cease enrichment work and close its newly-disclosed Qom site. The message could not be any clearer: Iran is not willing to alter its nuclear plans in any substantial way, despite the best diplomatic efforts of the Obama administration or anyone else.

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By Ilan Berman  |  Tue, December 1, 2009 10:15 AM  |  Permalink

GWOT, RIP

Years from now, historians are likely to look back on November 13th as the day the War on Terror died.

The Obama administration's decision, announced publicly on Friday, to bring terror mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four others to New York to stand trial in federal court for the atrocities of September 11th is flawed on many levels. For one thing, it wipes away years of progress and preparation by the U.S. military in bringing Mohammed and his co-conspirators to justice by way of military tribunal. For another, as former Justice Department official John Yoo writes in the Wall Street Journal, it is a potential "intelligence bonanza" for al-Qaeda, forcing the U.S. government to publicly reveal classified sources and methods used by the intelligence community in order to ensure a conviction. Most significant of all, however, is what it tells us about the Obama administration's attitudes toward the War on Terror.

In the days after September 11th, the Bush administration correctly recognized that the attacks on Washington and New York carried out by al-Qaeda were tantamount to a declaration of war against the United States. Thereafter, terrorists captured on the battlefield in places like Afghanistan and Iraq were classified as "unlawful combatants" - a military term that explicitly put those foreign radicals outside the purview of U.S. domestic law. The Obama administration's decision to abandon that framework in favor of a civilian one that provides the 9/11 plotters with the same legal protection U.S. citizens receive puts mass casualty terrorism on the same legal footing as burglary and rape, and serves as the strongest repudiation to date of the idea that we are at actually war with the forces of radical Islam.

All of which should be deeply disheartening to Americans of all political stripes. This summer, the President's top counterterrorism advisor, John Brennan, told a Washington audience that, unlike his predecessor's more ambitious plans for a "global" struggle against Islamic extremism, President Obama is focused strictly on a narrow "war with al-Qaeda." Friday's decision, however, indicates that the White House now has abandoned even that comparatively modest objective.

By Ilan Berman  |  Mon, November 16, 2009 11:19 AM  |  Permalink

Getting The Hint

Just what part of the word "no" don't we understand? Over the past month, the Obama administration's much-anticipated plans for detente with Iran have run up against some harsh realities. The tentative deal struck on October 1st in Geneva, under which Iran agreed to outsource a significant part of its uranium enrichment, has now officially collapsed, with Iran days ago formally rejecting the UN-sponsored plan to send its stockpile to Russia and France.

Official Washington, however, doesn't seem to have gotten the picture. The Obama White House, having been rebuffed in its diplomatic efforts to defuse the crisis over Iran's nuclear ambitions, now appears more eager than ever to embark upon more of the same. Reuters reports that the Administration, far from being discouraged, is now "willing to give Iran time to decide whether to accept a U.N. draft deal that is meant to defuse nuclear tensions with world powers." Washington, in other words, is not taking no for an answer.

All of which is reminiscent of an exchange that took place on an AFPC-sponsored visit to India in early 2007. As part of discussions in New Delhi, the delegation was granted an audience with Indian National Security Advisor MK Narayanan. When asked about India's approach toward Iran, Narayanan affirmed Delhi's commitment to "dialogue" to resolve the then-already-acute crisis over Iran's nuclear program. When pressed about the possibility that negotiations may not resolve the impasse with Tehran, Narayanan answered with conviction: "diplomacy cannot be allowed to fail."

The message was clear: back then, India didn't have a "Plan B" for dealing with Iran. Today, it's the United States that doesn't.

By Ilan Berman  |  Mon, November 9, 2009 3:31 PM  |  Permalink

The Elusive Palestinian Center

For those who aren't regular watchers of Palestinian politics, this week was just like any other. For those who are, however, all eyes have been on the Sixth Fatah General Congress taking place in Bethlehem. The conclave, the first gathering of the Palestine Liberation Organization's political core since 1989, is being seen by many as a make-or-break moment — an opportunity for the faction to modernize its political positions and bring itself into the political mainstream.

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By Ilan Berman  |  Thu, August 6, 2009 10:08 AM  |  Permalink

A Lesson In Strategic Surprise

Timing, they say, is everything. At the moment, no one knows that better than the EastWest Institute. On Tuesday, with much fanfare, the New York-based think tank released what it billed as the "first-ever U.S.-Russian joint threat assessment" on Iran's nuclear and ballistic missile capabilities. The report is a study in threat minimization, with every possible technological impediment to Iran's emergence as a nuclear power highlighted and stressed. Of particular note, however, is its take on Iran's burgeoning ballistic missile arsenal. Despite official pronouncements from Tehran on the subject, the report concludes, there is currently no evidence that Iran has a ballistic missile with a range of 2,000 kilometers. So imagine the Institute's surprise and chagrin when, less than twenty-four hours later, the Islamic Republic successfully tested just such a capability: the 2,000 kilometer range solid fuel Sajjil-2, capable of striking southeastern Europe and U.S. bases throughout the Middle East.

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By Ilan Berman  |  Thu, May 21, 2009 11:25 AM  |  Permalink

Iran: Plus Ca Change

By now, the idea that Iran is the world's leading sponsor of international terrorism is fairly common knowledge. Even so, the State Department's annual survey of global terrorism trends provides a useful glimpse into the breathtaking scope of Tehran's regional troublemaking. According to the latest edition of Country Reports on Terrorism, released on April 30th by State's Office of the Coordinator for Counterterrorism, Iran "remained the most active state sponsor of terrorism" in 2008, responsible for violence and instability that thwarted "international efforts to promote peace, threatened economic stability in the Gulf, and undermined the growth of democracy."

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By Ilan Berman  |  Sat, May 2, 2009 1:03 PM  |  Permalink

What's In A Name?

The War on Terror appears to be over — at least rhetorically. The Washington Post is reporting that the Obama administration has directed its officials and representatives to begin replacing the term "Global War on Terror" with the more anodyne "Overseas Contingency Operation" in their speeches and public pronouncements.

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By Ilan Berman  |  Thu, March 26, 2009 11:10 AM  |  Permalink

National Security Ethics 101

A lot can happen in three weeks. Back in early February, few had ever heard of Charles "Chas" Freeman. All that changed mid-month, when Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair formally nominated the former Clinton-era Ambassador to Saudi Arabia to serve as the new head of the intelligence community's top analytical body, the National Intelligence Council.

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By Ilan Berman  |  Wed, March 11, 2009 11:53 AM  |  Permalink