Tuesday, September 25, 2007
A question for Mitt Romney on regime change in Iran
Last week, I was invited to participate in a blogger conference call with Mitt Romney's Policy Director Sue Canfield and Stephen Smith, who runs his new media communications strategy. Other accounts of the call are here and here.
Governor Romney has spoken about Iran in tough language, with fraught references to the threat posed by the "Iranian regime." His principal policy document includes this admirable quotation:
The Iranian regime threatens not only Israel, but also every other nation in the region, and ultimately the world. And that threat would take on an entirely new dimension if Iran were allowed to become a nuclear power. And just think of the signal a nuclear Iran would send to other rogue regimes with nuclear ambitions - this could be the tipping point in the development and proliferation of nuclear regimes.
Now, anybody who follows the debate over Iran policy knows that the Bush administration has been divided over whether the United States should explicitly advocate and promote a change in the regime in Iran. It is a complex question and I am not sure how I would land if I were president. However, it seems to me that any presidential candidate should be able to give an answer even if it is "I decline to answer because I do not want to impair my freedom of action once elected." Ms. Canfield essentially avoided my question, answering that only the Iranian people could decided that. While it is true in some literal sense that "only the Iranian people" can decide to change the regime, that does not deal with my question, which was whether the United States should advocate that the Iranian people change the regime. This is a question that needs to be answered in the development of any coherent strategy to contain Iran, and the Romney campaign did not answer it.
I followed up with an emailed question to Steve Smith:
Stephen,
Sorry to torture Sally Canfield on the Iran question. Perhaps I was unclear, because I did not think that it was posing a hypothetical. If I sounded irritated it was because I thought she was dodging it.
Let me try again:
There is a debate in policy circles about whether "regime change" in some form should be an objective of United States policy toward Iran. The minority view is that the Islamic Republic is irredeemably expansionist, revolutionary in ideology and ambition, and that it will take any concession as a victory. This view says that none of the United States, Israel, Europe, or non-compliant Muslim states in the region will be safe from Iranian proxy terrorism or nuclear coercion unless and until the government of Iran changes not only its personnel, but its very character. This school of thought further believes that the prospects for internal revolution in Iran would be improved if the United States specifically and publicly endorsed regime change, and promoted it with a communications strategy and perhaps other forms of subversion.
The majority view (as nearly as I can tell) holds that (i) demanding regime change will alienate our more "realist" European allies, (ii) cause the doves *within* the Iranian regime to lose credibility, which will make it harder for Iran to negotiate away its nuclear program, and (iii) undermine Iranian democrats who are pushing for change internally by associating their cause with the foreign policy ambitions of the United States. This school of thought says that we should *not* make "regime change" a stated objective of American foreign policy.
A third position is that the United States should deny that it endorses regime change, but nevertheless work to promote it. I appreciate that if this is the Governor's position he cannot say so on the record if he does not want to be boxed in as president. However, an off-the-record confirmation of this point of view would be welcome.
If there is a fourth position, I am not sure what it would be.
So, does Governor Romney believe that the United States should make regime change in Iran an explicit objective of American foreign policy, or not. If so, why? If not, why not?
I have not received an answer and I assume that is because the Romney campaign does not believe it needs or ought to answer a blogger of my trivial stature. It would be delightful, however, if somebody with greater clout than I -- a major newspaper, perhaps -- would ask the same question of all presidential candidates. I can think of no question that would better expose a candidate's thinking on what will probably be the most puzzling foreign policy challenge of the next decade.
2 Comments:
By 
Purple Avenger, at
Tue Sep 25, 03:24:00 PM:
Should have asked her about "regime change" in the US. That probably would have gotten a prompt answer in the affirmative.
By 
, at
Wed Sep 26, 01:34:00 PM:
great question...
however, if memory serves me at all, i do believe similar questions regarding Iran were provided at earlier Republican Debates.
did the first Fox News question the Candidates if they would use force against Iran?
