Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards told a group of New Hampshire voters Saturday that he would consider pursuing a nonaggression pact between the United States and Iran.Of course, it's getting Iran to give up nuclear ambitions and sponsorship of Hezbollah and Hamas that's the challenge, isn't it? The nuclear ambitions question, hard as that would be to resolve through negotiations and sanctions, is a cinch compared to the task of getting Iran to stop funding anti-Israel militias and terrorists -- because the issue there is not just fear of U.S. aggression, but the need for a lasting and peaceful resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the unification of Lebanon around a strong central government that accepts Israel. I'm not sure how brave it is to say that if we could solve the Middle East peace problem we'd normalize relations with Iran and promise to never attack them if they didn't attack us. If we could solve the Middle East peace problem (which today includes resolving the tensions between Israel and Iran), we wouldn't necessarily need a non-aggression pact -- we'd have something even better.Edwards' statement came in answer to a voter's question at a house party in Nashua on Saturday morning. Asked about it later in an interview with ABC News, Edwards confirmed that he views such a treaty -- in which the United States would promise not to attack Iran -- as "a possibility down the road." But he emphasized that the Iranian government would first have to change its behavior in several areas.
"I wouldn't give away anything until it became clear what the intent of Iran was, that they've given up any nuclear ambition, that they would no longer sponsor Hezbollah, Hamas and other terrorist organizations," Edwards told ABC News, in an interview to be broadcast on "Nightline" Monday night. "So there would be huge jumps and these things would all have to be verifiable. We'd have to be certain that they were occurring in order to get to that stage. But I think we would consider all of our relations on the table."
These nuances, I suspect, will be lost in the domestic political discussion, where Edwards' statements will get interpreted, depending on the analyst, as either a gross pander to ignorance or a brave effort to transform American rhetoric on Iran from all stick to some carrot, while leaving the threat of force on the table. At some point, it would be useful if Edwards could unpack all this in a detailed foreign policy speech.
--Garance Franke-Ruta
