IRAN IN AFGHANISTAN. Setting aside the question of whether reports of Iranian assistance to the Taliban can be taken seriously (it's possible that some private or government elements in Iran could see some advantage in cooperating with the Taliban, in spite of past hostility), the important thing to remember is that Iran was of great assistance to the United States in the initial Afghan campaign. Instead of attempting to build on that cooperation and actually, you know, fight al-Qaeda, the Bush administration preferred to adopt a stance of hostility. This stance has failed utterly to advance any United States foreign policy goal. One doesn't need to sympathize with the Iranian state to believe that cooperation between Iran and the U.S. could be productive. Hostility is a defensible policy if it goes anywhere, but it really hasn't; Iran's nuclear program is more advanced now than it was five years ago, its government doesn't seem any closer to collapse, and it may (or may not) be aiding enemies of the United States in two different wars. At some point a policy choice should result in, well, results, and the only thing that U.S. policy has achieved is an excessively paranoid and angry Iran.
--Robert Farley
