Interviewer: So three of the candidates are getting support from Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, you’ve got the top hostage negotiator, Robert C. O’Brien, Brian Hook, special envoy for Iran, Ricky Waddell, he is assistant to the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff. So, although the President says that he will make the final decision, how much will Secretary Pompeo’s weigh in?

Dubowitz: Well I think the Secretary’s opinion will matter a lot. He has obviously a very close relationship with the President, certainly one of his closest national security advisors and is instrumental in most of the national security policies and challenges that the President will face over the next year and a half or longer.

Interviewer: Another name floated out there is US ambassador to Germany, Richard Grenell. Would he be good for the position?

Dubowitz: Ambassador Grenell would be great, he’s got a very close relationship with President Trump, he’s been the ambassador in Germany, really sort of in the belly of the beast there. Doing great work in Iran, on US NATO relations, and so I think ambassador Grenell is also somebody who the President admires greatly. He’s got a great personality, he’s been out in the media and very articulate.

Interviewer: How hawkish or dovish can you expect the next security advisor to be?

Dubowitz: I would say that they’re all going to be on the hawkish side. At the end of the day, the President himself, despite the fact that he doesn’t want to get into additional wars, certainly talks tough and is willing to use instruments of national power, so I would imagine he would bring in someone who reflects those views. So it’s really going to be either hawkish or very hawkish but I don’t imagine you’re going to get anybody there who doesn’t understand that American power and American leadership is essential for American security.

Interviewer: I also want to talk about the other big story today, the drone strike on the two major oil installations by Houthi rebels that knocked out 5% of the world’s oil production, so Secretary of State Mike Pompeo saying this was directed by the Iranian government. Do you agree with the Secretary, and if so, what is Iran up to?

Dubowitz: There’s no doubt this came from Iran, that Iran directed one of its proxies, whether it’s the Houthis in Yemen or some Shiite militias in Iraq, we don’t yet know. But we certainly know this is Iran’s mo. and they’ve been on a major campaign of destruction through the Middle East over the past number of decades, but certainly over the past recent months, trying to respond to the United States because we’re finally pushing back against Iranian aggression under this President with a maximum pressure campaign.

Interviewer: So you agree with the Secretary of State. Meanwhile, we’ve been getting reaction from Democratic senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut who disagrees, he by the way sits on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Senator Murphy, again, on twitter is saying “this is such irresponsible simplification and it’s how we get into dumb wars of choice. The Saudis and Houthis are at war. The Saudis attack the Houthis and the Houthis attack back. Iran is backing the Houthis and has been a bad actor, but it’s just not as simple as Houthis=Iran.” What do you say about that?

Dubowitz: I actually think it’s that simple. I think the Houthis, and we know this, have been trained by Iran and been trained by Hezbollah, they’ve been supplied with advanced weaponry by the Iranians and by Hezbollah and you have to understand, and I think everybody does on this network, that Iran has a business model and their business model is to basically replicate the Lebanese Hezbollah model across the Middle East in Yemen, in Iraq, in Syria, and obviously in Lebanon. So the Houthis are trained by Hezbollah, trained by Iran, supplied advanced weaponry by the Islamic Republic, and Iran is certainly not going to be able to hide its fingerprints behind this attack.

Interviewer: And as we told you, and as you well know, those oil installations are in Saudi Arabia. And we can report that today President Trump called Saudi Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman to reassert the President’s readiness to cooperate with the kingdom by all means, conducive to maintain its security and stability, reaffirming that the negative effects of those attacks on those facilities there, on the US economy as well as the world economy. And then, on top of that, because this is a developing story, moments ago we’re getting word from the US special envoy to Yemen urging all parties to “prevent such further incidents which pose a serious threat to regional security, complicate the already fragile situation, and jeopardize unled political process.” So will, or should, this impact any potential talks or meetings between President Trump and Iranian President Rouhani?

Dubowitz: Well it may. The President reportedly has been considering providing some kind of sanctions relief to Iran in order to enable that kind of meeting, there’s been talks about green lighting the $15 billion dollar French credit facility which would provide enormous relief to Iran. There was talks and reports that he might even be offering US sanctions relief. I think it would be very difficult for the President to do that now, in the wake of these Iranian and Hezbollah/Houthi attacks. I think the President is not somebody who’s going to be blackmailed by the Iranians and not going to be providing them billions of dollars in sanctions relief in the wake of these attacks.

Interviewer: So that’s a strong position. What’s the likelihood that in a couple of weeks when President Rouhani is here, that our President meets with him and looks him in the eyes and says just that – “I’m not going to be blackmailed”?

Dubowitz: Well I think President Trump would do that. I mean, if President Rouhani understands his predicament, he faces a severe economic crisis which could precipitate a major political crisis inside Iran, then he, if he’s smart, should sit down with the President and try to negotiate a comprehensive agreement. I think President Trump is going to sit down there and tell President Rouhani that no agreement will be acceptable unless it deals with the full range of Iran’s malign activities, its destructive activities in the region, its nuclear program, terrorism, missile program, the fact that it’s still retaining US and Western hostages. I think the President’s made that clear – an acceptable deal has to address the full range of those destructive behaviors, and the President is not going to be blackmailed by Iran and President Rouhani or anybody else.

Interviewer: Alright, we have to leave it there. Mark Dubowitz, thank you very much.

Stop Indulging Javad Zarif

There’s nothing ‘moderate’ about the Iranian foreign minister, who is now threatening our think tank.

 

The following is an excerpt:

Now we find ourselves in Mr. Zarif’s sights. The Foreign Ministry declared on Saturday that the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, and Mark Dubowitz personally, are guilty of “designing, imposing and intensifying the impacts of economic terrorism against Iran” and “seriously and actively trying to harm the Iranian people’s security and vital interests through measures such as fabricating and spreading lies, encouraging, providing consultations, lobbying, and launching a smear campaign.” FDD is “subject to the penalties that are allowed by the ‘Law on Countering the Violation of Human Rights and Adventurous and Terrorist Activities of the United States in the Region.’ ” On Wednesday, the Iranian Foreign Ministry threatened sanctions against people of “various nationalities who are “working with FDD.” It declared that “this foundation is in fact the designing and executing arm of the U.S. administration.”

The penalties are unspecified, but the ministry’s first statement adds: “Needless to say this measure will be without prejudice to any further legal measures that the other administrative, judicial or security institutions and organizations may take in order to counter, prosecute or punish the above-mentioned persons or their other Iranian and non-Iranian collaborators and accomplices.” We don’t think Mr. Zarif plans to sue FDD or send a letter to Interpol. Technically, according to the law cited against us, Mr. Zarif has already coordinated with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and Iran’s Intelligence Ministry in developing sanctions against FDD.

The Islamic Republic isn’t the first dictatorship to try to intimidate think tanks and scholars. And Mr. Zarif is hardly an all-powerful figure at home. We suspect his decision to threaten FDD was to show some revolutionary rectitude to those in the ruling elite who aren’t enamored of him. Many are angered by his failure to understand the American political system, which knocked down President Obama’s nuclear deal.

Mr. Zarif and President Hassan Rouhani had sold that accord as a victory: In exchange for short-term, limited nuclear constraints, the West would lift sanctions and Tehran would gain immediate access to tens of billions of dollars in hard currency and longer-term access to global markets worth hundreds of billions. Ali Akbar Salehi, Iran’s MIT-educated nuclear guru, well understood the enormous nuclear concessions Washington was making in the agreement, but Mr. Zarif didn’t understand America and the nature, depth and bipartisan politics of U.S. sanctions against Tehran.

Since 1979, Democrats and Republicans alike have been confronting and engaging Iran’s theocracy. If Mr. Khamenei wants Mr. Zarif as his foreign minister, the U.S. will deal with Mr. Zarif. But it’s long past time for the Washington foreign-policy community to stop indulging him. Think tanks and other nongovernmental organizations should stop giving him a podium and refrain from their see-no-evil, unofficial “Track II” diplomacy with Iranian emissaries.

[…]

Read Mark and Reul’s piece for The Wall Street Journal here. 

Shawn: This comes as Iran has threatened a private American citizen. State Department pushing back, saying that the outlaw regime in Tehran will face consequence if indeed anything happens to Mark Dubowitz and the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, Tehran announcing sanctions on them and basically threatening a private American citizen and the FDD because of their outspoken efforts for the Iranian people, for democracy and freedom in their country.

Wachtel: That’s right Eric. It’s like a throwback to the days when Salman Rushdie wrote the controversial book, the Satanic Verses, that the Ayatollah Khomeini issued a fatwah, actually put a death sentence on his head, asking for people to go out and kill him. It’s reminiscent of the early days of the Iranian revolution when there was so much zest and craziness and fanaticism in that country and it continues to this day and this is absolutely absurd.

Shawn: And Zarif seems to back all of this. Here’s what Mark Dubowitz tweeted about this, from the FDD, about this, saying “this is a direct threat against FDD, me and our Iranian and non-Iranian friends. These threats will only strengthen our resolve to research and reveal the truth about the regime in Iran, and to support the burning desire of the vast majority of Iranians for freedom.” Last word, Jonathan Wachtel, on what you would expect.

Wachtel: On the Foundation for Defense of Democracies? Bless them, I hope they’re going to be okay and nothing happens, but the international community, it shouldn’t just be the United States outraged about this, it has to be anybody. You can have differences with that foundation, which is pretty strident when it comes to Iran. It’s been very tough and it’s not surprising that the Iranians look at them as a direct threat. But they’re out promoting democracy, that’s the name of their organization. Iran is not about promoting democracy, it’s about shuttering, it’s about not allowing their own people to have access to social media, it’s about forcing women to wear hijabs – even if they want to or they don’t they should have the ability to decide what they want to do, and executing people for crimes that don’t constitute anything near what should be capital punishment in that country, imprisoning political prisoners, it’s out of control there.

Shawn: Speaking of civility, Iran is now targeting Americans as they have in the past. Mark Dubowitz is a very prominent critic, head of the think tank Foundation for the Defense of Democracies and the Iranian regime reportedly slapped sanctions on Mark and the FDD. What do you think about that?

Dr. Grant: Well I know Mark and his work and I have a great respect for him. I like what the State Department said and that is they take this very seriously, it’s absolutely wrong, and the State Department has said they will hold Iran accountable for compromising any security of Americans. I don’t remember, Eric, ever seeing this happen. FDD is a great think tank, super research, and what Iran has done is completely wrong. Macron has to keep that kind of stuff in mind as he’s trying to work with them.

Shawn: We’re looking at some video of Mark Dubowitz who is CEO of the FDD. Tehran claims they’re engaged in “economic terrorism” and that they spread lies about their regime but you know the FDD, look at their name – Foundation for the Defense of Democracies. And Mark is saying it’s a badge of honor to be on the list. This is what he tweeted out: “This is a direct threat against FDD, me and our Iranian and non-Iranian friends. These threats will only strengthen our resolve to research and reveal the truth about the regime in Iran, and to support the burning desire of the vast majority of Iranians for freedom.” You know, finally, Dr. Grant, it seems the Iranians know no boundaries. I mean, here they’re targeting a private group, going after a private American citizen publically in their way, they have allegedly tried to assassinate their opponents, critics among the Iranian resistance group to bomb one of their meetings in France as well as assassinate a critic and the Saudi Arabian ambassador here at the Georgetown restaurant, Café Milano, where all the big-wigs in Washington go to eat up there in Georgetown. It seems they know no bounds when it comes to trying to reach out their tentacles of murderous terror.

Dr. Grant: This is why Iran cannot be trusted with nuclear weapons and why President Trump was right to back us out of that and get us on course, and we are on course now with Europe as well, to try and find a different situation. The world cannot be secure if Iran has access to that technology. Stupid diplomats that they are, terrible regime, 40 odd years now, and it’s time to draw that line and make something different.

Interviewer: the Trump administration has been sending mixed signals on Iran this week. It imposed sanctions on Iran’s foreign minister and is taking other steps to isolate the country. But the administration also quietly waved some sanctions to allow a key part of the Iran nuclear deal to continue. Joining us now to talk about why is NPR’s Michelle Kelleman. Michelle, I want to start with the sanctions that have been waved, what’s the significance of this?

Kelleman: So the administration says that it’s allowing some projects to continue. These are Russian, Chinese, European companies that are working on projects that are central to the nuclear deal, that’s the deal the Trump administration left which limits Iran’s nuclear activity and ensures that it would take at least a year for Iran to produce enough material for a bomb. The state department says that these are limited, non-proliferation activities that do not help Iran, instead they help restrict and constrain Iran’s nuclear program, so it’s things like redesigning a reactor, and support for a Bushier reactor so that Iran doesn’t need to enrich uranium for that.

Interviewer: But the Trump administration withdrew the US from this deal, which President Obama negotiated. So, in some sense, is this the administration acknowledging that it’s keeping some of it alive?

Kelleman: Well as some critics have said, it’s on life support. It may not be for long, listen to how national security advisor John Bolton described this decision in an interview with the Fox Business Network: “this is a short, 90 day extension, it’s intended, as I say, to be under constant observation and I just keep my eye on that spot.” And Bolton, as you know, is a hawk on Iran, he seemed to be indicating that he’d like to see the administration stop waving these sanctions next go around.

Interviewer: Is the administration, essentially, all on the same page?

Kelleman: It doesn’t look like it, I put that question to Mark Dubowitz of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, he’s also a critic of the Iran nuclear deal, known as the JCPOA: “I think there’s an ongoing internal struggle within the administration between those who want to retain the JCPOA as a framework for future nuclear negotiations with Iran and those who believe that the JCPOA is a fatally flawed agreement.” And he says this whole debate about waivers, the extension for 90 days, these waiver extensions, really captures that internal disagreement.

Interviewer: Here, Dubowitz is talking about the idea of negotiating a new deal. The administration says it wants to do that, but it’s also imposing sanctions on Iran’s foreign minister, what’s the disconnect here?

Kelleman: Well diplomats are sure trying to figure that out right now and trying to figure out what the US strategy is here. France, Britain, and Germany, all signatories of the Iran nuclear deal, say that the US should keep all diplomatic channels open. The UN Secretary General again today called for maximum restraint rather than maximum pressure, the policy that the Trump administration is pursuing. So far Iran’s foreign minister is brushing off the sanctions, saying that they won’t have any effect on him because he doesn’t have any assets here but it’s obviously going to be hard for US officials to deal with him if he continues to be the main diplomat from Iran.