Neocons Lash Out at White House for Diplomatic Overtures to Iran

[Purveyor]

By Marc Perelman

The Bush administration’s recent diplomatic overtures toward Iran have unleashed a torrent of criticism from neoconservatives and have fueled concerns in Israel that Washington is shelving the option of using military force against Tehran’s nuclear facilities.

After months of rejecting the possibility of negotiating with Iran until it suspends nuclear enrichment, the administration sent a high-level envoy July 20 to European-led talks with Iranian diplomats on the nuclear issue. Washington also has suggested a willingness to open a low-level diplomatic mission in Tehran for the first time since 1979. And Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has signaled a preference for a diplomatic solution to the standoff.

Veteran Iran hands see the developments as evidence that President Bush has decided, at least for now, to give the State Department the lead on Iran policy. The White House’s shift has infuriated the advocates of regime change who held sway in Bush’s first term but have since been gradually sidelined.

“This is a major shift, but I see it in the context of any second term administration’s Hail Mary pass to secure a legacy,” said Michael Rubin, a former Iran analyst at the Pentagon who is now working at the American Enterprise Institute. “What we see now is the State Department running the show. Rice is a chameleon, and will always go with whatever side is up.”

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Leading neoconservative John Bolton, who was undersecretary for arms control before he was appointed ambassador to the United Nations in 2005, has expressed a similar view. Recently, he has spoken out publicly against engagement with Iran several times, blasting the Bush administration for what he describes as a betrayal of its principles in order to save its legacy.

Gary Sick, who served as an Iran specialist at the National Security Council in the late 1970s, said that insofar as arguing that the Bush administration has fundamentally shifted away from its Iran policy earlier in the presidency, Bolton was “absolutely right.”

“While much of the world was hyperventilating over the possibility that the United States (and maybe Israel) were getting ready to launch a new war against Iran, Bolton was looking at the realities and concluding that far from bombing, the U.S. was preparing to do a deal with Iran,” Sick wrote in a recent posting. “He will have observed that the worst of the neocons (including himself) are now writing books and spending more time with families and friends, cheerleading for more war by writing Op-Eds from the outside rather than pursuing their strategies in policy meetings in the White House.”

THE FORWARD: http://www.forward.com/articles/13852/

[Javaman]

1. the neo-nuts are like hungry dogs salivating for a biscuit that is long since gone.

fucking war mongering nut jobs.

[Purveyor]

2. Beware. They are likely to try and slink their way back into the Democratic establishment just as

they worked their way into the GOP establishment when they took power in DC.

[KansDem]

3. KYYYYRIST!!! Just what we need; more neo-cons "lashing out" (nt)

[jazzjunkysue]

4. George sobered up. Unbelieveable. If I hadn't heard it from a PNAC'er

I never would have believed it.

He knows we cannot afford the skyrocketing gas costs that would follow an attack.

I wonder if Daddy finally tied him to a chair and made the monkey listen.