Clinton set it at the Brookings Institution, and I liveblogged it. Two things I want to call attention to. Iran:
What’s “really at issue”: Iran has “refused for years to address the international community’s deep concerns about its nuclear program.” Iran’s” continued failure to live up to its obligations carries profound consequences for the security of the United States.” The concern is not “Iran’s right to develop peaceful nuclear energy,” but ensuring the program is for peaceful purposes. “This is not hard to do.” Iran faces a “choice.” It can have partnership in education and science and cooperation with the international community. Or “isolation and economic pressure, less progress for the people of Iran.” Dialogue alone “doesn’t guarantee any outcome, let alone success,” but refusal to engage “yielded no progress on the nuclear issue.” Iran “must now decide whether to join us in this effort,” but Iran has “engaged in a campaign of politically motivated arrests, show trials and suppression” and “stands in the way of the justice it seeks.” But Obama remains “ready to engage… to address the concerns we and our partners have.” But “we have no appetite for talks without action.”
And Israel-Palestine:
A questioner asks about Israeli-Arab peace and continued Israeli settlements. “Emotions in Arab and Islamic world are getting really very high,” the questioner notes. Asks about George Mitchell, the administration’s Mideast envoy, and his hopes for progress. Clinton: “I understand the emotion.” Obama “started on the very first day with a commitment to pursue a comprehensive peace agreement premised on the two-state solution” about which the administration “is very patient and very determined.” References a history of failure on peace processing, but says, voice rising, the Obama administration will “never give up” and “expect both sides, not just one, to be ready to pursue this comprehensive peace agreement.” Will do “all we can to persuade, cajole, do all we can… to make that agreement… It is up to the Palestinians and the Israelis.” Expects “both sides” to be “actively engaged and willing to work toward that resolution.” Mitchell’s work is “very valuable in sorting through a lot of the concerns,” because previously the parties were “encouraged to work themselves toward a resolution, the United States was not actively engaged in it.” But backsliding “is not going to discourage us.”



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Oh, really? Then why the demand to suspend enrichment that is a right guaranteed under the NPT and why the insistence that the IAEA and the NIE cannot be correct when they find no evidence of a weapons program or the diversion of ANY fissile materials? Seems to me if this was true you’d be willing to take YES for an answer. Also seems to me that if you want to address a potential WMD program in another nation, it might be productive to QUIT THREATENING TO ATTACK that nation so that they might become convinced that deterrence is not necessary. Just a thought, y’know?
OK, great. If this is the standard to put a pre-emptive strike on the table, I want to see it applied to EVERY nation that fits that description. It’s either US Policy or it’s not, but to selectively apply that standard to specific states doesn’t make the US look particularly serious about ANY of it…
mikey