Thursday, February 26, 2004
Had the Bush administration paid close attention to what occurred last July in Kuwait, it would have been prepared for what took place in Iran last week.
Iran's parliament is once again in the hands of conservatives who owe their allegiance and their election to the hard-line, 12-member Islamic Guardian Council. In other words, the reform movement that had held out so much promise has suffered a fatal blow.
But what does that have to do with the Bush administration? The White House's preoccupation with Iraq and Afghanistan has caused it to ignore the political goings on in other potentially troublesome countries in the region.
In July 2003, President Bush and his foreign policy team were caught by surprise when Kuwaiti voters replaced reformists with conservative Islamist candidates, many of whom had campaigned on a platform of challenging Western influence.
Here's what we wrote shortly after that disturbing power grab: "Such political developments are not good for the stability of the region and the future of U.S. ties to Kuwait. The Bush administration, which has made the spread of democracy in the Middle East the cornerstone of its foreign policy, cannot ignore the growing influence of Islamic extremism in a country that has long been a close ally."
Problematic
But nation building of the Iraq and Afghanistan variety is time-consuming, costly and problematic, especially when the president is running for re-election.
And so, Iran disappeared from the administration's radar screen. Its expression last Friday of concern that the election was deeply flawed -- as Iranians were going to the polls -- was too little too late.
Where were the warnings from Bush of dire consequences when the Guardian Council, appointed by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran's supreme ruler, barred 2,400 reform candidates from running (87 were sitting members of parliament)?
Where was the president's voice of solidarity with the 124 legislators in the 290-seat parliament who resigned in protest?
To be sure, the transition in Iraq from a dictatorship under the bloodthirsty Saddam Hussein, now in U.S. custody, to a democracy is important work, seeing as how Bush has literally bet his foreign policy record on the success of this nation-building endeavor.
But, the undermining of reform movements in countries such as Kuwait and Iran is a bad omen. It gives Islamic extremists in Iraq the impetus to push for a theocratic government, such as the one in Iran.
Although Iran has a parliament and a democratically elected president, the hard-line clerics have ultimate say on important issues, such as women's rights.
Indeed, leaders of Iran's new conservative majority in parliament this week blasted the European Union's criticism of the election, characterizing member nations as "enemies."
The conservatives also defended Iran's right to peaceful nuclear development.
Axis of evil
Iran is one of the three countries -- Iraq and North Korea were the other two -- that Bush said formed an axis of evil.
Iran's support of terrorist organizations and its nuclear capability are major reasons the White House is not willing to restore diplomatic relations with that country. Ties between the two long-standing allies were severed in 1979 when Islamic fundamentalists took over the country. They overran the U.S. Embassy in Tehran and took hostages.
Given this history, we have to wonder why the Bush administration did not react with more urgency and forcefulness in the months leading up to last week's election when it was becoming clear that the ruling clerics were not willing to let the reformers continue to dominate parliament.
The administration must now formulate a clear policy that offers support to the reform movements in Iran, Kuwait and other Middle Eastern countries, or else the enemies of democracy in Iraq will be emboldened.