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Herb London: How we deal with North Korea (and China) will show Iran how we will deal with them

Herbert London is president of the Hudson Institute and author of the book Decline and Revival in Higher Education (Transaction Publishers).

As Secretary of Defense Gates recently noted, any question about North Korea has only one response: “I don’t know.” There is indeed so little we actually know about this barbarian kingdom with nuclear weapons. Hence almost anything one does say is speculative.

As I see it, the nuclear facility recently disclosed is designed to be inflammatory. What it means is that North Korea can increase its supply of weapons and use them as negotiating instruments. Since there is nothing of value in North Korea, since the economy is moribund, since the government cannot supply basic necessities for the population, nuclear weapons – at least the threat of deployment – is a negotiating wedge for foodstuff, oil and hard currency. By any measure, this is an extortion ploy.

In a curious way, the Chinese government is complicit. China has the ability to clamp down on this backward kingdom, but it averts its gaze. From a Chinese perspective North Korea is an effective pressure point on the United States and its allies in Japan, South Korea, Taiwan. What the stalemate with North Korea demonstrates is the relative ineffectiveness of U.S. diplomacy and the obvious fact that the U.S. is an unreliable ally, perhaps even an untrustworthy ally.

What the U.S. cannot deliver – a stable east Asia – emerging Chinese military prowess in the region may. In other words, China uses North Korea as a tool to promote its regional dominance and, in the process, undermine U.S. influence.

This strategy has its advantages for China at the moment, but it could backfire. If Japan uses North Korean sabre rattling and Pyongyang’s deadly artillery barrage on a South Korean island as a catalyst to dismantle Article 9 of its Constitution and start producing nuclear weapons, China’s military dominance could be challenged. Anti Chinese sentiment in Japan should not be underestimated.

North Korean gamesmanship and Chinese cleverness are proceeding down a dangerous path in which an escalation scenario is quite plausible. The world waits to see how this situation will unfold with baited breath and the Iranian regime watches with intense interest. What the U.S. does in North Korea – or doesn’t do – is regarded as a portent of the U.S. position on Iranian nuclear weapons as well.

In yet another unfolding chapter in this tale of conflict, the United States and Seoul began joint naval maneuvers, an unmistakable message that sufficient force exists in the neighborhood to counter North Korean aggression. Moreover, even in South Korea, known for its restraint, there is increasing pressure to respond to Kim Jung Il’s unprovoked attacks. South Korean president, Lee Myung-bak told Chinese emissaries that now isn’t the “right time” to resume disarmament discussions. In fact, President Lee bluntly said Beijing should adopt “a more fair and responsible position” on Korean issues. Furthermore, President Lee said North Korea “would pay a price” for further aggression.

U.S. Admiral Michael Mullen, chairman of the joint chiefs, said, “It is hard to know why China doesn’t push harder. They clearly are interested in this – in the region not spinning out of control – so my sense is they try to control this guy, and I’m not sure he is controllable.”  Of course that is one man’s theory. There are others, including a China that benefits from the chaos by diminishing the U.S. role in the region and creating the impression with U.S. allies that only China can stabilize the unruly situation.

This is a scenario with dangerous implications, but strangely the world has seen it unfold before and diplomats seem to believe it will unfold again.

Silence over the imminent execution of Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani in Iran is inexcusable

Herbert London is president of the Hudson Institute and author of the book Decline and Revival in Higher Education (Transaction Publishers).

Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani is a name unknown to most Americans. Yet her imminent execution in Iran has elicited protests across the globe. Ms. Ashtiani has been found guilty of adultery; tortured by women-hating barbarians and has become a symbol of Sharia inspired laws that mistreat women.

Ironically and poignantly Iran is on the United Nations Committee for Women’s Rights and will soon join the Executive Committee for the Asian region. Yet remarkably Ambassador Susan Rice has not uttered a word in behalf of Ms. Ashtiani, nor has she said anything about Iran’s representation on the UN committee, a silence that is deafening.

It is simply outrageous that Iran is in a position to negotiate women’s rights when the government routinely violates those rights. This is a condition comparable to having Nazis investigate the human rights violations of Jews. But to make matters worse, the Obama administration through its conspicuous silence is seemingly complicit in the crime against fundamental rights.

Even the New York Times and the Washington Post have covered the story. Mina Ahadi, a spokesman for the International Committee Against Stoning and Execution, has been engaged in non-stop demonstrations against the Iranian government and its perverse judicial decision.

Yet remarkably Ms. Ashtiani probably hasn’t any idea there is vocal support for her cause. Iranian mullahs do not react to appeals of reason and fairness. Only when their positions are watched and challenged, only when nations to whom they wish to appeal respond with condemnation, do the mullahs pay attention.

That explains why the United States’ official inattention to this matter is tragic. Since we have not offered a diplomatic protest and have not uttered a word, to my knowledge, about Iran’s role on the Committee for Women’s Rights, the United States has abandoned its moral leadership in matters affecting all women.

Where is our leadership on this matter? Alas where are the feminists who should be at the barricades over this issue?

This isn’t the first time, and probably will not be the last time, hypocrisy is on display. But it is morally repugnant for a nation that is willing to consider stoning for an alleged legal infraction is in the position of defining rights for women.

If anything, this bizarre set of conditions demonstrates an Iran and its byzantine policies on the ascendency and the United States in decline. If this description is accurate, this can only mean turning the clock back several centuries when women did not have legal rights and were considered “half a man” in a court of justice.

My suspicion is if former Ambassador John Bolton were representing American interests at the United Nations a protest voice would be heard. Unfortunately Ms. Rice, his successor, and President Obama have chosen appeasement as their strategy believing that if we offend the Iranian mullahs, negotiation with them on nuclear weapons and other matters would be impossible.

As I see it, this is a fool’s errand. Our silence on human rights matters is interpreted as acceptance. Every gesture of compliance is a victory for barbarism.

Iranian feminists know what the Obama administration doesn’t: a global campaign against the imminent execution of Sakineh Ashtiani can make a difference. It can cause the mullahs to pause and it can raise questions about the strategy adopted by the U.S. government. It is time to let the world know Iran’s policies belong in the ash heap of history.

Will the revolutionary GOPers be as dedicated as the revolutionary Iranians?

Joe Loconte is an assistant professor of history at the King’s College in New York City. He writes widely about religion and international politics.

Thirty years ago, in the summer of 1980, a very strange thing happened in one of the Soviet Union’s satellite states: workers in Poland, supposedly dutiful members of the “United Workers’ Party,” staged a spontaneous revolution. Led by Lech Walesa, they demanded the right to form an independent trade union. The communist regime, acting on orders from Moscow, declared martial law. Strikes broke out. A violent crackdown ensued.

Writing in his diary, Ronald Reagan grasped the significance of the moment: “We can’t let this revolution against communism fail without our offering a hand. We may never have an opportunity like this in our lifetime.”

The cadre of Republicans elected to Congress in the mid-term election understandably focused their campaigns on domestic concerns: federal spending, unemployment, the national debt. Yet they should take a cue from Reagan who, upon assuming office, also faced a dire economic downturn at home. Nevertheless, Reagan understood that the United States could not ignore national security threats or struggles for political freedom abroad.

Reagan quickly approved a top-secret directive authorizing a mix of diplomatic, economic, and covert methods to destabilize the Polish regime. He established a close personal relationship with the Polish Pope, John Paul II, whose influence among his native Poles provided the moral ballast for their democratic campaign. In December, two days before Christmas, Reagan addressed the American people about the crisis in Poland: “For a thousand years, Christmas has been celebrated in Poland, a land of deep religious faith, but this Christmas brings little joy to the courageous Polish people. They have been betrayed by their own government.” The president asked all Americans to light a candle in support of freedom in Poland.

After the fall of communism, Lech Walesa explained that without this support from the United States, the Solidarity movement probably would have been strangled in its crib.

Compare Reagan’s example of leadership and moral vision to that of President Barack Obama during the “Green Revolution” launched in the summer of 2009 in Iran. When tens of thousands of demonstrators took to the streets to contest a rigged election, Team Obama instinctively sought to avoid even the appearance of “meddling” in Iranian affairs. Then the bloodletting began, as the theocratic thugs cracked down on peaceful protestors. If President Obama wrote anything in his diary that summer, it probably was along these lines: “America’s hands are soiled by its misdeeds in the Middle East, so whatever unpleasantness occurs on the streets of Tehran, we can’t be seen as taking sides.”

Think of it: Ordinary Iranians risk their lives for a principle enshrined in the American political order—government by consent—and the American president remains a spectator of events. No symbolic acts to identify with the democratic resistance. No hint of meaningful support for their cause. Over the last 16 months, the voluble Obama has failed to even articulate the nature of the struggle in Iran. Thus, even Slate magazine, a repository of Obama boosterism, admits that the people of Iran “feel abandoned not only by their own leaders but also by the United States.”

Here is where a new Congress can make a difference. The democracy movement in Iran represents not only the possibility of regime change, but the best hope for keeping the mullahs from acquiring nuclear weapons. Members of Congress do not direct U.S. foreign policy—that’s the role of the president. But Congress can influence foreign policy priorities, underwrite covert assistance, and help frame a national debate about the prospects of political change in Iran. It can identify and support emerging leaders. The vital thing is to move beyond merely criticizing human rights abuses and actively promote political reform.

Some believe that Iran’s democracy movement has come and gone; others say it was dead on arrival. Yet revolutions, like the people who lead them, have a way of intruding upon the regime du jour and shattering our assumptions about what’s possible in politics.

Conservatives claim to have elected a new crop of leaders who fancy themselves in this revolutionary mode. Let’s see if they mean it.