By DICK MORRIS & EILEEN MCGANN
November 29, 2006 -- Can Iran help us bail out of
Iraq? Maybe - but we'd better take a hard look at the price.
The idea has reportedly been floated via a draft
report to the Iraq Study Group (headed by former Secretary of State James
Baker), which calls for a "dialogue" with Iran as well as Syria. Along the same
lines, British Prime Minister Tony Blair recently said Iran could be a "partner"
with the West if it did not develop a bomb.
Presumably, we'd ask Iran to help stabilize the
situation in Iraq, curb the Shiite militias and encourage the Iraqi government
to make sufficient concessions to the Sunnis to end or at least reduce the
violence.
Would it work? It could. Iran certainly has sought
to arm and enflame the Shiites in Iraq. Maybe the mullahs can rein in their
proxies, and let us withdraw in dignity - not holding onto the skids of the
helicopter as it lifts off our embassy this time.
But why would they play ball with Washington at the
same time that Bush is threatening sanctions explicitly and a military strike
implicitly if Iran proceeds to develop nuclear weapons? No chance.
So this proposal amounts to the de facto
abandonment of any military or economic actions that could deter Iran from going
nuclear.
Of course, Baker may seek and Iran may offer public
assurances that it won't develop nuclear weapons - the same worthless assurances
it now passes out to the entire world. What will have changed is that America
and Britain will be so engaged with Iran that they can't and won't bomb or even
impose tough sanctions.
In short, we can only get Iran's help on Iraq if we
let Tehran get the bomb.
Yet, with nukes, Iran gains the leverage to force
Iraq, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and all the region's oil producers to move in its
orbit. The Middle East will become an Iranian sphere of influence.
Such an under-the-table deal would amount to a
total sellout of Israel and Saudi Arabia and America's other Arab allies.
The Jewish state would be left with no alternative
but to take whatever military action it could to stop Iran from completing its
nuclear program. American capitulation will have left it with no alternative.
Would Jim Baker cut such a deal? In a heartbeat.
Never a friend of Israel, he wouldn't flinch at a realpolitik solution giving
Iran power throughout the region.
But why would Bush go along? It would be "peace in
our time" - Munich, 1938 - all over again.
Eileen McGann co-authored this column.
***Copyright Eileen MCGann and Dick Morris
2006***
