Registered: Sep 2000
Location: The Bottom of the Toyem Pole
Posts: 9468

I missed this story, I guess

quote:

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In May 2003, shortly after the U.S. military destroyed the army of Saddam Hussein, a fax arrived at the State Department with an Iranian offer to open talks that would include a discussion of weapons of mass destruction.

The one-page document was written by Sadegh Kharazi, Iran's ambassador to France and nephew of Iranian Foreign Minister Kamal Kharazi and passed on by the Swiss ambassador to Tehran, who represented U.S. interests in Iran, a former administration official said.

The official, who saw the document, said it indicated that Iran wanted to negotiate a grand political bargain with the United States that would include everything from Iran's nuclear program to its support for groups that Washington regards as terrorist.

"The Iranians acknowledged that WMD and support for terror were serious causes of concern for us, and they were willing to negotiate," said Flynt Leverett, a former senior director for Middle East affairs at the National Security Council who said he read the document. "The message had been approved by all the highest levels of authority. They wanted us to deal with sanctions, security guarantees, normalization of relations, and support for integration of Iran into the World Trade Organization."

But the Bush administration was in no mood for conversation or grand political bargains, the former officials said. According to Leverett, who left government in mid-2003, the administration rejected the Iranian probe and instead sent a complaint to Swiss Ambassador Tim Guldimann, saying he had overstepped his role as an intermediary by passing it on in the first place.

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Registered: Apr 2003
Location: I cant say I buy this completely,
Posts: 2546

Oh yeah its hubris cause Iran was just offering to completely roll over on the issues we have in contention with them...yeah, I mean...what a fuckhead that Bush is for not accepting a back channel offer of negotiations with Iran in 2003. Im sure this one page overture detailed the entire agenda for the talks...I mean, it was a one page cost-us-nothing toss off from nowhere that said nothing but yeah, we dropped the ball on that one huh? Hey, did you know they did the same act about a month ago? At least bother us with something relevant.

I seriously doubt you can even begin to draw me a picture of Iran in 2003. I bet you have no idea how long their nuclear program was going clandestinely at that point or what sort of policy the US was actually engaged in to thwart this...nah, you couldnt or you wouldnt have said that. But then again, you did claim that rejecting an unsolicited letter asking for top level negotiations between countries that dont even keep embasies on each others soil was somehow hubris...probably cause you, like many here and elsewhere, have a laughable picture of history as something devoid of all context and narrative. Oh, and of course if the world isnt perfect its the fault of the US...more specifically, George Bush who has somehow managed to be personally responsible for everything that has ever gone bad in the world through the history of time.

Are you the same sort of shithead who watches a fucking movie to get their political opinions and then says everyone else is brainwashed?

Let me be the first to say: thats a fucking dumb article. You fail.

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