Middle East Strategy at Harvard

From Raymond Tanter
As the Obama administration prepares for October 1 negotiations with Iran, Tehran steals a page from Pyongyang’s playbook: escalate confrontation in advance of engagement. Why not? Escalation to win concessions and backtracking on promises have worked for North Korea.
On September 27, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps conducted war games that included test launches [...]

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From Gal Luft
While Washington is mulling over what to do next in order to weaken Iran economically, this summer the Islamic Republic has taught us a lesson in strategic maneuvering, taking major steps to bolster its economy and geopolitical posture by positioning itself as an indispensable energy supplier to hundreds of millions of people.

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From Mark N. Katz
Iranian President Ahmadinejad’s most recent statement that the Holocaust is a myth and denouncing Israel is an indication that he does not see U.S. President Obama’s call for dialogue and improved relations with Iran as desirable from his perspective.

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From Raymond Tanter
The opening of the UN General Assembly in New York provides advocates of human rights an additional forum to embarrass President Ahmadinejad of Iran for his serial violations of the rights of Iranians at home and abroad. A hunger strike by 36 Iranian dissidents, taken hostage by Iraqi forces, continues into its second [...]

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MESH invites selected authors to offer original first-person statements on their new books—why and how they wrote them, and what impact they hope and expect to achieve. David Makovsky is Ziegler Distinguished Fellow and director of the Project on the Middle East Peace Process at The Washington Institute for Near East Policy. His new book, [...]

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From Philip Carl Salzman
How do we know whether our models, or, to be more modest, our characterizations of countries are correct? We try to show that the case studies and other information that we adduce support our vision. But our interpretations are seldom challenged by immediate events, and their validity is most easily assessed in [...]

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From Raymond Tanter
President Obama continues to seek direct talks with Tehran in face of its suppression of Iranian oppositionists. But now is not the time to engage Tehran, given its violent suppression of the Iranian people and the American troop pullback from Iraqi cities.
If President Obama extends a warm hand toward the clerical-military rulers of [...]

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