Iran: interested no more by Bush

November 26, 2008
Iran: interested no more
Posted by Warren Strobel
McClathchy blog

Well, sometimes we in the media get out a bit ahead of ourselves. Warren reported a month ago that the Bush administration planned to announce the establishment of a U.S. Interests Section in Iran after the presidential election was over, but before year's end. The United States hasn't had a diplomatic presence in Iran for nearly three decades, and the idea was that taking such a controversial step is easier for a lame duck president.

We had this on pretty good authority, two sources, including one who is quite senior in the scheme of things.

But we at N&S have been hearing for about a week now that the plan has changed, and no such announcement would be forthcoming. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice made it official today: Bush has decided to punt the issue to President-elect Obama.

Bush "took an in- principle decision" months ago to establish the Interests Section, similar to one the United States has in Havana, Cuba, Rice said, but "there were intervening events that I think made it not a good time to raise this with the Iranian regime, because obviously we would have had to raise it with the Iranian regime." Rice cited the Russia-Georgia conflict, which dominated Washington's attention for most of the Fall. Others have said that Iran's alleged covert effort to derail a U.S.-Iraqi agreement on the status and withdrawal of American troops in Iraq soured the White House on the idea of diplomatic outreach to Iran--even if the idea behind it was to have more direct engagement with the Iranian people, not to reward the regime in Tehran.

Bottom line: This is one more issue Obama will have to wrestle with come January 20. Our guess is that establishing a diplomatic outpost in Iran won't be the Obama administration's first move on Iran policy.