Why Germany Tolerates Iranian Cheating – Commentary Magazine
Appearances over substance.
At both The Weekly Standard and the Jerusalem Post, the Foundation for Defense of Democracys Benjamin Weinthal exposes German intelligence reports that suggest that the Islamic Republic of Iran continues to work toward the goal of possessing nuclear weapons. He writes:
A report from the state of Hamburg holds that there is no evidence of a complete about-face in Irans atomic polices in 2016 [after the Islamic Republic signed the JCPOA deal with Western powers in 2015, aimed at restricting Tehrans nuclear program in exchange for sanctions relief]. Iran sought missile carrier technology necessary for its rocket program. The report noted that the federal prosecutor filed criminal charges against three German citizens for violations of the export economic law due to the deliveries of 51 special valves to Iranian company that can be used for the Islamic Republics sanctioned Arak heavy water reactor. The installation, the intelligence officials wrote, can be used to develop plutonium for nuclear weapons. Iran pledged, under the JCPOA deal, to dismantle the [Arak] facility, the intelligence report states. On the proliferation of atomic, biological and chemical weapons, a second report from Baden-Wrttembergs state intelligence agency report states: Regardless of the number of national and international sanctions and embargoes, countries like Iran, Pakistan and North Korea are making efforts to optimize corresponding technology.
In short, it looks like Iran may be cheating. As I document in Dancing with the Devil, whenever reports of cheating threaten to derail non-proliferation agreements, governments invested in those agreements are willing to bury the evidence to make a quick buck. Often, the State Department is willing to look the other way in order to keep the process alive. That was the case with Iraq in the 1980s, North Korea in the 1990s, and Iran in the first half of the last decade.
With regard to Germany, however, the triumph of appeasement over intelligence is dj vu all over again. Just months after Klaus Kinkel became Germanys foreign minister in 1992 and launched an initiative to bring Iran in from the cold through enhanced trade, Iranian assassins and Hezbollah operatives struck in the heart of Berlin, murdering four Iranian Kurdish dissidents at the Mykonos Restaurant. While several of the assailants fled Germany, German police arrested Hezbollah operative Abbas Hossein Rhayel and several accomplices. Subsequently, however, German officials intervened to prevent the questioning, let alone the arrest, of Intelligence Minister Ali Fallahian who had traveled to Germany and was suspected of ordering the hit.
Bernd Schmidbauer, Chancellor Helmut Kohls top intelligence advisor and the coordinator for Bonn-Tehran intelligence ties, continued to engage Fallahian after the assassination. As Charles Lane, at the time a senior editor for The New Republic, described:
On October 17, 1993, the glass doors of the Kanzleramt, Kohls office complex in Bonn, opened to receive an unusual guest: Ali Fallahian, the chief of Irans foreign intelligence service Fallahian was treated to several days of respectful meetings, including a tour of the German Federal Intelligence Agency headquarters outside Munich.
While Schmidbauer said that the engagement focused on humanitarian issues, both the Iranian ambassador and other German officials suggested otherwise. A German official speaking anonymously to Der Spiegel, ridiculed that claim, saying, Whoever says that only humanitarian subjects were discussed is a brazen liar.
Der Spiegel subsequently reported that the German intelligence service had supplied four computers and photographic equipment to Iran and helped train Iranian intelligence agents. Meanwhile, despite the evidence of Iranian-sponsored terrorism on German soil, German-Iranian trade ballooned. By 1995, German exports to Iran had increased to $1.4 billion, more than twice the level of any other country, and Germany became Irans largest trading partner. German newspaper Handelsblatt described the mood of German businesses at the Tehran trade fair as euphoric. Even after the 1997 Berlin court verdict, which founded Fallahian and other senior Iranian officials guilty of ordering the hit against the Kurds, Christoph Wolf, spokesman for the German Congress of Industry and Commerce, advised German firms to continue their trade with Iran and not to be distracted by political matters.
German diplomats have not only been willing to excuse Iranian terrorism, but also nuclear cheating. On November 20, 2003, IAEA Director Mohamed ElBaradei reported that there was a deliberate counter effort that spanned many years, to conceal material, facilities, and activities that were required to have been declared under the safeguards agreement material, facilities, and activities that covered the entire spectrum of the nuclear fuel cycle, including experiments in enrichment and reprocessing. Despite finding that Iran had been developing a uranium centrifuge enrichment program for 18 years, and a laser enrichment program for 12 years, German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer corralled European Union authorities to give the Islamic Republic another chance.
German leaders might preach human rights and the virtues of multilateralism, but when it comes to the Islamic Republic, the German governments desire to promote business always trumps holding Iran to account. Yes, Iran likely seeking to renew and advance its nuclear weapons program. Iranian leaders correctly calculate that even if they paraded a nuclear missile through the streets of Tehran or tested a warhead in their southeastern desert, German authorities would embrace any excuse however implausible to look the other way, deny reality, and run interference; all in order to keep trade channels open.
Republicans are in denial. The GOPs response to the bombshell revelations regarding the Trump campaigns inclination to indulge an offer of assistance from a Kremlin intermediary has been a muddled one. Depending on which Republican you ask, this is either a moment to pound the table over Barack Obamas failed attempt at a reset with Russia or to request patience as the sluggish investigations into the Trump campaign trudge along. Conservative and liberal columnists are likely to note that voters in Trump Country dont care about the investigation into Russian meddling in 2016 and, without that, Republicans in Congress wont either. These responses miss the point. What is alleged, and what Donald Trump Jr. has not denied, is a serious breach of the public trust. It is incumbent upon Congress to abandon its sheepishness and act forcefully to restore that trust.
First, lets dispense with the permissive idea that rank-and-file Republicans are just fine with the allegations regarding the Trump campaigns misconduct vis--vis Russia. As a CBS News survey released in late June demonstrated, a plurality of self-described Republican respondents said they believed Robert Muellers investigation into the Trump campaign would be impartial. Moreover, 75 percent of Republicans said Trump shouldnt try to stop Muellers probe, and a full 40 percent of self-identified GOP voters think it is likely Trump associates had improper contact with Russian government officials (a 15 percent increase from March). Those Republicans joined 65 percent of the broader public.
When it comes to bilateral relations with Russia, Republicans in Congress have a mandate to reassert their role in the conduct of American foreign policy. Even if voters had faith in the Trump White Houses ability to manage Americas interests with regard to Russia, it would be incumbent upon Congress to act. Fortunately, they have an avenue through which to achieve this pressing objective: a bipartisan bill, which passed the Senate by an astounding 98-2, that imposes new sanctions on Moscow and Tehran.
For lazy or cynical commentators quick to assert that the GOP-led Congress is unfailingly deferential to the Trump White House, that sanctions bill is a narrative-killer. It provides Congress with the sole authority to review any efforts by the administration to implement those sanctions in the manner of its choosing. The Trump administration has reportedly fought to have this provision stripped from the bill.
It is perhaps excusable that the executive branch would seek to protect its authority from an assault by a co-equal branch. Its equally understandable that diplomatic officials like Secretary of State Rex Tillerson would object to having their hands tied by Congress. These objections are also, however, mooted by the revelations regarding Donald Trump Jr.s conduct. The extraordinary nature of President Donald Trumps conciliatory rhetoric toward Russia and his refusal to respond directly to the Russian-led assault on American sovereignty in 2016 have forced Congress hand. There is no more room for the benefit of the doubt.
There are other legitimate objections to the sanctions billnamely a boomerang provision in the legislation that would bar U.S. oil exploration firms from participating in a project where Russian firms also had access rights. That provision would cost American businesses millions and, ironically, make it easier for Russian energy exploration firms to do business. Amending this provision and clearing the way for passage through the House shouldnt be difficult. It took just days to resolve a procedural hiccup in the bill, in which House members objected to a revenue-related provision originating in the Senate (a violation of the Constitutions Origination Clause). And yet, the bill has been stalled in the House for weeks. That inexcusable logjam must be cleared. If Tuesdays headlines wont do it, nothing will.
Economic sanctions arent the only area in which the U.S. Congress is obliged to hold the Trump administrations feet to the fire. Whether they like it or not, the Trump administration has been bequeathed an on-the-ground conflict in Syria, and they are prosecuting it. More often than anyone should be comfortable with, that conflict involves direct hostilities with the Syrian armed forces. The legislature should codify the emerging Trump doctrine into a new authorization to use military force against all forces loyal to Damascus. Such an authorization can be broad in scope so as not to put legal obstacles before the president, but it must recognize and sanction the fact that American soldiers are conducting combat operations in Syria against Syrians. This, too, would contain and constrict Russia.
Last week, following a glowing display of chumminess between the Russian president and his American counterpart, Secretary Tillerson announced a new cooperative initiative between Moscow and the U.S. in Syria saying that our mutual objectives are exactly the same. This is laughably nave.
American objectivesthe stabilization of Syria and the transition away from the Assad regimeare viewed by the Kremlin as serious threats. So serious, in fact, that when the Assad regime was threatened in 2015 (and, with him, the Russian Mediterranean port in Syria) Moscow responded by striking CIA-provided weapons and U.S. backed anti-Assad forces.
Russia is guilty of committing humanitarian atrocities in Syria, and the appearance of American military cooperation with Moscow in jointly monitored safe zones would render Washington complicit in those crimes. Tillerson and Trump appear eager to outsource the work of achieving a suitable peace in Syria to Russia. This is official resignation to unacceptable outcomes. Congress should not allow that to happen without a fight.
None of this is to say that diplomacy or cooperation with Moscow in Europe or the Middle East is not possible or even desirable. Indeed, cooperation between these two great powers is an imperative. But the Founders envisioned a role for Congress when it came to executing American foreign-policy objectives. Posterity will be unforgiving should they fail at their charge.
Putting it back together.
If you live anywhere but Northern Ireland, July 12 is just another day of the week for you. If, however, you happen to live in Northern Ireland, it is a national holiday, but one that is celebrated by only half of the population. You might say it is the Fourth of July in reversea celebration of remaining part of, rather than seceding from, the British Empire.
I was barely aware of this holiday myself until I visited Belfast last month. It commemorates the victory of William of Orange, the Dutch-born, Protestant monarch who had just taken over to the British throne, over the forces of the deposed Catholic King, James II. The Battle of the Boyne, fought about 30 miles north of Dublin in 1690, ended once and for all any hopes that a Catholic could sit on the British throne and ensured a Protestant ascendancy not only in England but also Irelandthen an integral part of the British Empire.
Today, most of Ireland has long been an independent republic, but six counties in Northern Ireland remain under British sovereignty. Ever since Michael Collins agreed in 1921 to allow Ulster to remain under the Crown as the price of independence for southern Ireland, the division has been resisted by Catholic die-hards. It has been just as adamantly defended by Northern Irish Protestants, who style themselves as Orangemen after good King Billy.
Hardliners in the Anti-Treaty IRA fought a losing civil war in 1922-1923 against their own erstwhile commander, Mick Collins, in an unsuccessful attempt to overturn this compromise. They lost the war, but killed Collins.
Another insurgency, known as the Troubles, was launched by the Provisional IRA in 1969, sparked by the complaints of Northern Irish Catholics that they were being discriminated against by the dominant Protestants. The result was a long-running, low-intensity conflict that led to the deployment of the British army to Northern Ireland and claimed more than 3,500 lives. The fighting finally ended with the Good Friday Accords of 1998, which instituted power-sharing between Catholics and Protestants in Belfast.
Save for a small splinter faction known as the Real IRA, most of the Irish Republican Army has given up political violence and turned to nonviolent action via its political party, Sinn Fein. The Protestant paramilitaries, notably the Ulster Defense Association, have also largely stopped carrying out attacks against Catholics. Both the Protestant and Catholic paramilitaries have been implicated, instead, in drug-dealing, extortion, and other criminal schemes. An uneasy truce prevails, but the signs of discord remain very visible to anyone who drives across Belfast.
In the Protestant, working-class areas one still sees giant murals honoring martyrs of the Ulster Defense Associationterrorists such as Stevie Top-Gun McKeag, who got his nickname for murdering Catholics, both civilians and IRA fighters. He died in 2000 of a drug overdose. A particularly chilling mural nearby depicts two Ulster Defense Association fighters, their heads covered in ski caps, pointing assault weapons at the viewers. This is all too reminiscent of the propaganda that ISIS puts up in areas under its control.
Meanwhile, in Catholic, working-class neighborhoods, there are competing monuments to martyred IRA fighters. Most prominent of all is a giant painting on the side of the Sinn Fein headquarters honoring Bobby Sands, the IRA leader who in 1981 starved himself to death in a British prison to protest Margaret Thatchers determination to treat IRA prisoners as ordinary criminals.
Separating the Protestant and Catholic neighborhoods are giant walls that remind me of similar walls erected in Baghdad in 2007 to separate Shiite and Sunni areas. The gates between the neighborhoods are open during the day but typically closed at night to prevent hot-heads from either side from making mischief in the sectarian cantonment next door.
Tensions will run especially high on July 12, when Protestant Orangemen march to commemorate the Battle of the Boyne. The night before, Protestant communities light giant bonfires to which they consign the flag of the Republic of Ireland and various other Catholic and Irish nationalist symbols. More than a month ahead of time, I already saw vast piles of wood being stockpiled in Protestant areas, getting ready for the sacred day.
In the past, Protestant marches, especially through Catholic areas, have led to riots and violence. That is unlikely to happen now, but you never know. Theres a reason why the police in Belfast (once known as the Royal Ulster Constabulary, today simply the Police Service of Northern Ireland) still patrol in armored cars.
Oddly enough, given the lingering tensions in Northern Ireland, there is absolutely no barrier whatsoever between its territory and that of the Irish Republic. The only way you know that you are crossing from the United Kingdom to the Republic is that the speed limits change from miles to kilometers and the cell phone providers change, too.
There are fears now that, with Britain leaving the European Union, border controls might be forthcoming, but this is one issueone of the fewthat unites Catholics and Protestants. Both Sinn Fein and the Democratic Unionist Party, the dominant Protestant party in Northern Ireland, oppose the erection of any border checkpoints.
Whats striking to me is how much suspicion and animosity still lingers between Catholics and Protestantsall the more so considering that few on either side are remotely pious. The old joke has it: Arent there any atheists in Northern Ireland? The punch line: Sure, there are Protestant atheists and Catholic atheists.
Its easy to think there is something wrong with the Northern Irish, but increasingly I wonder if their situation isnt merely a somewhat more aggravated form of the tribalism that is increasingly visible across the entire world, from the Philippines to Italy, to pick two countries at random that are experiencing significant secessionist movements (by Muslims in the Philippines and northerners in Italy).
We see it even in the United States, where Republicans and Democrats increasingly lack a commonly agreed upon set of facts and a common vocabulary: Are Trump opponents the brave Resistance or contemptible Snowflakes? We are more disunited than everor at least more than we have been in a very long time.
A visit to Northern Ireland is a bracing lesson in what can happen if divisionswhether ethnic, racial, religious, regional, or ideologicalspin out of control. Its also a reminder of how hard it can be to patch up civil society once its foundations disintegrate.
Podcast: Donald Trump Jr.'s scandalous emails and the president's controversial speech.
In the first of this weeks COMMENTARY podcasts, we go through the series of bombshell revelations this weekend about the heretofore undisclosed 2016 meeting between Donald Trumps son, son-in-law, and campaign manager with a Russian lawyer that evidently began with promises of Kremlin information about Hillary Clinton. Noah Rothman thinks this could be curtains for Trump. I say wanting to collude and colluding are two different things. Abe Greenwald says were both right. Then we take up Trumps Poland speech and its defense of Western Civ and the moral idiocy of those attacking him for doing so. Give a listen.
Dont forget tosubscribe to our podcast on iTunes.
...when bearing bias-confirming narratives.
Donald Trump Jr. is in very hot water. Reporters have alleged, and Trump Jr. has confirmed, that he brought Jared Kushner and Paul Manafort into a June 2016 meeting with a Russian lawyer during which Obama-era sanctions were discussed. That statement alone contradicts the assertions of administration officials, including Vice President Mike Pence. Subsequent reporting asserts the meeting was scheduled only after Trump Jr. was enticed with the promise of dirt on Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party. Most disturbing, Trump Jr. was reportedly informed in writing by the intermediary who arranged the meeting that the information on Clinton was coming from the Russian government with the express intention of helping Trump win in November.
These allegations deserve to be examined with care taken to avoid jumping to conclusions. Yet a new wrinkle in this story, provided graciously by the individual with whom Trump Jr. met, seems explicitly designed to ensure that Americans abandon all discretion. Natalia Veselnitskaya, the Kremlin cut-out who met with Manafort, Kushner, and Trump Jr. in Trump Tower last June, is a skilled manipulator.
I never had any damaging or sensitive information about Hillary Clinton, Veselnitskaya told NBC News. It was never my intention to have that. The claim is a bombshell. It suggests, contrary to Donald Trump Jr.s statements via his attorney, that damaging information on the Democrats was solicited from rather than dangled by the Russians.
Veselnitskaya went on to say that her intentions in that meeting were virtuousthat she only sought to lobby the Trump campaign in the interests of a clientbut that her interlocutors were myopically and voraciously focused only on getting compromising information on Clinton. It is quite possible that maybe they were longing for such information, she averred. They wanted it so badly that they could only hear the thought that they wanted. This is language that seems designed in a laboratory to elicit an emotional response from the president. It mimics his linguistic tics and implies she, not the presidents son, was the dominant figure in this meeting.
Veselnitskaya further claimed she had no relationship with the Russian government, but that strains credulity. She says she is an attorney working on issues related to the prohibition on the adoption of Russian children in the United States, a measure pursued by the Russian government in retaliation for the 2012 Magnitsky Act. That law was imposed on the pillars of Putins domestic support by Congress, and the Kremlin bitterly resents it. When Russian sources talk about the adoption issue, theyre talking about U.S. sanctions.
It is highly improbable that Veselnitskaya, the former wife of a Moscow region deputy transportation minister, is unknown in Kremlin circles. She served as the defense counsel for the son of the state-owned Russian Railways vice president when he was accused of involvement in a money laundering and tax fraud scheme in the States. That case was settled in New York City before it went to trial.
Moreover, it is equally likely that American intelligence agencies are aware of Veselnitskayas work. Following that controversial settlement, Veselnitskaya contracted the U.S.-based political consulting firm GPS Fusion to advance the cause of eliminating the Magnitsky Act and its associated sanctions. In June of 2016, GPS Fusion retained former MI-6 operative Christopher Steele to investigate Donald Trumps links to Moscow. The product of that investigation was the infamous Steele Dossier. The controversy involving that document has led Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley to call for a Justice Department investigation into GPS Fusion for allegedly violating the Foreign Agents Registration Act and working with former Russian intelligence operatives connected to that tax fraud case.
The preponderance of available evidence suggests that Veselnitskaya functions as a deniable intermediary for the Kremlin. Furthermore, her behavior and demeanor indicate that she is not an unskilled operative. Her comportment on NBC News on Tuesday seemed perfectly calibrated to generate discord in the United States, bog down the White House, and further inflame partisan tensions. Her effort to confirm Democratic suspicions that the Trump family actively tried to collude with Moscow is all but certain to convince Democrats to forget a proven maxim: Dont trust the Russians.
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Why Germany Tolerates Iranian Cheating - Commentary Magazine