Roxana Saberi and Geopolitics
The conviction and sentencing of American (and Iranian) citizen Roxana Saberi after a secret trial is an outrage for which, of course, the Iranian government bears full responsibility. That said, the latest news about Saberi's case raises at least two issues connected to U.S. policy.
First, there was the bizarre news that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad had sent a letter to the prosecution urging that Saberi be given a fair trial. It's hard to know whether this is even true, or what it would mean for Ahmadinejad to request a fair trial. It's also possible that the letter was a publicity stunt aimed at Iranian domestic opinion. Ahmadinejad faces a challenge from, among others, "reformer" and former President Mohammad Khatami. ("Reformer" is in quotation marks because it's practically part of Khatami's name.) Or perhaps instead (or in addition), this was a publicity stunt aimed at the U.S. Ahmadinejad may have calculated that his political interests lie in responding positively to the Obama Administration's diplomactic overtures. Holding an American journalist for 7 years on bogus espionage charges will undoubtedly make it more difficult for Ahmadinejad or his successor to do so, as it signals that the mullahs who hold real power in Iran aren't interested in warmer relations with us.
Second, the ability of the U.S. to rally international public opinion against Iran may well be undermined by U.S. detainee policies. The military commissions and combatant status review tribunals for Gitmo detainees almost certainly provided more procedural fairness than the secret trial of Roxana Saberi did. Still, having sacrificed the moral high ground on this issue, we cannot credibly describe the Saberi secret trial to the world as the outrage that it is. To be clear, even had we not undermined our moral authority in this way, it's quite possible that the Iranians would have been equally unmoved by our objections. But at least we could have made them more forcefully.
Posted by Mike Dorf
First, there was the bizarre news that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad had sent a letter to the prosecution urging that Saberi be given a fair trial. It's hard to know whether this is even true, or what it would mean for Ahmadinejad to request a fair trial. It's also possible that the letter was a publicity stunt aimed at Iranian domestic opinion. Ahmadinejad faces a challenge from, among others, "reformer" and former President Mohammad Khatami. ("Reformer" is in quotation marks because it's practically part of Khatami's name.) Or perhaps instead (or in addition), this was a publicity stunt aimed at the U.S. Ahmadinejad may have calculated that his political interests lie in responding positively to the Obama Administration's diplomactic overtures. Holding an American journalist for 7 years on bogus espionage charges will undoubtedly make it more difficult for Ahmadinejad or his successor to do so, as it signals that the mullahs who hold real power in Iran aren't interested in warmer relations with us.
Second, the ability of the U.S. to rally international public opinion against Iran may well be undermined by U.S. detainee policies. The military commissions and combatant status review tribunals for Gitmo detainees almost certainly provided more procedural fairness than the secret trial of Roxana Saberi did. Still, having sacrificed the moral high ground on this issue, we cannot credibly describe the Saberi secret trial to the world as the outrage that it is. To be clear, even had we not undermined our moral authority in this way, it's quite possible that the Iranians would have been equally unmoved by our objections. But at least we could have made them more forcefully.
Posted by Mike Dorf
posted by Michael C. Dorf @ 11:14 AM
1 Comments:
At 6:21 PM,
Sobek said…
"Second, the ability of the U.S. to rally international public opinion against Iran may well be undermined by U.S. detainee policies."Or, far more likely, other nations might use U.S. detainee policies as a pretext to pursue their own self-interest anyway.
Liberals seem to have this idea that if America were "morally pure," other countries would do what we say (never mind that us trying to get other countries to do what we say might be considered "morally impure").
There are three serious problems with that idea. First is the definition of "morally pure." If we want to make Iran like us more, do we do that by treating Hizbollah terrorists nicer? How about my stoning homosexuals to death? Or closing down dance clubs? Or forcibly convert our citizens to Islam? No matter how we answer those questions, we become less morally pure in the eyes of, say, Germany or France. We cannot be lily-white in the eyes of every value group.
Second, America has never been morally pure. Depending again on who you ask, America has always been evil because of slavery, or Indian policy, or nuking Japan, or failing to join the international communist revolution, or being too cozy with the international communist revolution. We have always had poor people; we have always had poor conditions in our jail cells; we have always had sexual discimination. We have never, in all our history, spoken with absolute moral authority. And yet (1) we have not always been the target of suicidal holy warriors, and (2) we have gotten along with our neighbors pretty well, more or less, for over 200 years.
Third, America never will be morally pure. This is both because we cannot undo the sins of the past - no amount of handwringing will feed or clothe those who died on the Trail of Tears - and because American freedom includes freedom to sin. Sayid Qutb did not help found modern Islamic radicalism because SCHIP was inadequately funded -- he did it because he saw immorality. It was not government action, but free (non-Islamic) citizenry, that most inflamed him.
Foreign governments will act in their own perceived best interest. They will do this without regard to how a memo in a desk in Washington interprets the Geneva Convention. If Russia thinks the gain of selling fissile material is better than the loss of Iran developing weapons, Russia will sell the material. And it will not make any difference who sits in the White House, or how often Khalid Shaikh Muhammed got a bathroom break. Russia will do what it wants. China will do what it wants. North Korea will do what it wants.
Think I'm wrong? Ask Islam Karimov why he cut ties with America. Ask Kyrgyzstan why it closed down America's supply chain. If your answer has more to do with Newsweek's false Qu'ran flushing story than with Russian ambitions in Central Asia, you might be a liberal law professor.
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