Tomorrow, Iranians will go to the polls to elect a new president in what has become the most anticipated political event in that country since the Islamic Revolution three decades ago. The results, however, are already a foregone conclusion. Whoever ends up becoming president will have little real power -- and even less influence over Iran's geostrategic direction.
When President Obama delivers his long-awaited speech in Egypt on Thursday, he will be fulfilling his inaugural pledge to "seek a new way forward" with the Muslim world. But finding areas of mutual interest may prove far more difficult than the president imagines. That is because, in recent years, the Middle East has seen the crystallization of regional politics around two distinct ideologies. Call it the new bipolarity.
If it needed another reminder of the global danger posed by Iran's nuclear program, the administration of U.S. President Barack Obama has just gotten one. In early May, the International Atomic Energy Agency, the nuclear watchdog of the United Nations, revealed in a closely held report that its inspectors had found traces of highly enriched uranium in Egypt last year. The disturbing revelation is the latest sign that the regime of President Hosni Mubarak in Cairo may in fact be looking for a nuclear deterrent, despite official assurances that its program is intended strictly for "peaceful purposes." Egypt’s apparent interest in "the bomb" is hardly an isolated incident, however. It is part of a growing pattern of proliferation and nuclear development in the greater Middle East — a trend that has been intensified by Iran’s increasingly mature, and menacing, atomic effort.
The Obama administration has offered to “reset” relations with Russia. But what is really needed is a change of operating system. A reset seeks to restore a previous relationship, which for former officials of the Clinton administration now back in office means the Yeltsin years. This will fail because Moscow views that period as emblematic of Russian weakness and exploitation by the West, and especially by the United States.
In a time of shooting wars, it is easy to lose sight of wars waiting to happen. This is dangerous, especially for a new US administration with an ample international agenda. Serious attention is required on Nagorno Karabakh, the simmering dispute between Armenia and Azerbaijan.