America and Iran: Always Winter, Never Christmas

MIDDLE EAST INSTITUTE

JOHN LIMBERT

In C.S. Lewis’ fantasy land of Narnia, the white witch put a spell on her realm to ensure that there would be perpetual winter and that Christmas would never come. For 34 years American-Iranian relations have been similar: a long, hard freeze unbroken by any cracks or signs of thaw.

Now the ice may finally break. The September 27 Obama-Rouhani telephone call was historic on many levels. It marked the very first time that an American president and his counterpart from the Islamic Republic have communicated beyond exchanging messages through intermediaries.  In October 1979, then Foreign Minister Ebrahim Yazdi set the dysfunctional pattern of Iranian diplomacy for the next 34 years. He met his American counterpart, Secretary of State Cyrus Vance, on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly, and, in response to Vance’s questions about how the U.S.-Iranian relationship could move forward after the changes in Iran, Yazdi only recited his list of real and imagined grievances against the United States stretching back decades. Repeated probing from Vance brought the same non-response from Yazdi.

Link to the article