Episode Description: This week, Reza breaks down why the recent US-Iran prisoner swap is a victory for diplomacy that Trump should replicate, why reports of President Rouhani’s demise are premature, and the tumult in US-Turkey relations. Negar Razavi, Visiting Assistant Professor at William and Mary, chats with Reza about the culture of expert impunity when it comes to Iran policy, the system of knowledge production in Washington that rewards ideologically-driven assessments of Iran, and how Washington has long claimed to care about the aspirations of the Iranian people but takes actions to the contrary.
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About Reza Marashi: With 15 years of experience working in both the U.S. government and Washington DC think tank world, Reza Marashi breaks down American foreign policy, the lack of diplomatic engagement and military restraint that is guiding it, the cast of characters that are making this unsustainable problem worse, and how all of this is firmly not in the national interest of the United States.
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Transcript:
Greetings. Good people of the world. Come on in. Sit down. Relax. Put in your fancy iPhone earbuds. You are now listening to The Message a podcast that breaks down American foreign policy, the lack of diplomatic engagement in military restraint that is guiding it, the cast of characters that in making this unsustainable problem worse and how all of this is firmly not in the national interest of the United States. I’m your host. My name is Reza Marashi.
Before we go any further, make sure to subscribe to this podcast on Apple podcast, Google podcast, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, YouTube or whatever your favorite podcast platform might be. And if you like what you hear go to Iranian.com, click on the donate button. Help us continue to fulfill our mission of giving knowledge to the people.
News Of The Week
Every week, we’re going to do three things for you. One breakdown, three news stories that you should know about to interview Smart, intellectually honest people who deserve to be heard and three. Answer your questions that you email to our mailbag. So, without further ado, enjoy the show to kick things off this week, we’re gonna go beyond the headlines and do a deep dive on three important news stories that the people need to know about. Why do the people need to know about these news stories? That’s a great question. Thanks for asking. The people need to know, because each of these stories highlights the core tenet that this podcast is built upon, which is that the foundations of American foreign policy are firmly not in the national interest of the United States.
US/Iran Prisoner Swap
Story number one that you need to know about US Iran Prisoner Swap This past weekend, Washington and Tehran exchanged prisoners, neither of whom should have been in jail in the first place after an almost daily avalanche of bad news on the U. S Iran relations front over the past two years. This is really a breath of fresh air and a much-needed step in the right direction. Now I have a bit of personal and professional experience with this issue. I was working in the Office of Iranian Affairs at the State Department when Roxana Saberi was freed from Iranian prison in 2009 and later on when I became a think tank, I wrote a report for the Swiss government that they used to help facilitate the 2016 prisoner swap negotiation that free Jason Rezaian from Iranian prison and the email that I got from the Swiss on the day Jason was released, saying it was your idea that we implemented is one of the proudest days of my career. And of course, I’m one of many who are proud to call Siamak Namazi a friend, and he remains unjustly imprisoned in Iran. So there’s still much work for the Trump administration to do on this front.
Now, to be fair, Trump deserves credit for pulling the trigger and approving this prisoner swap, despite many of his top advisers being skeptical, if not outright opposed to the process. To that end, the lion’s share of the negotiations that led to the prisoner swap with Iran weren’t even conducted by Trump’s top Iran advisers. Instead, former US officials negotiated directly with Iranian officials, and when the contours of the swap were agreed to on leave, ended the Trump administration step in and pull the trigger. Had this process been led by Trump’s top Iran advisers, the process wouldn’t even exist because they didn’t believe it could succeed and were instead focused on finding new ways to sanction and overthrow the Iranian government.
…diplomacy, not bluster, not bombs, not bullets produced the most rigorous nuclear deal in the history of the world.
Trump’s new national security advisor previously served as his chief hostage negotiator, so that no doubt played an instrumental role in getting this prisoner swap done. And getting around the various obstacles that Trump’s top Iran advisers have a track record of creating diplomacy is great promise that one can never predict where discussions will lead once they have begun. Let this prisoner swap be a lesson for the Trump administration in that regard, lest we forget, serious, sustained negotiations first produced a historic nuclear deal between the U.S. and Iran during the Obama administration. Then they continued working together to ensure that 10 American sailors were released from Iranian custody less than 24 hours after inadvertently crossing into Iran’s territorial waters. And then high-level negotiations led to the release of four Americans imprisoned in Iran in exchange for Iranians in prison in the U.S. Now imagine for a moment that your friend or family member was unjustly imprisoned, and it should be clear for everyone to see that this was the right thing to do. It was right when Obama did it, and it’s right that Trump did it, period. Full stop now in Washington. Iran Hawks on both sides of the aisle as well as neoconservatives who dominate the Republican foreign policy establishment have really tried to downplay this fact. But think about it for a second. Why are these Iran Hawks complaining? At a time when American citizens are being released from Iranian prisons and reunited with families, shouldn’t the safety and freedom of these people be the top priority?
So to recap, diplomacy, not bluster, not bombs, not bullets produced the most rigorous nuclear deal in the history of the world. It’s safely returned in record time 10 American sailors who inadvertently crossed into Iran’s territorial waters, and now it is reunited multiple Americans imprisoned in Iran with their families. And these positive developments don’t have to stop here. More is possible, but it will require the Trump administration to change its Iran policy and start investing in ways to solve problems rather than create them.
Iran’s Internal Politics After Protests
Story number two that you need to know about this week. Iran’s internal politics in the aftermath of recent protests that took place across the country more specifically an assertion has been floating around that President Hassan Rouhani is completely marginalized in Iran, and this is not a new assertion. We saw this assertion being circulated after Trump violated and pulled out of the JCPOA The Iran nuclear deal, and I believe that declarations of Rouhani’s demise are not only premature, but they also ignore Iran’s motivations for coming to the negotiating table in the first place not just with the United States but especially the United States, but also the rest of the world right large. And those motivations were A) maintaining unity amongst the ruling elite and B) deflecting responsibility for successful diplomacy on to Washington.
Now, make no mistake, there are real rifts between Ayatollah Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, and President, Hassan Rouhani. But both men have made a concerted effort to appear united on as many policy issues as possible, whether it be the nuclear deal or anything else. Neither man wants to encourage hardline pressure groups who are really instrumental in digging the ditch that Iran currently finds itself in Trump administration sanctions notwithstanding. There are also more practical reasons for these two men to cooperate as well it’s well understood that Rouhani needs Khamenei’s support to govern effectively. But the degree to which Khamenei needs Rouhani is drastically underestimated. Iranian extremists were really steering the ship from 2005 to 2013 and the fruits of their labor are clear for everyone to see. An Islamic republic that was isolated diplomatically, severed from global financial institutions and whose legitimacy further eroded in the eyes of his own.
People think that many of the Ahmadenijad years caused an unprecedented political and economic amount of damage to Iran and presented Iran’s Supreme Leader with a dangerous mix of serious challenges. Yet unemployment, inflation, brain drain and really a weakened domestic industrial sector and low investor confidence and sanctions exacerbated all of these problems as they continue to but they didn’t cause them. Mismanagement, nepotism and corruption have long plagued Iran’s economy way for America’s previous economic assault, and they will continue to do so during and after this latest economic barrage from Trump and Washington, D.C.
Rouhani has helped Khamenei achieve arguably a more important, strategic objective, and that is successfully deflecting domestic political pressure by shifting the onus of the U. S Iran conflict onto Washington.
And here’s the inconvenient truth. Khamenei can’t fix Iran’s problems alone, because the only alternative to Rouhani and his coalition is the same merry band of idiots who were responsible for Iran’s strategic and ineptitude during the Ahmadinejad years. So Khamenei may be a cunning ideologue, but he’s not suicidal. He’ll continue to use Rouhani’s political consensus building skills and his team of technocrats to help stabilize the economy as best they can, and more competently handle state affairs as best they can, especially at this timewhen Iran is under siege from the United States, Israel, Saudi Arabia, the UAE and others. Now, Iran’s political infighting won’t go away any time soon. But a majority of Iran’s political elite have recognized and blessed the shift in Tehran’s stance towards nuclear negotiations in 2013. Whether or not that stance shifts over the next 6 to 12 months remains to be seen. But the people who attack Rouhani today are the people who have been attacking him for the past 7-8 years. Now, in addition to projecting unity within the governing system, Rouhani has helped Khamenei achievable arguably more important, strategic objective, and that is successfully deflecting domestic political pressure by shifting the onus of the U.S. Iran conflict onto Washington. Khamenei repeatedly assured the Iranian people that the government left no stone unturned in pursuing a nuclear deal that honored their rights and was in their interest. His emphasis on the Iranian people reflects his concern over who bears responsibility for the conflict, Washington or Tehran. Now, for Iranian decision-makers, it’s more important to ensure that the Iranian people will not blame their leaders for sanctions than it is to actually get the sanctions lifted. Rouhani and Zarif sold the nuclear deal to Khamenei by arguing that proving Tehran is open negotiations puts the onus on Washington to produce a feasible deal and live up to its terms, the latter of which has obviously not taken place.
And in turn, Khamenei sold the nuclear deal inside and outside of the governing system by arguing that engagement with Washington means the onus will be on Iran’s rival, Washington, to compromise and live up to its end of the bargain, which Washington has not. With Trump violating and pulling out of the deal, Khamenei will obviously say ‘I told you so’ he has. He will continue to do so, but he’ll also continue to offer public support for negotiations with everyone not named America in order to show that it is Washington not Tehran that’s unwilling to resolve the U.. Iran standoff.
So in short, both Khamenei and Rouhani have positioned themselves so that they can’t truly lose if the Iran nuclear deal dies a full death due to Trump. Neither Khamenei nor the Iranian people will blame Rouhani because they can correctly accused Washington of killing the deal despite Iranian compliance. Now, Khamenei and by extension, the Iranian people won’t blame him for the same reason. Not only will political unity appear largely intact, but Iranian officials will also have shifted the blame both at home and abroad for the failure of diplomacy back onto the U. S. Which is widely the widely held view within the international community as things stand today.
So, not only will Washington fail to coax Tehran into more concessions or capitulation that will also strengthen Iran’s position at home and abroad at the expense of America’s position at home and abroad. Dare I say strategic foresight is not the Trump administration strong suit. As for Rouhani, he lives to fight another day.
US/Turkey Relations
Story number three that you need to know about this week. US Turkey relations this past week at the NATO summit President Trump and Turkish President Erdogan met on the sidelines of the summit to discuss of riot different issues and really highlights this idea of US Turkish relations or lack thereof. You know, things haven’t been that great for a while. And, ah, President Erdogan has been talking about alternatives to his alliance with the U. S.
Now I think it’s important to flush all of this out, flush out what’s going on, give you guys an idea of what to expect going forward. I think it’s important to keep in mind there’s never really been a golden period in U. S turkey relations, not least because Turkey is a fiercely nationalistic country with an identity all its own and highly complex regional relations on all borders. But Turkey has remained tied to the U. S. Because the U. S has found ways to keep it on side. The relationship existed almost exclusively in military channels backed by military hardware, transferred, financed and sold to keep Turkey a regional heavyweight and really a firebreak for Soviet forces streaming in Western Europe during the Cold War.
And there have been a variety of tension points in the U. S. Turkey relationship over its history. More recently, most recently, you saw attention point over the Persian Gulf War, in which Turkey maintain neutrality and then fought a decades-long insurgency campaign against Kurdish groups operating from the quote-unquote liberated northern Iraq. And then tensions flared again between the US and Turkey over the 2003 U. S. Invasion and occupation of Iraq. Turkey again chose not to participate in operations after a protracted and ultimately failed negotiation with the U. S. On basing an economic aid.
Now, at the outset of the Arab spring, Turkey in the U. S were aligned, But they soon diverged over Syria, where Turkey felt the U. S. Needed to either overthrow Assad and or establish a buffer zone in northern Syria and Turkey later split with the U. S. Over backing of rebel groups, especially Kurdish ones. Now current Turkish president, Erdogan swept power in 2002 with his Justice and Development Party on an anti-corruption and economic development platform that was tinged with political Islam. Now, at the time, it wasn’t clear how long he would last, and the Bush administration of the time definitely wasn’t happy. Well, fast forward, 16 years, and Erdogan has not only survived multiple political challenges and at least one attempted coup, but he’s also effectively changed Turkey’s system to a one-man presidential system. And he’s now on his third U. S president, and he’s never really gotten along with any of them very well, despite high hopes on both sides each time at the outset.
Now diplomats on both sides have lamented to me the relationship that the relationship excuse me hasn’t transformed beyond its Cold War roots as they put out one fire after another in the bilateral relationship and across the region. And yet Turkey and the U. S. Always find themselves needing one another in a crisis. And here is the reason why I don’t think Erdogan is correct when he says that Turkey has alternatives to the United States. Also, why I think President Trump should realize that he’s hurting long term American interests.
Now by alternatives, Erdogan’s really referring for first and foremost Russia and then to a host of other, clearly less credible options, like China, Iran or Qatar. So why isn’t this threat of alternatives something to take seriously? But I do think you’d take it seriously but I also think you have to look at the bottom line, which is a really alliance for Turkey, with Russia, Iran, China, Qatar or really any other country is not as easily possible because the points of divergence from a strategic standpoint are greater than the points of convergence. And the relationship that Turkey has with Russia, Iran, China, Qatar and others are either immature or fraught with historical baggage or really against Turkish core interests or the interests of any of the other countries that I just listed off. So when you take a step back and look at the geopolitical map for Turkey, it’s really the U. S. or bust, unless it fundamentally alters some of its strategic plans and viewpoints. And I think this is really the problem for Washington. It’s that former US officials agree on one thing. As difficult as Turkey is inside the tent. On any given issue, it’s 100 times worse to have them on the outside of the tent.
So what Erdogan is really threatening here is not alignment, and the U. S. Turkey relationship has long been in need of a reset and in need of redefinition. But for now, I think it’s really in need of life support. Tough as the relationship might be, both countries benefit more than not, and it’s totally reckless to throw it away, as is being pursued right now on both sides. I think for Turkey to be out on its own at this moment of geopolitical disorder is a high risk to itself in its neighbors. While doubtless the U. S relationship and US actions have complicated regional politics for Turkey, it’s important for Turkey to remember that the US is always there in a crisis, not least because of Article Five under the NATO treaty.
So even the most Turkey skeptic, US policymakers should ask themselves three questions as they make policy inside the Trump administration. One without close ties to the United States, can Turkey stay in NATO? Two with Turkey out of NATO, which countries or regions are less stable? And three, if Turkey leaves NATO, will it pursue nuclear weapons? If you answer those questions honestly, none of the answers are particularly promising, and that’s why the urgent most high level diplomacy is needed. And that’s why it was good that Trump Erdogan took the opportunity on the sidelines of the NATO summit to try and pursue their respective interest, Turkish interests and American interests. And trying to show an ability to do more than berate one another and instead have a warm diplomatic engagement. Now is truly the time for a summit beyond the name meeting on the sidelines of the natives, a really US Turkish summit that truly means something to long term US and Turkish interests.
Maiblag
And now it’s time for this week’s mailbag, where you ask me any questions you have about what’s going on in the world today, and I try to answer to the best of my ability. If you have a question, don’t be shy. Email them to info at Iranian dot com with your name and location, and I’ll do my best to answer as many questions I can on the next podcast. So without further ado, let’s dive right in.
Question number one from this week’s mailbag is from Allie from Phoenix. Shout-out to Phoenix, Ali says. Thanks for this podcast. I just discovered it from friend, and I’m looking forward to hearing future episodes. My question is as follows. Iran has many powerful proxies in the region. How much of this is driven by a need to militarily GERD the country in case of war versus a focus and mandate on exporting the revolution to Shia communities in the broader region? Thanks.
That’s a great question, Ali. Thanks for asking. And I think in order to answer the question that you have, we really have to take a step back. Okay, because, look, Iran has learned the hard way over many decades that neither hard power nor soft power alone can produce regional acceptance of Iranian power or global acceptance. By global acceptance I mean American acceptance. In the 1970s, for example, the Sha understood that conventional military superiority and record oil revenues really couldn’t establish a sustainable position As a regional power broker. Iran also needed its Arab neighbors to accept Iranian power. To that end, he sought legitimacy in the region by either befriending regional governments or seeking to resolve outstanding issues of tension. So the Sha succeeded up to a point. He settled border problems with Saudi Arabia and Iraq, and he improved bilateral relations with Egypt after President Sadat realigned the country with the Western bloc. But the Sha did not fully gain acceptance of Iran’s regional power status because he neglected soft power. In other words, bridging the Sunni Shiite and Persian Arab divides. So after the revolution in 1979 the Islamic republic’s leadership recognized that the Sha’ss neglect of soft power created a problem, and therefore they sought to bridge regional divides through political Islam. And in doing so, they traded the successes and failures with the Sha; in other words, Iran’s blend of political Islam and anti-imperialism when it valuable support on the Arab street, but simultaneously it destroyed relations with many Arab monarchs and strongman Saudi Arabia, who really feared political Islam more than the Shah’s military and economic power.
And today, a cornerstone of Iran’s regional power status continues to be its support for Arab and Muslim constituencies that seek to push back against perceived marginalization at home and in the region. From Palestine to Lebanon, Iraq to Yemen, Iranian support has been directed to ethnic and religious groups whose domestic persecution predates the establishment of an Islamic Republic. So rather than pushing for an overthrow of the existing political systems in these respective countries, Iran believes it can achieve its strategic objectives by committing varying degrees of money, weapons, intelligence and political advice to these communities. Contrary to the assertions of the Saudis, Iranian decision-makers do not need to interfere in quote-unquote Arab affairs because they know that they can outsource the fight to marginalize constituencies who have self-motivating grievances. Then, as Iran’s allies or proxies in these respective countries and power themselves domestically, Iran’s hand is strengthened as it jockeys with Riyadh and other countries over regional power.
The second question from this week’s mailbag comes from Lisa, and she’s riding in from the Falls Church of Virginia. Lisa’s question is as follows, she says. A recent article published on Iranian dot com by Finney and Cunningham claims that Netanyahu’s hasty meeting with Pompeo last week suggests that the U.S. and Israel are putting the final touches to their malignant masterpiece for provoking a war with Iran. What are your thoughts on this? With Netanyahu’s future hanging in the balance, have we entered into a more perilous time of provocations intended to bait Iran into war?
Great question, Lisa. Thanks very much for writing in short answer. Yeah. You know, I do think that Pompeo and Netanyahu have made their desire for war with Iran very clear. You don’t take my word for it. I’m not sure if that was the number one reason for their hasty meeting last week, but I do think that both Pompeo and Netanyahu realized that there is an increased likelihood that their respective days are numbered with regards to you know how much longer they’ll be in office. And they also realize that it’s not 100% certain that Trump will get re-elected. Maybe he will. Maybe he won’t, its too early to say so. All of that with all of that in mind, you know, they kind of have to strike while the iron is hot. And for all intents and purposes, they might be feeling like it’s a now or never situation not going to be easy to push that kind of policy forward, because I think Trump has made clear that his preference is to avoid a military confrontation with Iran. But I think there are a lot of people surrounding Trump that we’ll believe that war with Iran is a good idea. Pompeo being one of them and Netanyahu has a lot of people surrounding him that believe Iran. War with Iran is a good idea. So if you can’t make the call as Pompeo or, if you can’t make the call about a war Netanyahu, you can’t make the call to go to war. Then what you can do is try and lay the groundwork to box Trump into a war that he would independently seek to avoid. And I think that that’s something that we should really be watching out for in the weeks and months ahead.
Question Number three from this week’s mailbag has comes in from Massoud, and he’s running in from London. Shout out to London, one of my favorite cities of the world on some of my favorite people in the world having a live in London right now. So all the more reason for me to love that city, Massoud rights Manoto is rubbish. VOA is rubbish. BBC Persian is rubbish. Radio Farda is rubbish. IranWire is rubbish. And by rubbish. I mean that these are all US or UK funded government propaganda outlets. Given that I share similar politics to you, I would like to know what specific foreign policy news outlets you recommend. Also, are there any Twitter users you recommend that I follow for credible US Iran analysis?
That’s another great question. Thank you, Massoud, for writing in. You know, I think the situation today as it pertains to getting news is fundamentally different than it was 10, 20, 30 40 years ago. You know, like back in the day used to be a handful of newspapers, handful of radio stations, a handful of television stations and that’s where everybody got their news from Whereas today, I mean, you just inundated with information websites, journalism outlets, social media, you name it. So it’s hard to be able to say, you know, I would I would go here to get news that I would go here to get information. And it’s especially hard for a guy like me, because for the past 15 years of my career, I’ve had to read everything, even the things that you consider to be rubbish, because whether or not I think it’s rubbish is irrelevant. I have to know what people who I agree what they’re saying, and I have to know what people who I disagree with their saying.
So I would encourage you to read everything, it’s gonna make you smarter if you do and then figure out what it is that you like. and that’s really gonna be the best foundation from which you can grow and become a more savvy a version of yourself, which should be everybody’s goal, including myself.
Now, as it pertains to any Twitter users that I recommend for credible US Iran analysis, hey, man, this is a tough question to answer because I worked in this industry for 15 years, so I’m gonna end up inadvertently forgetting to mention so, my friends. So my apologies in advance to anyone that I forget to mention here, um, and gosh and I just got back on Twitter, so I’m probably gonna be a little rusty at this, but, um, let’s see Narges Bajoghli , she’s great. She’s fantastic. If you haven’t heard her interview on Episode One of this podcast, you should definitely go check it out. Um, Adnan Tabatabai, he’s fantastic when it comes to all things Iran related. Um, Hooman Majd is generally speaking, a great guy and super smart, super sharp when it comes to all things Iran unrelated. Um, Shervin Malekzadeh, he’s solid. Great guy, good analyst knows his stuff. Uh, my brother Amir Hanjani knows great guy, knowhis stuff. Check him out. Um gosh, well, my see, this is tough. Mohsen Milani, he’s fantastic on all things Iran related. So those would be those who read the names that I recommend, and I apologize to all my friends that I inadvertently left out. Please don’t send me nasty text messages about me not mentioning your name.
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Interview With Negar Razavi
And now it’s time for this week’s interview, and I’m really excited to share it with you guys because my guest is doing cutting edge, intellectually honest work that is a much-needed addition to America’s broken foreign policy discourse. Negara’s Evie is a political anthropologist with the focus on critical security studies, expertise, gender race and U. S foreign policy in the Middle East. Her research specifically examines the role of policy experts and think tanks in shaping US security policies towards Iran and Egypt. She received her PhD in anthropology from the University of Pennsylvania and is teaching at William and Mary as a visiting assistant professor in anthropology. Her research draws attention to the some systemic problem of Iran expertise in Washington, which she demonstrates is neither knew nor limited to the hawkish political factions now running U. S foreign policy. She asserts that the U. S foreign policy establishment has collectively created a culture of expert impunity when it comes to Iran, which has contributed in no small part to the unstable and dangerous policy conditions we see today. Under Trump, she studied the role of think tank experts in shaping U. S policies towards the Middle East and during two years of ethnographic fieldwork in Washington, D. C. From 2014 to 2016 she interviewed over 180 policy actors inside and outside of the government, attended hundreds of policy events and followed think tank experts working on Iran in person and through their writings.
Negar and I talked about the culture of expert impunity. When it comes to Iran policy, the system of knowledge production in Washington, D. C. That rewards ideologically driven assessments of Iran. How Washington d. C. Has long claimed to care about the aspirations of the Iranian people, but takes actions to the contrary and much, much more. You’re not gonna wanna miss what she has to say.
So without further ado, here’s Negar. Hi, How are you?
Negar
Hi, Reza. How are you?
Reza
I mean, I’m fantastic now. Thank you so much for making the time to do. This is a long time coming, so I’m happy we’re finally able to make this happen.
Negar
Absolutely. And I’m so happy that you are able to do this. And congrats on the new test. It’s exciting.
Reza
Appreciate it. It’s a pleasure. I mean, part of the mission of this podcast is to give knowledge to the people and not just knowledge more generally but intellectually honest knowledge that, um, acknowledges the fact you know that the U. S. Foreign policy foundations have ah run amok, shall we say, And I know I felt that way for a long time. I know a lot of my friends that are still in D. C. And some of my DC friends like me, who have left DC have felt that way for a long time and then comes along a researcher that does a very nice job of diving into this issue in a super unique way. So, um, do me a favor and describe your doctoral dissertation research, Uh, what inspired you to pursue it and what some of your key finding for
Negar
Sure. Um, And if you’ll indulge a young academic who loves talking about her own work, I will go a little bit further back in history. So as way of background, I originally started my graduate work in anthropology, wanting to study. You’re on. Like so many Iranian Americans, I really felt this desire to be inside Iran, working with our communities back home. And so my original project Waas, studying aspirational middle class youth in Iran and looking at the effects of economic instability on their social transitions into adulthood. So I was not talking to the super elites of Tehran. I was talking to the people who drive taxis and do work that is not considered, you know, very glamorous, but have those aspirations to become middle class and what I was seeing. And this is sort of between 2011 and 2013 was that they were being devastated by the sanctions in ways that I don’t even think scholars have been ableto fully grapple with to this day on. And I’d be willing to wager that a lot of these young people were those that were outs in the streets a few weeks ago.
So, yeah, um, so here I am any Tehran studying the effects of sanctions and everyone I was talking to kept throwing this question back at me. Why is the U. S sanctioning us? Don’t they claim they care about are right? Why, you know, why are they doing this to us? And I felt I was uniquely positioned to try to answer that question for them because I had previously worked in the foreign policy community as a researcher. I worked for a major foreign policy think tank as a research assistant working on Middle East policy. And so I knew the policy community well. And so I scrapped my original project, start all over again and reformulated this idea. Let’s ask those in power. Why do they formulate policies like sanctions policies. And what are the ideas that motivated, huh? So that was the background on the dissertation. That’s inspiring. Totally. Yeah, well, it’s It was a really roundabout way of getting here, but it was genuinely motivated by what I was seeing on the ground in Iran. And this disconnect between what I was hearing in Washington and what people were saying in Tehran. Totally. Um, so I spent two years doing field work in D. C. Using the methods of anthropology, which is participant observation. So I became both a participant and an observer in debates regarding the Iran nuclear program. And then my other case study was Egypt policy. And the reason why I picked those two is I had done research in both countries, and I could sort of compare what people here were saying with what I had a reserved on the ground in both of those countries. And also Iran is often pegged as this super exceptional case study that goes outside of all normal models of power. And so I also wanted to pick a country that’s much closer to us. Um, interests, which is Egypt?
Reza
Yeah. Makes sense.
Negar
Yeah. Um and then In terms of my findings, I found that this whole expert community that’s formed around Middle East policy is both has sent a It’s speaking to the success of the security apparatus and its failures at the same time. Um, so what do I mean by that? I mean that since 9 11 the U. S. Has made its security objective to end all forms of terror against the homeland. Right? So that’s a super ambitious gold to set out for yourself. And it’s a seemingly impossible goal. And so the U. S security apparatus has had to sort of grow and grow and grow to meet that demand. And eventually it outpaced the capacities and boundaries of the government itself. And so it’s had to outsource a lot of its functions. Two entities outside of itself and think things have come to play a really central role in that security ecosystem. And these experts that are based of these think tanks are now tasked with, um assessing what risks are out there legitimating U. S policy selling US policy and discrediting policies that are unpopular with the particular political factions they’re aligned with. So my work is really trying to unpack all of that and to show how it works in practice.
Reza
And I think you did a really great job of doing it. I mean, you published an article on Jadaliyya that everybody should go and check out. And, you know, I was really struck when I read it because you had this great phrase, the culture of expert impunity. And as somebody who was swimming in those circles for 15 years and I think I even said this. And when I was chatting with arrogance and the first episode of the podcast, I never called myself in Iran expert, you know, the second you do, something happens in Iran that completely disproved everything that you were just saying right after you called yourself an expert. I never I never did, you know, like it. Trying to predict Iranian politics is a very humbling experience for a variety of reasons. And friends of mine who work on other countries or other regions in the world would oftentimes say the same thing. So I don’t think it’s unique to Iran. But can you flush out what you mean by the culture of expert expert impunity? Um, because I think That’s a really central point that you made that very applicable to perhaps what’s going on today.
Negar
Yeah. Um, and I actually appreciated the fact that you and Argus both sort of alluded to that in the last podcast as well, about having a little bit of humility in terms of knowing that our knowledge about a country like Iran is always going to be partial. It’s always going to be limited, and it’s always going to be shaped by our own experiences and biases. And the problem with the way that this ecosystem of knowledge that’s formed since 9 11 in in relation to the security system and us is that Iran has targeted as basically the top enemy of the U. S. In terms of state power in the region. And yet we have no standard by which people need to be able to make claims on this country that is central to U. S foreign policy. In the academic world, there are mechanisms to keep people in check, right? Like to keep people riel. Yeah, there’s peer review that you go to a conference and you present a paper and people are going to ask you. Okay, what was your methodology? How did you come to that conclusion? You goto workshops and you get ripped apart by your colleagues on a regular basis in terms of having to prove what you said. And none of that exists in Washington. Even worse, you don’t have to declare your conflicts of interest in terms of who’s funding your research, and that’s potentially the most dangerous of all.
Reza
Yeah. Now that’s a big problem in the think tank world. I mean, you know, having worked in the think tank world for as long as I did. You know, going out and getting funding for your research was paramount. You know that you want to, you know, bring in money. How do you pay the bills? How do you continue to bring in a paycheck? And it was always very striking to me, going and talking to some of my colleagues on offer and friends who worked in the think tank world as well at other places and sometimes on other topics, but also, you know, on the Iran stuff, and see where the money would be coming from. Well, well, not a second. Let me get this straight. You work on Iran, and you’re taking money from the Saudi government and the Emirati government that strikes me as a conflict of interest.
Negar
Yep. Absolutely. And I mean Okay, fine. You want to take money from them, at least have that up front at the beginning of every report that you published on Iran? Exactly. Right. Like that needs to be listed. I you know, I sit on the board of Exxon Mobil, and therefore you need to be able to take my analysis with a grain of salt because I have a personal interest in the outcome of this interest in this research that may have nothing to do with us. National security.
Reza
Yeah, absolutely. And it’s so prevalent. It’s so prominent, you know, And some people have. Yeah, I think there was a New York Times article about it. That kind of touched on some of the points, but I don’t think was as hard hitting as I think the actual reality is. Um, but then you know the flip side of it, of course, is you know, when you’re in that world, it and then it pertains to your livelihood. You become very defensive about
And, um I am sure that you encountered, Uh, actually, I shouldn’t be so presumptuous. Like when you were doing these interviews. I’m sure people were happy to chat with you to some extent. You know, a PhD researcher. Cool. But fast forward to you actually coming out and talking about your findings. What has been the response to you publishing your work? What’s been the response in government circles? Think tank circles, academia, etcetera, etcetera.
Negar
Um, so this is a really interesting question. Thanks for asking. Erez is one of the important things to remember about. My research is from the beginning, I didn’t identify my interlocutors, so I did all of my interviews, not for attribution. And I give people acronyms throughout my research. Um and so a lot of times, people were saying the stuff you and I are saying behind closed doors or off the record, so does mean until after some of my stuff has come out, they’ve sent me private messages like Thanks for saying that. Like, yes, I wanted you to say that, like, that is awesome. And then, of course, there are people who got defensive and, uh, thought I oversimplified what they had said or misconstrued what they had said. Interestingly about that in your times piece that you’re alluding to, it came out the first, very first thing. I started my fieldwork about that Yeah, in September 2014 was the very first day of my fieldwork word. I think it was called foreign Powers by influence and think tanks. And so it was. My interlocutors kept bringing it up. I wasn’t even asking it half the time because I was a little bit nervous. I had just started out. I was like, Oh, should I bring this up? They were bringing it up either to defend it, to defend the art argument or two, you know, nuance and say, you know, it’s not that simple. You know, just because we get funding from ex government doesn’t mean we’re completely bought by them. And, you know, we have procedures in place to create a wall between the funding and the research, etcetera.
Reza
Yeah, that’s always my favorite talking point. Yeah, because then once you I don’t know how to roll. Your experience was, But I got said that line Ah, bunch And like Okay, well, what do your procedures Well, you know, that’s, you know, since the different proprietary, we can’t get into that That us so on so forth. But it’s a, um it’s really interesting to me, too, Really dive into, You know, not just what the feedback has been, but I want to circle back to this idea of culture of expert impunity. Do you think that it has contributed to the dangerous policy conditions on the Iran front that we see today under Trump? And, uh, do you think that the Trump administration is unique in this regard?
Negar
Um, I think it has definitely contributed to the dangerous situation we see with Trump today, but it far precedes him.
Reza
What do you mean by that?
Negar
So this dangerous thinking or this culture of expert impunity really started? I would say at the moment these think tanks started to really play a much bigger role in the foreign policy debates, which I argue in my research happens in 2000 to 2003. Really? And you run off with the Yeah, in the run up to the Iraq War, I II pinpoint that as this turning point. Um huh. And on Iran, specifically, there just has not been an honest discussion about where people are getting their information from how limited the knowledge is, how ideological, that money that their findings are and the money that’s really embedded behind this industry. Um, and I think people recognize that there was a lack of expertise going into the war in Iraq or basically the Bush administration ignored all the experts. Yeah, and so people were like, Listen, we need expertise, expertise, matters. Let’s start hiring a lot of experts that these think tanks. Let’s get people who a Ph. D’s of Middle East studies. Let’s do it. But for some reason, Iran continued to get passed over in that moment of reflexive ity and self critical discussion. Post Iraq. Um, and it’s to the point where even those who Sepp, whose support opening up with Iran and I say this in the piece, even those who support opening up with Iran just don’t have a deep understanding of the society or its history or it’s politics. And so they do these, they say things that make the situation worse half the time.
Reza
Yeah, I mean, one of the things that you wrote in your piece that blew me away was you had mentioned that you were interviewing one of the individuals that was on Obama’s negotiating team, and this individual said once we decided tow negotiate with the Iranians, we didn’t need Iran expect anymore. We needed nuclear experts. And I read that. And for somebody has 15 years in D. C. A cynical as I am, my jaw dropped to the floor. Clearly, I know this person. You have to tell you it is, but clearly I know this person and I couldn’t imagine no disrespect to this person. I couldn’t imagine something so idiotic beings head because nobody would sit there and say, Yeah, I’m gonna do something with France. But I don’t need anybody that speaks French. I don’t need anybody that spent any time in France. I don’t need anybody that knows the intricate details of French politics. It’s that drives that drives I dressed French society, and yet the rules of the game suffer some reason change when we start
Negar
and especially given how important they claim Iran is in terms of U. S. Foreign policy like that’s the huge glaring elephant in the room is okay. You don’t have a French expert. When you’re going into goes to negotiate with her as well. France is our ally, and I guess you could make all kinds of claims. But you’re you’re claiming Iran is one of the worst. And wouldn’t you want tohave somebody who couldn’t get it? The layers of nuance? Maybe, You know, there’s an aside in the conversation that you’re completely missing because they’re saying it in Farsi or whatever. You know, there’s so many missed opportunities there. Yeah, that’s almost sampling.
Reza
Absolutely. I remember when I went into the State Department in 2006 Dave very recently had established created the Office of Iranian Affairs where I worked. And before that there was two people in the office of Arabian Peninsula Affairs working on Iran to people. You just invaded the country, to the east and the country, to the west of your own. You got two people. So finally they wise end up and they decided that they needed to create a Kadre of Iran focused foreign service officers to, you know, start working on this country and of great importance. But then what did they do after that? They start bringing in all these political appointees and then political appointees, who said on the seventh floor of the State Department, You know, same floor, that secretary of State said, sits
Negar
the wood rooms. I’ve been there.
Reza
Oh, yeah, absolutely very, very fancy. And so then it becomes this top down, Ah, professional approach where everything has to go through the senior advisors and the political appointees, etcetera, etcetera. So if you are a foreign service officer who’s spending 2 to 3 years in Washington, D. C. And you go to the Office of Iranian Affairs to work, you get me the hell out of here. I want to go work on Lebanon where I can actually like craft policy. Why would I don’t want to work on Iran. And so the best and the brightest would come spend 6 to 12 months, at least during my time. Maybe it’s different, though. I have a sneaking suspicion it’s not. And then they would they would curtail. They would leave and go do something else. And so it was just it became this, Uh, that’s weird. Uh, this weird dynamic of we know we need people like you razzle or the two other Iranian Americans who are working on this issue during my time there. But we also you know, we don’t We don’t want you to go native. So you need toe. We need to make sure that you’re in line with, you know, with with what’s happening. There was there was this saying that, you know, you stand where you sit. Meaning the positions that you take are predicated upon where you sit every day. You know, I say 9 to 5, but the hour for much longer than that, Monday through Friday. And then they also remember Ah, Peed ASA, Principal Deputy Essex, Assistant Secretary of State. The number three person. Excuse me. Not the number three person. The number one gas. Remember one A dass at the office and the Bureau of Near East Affairs. Not
Negar
all the accident wasn’t hard. Like going down memory lane, right?
Reza
Yeah, right. This is not important to the listeners. Let’s just say an important person at the State Department told me, You know, at the end of the day, uh, when you’re in the four walls of any government building, whatever. Whatever you want to say, it’s okay. Like free flowing debate, which is not true, by the way, because there’s consequences repercussions to your professional career. You say the wrong thing around the wrong people. But he said, You know, whatever you want to say in the in the four walls of U. S. Government building, we encourage that so that we can, you know, get to the best answer, get to the best solution, and some people actually believe that. But I would argue that most people don’t especially on this particular issue of Iran, he said. But when you leave the four walls of the government building, you know you have to be. You gotta fall in line. You gotta toe the line,
Negar
right? It’s one voice, one voice, one policy right,
Reza
one voice, one policy. Which is why you see that the Trump administration being so haphazard even though their policy is, I mean, you would think you pull their string. They say the same five things. Why is that so difficult? They don’t have a strategy. They have a policy, and it’s a, uh it’s not. It’s not working to the extent that they would think that they thought it would.
Negar
And can I jump on what you just said? because I think it’s really important to understand how these experts that are quote unquote on the outside also become part of this culture. Of they were, most of them either worked inside the government or aspire to work in the government, right? So they are already inculcated in that culture of yeah, you. You can say all of these things to each other, but it’s off the record and you doesn’t go outside these walls, right? And so you can’t say that the Emperor has no clothes on the Iran debate because that might come back to haunt you later. Professionally. And so There’s a lot of aspects of careerism here. And, like I said before, one of the fact that the fact that my research was done, not for attribution allowed people to say those things to me in a way that they don’t feel empowered to do often without quote unquote outsiders. Um, but again, this this culture of you know, let’s keep things internal has now gone into the the thinktank community as well. That hasn’t stayed within the four walls of the State Department. That culture itself husband sort of, uh, exported into the Thinktank community as well.
Reza
100%. And I would even go a step further than because everything you just said, 100% my experience, I 100% agree on a dare. I say it’s factually accurate. Somebody would be hard pressed to refute it, right, to take a truth serum and refute what it is that you just said. But how would he go a step further? I remember my last year in D. C. When you know everything was really going to hell in a handbasket. Trump’s leaving the J. C. P away the Iran nuclear deal, and everybody’s trying to figure out what’s going on. I went to go meet with some former colleagues of mine and government won’t say which agency they’re working and won’t say who they are. Because again, I want to protect the innocent. Had, um, I essentially became a therapist for a lot of these people because I mean these people that I hung out with in a social situation we’re friends, right? So we Okay, well, let’s let’s catch up. How are your kids? Blah, blah, blah. And then let’s talk shop And I became a therapist because they knew that what this administration was trying to pursue would not work. They knew that what this administration was doing was going to damage American interests short, medium and long term. They knew that it was gonna end up hurting innocent people inside of Iran and one of them, one of the interesting thing that they told me this, that rise up Right now, the political appointees in the Trump administration that are working on Iran are drafting documents. And then they’re sending these documents to, ah, think think that shall remain nameless.
Negar
I can guess which
Reza
you can probably guess. And then, uh, you know, one or two individuals at this think tank are making edits to the document and sending it back. And then those documents are being used as U. S. Official us Garlic, sending it to the seventh floor of the State Department sending into the National Security Council. And I mean, that’s such a brazen violation of yours. Government security clearance first and foremost, but
Negar
absolutely. But the rules only apply, you know, to stop people from being critical of a policy, not when it is powerful people trying to legitimate their own policy, right? There’s always these strange, the whole standards in Washington,
Reza
and it speaks to this revolver revolving door dynamic that you know you. I mean, this is even beyond revolving door. But it speaks to this dynamic that you you mentioned earlier of expert impunity. And it also speaks to this dynamic that you were talking about about how you know these ideas. Air cycled in and out. And now it’s not even used to be a think tank. Person writes something, sends it to desk officer at State Department or NSC, and then that person takes three or four things, puts it in their memo, and then they send it up to the to..
Negar
where they’re actively editing the memo.
Reza
Yes. So the problem that you outlining your research has gotten even
Negar
worse. It’s gotten much worse.
Reza
It is mind blowing to me. And so this idea of there’s a question attached to this this idea of like guys like Pompeo and Bolton being enabled by a wider knowledge production in D. C. Because oftentimes we focus on the individuals that we don’t like, regardless of where you are in the political spectrum. Like if you don’t like trump, you probably don’t like Bolton, Pompeo, et cetera. Section If you didn’t like Obama, you probably didn’t like Carrie, et cetera, et cetera. So it do you get the sense that, um, ideologically driven assessments are rewarded at the expense of like in death evidence based analysis? Is that one of the takeaways that you got from your research?
Negar
Yeah, absolutely. And I think, um, I wasn’t able to articulate this fully earlier, so I’m glad you brought this up, but, um, what happened as this, um, security apparatus has outgrown the U. S. Government cap capacities is that essentially outside donors have come to play outsized role in shaping the debate and narrative. And what is the quality that their most looking for in an expert, someone who gets attention? Yeah, right. And I’ve interviewed people like vice presidents of think tanks who explicitly told me this. They told me when I’m looking for an expert, I’m looking for someone who has really strong social media skills who can write really well who can speak really well. Nowhere in that list is a deep understanding of the country. Access to the country. Ah, PhD in in, you know, history of political science. Studying that country is their primary case. Any. I mean, those were not in the top list of qualifications you’re looking for in this particular person was lamenting the fact they were saying, You know, this is the pressure coming from the donors. All right, so many in Washington really lament the fact that they’ve created a monster that sort of grown beyond their own control. Um and so yeah, ideology that is going to sell on Fox News or that’s going to get retweeted 20,000 times. Those kinds of ideological types of assessments are going to sell, and the donors like that, and they’re putting pressure on those experts to continue to produce that kind of quote unquote research. The guy who’s like Hold up. This is much more complicated than it looks. Let me explain to you how the Bessie G works in Prague in practice and the ways that religious foundations work, and I mean already they’ve lost their audience, right? The ex. The donors have no interest in that kind of explanation, and I was told time and time again by people inside the government that if someone comes to them and says this is complicated. They don’t want to hear.
Reza
Yeah, I can attest to that from personal experience. They
Negar
said it’s not useful when expert comes in and says, This is complicated. Well, the reality is that it is complicated, and here are the reasons why it is complicated, Um, and so, yeah, ideology particular. Let’s be honest. A particular kind of ideology cells on your own. And that’s what the ideology of confrontation and regime change and aggression towards Iran, the ideology of peace building is not as profitable. Let’s say
Reza
I completely agree. I want to unpack two of the points that you just makes. I think it’s important to unpack it a little bit. One I can tell you from firsthand experience. Like when I when I first started working in Nyack after after I left the State Department, you know, I had a Twitter account then I signed up for in 2009 when protests were going on and Ragnar was like, Oh, are you Twitter is gonna caused a revolution in Iran. I was like, Well, I better sign up and I signed up. I was like, No, it’s not, And then I didn’t touch it after that until I went to go work for Mac. And then, you know, Boss Man is like, No, you need toe. You need to get on the social media, and I was, like, super resistant to it. Oh, man, this is time sucks. It’s like Facebook. It’s time suck. Um, but, you know, Boss tells you to do something, you got to do it. And he told me He’s like, you know, this is your your work is important. Your work needs to be good. And, you know, this is stuff is important and he wasn’t wrong, you know, like that stuff. Yeah, I was like, Well, what am I supposed to do? And he’s like, I don’t know. You say funny stuff in the office Say that, you know, And I was like, Okay, I could do that. And I got consulting gigs from that. I got public speaking gigs at universities in World Affairs Council. From that really is this. And I felt like I you know, at the risk of sounding like I have an eagle, I felt like I was a force for good in the world. Dialogue, resolve problems peacefully, et cetera. Session now imagine if that’s not your motives. Operandi. Yeah, which goes to my second point based off the point you may. We said Ideology cells as somebody who’s worked in this field for 15 years. Um, there is no relationship between the U. S. And Iran, which means there’s no business relationship between the United States and Iran. Which is why there’s very few compared very few Iran analyst or Iran programs or Iran jobs in D. C compared to Japan, for example, who has a very functional, very robust relationship with the United States, which means there is a business relationship, which means there’s an entire ecosystem across the political spectrum. Whereas in D. C, there’s one pot, there’s two pots of money For me. There’s a pot of money on the left. There’s a pot of money on the right. The pot of money on the right is exponentially larger than the pot of money on the left. And so you know I can’t I can’t tell you how many coffee meetings I had with young, super talented people. Some of them were my former interns. They’re like, I want to do what you do for a living and I’m like, I don’t want to I’m not gonna tell you that you shouldn’t. I’m not here to crush your dreams, but I have have a responsibility to tell you how this works because it’s really hard to find it. Like I wish I could sit here and tell you that I was so awesome and super talented that that’s why it happened. But, you know Ah, a little bit. A little bit of I don’t like the word luck, because luck is for losers.
But, you know, like right place right time, you know, like I had the good fortune of being able to do the stuff that I did throughout my career. And there’s a very small number of people that were able to do it. And there was such a small pot of money on the left and in the centre, frankly, but the money on the right was just massive to the point where you would see certain individuals they don’t need to be named because most people know who they are. If they follow this stuff with any level of of of, ah, any level of interest who used to be saying one thing And then they just started saying another thing. And I remember talking to one guy about it. Classed him. Look, what’s the deal? You know, you used to be saying the same kind of stuff with me, and now you’re saying the complete opposite, and I’m not trying to attack your integrity. Which is what? I’m not saying this on Twitter. Like I asked you to meet for coffee because I respect you as an individual. I’m just curious. And I said, Well, you know, when I went into government for the brief time that I was in government, I got to see the classified information and I got see the intel, and it really, really changed what? My views. I mean, you’re just b s and because I saw the same stuff, you know, like, give me a break. Money. I get it. You want to remodel your kitchen? Maazel Tov to you. But like it’s not don’t write. Don’t don’t cheapen what other people like genuinely care about. So it’s, I guess, that meat What? I guess that leaves me. My next question is why do you think based on the research that you’ve done that Iran expertise is devalued the way that it is compared to other countries or other regions.
Negar
And I always give this copy out whenever I give a public talk now because one of the things I’m hoping that I do through this is that I am not an expert on other contexts. And so I can only speak about the two that I, uh, studied in depth. Yes, but from what I have heard from other people, there is a broader devaluation of expertise. I wouldn’t say it’s unique to Iran, and part of it has to do with something you alluded to a long time ago in our conversation, which is that people inside the government just don’t have time. Frankly, they work insane hours. They work from the dew 7 a.m. till 10 p.m. It sometimes sometimes more. Um, they don’t have time to process and come up with a smart analysis on every issue that is put on their desk, right. So they do need people who do supposedly have that time and energy and space to do the kind of deeper analysis. The problem is the people that they task that with which is in this think tank expert community are being pressured by their donors. Two have snappy, you know, tweets. And, ah, you know, I don’t know, like, three word analyses on what’s happening or even worse, like, really time analysis as something’s happening inside Iran with the very limited information and access that we have to a country like you’re on. Um and so you you look at that and you say Okay, so the people on the inside don’t have the time. The people on the outside who do have the time are being pressured, really are being incentivized by this acknowledge ecosystem to put information out fast and to put it out in the easily digestible form. And so where is expertise? And, you know, some of this is not unique to Iran at all. Some of this is across the board. I’ve heard from people that similar things could be said about Russia, about environmental policy, about tax policy. The problem with Iran is that the U. S. Has, according to its own standards, made its number one enemy in the region in terms of a state power. And yet it still is not demanding a higher standard of expertise And that’s where it really where this whole contradiction comes out of its like Okay, so across the board, there’s been a devaluation of expertise. Fine. But you’re claiming that Iran is so important to your national security interest. Why wouldn’t you try to invest or seek out voices that are going to bring you a level headed analysis of what’s happening inside the country? Who can talk about the history, who can talk about the politics, who can talk about things that they’ve actually studied in some degree of depth? You know that they don’t just jump around from issued issue as the news cycle changes. And that’s something that I’m I’m sort of alluding to in the piece that you referenced this well is like you can be. If you claim to be an Iran expert, you could be asked to talk about women’s rights in the Iran. You can be asked to talk about the oil prices in Iran. You could be asked to talk about sanctions policy. Hezbollah, give me asked to talk about African policy and its relations with Iran. I mean, like, the list goes on and on and on, and it’s like you What qualifies you to even talk about those issues?
Reza
Yeah, it’s true.
Negar
Riots? Absolutely. You are presenting yourself as a security expert, okay, To talk about Iran security. Don’t talk about all these other issues just because that’s what the person on the other side is asking you.
Reza
Yeah, you get It also speaks to this idea of, like, objectivity and neutrality. You talked a little bit about conflicts of interest earlier. Do you think that the ideas of objectivity and neutrality are kind of connected to the to that as well? Uh, did it? What kind of one and the same. Or does it deserve its own separate unpacking? Do you think
Negar
so? As a good critical scholar of knowledge, I don’t believe there is such a thing as objectivity.
Reza
I love that.
Negar
Um, yeah, and I think it’s actually really hard to be neutral on an issue like U S policy toward Iran. You all bring biases. We all have ideologies that have shaped our ways of seeing the world just put them out there. That’s actually what I’m demanding is put your biases out there in a way that other people can then take your assessments in your analysis and and sort of read it in in terms of those biases. So if anybody’s listening to my podcasts, I am an Iranian American who wants to see relations between us and Iran improved. Now, take my analysis with a grain of salt if you want. I’m not claiming to be an objective expert at no point in time that I ever in any of my conversations with any of my interlocutors present myself in any other way than what I just presented right now. Yeah, people knew those were my biases. People knew that I had been born in Iran that I had grown up in the U. S. And I always put those up front. And that’s sort of what I’m asking this community to do as well.
Reza
I think it would be a refreshing change of pace, right, And I’ve always found it to be interesting that the people who want more confrontational policies are less inclined to do exactly what you just said. And those of us who would like to see more, you know, diplomacy and conflict being resolved through dialogue. Yeah, what’s the problem in and saying Point blank that that we’d like to see um
Negar
And then it gets used against you
Reza
100% man.
Negar
if you do say I’m an Iranian American now, now what? You’re essentially admitting to the audience, You know, whoever that audience is a government official or the public is that you have quote unquote bias. Yeah, And again, we need to take that term and just, like, throw it out the window is absolutely everybody has bias. Yeah, right. It’s just a matter of whether the biased leads your analysis or it shapes your analysis or whether you’re pretending you don’t have bias, because that in itself has ideological balance to it.
Reza
Yeah, well said, Well said, I mean, that speaks to ah ah, larger issue that I want to ask you about this, this idea of the challenges of being, you know, like native Iran. Experts in D. C. By native I mean being Iranian American or being born in Iran thing. Uh, and there’s a lot of hate that’s thrown around, and especially amongst one another, Which kind of further models the analysis. What kind of take away their findings? Did you have over the course of your research on that.
Negar
Yeah. So I spent a lot of time with You’re on an American, I would say research assistants, but also a few experts who quote unquote made it. Um, and it’s really, really hard toe work on Iran as an Iranian American. And yet, because of a number of issues which I’ll get to, it is in a moment we have become the primary mediators of knowledge on Iran. Um, and what are those issues? It’s the access is you, which is that most people in Washington can’t go into Iran and do the kind of on the ground research that someone like marriages was able to D’oh. Yeah, Mom. And there’s tremendous value in that kind of research and more of it should be done. But we all recognize how dangerous and difficult it is to do that kind of research so badly props to those who are able to do it. Yeah, um, the other is the lack of language fluency. And I talk about that in the piece, and I talked about that elsewhere. You know, if you can’t go to Iran, you can access your on through its newspapers through speeches of leaders through films through historical pieces. I mean, there’s so many ways to quote unquote access Iran through its language, but that would require you to actually learn how to read, write and speak the language, which not everybody does. And then what ends up happening is that the Iranian American community becomes the source, sort of the proxy source of knowledge on the region because they’re presumed, often falsely, to have those two characteristics that they can automatically read, write and speak the language just because they have an Iranian name and that they have access to the country. And as you and I in most of your listeners know, it’s obviously much more complicated than that. Um, and then we all come all and I’m including myself in this. We, as Iranian Americans are looking for opportunities to do something positive in the world. And so we find a receptive audience that wants to see two here. Our views of things, but on the one hand sees us is to bias. On the other hand wants us to reinforce already existing narratives that are out there. Yes, um, and some people play that rule very willingly and are willing to use their quote unquote native nous to reinforce particular narratives about Iran without having a lot more expertise. I mean, it’s like having picking a random American and saying, Can you tell me about the American political system
Reza
that’s funny on multiple levels,
Negar
right? Like I can’t explain the American political, Um, I’ve lived here all my life. Now imagine someone who lived in the diaspora community who has struggles with the language being called upon to then do that kind of analysis, um, and then having the internal divisions that we do and the question you lead with, which is the hate we give each other just makes all of this so much worse because what ends up happening is that somebody with an Iranian sounding names says something on Twitter, claiming to have some really definitive viewpoint about what’s going on inside of Iran. And then everybody goes in and rips them apart to death. And then somewhere in the middle of all that, any semblance of analysis or real debate is completely lost. And again, we as a community, needs to take seriously the role that we have sort of been pushed into taking in these debates. Um for better or worse, we have become a proxy for the Iranian people, and I would say that’s it shouldn’t be that way. But that is what has happened. And so we need to be really responsible and guarded when we go online and make claims about what’s happening inside of your own and then equally be kind and respectful to one another as we make analyses of what’s happening. You know, like just going and making these really horrible personal attacks on people does not bode well for us as a community. And it doesn’t make the situation any clear for those who are following what we’re saying online and trying to make some kind of assessment about what to do with your on
Reza
absolutely story of my life. Gosh, yeah. I mean, when when Twitter raid the mute button, I was over the moon like, Oh, man, thank God. I felt like they made it for me, You know, uh, but more tear more to your point, I kid, but more to your point, it’s a, um it I have felt that responsibility, you know, like and how could I always thought to myself I mean, this is an impossible task like, how can I properly represent the hopes and aspirations of 80 million people? You know, I can I can just try to be as honest as I possibly can so that I can rest my head on my pillow peacefully at night, knowing that, like, I’m not a piece of you know what And you know, it’s a, uh it’s no small task. It’s no small task. And I think when you first get my experience Waas both having gone through it myself and then having seen other people go through it, you know, before me after me oh, are at the same time was you know, when you first kind of get that hate Well, where is that coming from? Very jarring. And then, you know, like some people that cut from leather, you know, they’re cut from swayed. And I I guess I had the good fortune of being raised by parents who gave me thick skin, so it never never bothered me that much. But I had a lot of conversations with a lot of good people who it did bother and understandably so because it can really nasty space. Yeah, especially Twitter when? When it comes to this kind of stuff. And it does have a debilitating effect for our community writ large and for, you know, 80 million people back in Iran as well. So I’m really glad.
Negar
And it’s particularly toxic, I want to say, just for women in this space. Oh,
Reza
my God,
Negar
yeah. I mean, like, even though we’ve all had a lifetime of being man Splain by our beloved proverbial uncles in our lives, I mean it. It’s really, really talks. Like the way people go after women experts in these spaces, um, in almost like shocking ways, where on the one hand, they’re talking about women’s rights in Iran and then in the same token, are saying things about women experts here that are so violent and disgusting. Yeah, there’s definitely something to be said about. There’s a very unfair double standard against women who speak in these spaces
Reza
100%. I mean, I can’t remember who did it, but somebody was posting stuff on Twitter a couple years back. I just got back on Twitter, so I don’t I don’t know if it still is taking place. I’m still Marie, learning how the Internet works. It’s a brave new world so that they used to post pictures of panel discussions in D. C. Where all dudes,
Negar
man, oh man, oh,
Reza
man, Exactly. And so it’s It’s I don’t know if there’s a greater level of accountability now because D. C is very much an old boys club when it comes to this kind of stuff. But yeah, it’s it’s a problem. You’re insane. And not coincidentally, a lot of times in my personal experience, I don’t know this is a broader trend, but in my personal experience, I think some of the best people working on thehe Ron Issue were women both in academia and in government, you know, and you know, it’s I will jump around here a little bit, but I think it’s it actually highlights so many of the important points that you’ve made. I look at what happened to Sahara Nora’s today, who is a wonderful person and beyond being a wonderful person, I can tell you from personal experience. She is one of the three best analysts in the U. S. Government on this issue. Like hands down one of the three best and two of the three women and she came in the government like I did George W. Bush administration, a career official carried over into the Obama administration and, you know, worked her way up to a high level position. And then the Trump administration comes in. And what did they do? They d seed her? Yeah, you know,
Negar
and allowed basically conspiracy theorists to drive the narrative in all of these right wing news outlets to drive the narrative. And then they could justify her treatment on the inside.
Reza
Yeah, and it’s reprehensible. And it’s, you know there are. There’s a growing number of young Iranian Americans who want to do this kind of stuff for a living, whether it be outside of government or inside of government, and to see what happened to one of the best right who earned it, who did the work universally praised across Republican and Democratic administrations, and then to have no accountability, you know, no accountability inside the U. S. Government for what was done to her, I think speaks to ah, lot of the problems that you found in your dissertation research and speaks to a lot of the findings that you’re not speaking about publicly. Yeah, actually, you know, it wasn’t until yesterday when I started kind of thinking about Well, you know what kind of stuff don’t want. Ask her what kind of stuff don’t talk to Meg are about, You know? Gosh, you know, this research really reminds me of of satire, you know, and and bless her soul, you know, she’s she’s great and she’s super talented. So she’s gonna be successful that no matter what she does. But it speaks to a larger problem of of what’s going on in this industry right now and and a broader problem that we see, you know, inside the U. S. Government as a whole. You know where you know it’s ah,
Negar
and I want to caution you as to say that it’s it’s ah, once again, I think this process was long, deeper and longer than Trump. It precedes him, No question, and Trump just because of the way he does politics or his administration. Those politics is they just do it in such a old ugly way. Yeah, but a lot of these accusations of dual loyalty have been sort of there, and they’ve been a disciplining force against Iranian Americans who have tried to be a voice of reason within these debates and not just the Iranian Americans. A lot of people who have wanted to see more open relations with Iran have been disciplined by those same you know, forces and and it’s so ugly and and sort of done in its crudest form under the Trump administration. But it’s been there for quite a long time. Um, you could argue since 79 but really, in my research, I can only really trace it to 2003. But I’m I’m sure we can trace that much longer.
Reza
I’m really glad you made that point because I think it’s it’s accurate. It fits with with my personal experience, having worked in government and then outside of government in the broader think tank world. I mean everyone time I was going to the State Department and we were having a a debate at a staff meeting over sanctions, and I mean this. I waited in these 20 minutes, probably closer to 30 before I jumped in, right. I just wanted to hear, like, who was gonna be the person to say, Well, how does this how How are these sanctions going to impact the people that we are ostensibly saying that we want to help the Iranian people inside.
Negar
Right? The very question that people in Iran were asking me
Reza
Yeah, like our quarrel is not with you. Our quarrel is with your government. It’s great talking point, but didn’t really pan out. And and that’s the theory versus the practice of foreign policy, right? Right. And finally, you know, I chime in and I’m like, Well, you know, this is really gonna make the lives of the people that we say we want to help, like, exponentially more miserable.
Reza
right, So, um, I’m not saying we should have our Madeleine Albright moment of Yes, I think the sanctions are worth it if they’re killing innocent Iraqis like she had a TV back in the day. But surely we can acknowledge this openly at staff meeting, and there was a ninny. An American guy who will remain nameless. He’s cool. Dude, he’s not a bad guy where he didn’t agree with the point that I was making. It’s like, Ah, you know, that’s that’s nonsense. You know? Like, you know, you sound like an Iranian government official. You all you guys sound like, you know, like you’re like you’re running a 7 11 or your used car salesman, and I just kind of giggle to myself. But I start dio like, First of all, if you’re gonna use racist tropes, they don’t use the one that applies to Indian Americans are funny like that. Is that a little bit of irony in that 2nd 2nd of all? Like what?
Negar
What would be a break? And
Reza
it was countless examples of that kind of stuff by well meaning people who aren’t like overly trying to be racist or discriminatory or demeaning. But they just don’t catch themselves with their inherent bias of, well, you might be going a little too far because you’re going native, which is what they’re what they’re saying. It’s not applying,
Negar
and this is the thing that I’m I’m again. I keep coming back to it, but I’m confused about is why Why wouldn’t you want to hear what the official Iranian perspective is? Either, like, why shouldn’t we also be talking to Iranians who support the regime? There are Iranian Americans who fully support the regime wine and, like, why shouldn’t we be listening to them as well. Doesn’t that make your policy stronger if you’re able to actually think like your adversary or two, at least understand their logics or at least understand where they’re coming from and their interests? I mean, there’s sort of this, um, weird exceptionalism when it comes to your own. Where is? You know, during the Soviet times, people try to understand why air the Soviets thinking this way. People went and learned Russian people went to the Soviet Union for extended periods of time to actually study the country that they was their number one enemy. Why wouldn’t you want to understand that perspective? Even if you did sound like an Iranian regime official? Isn’t that something that they should be able to try to respond to? Because guess what? The Iranian people are going to hear the Iranian government respective and their interpretation of how sanctions are affecting their lives. Don’t you want to understand that?
Reza
Yeah, one would think
Negar
one would think
Reza
one would think, But unfortunately for a variety of reasons, you know it doesn’t quite pan out the way that it should, which is exactly what you just articulated like it’s a you know, it’s a diplomat’s job to be ableto understand your adversary and to be able to try and, uh, tell your adversary to go to hell in such a way that they ask for directions.
Negar
Oh, I like that.
Reza
And that’s a lost art, I think in D. C. You know, I always say that sometimes when I think back, I spent 15 years in D. C. Who knows? Maybe one day I’ll go back. I don’t know. But I always say so sometimes when people ask me what it was like, I would say the struggle wasn’t becoming what I wanted to be. The struggle was fighting the pull to become what I never wanted to be in the first place. Interesting. And, um, I know a lot of other people that have really struggled and grappled with that as well. Um, most of whom haven’t left. And, you know, I managed to escape, whether temporary or permanent, it remains to be seen. But I get a lot of text messages and emails above all. How did you do it? What is it like? You know, because that out? Yeah, that wait, it really wait. That pressure that way to really weighs on people. But one of you
Negar
can I? Can I jump on that point just to say that you know this is not about good or bad in individuals or about good and bad and intention. There are some people I think we can all agree have bad intentions. But for the most part, most people come to Washington to do good. Yeah, I’m willing to say that with a fair amount of empiricism by me. I mean, there’s Ah, I would say most people come to D. C to do some good. There are structures in place that can often times model the good intentions of people or reshape what they think are good policies in their own minds so that they start defending things that probably 10 years prior they would have been horrified and having to defend. And there’s in my broader work. I talk about, like why that happens and how it happens. But careerism is one of them. It’s very riel. The other is like you really care about the people around you and you want to protect them. And there’s something incredibly human about that that you wouldn’t want toe hurt your friend. Even if they’re doing something that you disagree with, you wouldn’t want to hurt them publicly.
Reza
Fantastic. Why a I can’t thank you enough for taking the time to have this conversation. May I truly appreciate it? Like I said, it’s a long time coming and be on a personal level, thinking for doing the work that you’ve done. I think it’s super important. I wouldn’t have asked you multiple times. Do this if if I didn’t, I really do think you’re doing a service not just to, you know, Iranian American community, but also to the United States writ large because it forces people who work in government and in think tanks and other places to really take a long look in the mirror and ask themselves, Is this is this how we want to be? Is this how we want it to be? So I commend you and give you props.
Negar
Well, thank you so much for us. And I’m so happy that you’re doing this podcast. I mean, it’s so timely and important. So thank you.
***All right, but all right, guys, that’s it. That’s the episode for this week. Thank you all for listening. This has been the message. I’m Raza Marashi and I’ll be back next week to give more knowledge to the people.
