"If you go into negotiations thinking that the other side is irrational, crazy and violent, you definitely won't reach any agreements," says Limbert. To American eyes, to be sure, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad looks quaintly eccentric when he demands, as he did in late January, that the Western powers be "polite" when dealing with his country. His truculence toward Israel is inflammatory if not insane—not least because it could goad the Israelis into mounting an attack. And his response to President Barack Obama's talk of an extended hand has hardly been encouraging. Ahmadinejad demanded that Obama first apologize for America's many alleged crimes against the Iranian people, dating back to its support of a coup in 1953.
Iran RPCV John Limbert on on how—and whether—to start the conversation with Iran
Talking To Tehran
America's old Iran hands on how—and whether—to start the conversation.
By Maziar Bahari and Christopher Dickey | NEWSWEEK
Published Feb 7, 2009
Ever since their 444 days spent in captivity, from November 1979 to January 1981, Bruce Laingen and John Limbert's names have been preceded by the words "Iran hostage," a grim honorific that's emblematic of the suffering and frustration that have marked U.S.-Iranian relations.
Laingen was the highest-ranking U.S. diplomat in Tehran when revolutionaries stormed the embassy. Limbert, a Persian speaker and former Peace Corps volunteer, was an English teacher at the time who later went on to become an ambassador.
[Excerpt]
On a recent Saturday afternoon, Laingen, now 87, Limbert, 65, and Precht, 76, met at a Persian restaurant in Washington, D.C. Over plates of pomegranate stew, they spoke, as they often do, about how the United States government, after years supporting the shah, got blindsided by the Iranian revolution, and what lessons might be learned. In general, they agreed the Iranians today want, and should be shown, "mutual respect." But the Great Satan is in the details.
"If you go into negotiations thinking that the other side is irrational, crazy and violent, you definitely won't reach any agreements," says Limbert. To American eyes, to be sure, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad looks quaintly eccentric when he demands, as he did in late January, that the Western powers be "polite" when dealing with his country. His truculence toward Israel is inflammatory if not insane—not least because it could goad the Israelis into mounting an attack. And his response to President Barack Obama's talk of an extended hand has hardly been encouraging. Ahmadinejad demanded that Obama first apologize for America's many alleged crimes against the Iranian people, dating back to its support of a coup in 1953.
"When Ahmadinejad brings out this laundry list of grievances, you can go with that two ways," says Limbert. "You can say that the guy's crazy and can't do anything about it. Or you can say that like many people in Iran he carries around this burden of history. And it's a history of grievances: grievances real and grievances imagined, but they are still around."
"Or you can move on," says Precht.
"You have to deal with the grievances and then move on," says Limbert.
In either case, there will not be warm handshakes any time soon, nor should there be. Talks between Washington and Tehran might begin with questions of regional security and stability, especially in Iraq and Afghanistan, both of which border Iran. There have been such successful contacts in the past. "We have to find how to make more of this," says Limbert. "But people on both sides are doing their best to undermine it."
