line” warning in Syria.
Clearly, the Obama administration recognizes that its passive approach in the South China Sea has failed and that something must change. It seems likely, though, that American aims are relatively modest: to dial down Chinese aggression. The airstrip and many of China’s man-made islands are near completion; the Chinese won’t abandon them. The U.S. and its allies are probably going to have to live with that, but through concerted effort, they should work to get Beijing to relinquish its wildly ambitious talk of colonizing the South China Sea and converting international sea lanes into Chinese territorial waters. In short, American options here are limited, which is why we need leadership and strategic vision more than ever. Dangerous as it could prove to be, the situation in the South China Sea holds more potential for constructive resolution than the crisis in Ukraine: American and Chinese interests are more intertwined than America’s and Russia’s, and in Xi, Washington faces a leader as formidable as Putin but less driven by motives of honor and revenge. American statesmanship has an opening here. All we need is statesmen.
ENABLING AND FACILITATING ROGUE REGIMES
On a separate front, Russia and China’s facilitation of leading rogue actors has sown discord and instability around the world.
In April 2015, the Obama administration announced a preliminary agreement with the Islamic Republic of Iran to limit Iran’s nuclear program, allowing Iran to keep its nuclear facilities open under strict limits. But those limits would be in place for only the first decade of the accord, and even under these, the only assurance that the Americans could provide was that Tehran could not “race for a nuclear weapon in less than a year.” In short, the agreement all but guaranteed that Iran would soon have a nuclear capability. The agreement was reached through the administration’s willful disregard of stubborn facts about the Tehran regime’s behavior and intentions.
Nuclear experts warn that the deal will be impossible to verify, given Iran’s history of noncompliance with similar agreements.20 Ray Takeyh, an Iran expert at the Council on Foreign Relations, notes that Iran will enjoy “a sizeable enrichment capacity, and none of its facilities will be shuttered as was once contemplated.” And Takeyh points out that the 10-year “sunset clause” is the real key to understanding the agreement. After 10 years, he says, “all essential restriction on Iran’s enrichment infrastructure” will expire, thereby allowing Iran to develop highly advanced nuclear capabilities.21 “What is often missed,” he adds, “is that Iran’s ingenious strategy is to advance its program incrementally and not provocatively.”
Skeptics of the deal could hardly be encouraged by the increase in provocative behavior from Iran since the deal was announced. In April, Iranian Revolutionary Guard ships fired warning shots and then intercepted and seized a Marshall Islands vessel in the Persian Gulf, only days after Iranian patrol ships surrounded an American vessel.22 The United States directed a destroyer toward the area, along with patrol aircraft.23 And the Obama administration’s reassurances to Israel about its continued security were belied when Ayatollah Khamenei, discussing the Iran deal shortly after its completion during a speech in Tehran, warned: “I’d say [to Israel] that they will not see [the end] of these 25 years.”24
Iran’s aggression in the Gulf mirrors that of China’s activities in the South China Sea. In fact, China has enabled much of Iran’s naval activities, in addition to providing other military assistance: “Over the years, China has supplied Iran with anti-ship cruise missiles, surface-to-air missiles, combat aircraft, fast-attack patrol vessels, and technology to produce ballistic missiles and chemical weapons,” writes Tzvi Kahn, a Senior Policy Analyst for the Foreign Policy Initiative.25 Iran’s naval commander visited China to discuss broader military cooperation shortly before the incidents in the Gulf.26
Preparing for both Iranian and Chinese naval threats is straining the U.S. Navy’s current force structure.27
At the same time, Russia, long a partner of Tehran’s, has just announced the sale of an $800 million, S-300 missile-defense system to Iran. Coming just as Iran began formalizing the nuclear deal with the United States, the missile-defense sale is illustrative. It suggests that Iran is emboldened by the arrangements it has made with Washington, while also preparing itself, defensively, for any consequences of breaching the agreement—especially since the Americans insist that the “military option” remains “on the table” should Iran violate the terms. Putin just made it easier for Iran to do so.
“That deal represents a lot of money to Russia and a system Iran wants,” said Russian expert Tom Nichols, a professor at the Naval War College. “From their perspective, why bother waiting? What price would be paid if they do it? This is what happens when other countries in the world feel they can act as if the United States doesn’t exist.” The missile-defense deal, he continued, was “yet another moment where Russia and Iran underscore the reality that they can do whatever they like, unconstrained by a disengaged United States.”28
The S-300 sale reflects a deepening alliance between Moscow and Tehran that has developed over certain shared goals, all of which revolve, in some form or another, around checking American influence in the Middle East and around the world. Thus, Moscow has worked assiduously to help Tehran get closer to where it can reach its “breakout” nuclear capacity—after which point, a whole new reality will take shape. That explains why Tehran has dragged out the talks so long; time is its ally, and the Russians are helping them build more nuclear facilities. In 2014, Moscow announced agreement to help Iran build two more nuclear reactors in Bushehr. Moscow and Tehran have also found common cause in Syria, where they support the Assad regime, and they have played an indispensable role in its survival. Both countries are working together to blunt international sanctions against them—Iran because of its nuclear program, Russia for its annexation of Crimea and violation of Ukrainian sovereignty. The two countries have reached an agreement for Russia to market $20 billion of Iranian crude oil on the world market, weakening the U.S. effort to shut down Tehran’s oil revenues.
According to Amir Taheri, the Russians have a phrase, fortochka Obama: the “Obama window of opportunity.” It refers to the sense among many internationally that there will never be a better time than now to make advances and claims, while the United States is saddled with such dilatory leadership. As Taheri summarizes: “By the time the ‘fortochka Obama’ is closed, Moscow and Tehran hope to have consolidated a firewall spanning a vast territory from the Baltics to the Persian Gulf, shielding them against what Putin and Iranian ‘Supreme Guide’ Ali Khamenei designate as ‘American schemes.’”29
The “fortochka Obama” has been left wide open in Syria, where 2,000 Russian troops have been deployed30 along with tanks and dozens of aircraft31 to prop up Assad’s government and supplement his military. Russia has also begun to lay the groundwork for even wider involvement, building an additional weapons depot and military facility north of the city of Latakia, Assad’s stronghold.32 Putin claims he is backing Assad only to defeat ISIS, because the West has done little to stem the rise of the would-be caliphate. But the facts tell a different story: Putin is playing both sides of the Syria crisis, while America sits on the sidelines. The FSB, Russia’s security service and replacement for the KGB, has established a “green corridor” to allow would-be Russian jihadists, especially from Chechnya, to reach Syria and join up with ISIS.33 While Putin backs Assad overtly and ISIS covertly, America has spent $500 million to train a grand total of “four or five” rebels, according to Senate testimony from General Lloyd Austin.34 In Syria, Putin saw the window of opportunity and climbed through.
Russia must sense that same window of opportunity when it comes to North Korea, with whom it has recently entered into a highly touted “year of friendship,” in 2015, during which the two countries will explore deepening their economic and political ties. What some have called a “pariah alliance” would unite two of the most destabilizing
