Imperfect but Useful

来源 :Beijing Review | 被引量 : 0次 | 上传用户:heliuer
下载到本地 , 更方便阅读
声明 : 本文档内容版权归属内容提供方 , 如果您对本文有版权争议 , 可与客服联系进行内容授权或下架
论文部分内容阅读
  U.S. President Barack Obama continues a good month with a “historic” deal reached on Iran’s nuclear program in mid-July. The incident marked a breakthrough in diplomatic relations immediately compared to Richard Nixon’s establishment of ties to China more than 40 years ago and was labeled a “leap of faith” that has the possibility to alter the course of world peace.
  The agreement does not seek to stop Iran’s course to become a nuclear power—it merely attempts to delay the threat until Western powers can restructure the deeply adversarial nature of relations between Iran and the United States. Its success remains to be seen, but even critics agree that the deal marks the sunrise of a new era.


  “Today, after two years of negotiation, the United States, together with the international community, has achieved something that decades of animosity has not: a comprehensive long-term deal with Iran that will prevent it from obtaining a nuclear weapon,” Obama said from the White House, with Vice President Joe Biden at his side.
  Iran, for its part, will receive relief from economic sanctions while being allowed to continue its atomic power program in exchange for limits on the weaponization of its nuclear activities. Yukiya Amano, the chief of the International Atomic Energy Agency, said he had signed a “roadmap” with the Iranian Government “for the clarification of past and present outstanding issues regarding Iran’s nuclear program.”
  With the announcement of the accord, notes The New York Times, Obama has now made major strides toward fundamentally changing the American diplomatic relationships with three nations: Cuba, Iran and Myanmar. Of the three, Iran is the most strategically important; it is the only country with a nuclear program, and it is still on the State Department’s list of state sponsors of terrorism.
  Yet will Obama be known as a peacemaker or an appeaser to one of the world’s most contentious countries? When Obama was running for office eight years ago, he pledged to talk to countries like Iran and establish relations—to shake hands if the enemy would unclench his fist. It was a statement universally derided by Republican opponents and even some in Obama’s own party. Today, however, the United States has reopened its embassy in Cuba and has the near-impossible deal in hand to place some limits on Iran’s nuclear ambitions. Diplomacy has won out over force.    An unclear future
  As the country heads into another electoral cycle, the future of American diplomacy is once again up in the air. How will the United States confront its enemies in the coming decade? Diplomatic successes like the one reached with Iran give hope that peace will at least be given half a chance before military interventions are used.
  “Part of our goal here has been to show that diplomacy can work,” President Obama said in an interview with The New York Times columnist Thomas L. Friedman. “It doesn’t work perfectly. It doesn’t give us everything that we want.” But, he added, “What we can do is shape events in ways where it’s more likely that problems get solved, rather than less likely, and that’s the opportunity we have now.”
  Critics don’t see it that way, and compare the deal to Neville Chamberlain’s Munich Agreement with Adolf Hitler in 1938, which paved the way for global war.
  “The president disagrees with himself—everything that’s in this deal is what he said he would not do,” said Danielle Pletka, a national security scholar at the conservative American Enterprise Institute. “The analogies to Chamberlain are much too facile, but I do think at a certain moment he needed to stop and say to himself, ‘Why have I given on all of the things I said I wouldn’t give on?’ And the answer is because ultimately the deal itself became more important than what was in it.”
  Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was forceful in his condemnation of the deal, calling it a “historic mistake for the world.”
  “Far-reaching concessions have been made in all areas that were supposed to prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons capability,”Netanyahu said. “In addition, Iran will receive hundreds of billions of dollars with which it can fuel its terror machine and its expansion and aggression throughout the Middle East and across the globe.”
  Obama said Israel concerns were “legitimate” with groups like Hezbollah aiming “tens of thousands of missiles” at Israel.
  “So [Israel is] not just being paranoid,”Obama said. “Iran is acting in an unconstructive way, in a dangerous way in these circumstances. What I’ve simply said is that we have to keep our eye on the ball here, which is that Iran with a nuclear weapon will do more damage, and we will be in a much worse position to prevent it.”
  In the event that Iran violates the agreement, there are provisions to “snap back” the crippling economic sanctions the country has been under. In that way, it seems that the world has more to gain from the deal than the risk it presents. Almost everything worthwhile entails a leap of faith, and here is a chance to fundamentally change one of the world’s most contentious relationships. It paid off with Nixon and China, and the same chance of success should be given to Obama and Iran.
其他文献
5月26日,中央汇金公司在A股市场内减持工行和建行,金额分别为16.29亿元和19.06亿元。作为“国家队”的代表,中央汇金的增持减持对整个A股市场有指导意义。本次汇金减持是一个重
期刊
尽管作文难教难写,然而作文还是要写的,写作教学也还是要坚持下去的。它毕竟能反映学生的语文学科的全面素质,据说有地方试验过中考就写一篇作文,可见作文何等重要。作为一个
本文运用索洛残差法,选择C-D生产函数,通过对1978-2007年湖北经济统计数据的计量分析,估算了湖北省全要素生产率及其增长率.分析表明,在1979和2007年间湖北经济的全要素生产
China’s GDP growth leveled off at 7 percent in the first half of this year, with an array of optimistic signs, such as better structure, improved growth quality, faster-thanexpected job creation and a
期刊
【摘要】:随着我国高等教育体制改革的深入,高职院校资本运作规模增大,高职院校经济活动呈现多样化和复杂化趋势,如何进一步加强高职院校财务管理成为目前高职院校亟需解决的重要问题。本文分析了高职院校财务管理存在的问题及其原因,提出了强化高职院棱财务管理的设想。  【关键词】:高职院校;财务管理;探索与思考    我国的高职教育在近年得到了高速的发展,随着教育体制改革的深入,高职院校资本运作规模增大,高职
伴随着社会的不断进步以及人们生活水平的逐渐提升,园林工程项目也赢得了巨大的发展空间.在园林工程项目中,工程预算极为重要,其几乎可以作为整个园林工程项目的核心环节,并
“营改增”结构性税制改革是我国“二五”十期间一项重大经济改革措施,对我国税务乃至经济的发展产生了积极的影响。伴随着“营改增”试点的全面推广,其涉及的产业类别和税种
挡风墙在陆地工程建设中有着广泛的应用,在很大程度上维护了施工环境及施工安全,有着重要的作用.在渤海油田开发中,由于平台地处渤海湾海面,冬季平台受冷风影响极大,为充分保
毋庸置疑,煤炭是我国的基础能源,在国民经济中战略地位显要。近年来,我国煤炭清洁高效利用取得很大进步。在煤炭提质加工方面,原煤入选率由2000年的25.9%提高到2014年的62%,动力配
期刊
随着我国高校毕业生逐年增长,大学生就业面临严峻趋势.同样,高职院校学生也必须面对这种境况.当前,我国正倡导工匠精神和号召大学生创新创业,因而有必要加强对高职院校学生的