The White House insists that the United States will not talk directly with Iran until Tehran suspends its nuclear program. But US officials have been discreetly meeting their Iranian counterparts one-on-one for more than a decade, often under the auspices of the United Nations. The little-known history of the contacts between the nations, which have not had formal diplomatic relations since the Iranian hostage crisis 27 years ago, is one of misunderstandings and missed opportunities. Budding cooperation on Afghanistan, Iraq and rooting out Al-Qaeda has led to increased distrust and frustration instead of warmer ties — a record that makes a summit both countries plan to attend this weekend in Baghdad all the more fraught. David Satterfield, the top adviser on Iraq to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, said on Thursday that he would confront Iran about its suspected provision of materiel and training for Iraqi attacks on US troops. He added that he would not seek out Iranian diplomats, but said, “If we are approached over orange juice. we are not going to turn and walk away.” Despite decades of enduring tensions, the continuing conversations reveal a slender swathe of common ground upon which Washington and Tehran have built a delicate bridge: The two share an interest in the region’s security and resources. “The point is that we think the Iranians can do a lot that will be conducive to peace in the region and good for them and good for their people,” White House spokesman Tony Snow said last week. Whispered dealings between the foes have had a way of going wrong. Secret negotiations by the Reagan administration for Iran’s help securing the release of American hostages in Lebanon in exchange for sending arms to Nicaraguan rebels produced the ‘‘Iran-Contra scandal.’’ In 1994, President Clinton covertly condoned Iran’s arms shipments to Bosnian Muslims, but criticism after it was revealed in 1996 kept Iran and the US from broadening ties. In 1999, Clinton tried to bring the talks out in the open, offering an “authoritative and unconditional” dialogue with Iran, but Tehran insisted that the US lift its sanctions first. In the end, it was the UN that provided a discreet diplomatic safe house in which the two countries could talk. In 1998, a UN diplomat from Algeria named Lakhdar Brahimi created a group called the “6(plus)2” that met in New York about resolving the conflict in Afghanistan. It consisted of the country’s six neighbours: China, Pakistan, Iran, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, plus Russia and the US. “I remember the Iranian diplomats and the Americans saying that this was the first time they were in the same small room together,” Brahimi said in an interview. In 2001, the UN created another forum to ease contacts between the US and Iran, called the Geneva Initiative, which included Italy and Germany. “It was really just a cover to allow the Iranians and the US to meet,” Brahimi said. “After a while, I told them, ‘We don’t have to drag the Italians and Germans in every time you want to talk.’ Then when it just us sitting at the table, I would get up and tell them, ‘I will leave you alone.’” After the September 11 attacks, Iran and the US suddenly had a common enemy in the Taliban: the Sunni rulers of Afghanistan, whom Iran regarded as a threat and the U.S. considered the protectors of Osama bin Laden. In the days before America’s Oct. 7, 2001, invasion of Afghanistan, officials from Iran and the US met intensively through the UN in Geneva to coordinate the Iran-backed anti-Taliban warlords with US forces. The cooperation continued politically as well. Iranian diplomats were particularly helpful during a conference in Bonn, Germany, in December 2001 that established Afghanistan’s interim government. James Dobbins, who represented the State Department at the time, said the Iranian diplomats were “essential” in shaping Afghanistan’s new government. At one turning point, the representative of the anti-Taliban Northern Alliance, Yunus Qanooni, insisted on controlling 18 of 24 ministries, a demand that would cause the whole agreement to crumble. Dobbins said that after diplomats from several countries “worked him over” through the night, Iran’s UN ambassador, Javad Zarif, took him aside and whispered in his ear, “This is the best deal you’re going to get. You better take it.” Qanooni conceded two ministries and the deal was sealed. “It was decisive,” Dobbins said. Iran made clear it was interested in a broader strategic dialogue with the US. But the US, sensing it had the upper hand, brushed off the overtures, Dobbins said. Six weeks later, President Bush in his 2002 State of the Union address dubbed Iran part of the “Axis of Evil”. Iranians had been expecting some sort of diplomatic reward in exchange for the help in Afghanistan, and took it as a slap in the face. Still, Iranian diplomats continued to meet in Kabul with the US ambassador to Afghanistan, Zalmay Khalilzad, for about another year. The Afghan-born Khalilzad was at the Bonn conference and would become a key player in the cautious diplomatic connection. He spoke Farsi. He went on to become the US ambassador to Iraq, has been nominated as the UN ambassador. The talks about Afghanistan broadened to include other strategic issues. “They certainly talked about Al-Qaeda and Iraq,” Brahimi said. “But I don’t how much they discussed wider issues, such as the resumption of diplomatic relations.” But Iran was becoming emboldened. In May 2003, a two-page fax arrived at the State Department. It was a “road map” to normalised relations, sent through the Swiss ambassador in Tehran, and was ostensibly endorsed by Iran’s senior political and religious leaders. Secretary of State Rice, then director of the National Security Council, said she never saw the memo. Instead, the administration scolded the Swiss ambassador in Iran for overstepping his bounds, said Trita Parsi, the president of the National Iranian American Council. The US was at the height of its power in the region: Its army was in Iraq, Iran had yet to begin enriching uranium, and the reformist Mohammad Khatami was still president. It didn’t seem like Washington’s last, best chance to stop Iran’s nuclear programme and change the direction of its relationship with Iran. But the fortunes of the two players began to shift. Iranians elected Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, as their president, and Tehran forged ahead in its uranium-enrichment programme in defiance of Security Council resolutions. In January 2006, the US asked Iran for talks on Iraq, said Zarif, the Iranian ambassador. Khalilzad had permission to arrange meetings with Iranian counterparts — and then there was a change of heart in the White House. “The US sends out these trial balloons as soon as Iran responds positively, the interagency talks begin in Washington, and the results are always negative,” Zarif said in an interview last year. Some analysts say the White House continues to send a mixed message to Iran. “At the same time we’re beating them up in the Security Council trying to get them under sanctions, we’re trying to get them to help us in Iraq,” said Flynt Leverett, a former CIA analyst and Middle East expert at the State Department under Bush, now at the New American Foundation. “Why should they be helpful?” John Bolton, the former U.S. ambassador to the UN and a staunch advocate of regime change for Tehran, said that the convergence of interests isn’t as tidy as it was in Afghanistan. “It’s not like we’re going to give them a pass on their nuclear programme if they stop interfering in Iraq, ’’ he said. Dobbins said that among the lessons learned from Afghanistan, it is that Iran can make or break the situation. “If we can’t get Iranian help in stabilising the situation, it’s not going to get stabilised,’’ he said. “In the end, the only country with significant influence and capacity for good and evil is Iran.’’
