THE EXTREMISTS GET IT:

Iranians See Talks With U.S. as Historic: Desire for Improving Ties Grew With Population Too Young to Recall Hostage Crisis (Karl Vick, March 20, 2006, Washington Post )

Iran's acceptance of direct talks with the United States over Iraq is being regarded among Iranians as a major foreign policy development, a historic if still tentative departure from 27 years of official enmity that held the government of the "Great Satan" as one to be spoken against, but never with.

"America's objective in inviting Iran for talks is to send a message to Islamic movements throughout the world that Iran gave in to Washington after 27 years of resistance," Kayhan, a hard-line daily newspaper, warned Saturday in an editorial that analysts said underscored the significance of Iran's shift.

"Announce as soon as possible that you won't have any dialogue with the U.S. and avoid entering a destructive trap that has been prepared for Islamic Iran," the editorial continued.

W ought to go there ASAP.

MORE:
Realism pushes US and Iran a bit closer: Mutual interest in Iraq's future will bring the two together for first time since '03 - but to what end? (Howard LaFranchi, 3/20/06, The Christian Science Monitor)

A mutual interest in a stable Iraq is driving Washington and Tehran - two otherwise increasingly antagonistic capitals - to sit down and talk. [...]

In Iran, "efforts to talk to the US may well be the work of foreign ministry pragmatists [in Tehran] reasserting their influence" over the extremist stance of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, adds [Daniel Brumberg, a professor of comparative government at Georgetown University in Washington.]. For these pragmatists, landing in the Security Council is the direct result of Mr. Ahmadinejad's confrontational antics, and they may see in Iraq a way to start undoing the damage.

The Realists in Iran recognize that their future is American.

Posted by Orrin Judd at March 20, 2006 8:14 AM