At the March 2012 Ecumenical Advocacy Days (EAD), liberal church lobbyists commented on the difficult condition of Iran and its suspect nuclear program. The speakers, culled from secular and church offices alike, condemned potential military measures while they searched for peaceful means to prevent conflict.
EAD is convened annually in Washington, D.C. by Mainline Protestant lobby offices and liberal Catholic orders to mobilize hundreds of religious activists around key political issues for the Religious Left.
“Eight years of the Bush administration’s policy of not talking to your enemies to legitimize them…[is] why we are closer to war than ever before,” complained Trita Parsi of the National Iranian American Council. Over the past 3 years or so he has analyzed President Obama’s foreign policy decisions, authoring A Single Roll of the Dice: Obama’s Diplomacy with Iran. “The [current] President’s space to accomplish [peace with Iran] was very narrow.” Like the other lecturers, Parsi wanted to keep nuclear weapons out of the hands of Iran’s Islamist theocracy while avoiding yet another expensive war in the Middle East. “We’re desperate to get them back to the table,” he reported, commenting that sanctions are unhelpful. In light of the international condemnations, Parsi predicted, “It is more likely that these states will become more unstable, more repressive.” He mourned the “utterly false frame…between bombing Iran or letting them make an atomic bomb” that he saw in conservative commentators. Parsi claimed: “There’s only one way to avoid war: diplomacy…[There is] tremendous amounts of pressure in favor of diplomacy…The military is very clear: this is not a war they want.” In hindsight, he declared, “I think we were perhaps a little too complacent.”
Next, Stephen Miles of “Win Without War” commented on the prudence of violent intervention. “We’re starting to hear the same things we heard nine years ago,” he warned. “The president is one piece on the field, and the field is set for conflict.” He added: “The American public is extremely skeptical about military-only options.” But Miles tried to avoid naiveté: “No one wants to see Iran with a nuclear weapon…The nuclear situation is one we’re going to be dealing with in the years to come.” The lobbyist worried about the tense “naval situation” between Iranian and American warships in the Gulf. He described the status of that area as “a powder keg read to erupt.” He complained: “The members of Congress are not hearing from anti-war voices.” But he hoped the diplomacy message would gain traction at EAD: “The faith community is a well-organized community and one with a moral voice” to “change the context of the debate.”
Throwing off Miles’s moderate attitude was Jim Winkler, General Secretary of the United Methodist General Board of Church and Society. “The notion of war with Iran is absolute lunacy,” he exclaimed. “The U.S. was unable to defeat Iraq and Afghanistan…I don’t know how we think we can beat a nation three times that size.” Winkler drew parallels between America’s treatment of Iran and its 1960s policy with Vietnam. He hoped for a sort of détente with Iran’s theocracy while condemning the formerly pro-U.S. regime in that country. Winkler condemned a “dictatorial Shah” while defensively claiming that Iran’s anti-American theocrats’s “only frame of reference is 1953,” referring to the U.S.-backed coup that restored the Shah to power. “We need to say no, no, no to war!” he urged. “The war in Iran cannot be successful by a bombing campaign.” Winkler insisted: “We still have no conclusive proof that Iran is trying to build a nuclear weapon.”
The speakers showed much boldness in adding their recommendations for the complex Iranian problem. While Parsi and Miles represented more pragmatic analysis of diplomacy, the only actual church commentator—GBCS’s Winker—revealed a strong ideological bent. No doubt many United Methodists would be surprised that their General Secretary could speak politically on their behalf with such dogmatic confidence.
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