Interest Trumps Friendship

This line by Lord Palmerston is very famous:

“England has no eternal friends, England has no perpetual enemies, England has only eternal and perpetual interests.”

Those lines, of course, hold true for all other nations too.

While cynical, it would seem to be the basic concept of every nation’s foreign policy. That is why Michael Totten’s line provoked such ridicule on the Net:

“Foreign Policy 101 dictates that you reward your friends and punish your enemies.”

Andrew Sullivan tore into it, and for good measure dragged George W. Bush’s administration into it!

“It’s a spectacularly dumb statement, reflective of neoconservative tribalism rather than sensible foreign policy. You can tell it’s of neocon provenance because if its crudeness and simplicity. It’s the kind of idiotic thinking that (Bush’s vice-president) Cheney holds to.”

The Saudis seem to have forgotten this basic principle and assumed that the US was their BFF (Best Friends Forever). No wonder they were so shocked when the US started negotiating with Iran: you can see how pissed they were when they resigned immediately after getting voted to the UN Security Council. That was such a childish reaction (why stand for election if you didn’t want the seat?).

Israel, while equally angry, was far more sensible in its reaction to the Iran deal. They opposed it, tried to warn anyone who would listen that the deal was a very bad idea and that Iran could not be trusted.

None of it made any difference, because as Sullivan said, there is no “unbreakable bond” between the US and Israel. Or as Nicholas Burns, a Bush administration guy (surprise, surprise) put it even more bluntly:

“It’s in the American national interest to try to make this negotiation work. If it’s not in the Israeli interest or the Saudi interest, so be it.”

So be it indeed.