The astute reader probably can see where this is headed. A while back, the Obama Administration gained the release of US Army Sgt. Bo Bergdahl. It is a wonderful thing that this American soldier was released from Taliban captivity; but there are a great many who think that the price paid, which was in case you have forgotten, five Taliban “generals” released from US detention at Guantanamo, was too high.
A similar “bargain” was struck this week, when the Obama Administration secured the release of some Americans who were being held by Iran. We haven’t heard anyone say that their release was wrong, but there are plenty of people who think that the price paid was excessive. Well, that depends on how the deal is reported. The Administration prefers we view it as a straight swap for four Americans (later five) for seven Iranians. They don’t emphasize the fact that the Americans were not “prisoners” except in the broadest possible interpretation. “Hostages” is a more accurate term. They were arrested on concocted charges and were imprisoned in very harsh conditions, The seven Iranians were arrested for actual crimes, were given due process and were tried in independent courts of law, and once convicted, they were incarcerated not in dungeons or filthy jails with substandard conditions but in modern institutions. So on the basic level we traded seven convicted felons (guilty of violating sanctions that prevented Iran from trading with western nations) for five people who committed no actual crime and should never have been imprisoned in the first place.
The president also considers it a victory, and we agree that it is great to have the hostages released. However, in his victory statement the President set up the false premise that “war” was the only alternative to the deal he struck. No one is seeking war with Iran, and it is hard to believe that the President really believes anyone was doing so. And, to give the President his due, after the swap, he did announce some new sanctions on eleven companies or people working for Iran. This was done to punish Iran for conducting ballistic missile tests last year. The President’s determination would have been more effective had it been expressed before the sanctions were lifted and the money released. Nations such as revolutionary Iran do not see compromises as diplomatic gestures but as indications of weakness. A deal less one-sided could have been arrived at, not through war or its threat, but through a real negotiation that held true to the principle that Iranian malfeasance and bad faith would not be accepted; that a change of behavior was required before a deal was struck. The President seems to place more importance on getting a deal than on what the terms of the deal are.