Does Kerry want an Iran deal too much?

By Michael Crowley

Critics worry the U.S. secretary of state is so eager for a deal that he’ll accept a bad one.

As he meets with Iranian officials in search of a nuclear deal in the coming days, John Kerry may sense another presence in Vienna’s Palais Coburg hotel: his legacy.

Over his 30-year political career, Kerry has long been knocked for delivering more talk than results. Achieving a nuclear deal he first began pursuing even before he became secretary of state could redefine his place in history

And that, Republican critics, foreign officials, and even some ex-administration officials say, is a big problem. Kerry’s eagerness for a deal, they argue, risks that the Iranians will seduce him into a bad one.

“I don’t know how anyone who has observed Kerry over the past two years would think differently,” says a former administration official who worked on Iran issues.

Kerry allies and administration officials strongly dispute the critique. On two previously unreported occasions this year, Kerry has threatened to break off negotiations, at least temporarily, according to a source familiar with the talks.

Speculation about Kerry’s mind-set has peaked around Tuesday’s official deadline for a nuclear deal with Iran, which Western officials have said will not be met. Iran’s foreign minister left Vienna over the weekend to confer with officials in Tehran, guaranteeing that the talks will stretch into July. Many observers predict a deal within a week, though the talks could break down if key differences between Iran, the U.S. and five other world powers can’t be resolved.

Kerry has certainly worked relentlessly toward a deal. His many one-on-one meetings with Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif, for instance, have raised eyebrows among foreign diplomats who worry he may put too much stock in that relationship.

Kerry’s personal role has also become a focus of criticism from Capitol Hill Republicans.

“I think he is desperate for an agreement,” Republican Sen. John McCain told MSNBC in March. Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Bob Corker has told Kerry directly that “it’s just as much of a legacy to walk away from a bad deal.”

Holding out for a better deal

Kerry’s loyalists say the critique underestimates both Kerry’s fidelity to the national interest, as well as his political savvy.

“Newsflash: If Kerry was satisfied with less, he’d already have taken it. He’s held out for more,” said his former longtime chief of staff, David Wade. “A deal that doesn’t get the job done isn’t something he’d ever stake his reputation on, period.” Wade said Kerry would not agree to a deal he could not confidently defend from critics in Capitol Hill hearings.

The concern is that, in search of a historic accomplishment with his name on it, Kerry might succumb to wishful thinking. As a senator, Kerry was dogged by the critique that he authored few major bills over his 30-year career. He won the Democratic nomination in 2004 but lost his bid for the presidency. And since arriving at Foggy Bottom he has been frustrated in his efforts to contain Vladimir Putin in Ukraine and, above all, in his so-far fruitless quest for Middle East peace.

Allies say the conventional wisdom sells short his Senate and Foggy Bottom record, including his recent role brokering a peaceful resolution to Afghanistan’s disputed presidential election amid fears of a civil war.

Kerry has also shown that he can play chicken, as evidenced by two recent episodes from the nuclear talks.

In February, Kerry was in London with plans to head to Geneva the next morning for a meeting with Zarif when word came from U.S. negotiators already in Switzerland that the Iranians were dug in on a crucial point. Kerry scratched his early-morning departure and threatened to return to Washington; the Iranians relented and Kerry flew to Switzerland later the following day for a productive session.

The talks were snagged on a different issue ahead of the political framework agreement struck in Lausanne, Switzerland on April 2. Kerry and Zarif were the only top ministers present at the time, and after more than two days of arguing over the same point, Kerry was fed up. He arranged for an evening visit to Zarif’s hotel room, during which he warned the Iranian that he was prepared to tell other ministers flying in the next day to cancel their plans. The next morning, Zarif showed new flexibility on the point and the talks proceeded.

“His first instinct is to find a creative solution,” says a senior administration official. “But he realizes when things are stuck and is perfectly willing to move on.”

Others noted that the portrait of Kerry as a mark oversimplifies how the nuclear talks work. While Kerry spends hours in meetings with the Iranians, he is not the final arbiter of the U.S. position. His work is backstopped by top White House officials — and ultimately by President Barack Obama — who lays down U.S. negotiating red lines. “It’s not as if he’s out there without a mandate to just see what he comes up with,” said Phil Gordon, who left as the White House’s top Middle East official last month.

Meeting after meeting

In contrast to Kerry’s countless photo-ops and press statements, cameras rarely capture the activity of White House officials who manage the talks from afar. That includes copious planning meetings involving officials from across the government — including the departments of defense, treasury and energy — before each new round, as well late-night sessions in the West Wing bridging the time zones between Washington and Switzerland.

During peak periods of the talks, Kerry repeatedly calls into the White House — sometimes speaking several times a day to National Security Adviser Susan Rice — to report back on Iran’s latest position and receive guidance on the next steps. The night before the April agreement, Kerry spoke by phone from Lausanne with Rice and Obama in Rice’s West Wing office. Following that meeting, according to a person familiar with the events, a core team spent most of the night at the White House going line by line through the proposed framework and sending edits back to Kerry’s team.

At key moments, Kerry has also stepped into a secure anti-surveillance tent and donned a microphone headset for a video-conference link to Situation Room meetings with a wider group of officials led by Obama.

“The president’s going to decide if this is a good deal or not,” said Gordon.

Of course, many critics of the talks fret that Obama faces much the same pressure as Kerry for a legacy-making achievement, especially in the realm of foreign policy, where Obama has faced an unrelenting string of crises in recent months. A new article in the conservative Weekly Standard attacking Obama’s “capitulation” to Iran notes that Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes has likened an Iran deal to Obamacare in its importance to the administration.

Obama challenged the idea that he is overeager for a nuclear deal in an interview last month with The Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg. “Twenty years from now … [if] Iran has a nuclear weapon, it’s my name on this,” Obama said, adding: “I have a personal interest in locking this down.”

But Kerry’s own investment is also huge. He has pursued a nuclear deal since he was a senator, well before the administration’s direct diplomacy got underway: As chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Kerry secretly flew to Muscat in November 2011, where he asked the Sultan of Oman to help broker talks between Washington and Tehran. That set the stage for the administration’s first direct contacts with Iranian officials on the nuclear question.

Striking a deal in Vienna this summer will require persuading Iran’s supreme leader to backtrack on his own stated red lines, including on the pace of sanctions relief and access of inspectors to Iranian military sites and nuclear scientists.

Dennis Ross, another former senior Middle East aide under Obama with long experience in diplomatic negotiations, said the key to effective deal making is “being able to show you have a genuine interest in a deal but can live without one.”

“We should show little interest in a deadline and focus exclusively on our essential needs,” Ross added. If Iran won’t meet those needs, Ross said, then Kerry should “suggest a pause — but with the proviso that we will also reassess where we are, with the understanding that our positions are likely to harden.”

Walking away from a deal would surely be a disappointment for Kerry. But it could, at least, put the questions about his motives to rest.