Iran hangs up on U.S. hotline

Iran has rejected a plan proposed by senior Obama administration officials to establish a military hotline between Washington and Tehran, reports The Wall Street Journal.

The military-to-military hot line would have allowed for open lines of communications if an incident between Iran and the United States were to occur, and its rejection increases the potential for misinformation and conflict, American officials fear. Even in the darkest days of the cold war, the Soviet Union and the United States maintained such a hot line.

The decision by Iranian military officials to reject it may reflect the increasing marginalization of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Ahmadinejad voiced support for the idea in New York last month. "It's good for us to have warning systems to mitigate unwanted clashes" in the Persian Gulf, he told reporters.

Adm. Mike Mullen, the recently departed chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said the day before Ahmadinejad's comments that the hotline would mitigate risks of a serious clash with Iran. "If something happens [with Iran], it's virtually assured that we won't get it right, that there will be miscalculations, which would be extremely dangerous," he said.

Ahmadinejad's power in Iran appears to be waning. Indeed, the refusal to set up a military hotline is just the latest episode in what appears to be a deep split between Ahmadinejad and the Supreme Leader of Iran, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

In September, Ahmadinejad promised that two American hikers detained for crossing the unmarked border with Iraq would be released immediately, within "a couple of days." In what was widely seen as a rebuke by the courts, judicial officials ruled that the president did not have the authority to release the prisoners. The two hikers have since been released.

In May, Khamenei ordered that Ahmadinejad reinstate an intelligence minister that he had fired. Enraged, Ahmadinejad reportedly stayed home for 11 days but eventually relented.

Source: POLITICO