I had a bit of trouble with Bobby Ghosh’s discussion at Bloomberg of whether Iran under the mullahs were a “rational actor”. He thinks it is:
My own view is that the regime has just one priority: its own perpetuation. Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei has demonstrated repeatedly in his three decades in charge that his sole objective is to preserve the peculiar form government that vests him with vast power over his people with little accountability. But his pursuit of that priority is as likely to be informed by ideology as it is by logic, as much by paranoia as it is by pragmatism.
That’s spoken like any good 21st century Western materialist. I would suggest he cast his mind back to Operation Eagle Claw. Back in 1980 the mission to rescue the American hostages being held in our Tehran embassy was a failure due to mechanical problems and a sandstorm. On hearing of it Ayatollah Khomeini declared it a sign of the direct intervention of Allah on Iran’s behalf. How does that fit into the “rational actor” paradigm?
It seems to me that either a) you’ve got to think that the mullahs are just faking it and are just as materialist as a Western politicians; b) Iran under the mullahs is not a rational actor; or c) you’ve got to figure out a way to include expectations of the direct intervention of Allah under the rubric of “rational actor”.
Mr. Ghosh does touch on this a little in his piece:
Plenty of smart people — including military men such as General Martin Dempsey, former Chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff — say it is. Other foreign-policy thinkers take the more nuanced view that Iran is rational without being reasonable: It has different priorities from those of its enemies, but its behavior is entirely logical in the context of those priorities.
I fit more into the “rational without being reasonable” camp but I would phrase it differently. The mullahs aren’t Western politicians and they aren’t materialists but they are pragmatists as they understand pragmatism. IMO that’s what we should be worrying about.
What’s “rational” depends on your objectives, values and worldview. Too often discussions on rational actors is merely mirror-imaging.
Richard Heuer, in his seminal work on intelligence analysis, put it like this:
You go over to OTB and see the same thing – commenters there cannot comprehend the Trump supporter (despite their claims of expertise) and think Trump supporters are as irrational, or crazy, or immoral as the mullahs.
That ties in neatly with something I started to try to weave into the post but abandoned. Our predisposition to drag everything that happens anywhere through the prism of American politics puts us at a terrible disadvantage in trying to understand leaders not just in Iran but in China, India, and even the United Kingdom.
Xi Jinping is not an American politician, not even a Western politician. Some motivations are informed by human nature but not everything that Americans take for granted is universal.
This is the kind of thing U S intelligence services should be doing instead of working to upend the President out of loyalty to the previous one. I’m not so sure that Obama has completely retired from the executive.
“On hearing of it Ayatollah Khomeini declared it a sign of the direct intervention of Allah on Iran’s behalf.”
An American politician claiming that we are acting with God’s blessing is also pretty common. Heck, just listen, if you can, to our sports figures. Lots of people invokes God’s blessing. I think the following is probably a useful definition.
“In international affairs or economics, the term rational actor is used to describe somebody who is concerned about their survival, prosperity or strength and is making calculations on the basis of these concerns. It describes someone who calculates costs and benefits.”
Someone who is not a rational actor would make random decisions or would not consider costs and benefits. They would proceed based entirely on their ideology or religious beliefs. Of course some of us value different benefits.
Steve
My point is that not taking the assessments of the other party seriously means that you cannot determine what is rational or not. Your claiming to be Napoleon isn’t rational. Napoleon’s claiming to be Napoleon is.
Do you take the claims of American politicians who are claiming God’s favor seriously? I doubt that most Americans or, particularly, most American politicians do.
Nor do I believe that Allah caused that sandstorm to help Iran. In both cases I think it is probably best to judge based on actual behavior. To be clear, I think religion is complicated. I think a number of politicians are real Christians and some people in Iran are real Muslims (though clearly there are also politicians who just fake it to use believers). I think a real believer could think that God was blessing the US or Iran, but also behave rationally. They wouldn’t believe that God would protect them is they got into a real nuclear war, understanding that everyone would die.
Steve
Let me see if I can articulate my point better. Khameini may genuinely believe that Allah is intervening on Iran’s behalf and act accordingly. If you don’t believe he actually believes that, from your point of view he’s acting irrationally.
The Japanese certainly believed that the original Kamikaze was divine intervention against Kublai Khan’s second invasion. The second edition merely wiped out may of Nippon’s best and brightest and most gullible.
IMO Khameini doesn’t really believe, but it suits his purposes to pretend as if he did. Otherwise he would egg Trump on to get his Last War because the Twelfth Imam would miraculously appear, lead the Faithful to victory at Megiddo, nuke America until it glows along with the rest of the unbelievers, and ring in the new age.
Many Christians believe that Revelations is correct and Armageddon is coming. Few believe that they should try to make it come to pass (though if they do they are likely Trump supporters). Haven’t read all of the Koran and am not familiar with all of the Muslim sects, but I am pretty sure that is what most of them believe also.
Steve