We should also remember that the Bush Administration had a second chance at rapprochement with Iran when in May 2006, the President of Iran sent a letter full of philosophizing to President Bush. The approach was rebuffed by Secretary Rice who said "There is nothing concrete here."
Maybe not in the letter's content, but the very concrete existence of the letter suggested that some faction in Iraq was interested in pursuing a dialog with the United States despite being rebuffed in 2003.
One would have hoped that Secretary Rice, a Soviet expert, would have drawn the lesson from the Cuban Missile crisis that it was useful to reinforce the doveish elements and ignore the hawkish elements among our adversaries.
It would have been useful to engage in further discussions with Iran. Why did the administration fail to do so?
Sent to New York Times
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