Who's Kidding Who on "Talks With Iran."

So the US and Iran held formal talks yesterday for the first time in 27 years, but there's this manner in which they're holding them that assures that no real progress will arise.

In briefings to reporters afterward, the chief negotiators -- U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Ryan C. Crocker and Iran's ambassador to Baghdad, Hassan Kazemi Qomi -- said the talks focused solely on Iraq and did not stray into the contentious areas of Iran's nuclear program or the recent detentions of four Iranian American citizens by Tehran.

There is no way to hold credible talks with Iran that are so narrowly focused and expect them to reach any kind of agreement. Matthew Yglesias explains.

US-Iranian enmity isn't rooted in disagreements about Iraq. Rather, we find it difficult to cooperate with the Iranians with regard to Iraq precisely because the overall state of US-Iranian relations is so poor.

Insofar as our goals in the Middle East include overthrowing the regime in Teheran and, short of regime change, doing everything possible to destroy the Iranian economy then, naturally enough, the Iranians are going to seek to thwart our goals. After all, they hardly have any choice of the matter.

Iraq can be a launching pad for negotiations, a way to build consensus and trust so that the other issues can be brought into play, but it can't be the only issue. Otherwise the cries of "Iran would never help the United States" become a self-fulfilling prophecy.

This is slightly different with Syria, although you can see it play out similarly in the context of the Lebanon issue. You can't compartmentalize this kind of diplomacy.