Negotiating with the ‘enemy’. Can this ever be the right choice? Under what circumstances might a government consider negotiating with another state or group that it perceives as an enemy or an adversary?

Introduction
It is often argued that when there is in conflict it is better for the two sides to sit down and negotiate in order to seek a reasonable compromise, instead of simply continuing the conflict with all the economic and human costs that this may involve. At the same time a good argument can be made for saying that there may be some states or groups (terrorists, for example) with which it is basically wrong or dangerous to negotiate. Thus the question of if and when to negotiate with a perceived ‘enemy’ has been and will remain for the foreseeable future a key issue for diplomacy.
After 9/11 the Bush administration decided to wage a ‘war on terror’ against Al Qaeda and the Taliban. It also named North Korea, Iraq, Iran and Syria as’ rogue states’ arguing that these states supported terrorism and were not therefore reliable members of the international community. It was generally unwilling to negotiate with groups or states that it considered enemies. It claimed that it would use US power if necessary to ‘export democracy’ through regime change. This led to military intervention first in Afghanistan, then in Iraq.
However, at the same time the US seemed to make a deal with Libya – no intervention in Libya in exchange for no further support for terrorism. And later it opened a partial though temporary dialogue with Syria, warning Syria of retribution if Syria tried to destabilize post-Saddam Iraq.

With the arrival of the Obama administration the US government said it was open to dialogue with old enemies if the conditions were right. However, faced with the Arab spring, growing protests across the Arab world and the fall of the regimes in Tunisia and Egypt, the Obama administration decided to back this popular movement for change. This meant breaking with Gaddafi when he repressed public protests and supporting military intervention ‘to protect civilians’ and eventually regime change. The US and its allies also believe that the Assad regime in Syria should step down or be forced to step down after bloodily repressing public protest. While many Arab and Muslim countries agree, the international community is divided on the question of continuing negotiations with the regime. The UNSC was also divided on the question of more forceful action, with Russia and China against. All members supported UN attempts to negotiate a truce as a precondition for negotiations between the government and the rebels, but Western and Arab countries imposed sanctions on the Syrian regime to try to discourage it from further acts of violence and in the hope of bringing it down. The Syrian regime agreed to dismantle its chemical arsenal under UN supervision. With the rise of IS Russia and China now actively support the Syrian regime and Russia has called for an alliance with the US and its NATO allies. The US refuses to accept Assad as someone it is prepared to do a deal with. Meanwhile, after months of negotiations in July 2015 Iran agreed to a deal on its nuclear program with the P5+1 (the permanent members of the United Nations Security Council–the United States, the United Kingdom, Russia, France, and China plus Germany) plus the European Union, in exchange for the lifting of sanctions.

Given all the ongoing arguments and negotiations with (and sanctions imposed on, lifted or threatened against) North Korea, Syria, Iran, Russia and until recently Myanmar, identifying if and when it is a good idea for an actor to negotiate with a state or organization it considers an enemy is still a vital question for both individual democratic states and the international community as a whole.
Here are some of the factors that may influence the decision whether to negotiate or not, and some examples to think about, although you will no doubt be able to find for yourself more and better examples from current affairs and from history:

1)   Is there some kind of believable/ feasible /viable/reasonable compromise that could be reached?

Cuba – since the rapprochement in December 2014 it seems so, but there is still a long way to gohttp://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/dec/18/us-cuba-relations-one-year-later-progress-report
Al Qaeda and Islamic State –there seems no basis for a negotiation
Colombia and the FARC – a deal has been negotiated. Will it hold and be implemented successfully? http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/sep/26/colombia-farc-peace-santos
http://www.aljazeera.com/blogs/americas/2015/12/farc-rebels-days-colombian-jungle-151210205526133.html
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-35357170

2)   Can a temporary truce and release of prisoners be arranged to give a positive start to negotiations? Can negotiations begin with a moderate political interlocutor who can also act as a proxy for or channel to a more radical group that we are not yet ready to negotiate with directly – Sinn Fein for the IRA in negotiating the 1998 Good Friday Agreement in Northern Ireland / Fatah for Hamas in negotiations for a settlement with Israel? This is a way to start things in the hope of broadening participation if progress is made

3)   Does the adversary have some legitimate grievances even though we don not like their methods? – Hamas / Russia in the Ukraine?

4)   Do they have a leadership with whom to negotiate? Will their followers accept the settlement the leadership negotiates? Yasser Arafat’s problem at Oslo.

5)   Do they have widespread local support? Is not negotiating with them a dead end? Brigate Rosse – no/ Hamas –it seems so in Gaza / the Taliban –in some areas, is it gaining support?

http://thediplomat.com/2015/10/heres-the-most-disturbing-thing-about-the-taliban-takeover-of-kunduz/

6)   Do they have international support – Cuba in the past, and Assad today, North Korea today?

7)   Time and timing – is this the right moment to negotiate? Is the population in the area tired of the struggle? Is the enemy now ready to negotiate? Attitudes in Northern Ireland, Ireland and Britain in the 1990s / in France during the Algerian crisis. Has the struggle changed? ETA is no longer fighting Franco but democratic Spain /Cuba is no longer a Cold War threat, a centre from which Communism can spread to the Americas. Or is the situation the same? Has there been too much blood? Is there still too much hatred and distrust? Israel and the Palestinians? In elections and surveys both the Palestinians and Israelis say they want peace but both sides seem intransigent and very unwilling to make any concessions.

8)  Does the group have two wings, radical and moderate? Can the moderates be persuaded to start negotiations and abandon and isolate the extremists – the Taliban?

9)  Are there outside sponsors for negotiations? – the UN, US, EU and Russia and the moderate Arab states for negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians

10)  Are these sponsors willing to offer money and other aid as an incentive to negotiate? The UN, Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states if the Palestinians reached a settlement with Israel

11)  Realpolitik – how desperate are we? Afghanistan? How much do we need an agreement? Can we win without one? Does the present situation cost too much in terms of lives or money, or damage us in other ways? Should the Iraqi government include Sunni leaders who were ex-Baath party members, Shiites who are ex-insurgents or Kurdish separatists? Should the US accept a dialogue with Assad? Should the Afghan government do a deal with some of the Taliban? Will the EU and NATO be forced to accept Russia’s annexation of Crimea?

12)  Realpolitik – can we buy them out? North Korea and US-South Korean aid to North Korea in the past in exchange for promises to halt its nuclear program

13)  Realpolitik – Are there domestic reasons for negotiating or not negotiating? North Vietnam and the Viet Cong (National Liberation Front) and changing US public opinion on the Vietnam war / Russia’s refusal to negotiate with Chechen rebel separatists because of the fear that separatist hopes will spread from Chechnya  to other Caucasian republics (and same for radical Islamist groups in the area) /Turkey’s fears regarding the Kurds both in Syria and in Turkey itself and the consequences for its territorial integrity

14)  Realpolitik – Is it better to use another approach? An embargo, an invasion, political isolation, pressure from an intermediary – for the latter, the US has often asked China to put pressure on its ally, North Korea

15)  How weak are our allies? How much do they need peace to survive? The government of Pakistan and negotiations with moderate Taliban?/ the government of Iraq and possible negotiations with Sunni ex-Saddam Hussein supporters and ex- al Qaeda supporters and other non-government groups?

16)  How expensive for us is what they want (in economic or non-economic terms)? What would happen if Islamist radicals were successful and threatened to take control of the Gulf states and Saudi Arabia / Iran and nuclear power / are the stakes too high to back down and negotiate? September 1939

17)  How final will the treaty be? Israel wants a lasting settlement that guarantees security and means no more attacks and no more claims at a later date. It doesn’t want a treaty with 60% of the Palestinians on most but not all of the issues

18)  Is the situation a kind of civil war? A fight to the death between irreconcilable enemies? The Algerian government and Islamist rebels in the past? / Syria today?

19)  Are there any really effective negotiators who can help? In Northern Ireland, Senator Mitchell and Mo Mowlam

20)  Costs - Is competition too expensive? The Soviet Union and the US, SALT I and II and the oil crisis / the US and the Russian Federation and START and New START?

21)  Impasse – the need for coexistence / Israel and the Palestinians?/ the US and Soviet Union (Nixon and Kissinger) / the US and China (Nixon and Kissinger) 

22)  New opportunities, especially commercial ones – the US and Soviet Union (Nixon and Kissinger) / the US and China (Nixon and Kissinger) 

Conclusion
There may be space for negotiations with some groups or countries which are currently considered adversaries, but it requires a case by case approach, realism so as not to waste time where progress is not really likely or the counterpart is unreliable, but also  real commitment once negotiations are opened (there were accusations of diplomatic inactivity in many areas during the Bush administration). Obama’s willingness to listen and offer dialogue has been a first step and a necessary condition as regards both Cuba and Iran, but the sincerity of the interlocutor in the eyes of skeptics remains doubtful. So progress needs to be monitored in terms of actions in line with the settlement reached or simply in line with the conditions set for opening negotiations. Finally, the possibility of meaningful negotiations depends only in part on the decision and determination of political leaders. It is largely conditioned by public perception of the idea particularly in a democratic country. ETA renounced armed activity in 2011but the Spanish government refuses any dialogue with it, Would negotiations with ETA be acceptable to the Spanish public today? Are they no longer necessary? The same question about popular support for dialogue is perhaps the key to any real hope for serious negotiations between the Israelis and the Palestinians.http://pon.harvard.edu/wp-content/uploads/images/posts/N0402Af2.pdf
Below, from page 2 onwards ‘Without Conditions’, but the other articles too:http://www.tobinproject.org/sites/tobinproject.org/files/assets/Prudent_Use_Full_Book.pdf