Close to Home: Former ambassador on future of U.S.-Iranian relations

It will take some time – probably months – before the nuclear agreement with Iran can be implemented fully. It is due to come into force on Oct. 19, after which the Iranians must get rid of a lot of their uranium and centrifuges before sanctions will be lifted. What should the United States and our allies focus on after that by way of our relationships with Iran?

We will have to cope with continuing efforts to impede implementation of the agreement by those in Iran, the United States and Israel who oppose it. The Obama administration will have its hands full with Republicans in the House and Senate. We will have to hope that Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the supreme leader of Iran, will not cause serious problems.

President Barack Obama should try his best to restore a working relationship with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, so it's good news that they will be meeting next month.

Obama and his team have done a good job with the Saudis and the Gulf states to dampen their opposition, mostly with arms sales.

The ongoing, critical requirement is for us to monitor Iranian implementation of the agreement, with the help of the International Atomic Energy Agency and our allies. There will be disputes with the Iranians on both the sanctions and their permitted nuclear activities.

Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry have already established an office in the State Department to oversee that task. We should cultivate and maintain relationships with Iranians from the level of foreign ministers to technical experts working on implementing the agreement. Differences of opinion and misunderstandings are bound to arise and must be dealt with quickly and satisfactorily.

We should keep looking at a longer-term relationship. Both Iran and the United States will have internal political opposition to any rapid improvements in our relations, such as re-establishing embassies. But there are lots of issues on which we can and should engage with the Iranians, such as Afghanistan, Syria, Yemen and Russian ambitions in the region.

The administration should encourage American companies to explore trade with and investment in Iran. That process will be slow, and competition between many countries in these fields will give the Iranians leverage to demand significant concessions.

In due course, we should try to open exchanges of persons and cultural programs with Iran.

American academic institutions should be encouraged to explore those possibilities once the Iranians express interest.

Whatever we do, we must deal with the Iranians with the respect that they deserve as one of the oldest human cultures and one with a highly educated population. The Iranians will take great umbrage at any words or actions that indicate to them that our policies go beyond a normalization of relations between two countries of equal status.

Ted Eliot is retired U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan. He lives in Sonoma.