Judging Iran and Making it Personal
BOOK REVIEW: Judging Iran – A Memoir of the Hague, the White House, and Life on the Front Line of International Justice
By Hon. Charles N. Brower / Disruption Books
Reviewed by Elizabeth C. MacKenzie Biedell
The Reviewer: Elizabeth MacKenzie Biedell writes about democracy, national security, and intelligence reform. Previously she served nearly a decade in the CIA and State Department.
REVIEW — Though I was only five years old when Iranian students stormed the US embassy in Tehran, the images of Ayatollah Khomenei were seared into my mind. As a lifelong student of the Middle East, I was eager to get my hands on Charles Brower’s new memoir Judging Iran to learn from his front row seat to the crisis and the tribunal set up to solve disputes over seized assets and ultimately release the hostages. My slightly less noble motivation to grab an early read, I was eager for some juicy anecdotes from Brower’s time in the White House during the Iran-Contra investigation. Judging Iran delivers on both scores.
Starting out as a lawyer for the US State Department during the Cold War, Brower was involved in designing an agreement between the US and the Soviet Union to protect West Berlin as the Soviets were tightening their reins in the Eastern bloc countries. Following the signing of this agreement that included placing a Soviet consulate in West Berlin (much to the chagrin of Brower’s parents-in-law who lived two blocks from its new location), he proudly was driven through East Berlin with the Stars and Stripes flag on his limo. The work was personal for Brower as his German wife’s parents and family were living in Berlin when the wall went up. His future sister-in-law was stuck on one side of the wall while her fiancé, Brower’s brother-in-law, was in West Berlin. Unable to get her over legally, she escaped through a tunnel much later.
Brower also witnessed the limitations of the newly created post WWII International Court of Justice (ICJ). The ICJ had jurisdiction only in disputes between nations and even then, had no enforcement mechanism.
When the Cold War began to thaw and international trade and financial transactions between former enemies grew, there were significant challenges for American companies trying to do commerce in the Soviet Union in which the government itself was the owner of the company. A system of international dispute settlement emerged that Brower realized was vital to keep some of the peace. Arbitration as a means of protecting investors doing business overseas became something of Brower’s specialty, and he was glad to be able to participate in an area of international law that could achieve its aims. The creation of neutral tribunals became the innovative way to encourage relations and settle disputes fairly and the book captures this legal evolution in great detail.
Yet for me the most salient part of the book, and its namesake, is when Brower turns to the subject of Iran. Beginning with the dynamics of the US-Iran relationship following World War II, when Iranian Prime Minister Mossadeqh was trying to nationalize the Anglo Iranian Oil Company, Brower describes the US’ involvement in helping Britain overthrow Mossadeqh and the resentment it bred as the reason for the 1979 takeover of the US Embassy in Tehran. He then details his work on the Algiers Accord between the US and Iran that negotiated the hostages return and how the Iranian assets would be settled. Iranian assets had been frozen in the US pursuant to Iran’s plans to withdraw all their money held in US banks. At the time there were 300 American business claimants in dispute with Iran and now there were suddenly millions if not billions of dollars the US had access to. Working as a judge at the newly created Iran-US Claims Tribunal became the bulk of his legal career and makes up much of this memoir.
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In addition to his international work, Brower, a Republican, was brought into the Nixon White House for meetings following the leak of the Pentagon Papers. Brower felt he was in an awkward position–and not just because he had previously dated Daniel Ellsburg’s wife, something altogether unrelated but coincidental–but instead because the Nixon administration was demanding the State Department and others demonstrate that the leak posed a national security threat, a concern Brower did not share. He was worried that whomever from the State Department made that claim publicly would face blowback. Brower tried to shield non-political State Department employees from this duty. He also faced difficulty later in the Nixon administration when he had to face questions from Congress about the authority of the bombing of the Vietcong forces in Cambodia, something Brower felt was on shaky ground. He did not want to be held responsible for this questionable authority.
In the Reagan years, Brower was brought in as deputy special counselor following the Iran Contra scandal to help the White House deal with Congressional inquiries into President Reagan’s knowledge of the monies going to the Contras and the sale of arms to Iran. Brower found Reagan to be confused and non-intellectual in dealing with questions and remembering the facts of the Iranian hostage arms exchange as he knew them at the time. Yet he was glad he was “exonerated” (in Brower’s words) and remained in power and thought this was best for the country.
Brower noted that Reagan, a former actor, always drank hot water before giving speeches, something Brower does to this day. He also shares that much earlier in Reagan’s career when he was an actor, Reagan was fired by Brower’s father who was in charge of advertising for a show that Reagan was hosting. When Kennedy became president, Reagan’s opening monologues became “paranoid and anti-government,” and General Electric, the largest advertiser, came under pressure to get rid of him. Brower remembered something his father did after meeting Reagan for the first time, he made his index finger and thumb into a circle and said his brain is ‘about this big.’
Where the book loses its way a bit, is in the litany of international cases Brower handled, sometimes feeling less like a memoir and more like a legal history, but Brower does not make the mistake of getting too far into the legal weeds. His career is vast and features time on the United Nations Compensation Commission for Iraq and as an ad hoc judge at the ICJ.
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After reading Judging Iran, I have an understanding that the best hope for peace is establishing a trusted framework to solve a dispute and quickly getting conflicting parties to sit down to prevent further violence. But at a time in history when Putin has been issued an arrest warrant by the International Criminal Court but there is no sheriff to bring him to justice, no one would argue ‘might makes right’ does not remain the ultimate law of the land. Yet Brower’s memoir ends on a note of optimism that the majority of us are incentivized to abide by international rules because the planet is becoming more crowded and our business and finance interdependent. Hence, our needs and interests are becoming their own sheriff. His hope is that with more established rules and laws, more order will be created and ultimately more peace. He is most proud of the work he did to help the US lead by example when it went before judicial tribunals and was subject to their decisions despite the US’ military might.
Brower chose to leave his last international justice posting at age 87, the same age Ruth Bader Ginsburg was when she died while still on the bench–something that helped him realize his time was limited and he wanted to record his experiences. This memoir is a result of that decision.
Judging Iran gives readers, along with a timeline of Brower’s legal career, a status report on international justice and the current strengths and limits of international law. It is a solid legal memoir with anecdotes aplenty that will benefit anyone seeking to understand the key international legal frameworks we all live under.
Judging Iran earns a solid three out of four trench coats.
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