The Cable
The Cable goes inside the foreign policy machine, from Foggy Bottom to Turtle Bay, the White House to Embassy Row.

Rumor mill: Kerry to Tehran?

The Cable is picking up some chatter today around town that Senate Foreign Relations Committee chairman John Kerry is offering to travel to Tehran to try to broker a last-ditch agreement with the Iranian regime regarding its nuclear program. It’s an interesting idea considering Kerry’s role in representing the administration after the recent Afghan presidential ...

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575280_091219_kerry2.jpg
US Senator John Kerry speaks during a press conference at the Bella center in Copenhagen on December 16, 2009 on the 10th day of the COP15 UN Climate Change Conference. US Senator John Kerry urged the Copenhagen climate summit Wednesday to ensure transparent action by China, India and other emerging nations, calling it crucial to ensuring support in Washington. AFP PHOTO / OLIVIER MORIN (Photo credit should read OLIVIER MORIN/AFP/Getty Images)

The Cable is picking up some chatter today around town that Senate Foreign Relations Committee chairman John Kerry is offering to travel to Tehran to try to broker a last-ditch agreement with the Iranian regime regarding its nuclear program.

It’s an interesting idea considering Kerry’s role in representing the administration after the recent Afghan presidential election. But Iran isn’t Afghanistan and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is no Hamid Karzai

And after all, he does seem to be the administration’s point man on negotiations over new Iran sanctions.

One Middle East insider told The Cable that Kerry pitched the idea to the White House and the White House was thinking it over.

National Security Council spokesman Mike Hammer couldn’t confirm or deny the story and Senate Foreign Relations staff declined to comment.

Kerry is in Copenhagen today. Let’s see what happens…

OLIVIER MORIN/AFP/Getty Images

Josh Rogin covers national security and foreign policy and writes the daily Web column The Cable. His column appears bi-weekly in the print edition of The Washington Post. He can be reached for comments or tips at josh.rogin@foreignpolicy.com.

Previously, Josh covered defense and foreign policy as a staff writer for Congressional Quarterly, writing extensively on Iraq, Afghanistan, Guantánamo Bay, U.S.-Asia relations, defense budgeting and appropriations, and the defense lobbying and contracting industries. Prior to that, he covered military modernization, cyber warfare, space, and missile defense for Federal Computer Week Magazine. He has also served as Pentagon Staff Reporter for the Asahi Shimbun, Japan's leading daily newspaper, in its Washington, D.C., bureau, where he reported on U.S.-Japan relations, Chinese military modernization, the North Korean nuclear crisis, and more.

A graduate of George Washington University's Elliott School of International Affairs, Josh lived in Yokohama, Japan, and studied at Tokyo's Sophia University. He speaks conversational Japanese and has reported from the region. He has also worked at the House International Relations Committee, the Embassy of Japan, and the Brookings Institution.

Josh's reporting has been featured on CNN, MSNBC, C-Span, CBS, ABC, NPR, WTOP, and several other outlets. He was a 2008-2009 National Press Foundation's Paul Miller Washington Reporting Fellow, 2009 military reporting fellow with the Knight Center for Specialized Journalism and the 2011 recipient of the InterAction Award for Excellence in International Reporting. He hails from Philadelphia and lives in Washington, D.C. Twitter: @joshrogin

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