Thursday, May 10, 2018

I Just Want Clarity About Iran

The argument that sanctions won't be restored by America pulling out of the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, so killing the deal benefits Iran, is wrong. I am well aware that reinstating sanctions is hard--"snap back" sanctions were always a myth. That's just one reason I opposed the deal.

So opponents of the deal assume this?

JCPOA critics inside and outside the administration assume that the simple act of letting U.S. sanctions waivers lapse will result in crippling economic pressure on Iran.

I don't assume that and I don't assume other opponents of the deal assume that. How many critics of the deal pointed out that the "snap-back" sanctions provisions of the deal could do no such thing?

I am well aware that rebuilding sanctions will be hard--in part because the deal made doing that hard with loopholes that allow Iran to lock in economic deals immune to any theoretical ability to reimpose sanctions.

But I am also well aware that by remaining in the deal there will be strenuous efforts to pretend the deal is working just fine--just look at the Obama alumni working overtime to defend that atrociously bad deal.

And Kerry himself is--dare we say it--colluding with the Iranians:

[Kerry] sat down at the United Nations with Foreign Minister Javad Zarif to discuss ways of preserving the pact limiting Iran’s nuclear weapons program. It was the second time in about two months that the two had met to strategize over salvaging a deal they spent years negotiating during the Obama administration, according to a person briefed on the meetings.

With the Iran deal facing its gravest threat since it was signed in 2015, Kerry has been on an aggressive yet stealthy mission to preserve it, using his deep lists of contacts gleaned during his time as the top US diplomat to try to apply pressure on the Trump administration from the outside.

There will be no lengthy investigation of Spongespine Spandexpants because shut up this is different.

And the nuclear deal is bad--strategically and morally absurd, even:

The many debilitating weaknesses of the JCPOA [Note: the nuclear deal]—for one thing, the strategic and moral absurdity of paying, via sanctions relief, for Iranian imperialism in the Middle East so we can have a short surcease to the mullahs’ quest for the bomb—stem directly from Obama’s paralyzing fear of war, as well as his aspiration for a Middle Eastern détente.

The deal deserves to be killed. Absorb the hit our security took by foolishly agreeing to it, and move on.

And the sooner it is in our rear view mirror the better--don't be tempted by calls to "fix" the deal because Iran will stall those talks until the moment of danger for cancellation passes.

Because every day of the deal Iran took advantage of the deal to improve their ability to build nukes even as many of us pretended that the burning sensation means it's working!

Once the deal is accepted as dead, we can at least face the reality of the situation in all its nuclear and non-nuclear aspects and try to undo the damage done and finally oppose Iran led by enemy nutball mullahs.

There's a lot of work to do. Start now. Every day of delay makes the job harder.