Trump Threatens as Iran Says Missile Program Not Up for Negotiation

Iran Denies Claims They're Offering New Concessions

Following up on yesterday’s report that President Trump is going to decertify the P5+1 nuclear deal with Iran on the grounds it is “not in America’s interests,” he is stepping up threats against Iran, promising a “broad strategy” to punish Iran for all of its bad behavior.

Decertification would lead to a vote in Congress, which Trump appears to believe will lead to the US withdrawing from the P5+1. This isn’t going to take place until next week, however,which has fueled speculation Iran might be coerced into making new concessions to placate him.

Iran, however, says that this is not the case. Noting that they’re complying with the nuclear deal as it is, Iran has denied reports they’d be willing to negotiate on their conventional missile program, saying they believe demands for more concessions are a violation of the UN Security Council resolution on the nuclear deal.

It would be odd for Iran to try to make a second deal, having complied with the first one and still faced constant threats and condemnations from the Trump Administration. Rather, Iran’s strategy appears to be to try to salvage the P5+1 deal, even if it’s without US participation.

Which could well happen. The other P4+1 nations all seem happy with the deal as is, and don’t act furious every time the UN admits Iran is complying. They may well decide that the US pullout is just a show of bad faith from the Americans, and not a reason to revise the deal for the remaining participants.

That concern is actually one of the main arguments officials have made to Trump against withdrawing from the deal, warning that it would both hurt America’s reputation and remove them from the deal for no real benefit.

Author: Jason Ditz

Jason Ditz is Senior Editor for Antiwar.com. He has 20 years of experience in foreign policy research and his work has appeared in The American Conservative, Responsible Statecraft, Forbes, Toronto Star, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Providence Journal, Washington Times, and the Detroit Free Press.