A day after Iran announced that they were withdrawing from voluntary
portions of the P5+1 nuclear deal, the Iranian Atomic Energy
Organization spokesman called on the parties of the deal to open a new round of negotiations designed to strengthen the deal.
Iran has grievances surrounding the sanctions relief promised under the
nuclear deal, which the international community largely has not been
able to deliver since the US dishonored the pact and started applying
unilateral US sanctions which European companies are too scared of
violating to comply with the deal. Iran wants other assurances to
replace those.
The European nations involved int he deal don’t seem open to offering
any incentives. Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani said he wanted such a
plan within 60 days, and the EU is rejecting that as an “ultimatum.“
President Trump had wanted negotiations on the nuclear deal way back
when, before the US pullout, and while he’s presumably not interested in
making it better for all parties, he is urging Iran to call him.
It’s not clear how serious this talk of a call even is, with Trump
making the comment while saying he can’t rule out attacking Iran.
Iran waited one year for EU to come through on independant payment mechanism for Iran trade in biew of the fact that EU did not cancel the nuclear deal and Iran continued compliance with the agreement. EU played games, requiring at some point that Iran comply with US banking oversight rules under this payment mechanism. Itanian Foreign Minister agreed, causing a backlash from his party, and resigned. Resignation was not accepted, and he prevailed. Why would he agree? Because he knew that EU was just asking for imposdible in order to avoid setting the payment mechanism. Zarifi called their bluff – and exposed the sham. Now, Iran is moving on under the Agreement, there are two paragrsphs that specify what Iran is allowed to do if the other party or number of parties break the deal. So, this “escallation” is within the Agreement as a remedy of US or others breaking the deal. We see what is going on. Trump is asking Iran to call him, and open negotiations. Presumably their economy is horrible, and US can help! OK, Iran, all you have to do is turn your assets to US, change your government, let IMF tire hou down with loans so you cannot brathe for generations to come. Problem is, our economic afvice is not something the world listens any more. Everyone — from EU to Japan — are scrambling, searching for alternatives to debt driven growth. Iran is reorienting their economy to Asia and elsewhere. It already has independence from the West. Sure, Iran trade with EU would have bern desirable. But not a must. There is nothing critical — nothing — that Iran can be blackmailed with.
Now we are testing our allies “resolve”. Let me be ghe first one to make it clear. MbS is NOT one of them. He needs US to let go of claims to control any part of Arabian side of Bab Al-Mandeb. His allies, UAE and Bahrein have in fact recognized Assad by reopening their Embassies. Who is in? Not Iraq, nor Kuweit. Not Oman nor Qatar. So if UAE and Saudis are not in — who is? Saudis need Russia, signing hundreds of investment deals. Saudis need China as the biggest custlmer. Saudis no longer fear Iran, now that it is firmly within Rusdia-China orbit, not a frre agent that can be used by anyone to harm rich oul states without population to be formidale militarily. Now, Iran cannot be used as a battering ram. Under Shah, that is exactly what it was.
Iran waited one year for EU to come through on an independent payment mechanism for Iran trade in view of the fact that EU did not cancel the nuclear deal and Iran continued compliance with the agreement. EU played games, requiring at some point that Iran comply with US banking oversight rules under this payment mechanism. The Italian Foreign Minister agreed, causing a backlash from his party, and he resigned. His resignation was not accepted, and he prevailed. Why would he agree? Because he knew that EU was just asking for the impossible in order to avoid setting up the payment mechanism. Zarifi called their bluff – and exposed the sham. Now, Iran is moving on under the Agreement. There are two paragraphs that specify what Iran is allowed to do if the other party or number of parties break the deal. So, this “escalation” is within the Agreement as a remedy for US or others breaking the deal. We see what is going on. Trump is asking Iran to call him, and open negotiations. Presumably their economy is horrible, and the US can help! OK, Iran, all they have to do is convert their assets to US dollars, change their government, let the IMF tie them down with loans so they cannot breathe for generations to come. Problem is, our economic advice is not something the world listens to any more. Everyone — from EU to Japan — is scrambling, searching for alternatives to debt driven growth. Iran is reorienting their economy to Asia and elsewhere. It already has independence from the West. Sure, Iran trade with EU would have been desirable. But not a must. There is nothing critical — nothing — that Iran can be blackmailed with.
Now we are testing our allies “resolve”. Let me be the first one to make it clear. MbS is NOT one of them. He needs US to let go of claims to control any part of Arabian side of Bab Al-Mandeb. His allies, UAE and Bahrain have in fact recognized Assad by reopening their Embassies. Who is in? Not Iraq, nor Kuwait. Not Oman nor Qatar. So if UAE and Saudis are not in — who is? Saudis need Russia, signing hundreds of investment deals. Saudis need China as their biggest customer. Saudis no longer fear Iran, now that it is firmly within Russia-China orbit, not a free agent that can be used by anyone to harm rich oil states without sufficient population to be formidable militarily. Now, Iran cannot be used as a battering ram. Under the Shah, that is exactly what it was.
There FTFY.
Meanwhile, Bianca, you wrote:
“Everyone — from EU to Japan — is scrambling, searching for alternatives to debt driven growth.”
This is a matter of some interest and importance to me. Could you provide a link to an information source/discussion of this effort?
What did you fix? Don’t make read both of them line by line to figure it out.
Bianca doesn’t do spell check, and it drives me crazy, so I cleaned it up, like a proof reader. I did not change anything substantive.
Me too. Follow her and do that for all her posts. 🙂
Yes Iran, by all means give Donald a call. He has a deal of the century waiting for you. All you have to do is neuter yourself and promise your undying servitude to us. In return we promise to never uphold any part of our end of the bargain and we won’t lift the devastating sanctions until every last one of our demands is verified. We will send our top diplomatic team of Bolton/Pompeo/Abrams to work out any details.
On the other hand, wars, “It’s better to jaw jaw than to war war.”
(Winston Churchill’s official biographer, Sir Martin Gilbert, speaking of this quote, noted that Churchill actually said, ‘Meeting jaw to jaw is better than war.’ Four years later, during a visit to Australia, Harold Macmillan said the words usually—and wrongly—attributed to Churchill: “Jaw, jaw is better than war, war.” Credit: Harold Macmillan.)
Consequently, behind Trump’s offer there may very well be a strategy that runs counter to the Bolton effort to attack Iran, because talking forestalls attacking, quite the opposite of what Bolton wants.
Trump hate prevents people from seeing this possibility. In NK, over-the-top bellicose rhetoric as prep, then lovey dovey. No matter the fact that things seemed to have slipped backwards a bit. It’s a process: first scare the shit out of everyone to break them out of the frozen status quo. Then when things start to move, move them in the direction of positive change. I know, the bellicose talk is scary, but that’s the point. Then, look at the direction of the real change that follows.
Bolton, Pompeo, and Abrams are the perfect boogiemen for this process. And Trump enjoys the added advantage of bringing his enemies close, where they are less dangerous to him than if they were on the outside opposing his efforts. And then, since the BAP trio are hugely hated by the center and left, he can fire them in the run-up to 2020 and be a hero of the center and center-left.
Watch for it. He’s already expressed dissatisfaction with BAP’s failure in Venezuela.
I know no one wants to here it, but Trump is transactional*, has incredible instincts and timing, is nimble and can pivot on a dime, wants to win, and ***KNOWS HOW TO WIN***.
* transactional: knows how to maneuver towards his goal in a dynamic environment.
“In NK, over-the-top bellicose rhetoric as prep, then lovey dovey.”
As Daniel Larison has pointed out repeatedly, this is nonsense. Trump has accomplished nothing vis-a-vis NK. Whatever progress has been made has been due to the efforts of South Korea.
Daniel Larison built his career out of being an ideological extremist. Currently, like so many self-made professional cultural-spectacle mouth-breathers he has latched onto the trending Trump-hate as a means to increase his revenue stream. He has zero credibility.
Wow. Only Sunday and already a strong candidate for “Dumbest Thing Tom Has Read This Week.”
I’m embarrassed to have to admit that I blew it on this one. Truth time: I checked him out on Wikipedia, but other than that I know absolutely nothing about Larison. I overreacted to his criticism of Trump’s effort at diplomacy with NK. My bad.
Hey, it happens.
For all I know, he IS an “ideological extremist” in various respects.
But what he’s KNOWN for is offering fairly sober “realist” critiques of US foreign policy regardless of which party holds the White House or Congress. That may not be all he does, but it’s certainly his bread and butter.
LOL. I’m an anti-interventionist left-liberal, and I don’t think he’s an extremist on what he focuses on, FP. He was critical of interventionist policy long before Dumpf arrived on the scene. Finally, his view that Dumpf’s NK negotiating process is moronic is widely shared across non-hawkish fp experts.
I’m embarrassed to have to admit that I blew it on this one. Truth time: I checked him out on Wikipedia, but other than that I know absolutely nothing about Larison. I overreacted to his criticism of Trump’s effort at diplomacy with NK. My bad.
The president was asked about Bolton at an impromptu news conference in the White House Roosevelt Room on Thursday.
“John’s very good. He has strong views on things which is OK. I’m the one who tempers him, which is OK. I have John Bolton and I have people who are a little more dovish than him,” said Trump.
So a US illegal “ultimatum” is acceptable, but not a suggestion from the aggrieved and damaged party, Iran, which has done nothing wrong.