The Iran deal

[Luvnit2]

(05-10-2018, 02:54 AM)Dill Wrote: If you have been paying attention to US politics during the last 10 years then you know that Republican Senate was not "convincable" and that had nothing to do with the viability of the Iran Deal. Obama took the risk that enough in Congress would see the deal was working, and would understand that breaking deals harmed US credibility. He was wrong.

Shumer's claim there was no power to inspect and insure was just parroting Netanyahu. And now you are just parroting Shumer. You cannot judge JCPOA was a "bad deal" if you don't know what the US gained and what the alternatives were.

1. 2013--China and Russia said they were no longer going to to enforce sanctions if the US did not get a deal. That meant by 2015 an Iran with no effective sanctions and no inspections, and ALL its centrifuges and enriched plutonium.

2. Iran's breakout time was 6-8 weeks in 2013, when negotiations began. Then in 2015 it destroyed two thirds of its centrifuges and gave up over 200 kilos of enriched plutonium. They willingly destroyed their own track to the bomb. Now breakout time is well over a year. incalculable, really, since they have to replace all those 15,000 centrifuges they destroyed. Why is this "getting nothing"?

3. The inspections regime was the most rigorous and intrusive in history. China, Russia, the E 3, and the IAEA agreed. Effective and working. No bomb since 2015 and none in sight for the next decade while we had the deal.

4. Iran took a risk. It listened to its own moderates. Empowered them to make the deal. And when it went through and opened their economy, it set the country on a track away from hardliner control. Now the moderates are discredited. The hardliners want Iran on a road to the bomb, and they are determined to get there regardless of sanctions. Moderates still have enough power to keep open plan B--continue deal with the remaining responsible powers. If that fails, then control and iniative fall back to the hardliners; it is hard to see how anyone can prevent a run for the bomb--short of an invasion. ZERO incentive to cooperate with the US.  And every incentive to get a bomb.

US "strength" was our ability to pull all these different, powerful, independent countries together at the last minute for a deal that helped everyone but Netanyahu and Saudi Arabia.  People who believed Trump bluster empowered him to throw all that away. Ntanyahu knew that and played to Trump's base with his timed "expose" of Iranian lies. Why would ANY of the former deal partners want to help Trump while he threatens them with sanctions too?

How do you ever imagine the ignorant and blustery Trump can do anything to influence Iran now but turn to war, which would have little effect on Iran without a ground invasion.   "Negotiate through strength" Trump style means The Iraq war, only in a country three times the size of Iraq and undivided by sects. Outside of Israel and Saudi Arabia, who would help the US? How does this fit anyone's goals except the Likud?  We have a huge base in Qatar, across the street from Iran. How do US "allies" up and down the Gulf view the prospect of a war which makes them targets?  They are not Trumpsters. They see an erratic deal breaker, not a deal maker. An erratic, authoritarian leader, more like the Arab dictators they all hate than a steady Clinton or no drama Obama.

We have 3 branches of government for a reason. I see hypocrisy for you and other praising Obama for circumventing 2 branches, then Trump does the same and since you disagree with his decision you bash him.

Hopefully a better deal is negotiated and then goes through Congress to be passed this time, the right way and only way for it to stick. Hopefully President Trump does does not follow the Obama rogue technique moving forward so long term results achieved and locked in versus a rogue President ignoring the will of Congress.