Reenter
President Trump has driven the United States into a cul-de-sac. Withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal (aka Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action or JCPOA) and re-imposition of sanctions has made it nigh on impossible for Iran to gain the economic benefits of the agreement. But rather than driving Tehran back to the negotiating table, Washington has strengthened its hardliners and given them an excuse to begin enriching uranium beyond the level permitted by the JCPOA, which they threaten to reach within the next 10 days. The Iranians may also have attacked shipping in and near the Gulf, though that is still an unverified American and British allegation.
The first law of holes applies to this situation: when you are in a hole, stop digging. Trump of course is not law-abiding, so instead he is increasing the US troop, naval, and air force presence in the Gulf. That’s simply foolish: it puts more Americans at risk. I’ll know this administration is serious about attacking Iran when it removes as much of the exposed military and civilian presence in the Gulf as possible. Much of it–including the warplanes at Al Udeid in Qatar–are within the range of Iranian missiles. They and the embassies in Muscat, Doha, Manama and likely Riyadh will need to be draw down in advance of even a limited strike.
The alternative is to reenter the JCPOA, which would have prevented Iran from developing nuclear weapons before 2025 or so and arguably thereafter. Had the US stayed in the deal and ensured that the benefits flowed to Tehran, it could now be arguing for negotiations on missiles and Iran’s regional behavior with support from Europe and perhaps even Russia.
It could also have argued for a follow-on nuclear agreement. Iran has very good reasons not to go all the way to developing nuclear weapons. Well-informed Israelis have long believed that Tehran wants to develop all the enabling technology but not build nuclear weapons or deploy them, for fear of what Israel might do if it thought Iran might do so. Even the current runup of enrichment is explicitly planned to stop before the levels needed for nuclear weapons are reached.
The only way out of America’s current cul-de-sac is to back up. Tehran has made plain that it will talk with Washington only if the US reenters the JCPOA. I imagine they might even offer some sweeteners: release of some US citizens from prison, for example, or a modicum of restraint in Yemen, where their Houthi partners are not doing brilliantly anyway. President Trump has backed up in the past with an aspiring nuclear power, when he agreed to meet Kim Jong-un in Singapore. He could do it again, with his usual triumphalist bombast about how the Iranians will be his newest best friends once they see the Trump golf courses they might acquire. The Iranians understand that the North Koreans have not yet given up anything significant in exchange for Trump’s good graces. They might hope for the same treatment.
But Tehran also might figure that Pyongyang is treated with kid gloves because it does in fact have nuclear weapons. The closer Tehran gets without triggering an Israeli reaction, the better from the point of view of the Supreme Leader. So he might just prefer that Trump continue digging his hole by putting more American military and civilian assets at risk. Iran is a country of more than 80 million people. It endured an 8-year war with Iraq, suffered enormous casualties, and continues to pride itself on “resistance.” An American air attack would strengthen Iran’s hardliners further and dismay the Europeans, Russia, and China. Why not let Trump bury himself in the hole he has dug?
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By withdrawing from the nuclear agreement with Iran American and Israeli war hawks want to create a “nuclear blackmail” moral justification for attacking Iran. Except this time, unlike the costly Iraq war, its unlikely to lead to a full scale ground war. What they likely have on their mind is bombing Iranian nuclear facilities.
There are wild cards they haven’t carefully considered though.
1. Iranians well know their nuclear facilities might be eventually bombed. They likely have prepared for this for year by burying some so deep a bombing campaign might slightly slow things down but not end progress towards nuclear weapons. Americans will look pretty silly if exit the treaty, bomb Iran, then have Iran test a nuke a few months or years later.
2. By Trump going on a America first offensive against so many states globally (both in trade and economic sanction, including bizarrely his own allies), he might have opened too many fronts The classic military mistake of hubris.
3. Much of the world might very well effectively come to the defense of Iran politically by refusing to lend morally support to a US military campaign. So even if it bombing campaign proceeds, it will generate so much negative press in the US globally that it may open up even more nuclear armed fronts (countries fearing they will be next… might scramble to get their hands on nukes)
4. As North Korea was part of the so-called axis of evil — they might agree to a quick technology transfer and hand over their nuclear weapons knowledge to speed up Iranian nuclear weapons development. My enemies enemy is my friend as they say.
5. In Russia’s case, much like Syria, they might supply Iran with military support making direct US military intervention in Iran a potential military fiasco. I’m sure some Russians would love to get an opportunity to have s400s shoot down 1o0M dollar f35.
5. And a final point.. .hypocrisy. Few want Islamic religious crazies in Iran armed with nuclear weapons but its getting rather stale listening to Christian and Jewish religious crazies in the US and Israel constantly arguing for wars against other countries for WMDs — when they themselves have WMDs.
NPT is clearly a failure. It was supposed to be about all nations getting rid of their nuclear weapons. 30 years post cold war its clear some nations have no interest in meeting their treaty commitments to fully disarm their WMDs.
It’s a dangerous game but perhaps more hostile nations with nukes might turn out to be a good thing over the long term for both disarmament and peaceful conflict resolution.. A world with many nuclear powers will be much risker proposition for current powers attack sovereign states. It would force nations with existing stockpiles of nukes to revisit their failure to dismantle their own WMDs along with their gunboat diplomacy.
Easy to argue to attack another country when it can’t fight back. Much harder to go to war when they can.