The Iran nuclear deal was in near terminal condition and on life support even before President Donald Trump fired Secretary of State Rex Tillerson. Tillerson\u2019s dismissal this week may hasten its demise. As CIA chief and Iran hawk Mike Pompeo prepares to run the State Department, the Trump administration is weighing a speedier withdrawal from the agreement than even the president has threatened, according to two US officials and two outside advisers briefed on the matter. They were not authorized to discuss the sensitive negotiations publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.<\/p>\n
While such a scenario is unlikely, the fact it is being floated as an option may give US officials more leverage in negotiations with European signatories to salvage the accord by toughening it. Two such negotiating sessions have already been held and a third is set for Thursday in Berlin.<\/p>\n
Trump, who calls the Obama administration\u2019s signature foreign policy achievement the worst deal ever negotiated, has vowed to walk away from the 2015 agreement in mid-May unless Britain, Germany and France join the US in addressing what the president says are its fatal flaws. These include no penalties for Iran\u2019s missile work and support for militant groups in Lebanon, Syria, Yemen and elsewhere.<\/p>\n
The deal that was negotiated by the Obama administration and six other countries limits Iran\u2019s enrichment and stockpiling of material that could be applied to a nuclear weapons program. In exchange, Tehran was granted widespread relief from international trade, oil and banking sanctions. Trump\u2019s next deadline to extend some of those concessions is May 12, and he has vowed not to do so again unless the Europeans meet his demands.<\/p>\n
Any US withdrawal would likely crater the agreement. If the US begins threatening fines and other punishments for sanctions violations, countries around the world are likely to curtail commerce with Iran. That could prompt the Iranians to walk away as well, and perhaps even restart nuclear activities banned under the accord.<\/p>\n
An indication of the Trump administration\u2019s thinking could come Friday, when the US, Britain, China, France, Germany, Russia, the European Union and Iran meet for a periodic review at the International Atomic Energy Agency headquarters in Vienna.<\/p>\n
State Department policy planning chief Brian Hook, who is running the negotiations with Europe, will lead the US delegation to the larger meeting in Austria\u2019s capital. Hook, who Tillerson leaned on heavily for policy advice and direction, could meet separately in Vienna with the Iranian delegation head, Deputy Foreign Minister Abbas Aragchi. For his part, Aragchi sees the writing on the wall. He told a parliamentary committee in Tehran on Wednesday that Tillerson\u2019s ouster was proof that Trump would pull out and promised that Iran would withdraw if the US does.<\/p>\n
In the US, Iran deal supporters braced for what they see as the inevitable. Pompeo \u201cis certain to advise the president to withdraw the United States from our obligations under the nuclear agreement,\u201d said Diplomacy Works, a group of mainly former Obama administration officials that lobbies for staying in the deal.<\/p>\n
Hook had been tasked by Tillerson with getting the Europeans to agree to as many of Trump\u2019s demands as possible, with an eye toward selling the president on extending the sanctions waivers. Doing so would buy US negotiators time to deal with elements of the agreement Trump has disparaged \u2014 such as its expiration dates on key nuclear constraints \u2014 and missile and terrorism concerns.<\/p>\n
The ex-oilman had waged an often lonely battle within Trump\u2019s Cabinet to save the deal. He succeeded for 13 months. But each time Trump faced another sanctions deadline, Tillerson met increased resistance to keeping the agreement alive.<\/p>\n
In firing Tillerson on Tuesday, Trump in particular noted his disagreement over the Iran accord. Trump won\u2019t have that problem with Pompeo, who has lambasted the deal on a level similar to Trump, making clear the two men are of the same opinion.<\/p>\n
Trump said that he and Pompeo \u201chave a very similar thought process\u201d on the deal. As a congressman, Pompeo vociferously denounced the accord when it was struck. \u201cThe (deal) can perhaps delay Iran\u2019s nuclear weapons program for a few years,\u201d he wrote at the time. \u201cConversely, it has virtually guaranteed that Iran will have the freedom to build an arsenal of nuclear weapons at the end of the commitment.\u201d<\/p>\n
His stance and position with Trump could give Pompeo leverage with the Europeans that Tillerson never enjoyed.<\/p>\n
US officials said American positions have hardened over the past several weeks, notably on Iranian ballistic missile testing and the deal\u2019s provisions that allow Iran to gradually resume advanced atomic work. Because Iran and the Europeans refuse to renegotiate the nuclear deal, US officials are seeking to create a supplemental agreement with Europe to address these matters.<\/p>\n
At Thursday\u2019s meeting in Berlin, US and the European officials are hoping to compare draft written proposals and combine points of agreement into a new document that could form the basis of a side deal.<\/p>\n
US and European diplomats say they\u2019re closer on long-range ballistic missile launches, inspections and new sanctions on Iranian-backed militant groups. Gaps are larger on medium-range missiles that could hit Israel, Saudi Arabia and other Gulf Arab states and on the deal\u2019s particulars for when advanced atomic work can restart.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Iran nuclear deal was in near terminal condition and on life support even before President Donald Trump fired Secretary of State Rex Tillerson. Tillerson\u2019s dismissal this week may hasten its demise. As CIA chief and Iran hawk Mike Pompeo prepares to run the State Department, the Trump administration is weighing a speedier withdrawal from […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":24872,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[87],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-24871","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24871","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24871"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24871\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24873,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24871\/revisions\/24873"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/24872"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24871"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24871"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24871"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}