Don't try trusting Iran

After years of broken promises, missed deadlines, and ready concessions, President Obama got what he wants: a deal with Iran. He doesn’t care that it is a dangerous, unenforceable deal, but Congress presumably does, and needs to do all it can to stop it. The agreement’s details are troubling: It will be significantly weakened within ten years, Iran gets to retain significant nuclear infrastructure without any good justification, etc. But the real problem is its fundamental structure.

President Obama compared today’s deal to past agreements with another adversary, the Soviet Union. But the agreements bear almost no resemblance to each other. First, of course, the Soviet treaties were, well, treaties — approved by two-thirds of the Senate. Second, Reagan entered into them when he judged, correctly, that the U.S. campaign of military, economic, and moral pressure had brought about a fundamental change of attitude in the Soviet regime. Finally, the treaties involved reductions in and limits on arms from both sides. If the Soviets stopped complying, we could too. This deal works differently: We give money to an unreconstructed Iranian regime in return for its promise to limit its nuclear program. But if it doesn’t limit its nuclear work, we can’t take the money back. The U.S. and other countries will be handing Iran more than $100 billion in freed-up assets and eliminating all sanctions long before we have much evidence of compliance. For instance, the money will likely arrive in Iran’s hands before the deadline for the country to disclose its past nuclear work, deadlines it has simply ignored in the past. Without leverage, all we’ve got is trust — trust in the Islamic Republic of Iran.

Read more at: http://www.nationalreview.com/article/421185/dont-try-trusting-iran-editors
Read more at: http://www.nationalreview.com/article/421185/dont-try-trusting-iran-editors