Expecting 71-year-old President Donald Trump to back out the 2017 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action [JCPA], AKA the Iranian Nuke Deal, Russia sees an opportunity to triangulate Iran. With Iran nearly at blows with Israel, Russia looks to gain more leverage in the Middle East sucking up to Iran. Since signing off with the P5+1, U.S., U.K., France, Russia, China and Germany, to curb Iran’s uranium enrichment program for 10 years, Russia wants to back Iran’s efforts to resist U.S. foreign policy. Not since the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis has U.S.-Russian relations been so poor, working at cross-purposes in the Middle East. Russia and Iran joined forces to save the flagging regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad from a determined Saudi proxy war to topple his Shiite government. Joining forces with Syria and Russia, Iran directly confronts U.S. foreign policy.
Trump sees former President Barack Obama’s Iranian Nuke Deal as a farce since there’s no way to verify Iran’s compliance at its secret military sites. Israeli President Benjamin Netanyahu insists he has proof that Iran has not stopped enriching military grade uranium, something Iran denies. Yet when Iran denies that it ever had any intention of building an A-bomb, it simultaneously warns Trump of the consequences of backing out the 2015 agreement, namely, ramping up uranium enrichment. If Iran’s uranium enrichment program isn’t for a bomb, then what’s it for? Or, threatening to ramp up military grade enrichment, loses all meaning if Iran only enriches uranium for reactor fuel or medical radioactive isotopes. With or without the U.S. vacating the JCPA, Russia and Iran have developed common ground for economic cooperation and shared nuclear and ballistic missile technology.
Trump’s May 12 decision to either stay in the Iranian Nuke Deal or back out has little to do with Russia’s economic cooperation with Iran. Already buying Russian-made S-300 missile defense systems, Tehran spends billions for Russian technology. “It might even be easier for us on the economic front, because we won’t have any limits on economic cooperation with Iran. We would develop bilateral relations in all areas—energy, transport, high tech, medicine,” said Vladimir Yermakov, Director General of the Department of Non-Proliferation and Arms Control at Russian Foreign Ministry. Trump already knows the close economic ties between Moscow and Tehran, something that won’t weigh into his decision to abandon the JCPA. Trump’s new Secretary of State Mike Pompeo agrees that Obama’s Iranian Nuke deal did more for Obama’s resume than U.S. national security.
Since signing the JCPA July 15, 2015, Iran has actively backed revolution in Yemen, fighting a proxy war with Saudi Arabia, supplying arms-and-cash to Yemen’s Houthi rebels. Iran actively tries to undermine Israel’s national security setting up permanent air and land bases in Syria. Flying predator drones into Israeli territory, Israeli Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman has ordered air strikes at Iran’s Syrian strongholds. Promising to wipe Tel Aviv off the map, Iran is close to coming to blows with Israel. When Israel celebrates its 70th anniversary May 14, Iran has warned it may hit Tel Aviv with long-range ballistic missiles. With Trump considering attending the 70-year-anniversary, Iran’s missile threats directly threaten Israel and the U.S. Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei warned Trump April 30 that Iran is ready to defend itself against U.S. aggression.
Iran hopes a security arrangement with Russia would deter the U.S. from acting aggressively militarily. “If the United States breaks an international agreement backed by U.N. Security Council resolutions, it will be the United States that should suffer the consequences. Neither Iran nor China nor Russia nor the European states should lose out,” said Yemakov. Iran has done everything possible to split U.S. allies away, if Trump decides to vacate the Nuke Deal. Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammed Javad Zarif said yesterday that Iran will not renegotiate the 2015 agreement, nor add on to it. Zarif insists that Iran is in compliance with 2015 agreement, despite not permitting the U.N.’s International Atomic Energy Inspectors [IAEA] to inspect secret military sites. Trump’s concluded that without intrusive inspections, the JCPA is worthless, not worth the paper on which it’s written.
When Trump met April 24 with French President Emmanuel Macron, he laid out his case for vacating the 2015 Iranian Nuke Deal. Macron listened to Trump and came around by the end of their three-day visit. Macron understood Iran’s role in destabilizing Saudi Arabia and threatening Israel, setting up permanent bases in Syria. Realizing that Iran had breached the spirit of the Nuke Deal, Macron understood why Trump must back out the deal. Former Secretary of State John Kerry, when negotiating the deal with Zarif, said some deal was better than no deal. After watching Iran subverting Yemen and the Middle East over the last three years, something must be done stop Iran’s grand scheme to destabilize the Middle East.. Continuing the Nuke Deal perpetuates the illusion that Iran’s complying with the agreement. Ending the deal allows Trump more options to rein in Iran before its too late.
