Across the border my latest comments on the US – Iran nuclear deal, and Trump secures prisoner release.
Despite former (repeat: FORMER) Secretary of State John Kerry’s intense and highly inappropriate efforts to save Obama’s ill-advised Iran deal and preserve Obama’s damaging legacy, President Trump has fulfilled a campaign promise to step away from the deal, outlining a 90-day window for working out details with allies and re-instigating sanctions on Iran.
The hope is that America will end up with a better deal; it could hardly be worse. Right now, Iran’s leadership has its fist in the air, saying Trump’s withdrawal is “illegal and illegitimate,” and that was entirely predictable. (Of course, they always have their fist in the air when it comes to America.) The deal as negotiated by Obama offered no provisions for pulling out, and that in itself testifies to how ridiculously bad a deal it was. But since Obama entered into it without having it ratified as a treaty, Trump has the authority to pull out.
The terms were to the Iranians’ immense advantage, with no rules against their pursuit of long-range ballistic missiles and only a short-term ban on their pursuit of nuclear weapons. Restrictions were to end in 2025 –- just 7 years from now. Do you know how long 7 years is in their strategy to wipe out the nation of Israel (“the Little Satan”) and destroy the West (“the Great Satan”)? A nanosecond.
Iran also got a lot of money early on, $150 billion in the form of unfrozen assets and more in the form of secretly-shipped cash, a gift from President Obama, but there’s nothing to be done about that now. No doubt it quickly disappeared into the pockets of Iranian leaders, weapons dealers and/or the families of terrorist martyrs.
Trump is signaling that America now operate from a position of strength and are unwilling to go along with a bad deal in the interest of “peace.” In the long run, the deal would not have been conducive to peace — only to the illusion of peace, comforting to some until the Iranians let fly their first atomic bomb.
Trump’s announcement also sends a message to Kim Jong-Un, as he works to facilitate negotiations on the Korean peninsula, including the release and homecoming of three U.S. prisoners and even a possible end of the Korea War.
Yes, there’s a certain amount of discomfort among some of U.S. allies –- and certainly the U.S. mainstream media and political enemies, but I repeat myself –- associated with shaking things up this way. Sen. Chuck Schumer did not support the deal when it was voted on as a resolution, yet he’s critical of Trump’s actions today. Obama has also fired back, with a three-page statement insisting the deal is working and is in America’s interest; never mind that it defies common sense how this deal could have furthered the interest of peace long-term. The process of extricating America from this bad deal isn’t easy, or it would have already taken place. Obama holdovers at the State Department aren’t happy, either; in fact, it’s been reported that some are threatening to resign. Considering the problems being caused by Obama holdovers at State, I don’t see how that could be a bad thing.
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After a long, agonizing wait (especially agonizing for cable news reporters who had to fill many hours with nothing to say while waiting for it), a plane touched down around 2 a.m. at Andrews Air Force base outside Washington, D.C., carrying Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and three Korean-Americans who had been held captive in North Korea.
President Trump greeted the returning Americans and said, “These are great people. Frankly, we didn’t think this was going to happen, but it did. It was important to get these people out. This is a special night for these three really great people.” He also praised North Korean leader Kim Jong Un for releasing them (without bringing up who was responsible for unjustly arresting them in the first place, or as that’s known in DC, “diplomacy”) and said he believes Kim “really wants to do something” about bringing North Korea “into the real world.”
Trump said the nuclear summit time and place are now set, in Singapore , June 12, 2018 adding, “We’re starting off on a new footing. I really think we have a very good chance of doing something very meaningful, and if anybody would’ve said that five years ago, 10 years ago, even a year ago, you would’ve said, ‘That’s not possible.’ ‘My proudest achievement will be when we denuclearize that entire [Korean] peninsula.”
The New York Times story on Trump’s announcement that he was pulling out of Obama’s nuclear deal with Iran was snottily headlined, “At a Key Moment, Trump’s Top Diplomat Is Again Thousands of Miles Away.” It slammed Secretary of State Mike Pompeo for not being in Washington to answer calls from any European leaders who might get the vapors at the news. Now, the Times knew that Pompeo was doing something reasonably important – he was “thousands of miles away” because he was setting up a denuclearization summit with North Korea and freeing three American prisoners. They also knew that if anyone wanted to reach him, he has a cell phone – but they harrumphed that calls are sometimes dropped when he’s on his plane.
Well, I never! The very idea! Freeing Americans from forced labor prisons and ridding the world of nukes in the hands of a dangerous dictator pale before the importance of preventing some ticked-off Europeans from having to call back a second time! Why, just imagine the torture they might go through if they don’t have “Redial” buttons on their phones.
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