"Iran is very high on my list of things to watch," President Trump said late last month. "We will have to talk it out or very bad things are gonna happen to Iran, and I don't want that to happen."
But since then, Trump has steered Israel away from striking Iranian nuclear sites and, in a wide-ranging interview with Time,
said he's open to meeting with Iran's president or supreme leader to
get a deal done. "I think we can make a deal without the attack. I hope
we can," Trump told Time. "It's possible we'll have to attack because
Iran will not have a nuclear weapon," he added, but he "would much
prefer a deal than bombs being dropped."
Trump's willingness to countenance both scenarios reflects a struggle
within his administration, contends DEFP Fellow Daniel DePetris in a new
op-ed at the Los Angeles Times. Meanwhile, at The Hill, DEFP Research Associate Scott Strgacich spells out exactly how disastrous it would be if more hawkish voices prevail.
Here's a rundown of their arguments ahead of the next round of U.S.-Iran talks beginning on Saturday, May 3.
The White House debate over Iran
- The "Trump administration appears divided as to what the
appropriate endgame for these negotiations should be. In Trump's mind,
the goal is clear: Iran can't have a nuclear weapon. But he often
changes his mind depending on who he last spoke with."
- On the one hand, U.S. envoy Steve Witkoff "has brainstormed
about instituting a strict verification and monitoring program to
ensure Tehran can't weaponize its nuclear knowledge. Ironically, this
sounds exactly like the deal Trump could have inherited if he hadn't withdrawn from the Obama administration's Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action in 2018."
- On the other, "national security advisor Mike Waltz and Secretary of State Marco Rubio are talking
as if Iran must give up everything, as the late Libyan dictator Moammar
Kadafi did when he handed over his weapons of mass destruction to
American inspectors in 2003 and 2004."
- If the Waltz-Rubio faction prevails, recent diplomatic progress
will be all for naught. "Diplomacy will succeed or fail depending on how
flexible the parties are at the negotiating table."
- "U.S. demands must be reasonable, not maximalist," and Iran must
accept that Trump can't truthfully promise no future president will
withdraw from a new deal just as he withdrew from the old one. [LAT / DePetris]
Why diplomacy—or at least the status quo—must prevail
- That flexibility is vital because the common "assumption that
striking Iran to stop its nuclear program is a viable option" is
dangerously wrong.
- It's true, of course, that the U.S. has Iran wildly outmatched as a
military power. "However, the victory Trump would be pursuing in such a
war would be strategic, not just operational. An Iranian battlefield
defeat means nothing unless its nuclear program is permanently
dismantled. Is that possible to do from the air? Likely not, and most
policymakers don't seem to appreciate what this would involve."
- Think "nationwide, sustained and round-the-clock sorties" over a
massive land area including hardened, subterranean targets that even
bunker busters might not take out. And even if it went well, the
impermanent success of this kind of air campaign "could naturally lead
some to conclude that only a U.S. ground presence will do the job."
- "Such an effort would be titanic in a country almost thrice as populous as 2003 Iraq, with one estimate putting the necessary U.S. force to occupy the country at 1.6 million—nearly triple that at the height of the Vietnam War."
- The military option would be catastrophic. "A deal is the best
alternative, but even muddling around in the uncertain status quo is
infinitely preferable to inflicting on Americans another disastrous war
in the Gulf." [The Hill / Strgacich]
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