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What It Really Takes For a US-Iran Deal
Authored by Pepe Escobar, Op-Ed via RT.com,
Forget the mad spinning. Here it is, in a nutshell, what it really takes for Iran and the P5+1 to clinch a game-changing nuclear deal before the new July 7 deadline.
Iran and the P5+1 agreed in Lausanne on a “comprehensive plan of action,” taking into account delicate constitutional considerations in both the US and Iran. A crucial part of the plan is the mechanism to get rid of sanctions. Lausanne – and now Vienna – is not a treaty; it’s an action plan. There will be a declaration when a deal is reached. But there won’t be a signing ceremony.
The next important step is what happens at the UN Security Council (UNSC). All the concerned parties at the UNSC will endorse a declaration, and a resolution - which is still being negotiated – will render null and void all previous sanctions resolutions.
As it stands, all the parties – except the US government – want to go to the UNSC as soon as possible. Washington remains, at best, reticent.
Iranian negotiators have made it very clear at the table that Tehran will start implementing its nuclear restriction commitments - removal of a number of centrifuges, removal of the core of Arak’s reactor, disposal of uranium stock, etc. - immediately. The IAEA will be constantly checking Iran has complied with an extensive list.
But it has to be a parallel process; the US and the EU must for their part and “take physical action”, tackling the complex mechanism of lifting all economic sanctions. Once again; a UNSC signature instantly erases all previous sanctions.
And here is something crucial; all of this has been agreed in Lausanne. The work must be simultaneous, as stressed, in tandem, by Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif and EU representative Federica Mogherini.
Those fateful parameters
Meanwhile, we have the media centrifuges spinning like mad, as I described here. On the negotiating table, there are still skirmishes related to the US desire in trying to “prove a negative” – as in the “possible military dimensions” (PMD) of Iran’s nuclear program.Logically, you don't need to be a neo-Wittgenstein to see that’s impossible.
The deadline extension from June 30 to July 7 is mostly about finding – rather, finding again - a “reasonable common narrative” inbuilt in the Lausanne framework, and even before.
This means Washington should make the political decision to tone down repeated attempts to introduce new demands. Iranian officials admit, “we may have had disagreements on how we do simultaneous work,” but that’s part of Lausanne. New demands are not.
In Lausanne, US Secretary of State John Kerry and Foreign Minister Zarif agreed on a “set of parameters” – after excruciating nine hours of debate.They also agreed, crucially, that both sides would refrain from humiliating one another publicly.
The recent record shows that’s been the case – as far as negotiators and diplomats are concerned. On the other hand, US corporate media predictably has been wreaking the proverbial havoc.
Which brings us to the clincher; Iranian negotiators have yet to detect a readiness of the US government to really change the “culture of sanctions” in the UNSC. And here a diplomatic consensus emerges, involving, very significantly, Russia and Germany; this agreement will be made - or broken - on one crucial point; whether the Obama administration wants to lift the sanctions or keep them.
Watch the BRICS front
The least one can say about what’s really happening in the Palais Coburg since this past weekend is that the Obama administration’s position is oscillating wildly. There seems to be – finally – some movement on the American side in the sense they feel a strategic interest in changing the situation.
That will depend, of course, on the Obama administration’s evaluation of all factions operating in the Beltway establishment. Diplomats in Vienna agree Kerry is personally involved in trying to change the equation. So this means the ball is really in the US court.
But all’s still murky; even oscillating wildly; the Americans continue to entertain what an Iranian official described to me as “buyer’s remorse” regarding what they agreed on Lausanne in the first place.
Serious, key sticking points remain. The duration of the sanctions; confidentiality issues – as in the US, especially, respecting terms of access to Iranian military installations; and what’s defined as “managed access” under certain conditions.
Also very crucial is the BRICS front at the P5+1. Neither China nor Russia wants to see any exacerbation of tensions, in Southwest Asia and beyond, because a deal is not clinched. The bottom line; with their eye in the Big Picture – as in Eurasia integration - both are committed to facilitate a deal.
Until tomorrow, all remains in play. Obama has been spinning he doesn’t want a “bad deal”. That’s not the issue. The issue is Obama himself making the fateful political decision of abandoning the weapon of choice of US foreign policy; sanctions. Has he got what it takes to pull it off?
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WTF this isn't about Greece or Russia.
This entire "deal" smells fishy...I don't buy it
WTF this isn't about Greece or Russia.
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Yep, exactly... that's what Obozo and Kerry are hoping for...
So they can try to sneak this stinkin' deal through unnoticed.
Deport the neocons and the problem will be solved.
Maybe 'you' wouldn't but Obammy has never made a deal that was truly a benefit for our country-name just one thing that he has been involved with that has worked in the favor of the USA? Anyone?
Not so! Those nefarious Greeks are behind the Iranian nuke program and you know it.
Even if a "deal" is made, it still has to undergo either a 30 day or 60 day review period (depending on if said deal is reached by July 9th) by the US congress. Does anyone actually believe the strong Jewish lobby in Congress is going to let any deal with Iran get pushed through?
This was all just one giant round of mental masturbation that will ultimately lead to nothing changing.
Except an even more diminished US credibility and stature.
As Pepe claims HorseFace is taking the other side on this, maybe it was this that got him shot, indicating - No push by the ZOG at the UNSC. No deal.
Let the others, bar the US, take it to the UNSC and watch the US isolate themselves as they abstain or veto it.
It would turn the 'lets isolate Russia' plan on its head.
By the way, no mention in the article of the concern in the West of how they give back to Iran the $100 to $300 billion that was frozen. Bet that's a sticking point.
Each of those siezed dollars has probably been rehypothocated a billion times...
As long as iran promised to isolate China and Russia, they will normalize the relationship and no more blockage
Agreed, provided Iran promises to do all trade in dollars this deal is signed, sealed and delivered.
The heart of any agreement, surely.
"...taking into account delicate constitutional considerations..."
That will be a first for this administration.
Well, for the last several administrations. Hell, I'm not old enough to remember when the Constitution really made a difference to any administration.
http://www.thetruthaboutthelaw.com/the-first-amendment-was-dead-on-arrival/
h/t lawyer4anarchists
Every public statement by the Iranians is in direct conflict with these stated facts. Obama says its all political posturing for their domestic consumption, but if that's so, is it safe to assume Obama is doing the same for us? The reality is that no deal that this administration pursues is anything they say it is and almost always serves a purpose unrelated to its stated goals.
No deal. Netenyahoo has his way. If HF got shot, that would be the exclamation point. Rival factions of western oligarchs almost or already fighting? Its happened before. Remember Yitzak Rabin.
For Israel to accept that sovereignty belongs to every nation.
I'm sure this agreement will be just as successful as the Agreed Framework and the Six Party Talks were with the North Koreans.
We are one sad ass world.... The president is worst than Carter and lets party
Worst? Is that a type of cloth? No comparison. At least Carter was a real, albeit incompitent, person with a birth certificate.
Obama is the very most worstest. The comparisons to Carter were shattered long ago.
If we get a deal signed with Iran, I suggest moving as far away from New York, Washington DC, and Los Angeles as possible. You have about a 3 year window.
don't forget silicon valley
Is it still 3 years?
I thought Iran had everything to make that Bomb 10 years ago?
Iran has been '3 months from making the bomb' for the last 20 years.
This is all irrelevant anyway as BDS is The New Hitler (TM).
Obama has buyers remorse all right. The additional oil supply fucks the frackers good and proper and on his watch. Chinese and even the energy exporting Russians want this deal because it fucks the frackers and anyone who underestimates the effect that will have on US bank balance sheets and US sentiment is about as dumb as a Greek bank depositor.
If Iran didn't already have nukes they wouldn't be talking.
I simply can't see why the Americans want this deal when their Puppet masters, Israel publicly does not.
I sometimes wonder if this is the prelude to accusations in the future of Iran lying and hiding a military nuclear program that coerces the US into using nuclear weapons against Iran.
Max
Maybe the Iranian deal is America's Samson Option.
Wittgenstein was a beery swine, who was just as sloshed as Schlegel.
But there's nothing Nietsche couldn't teach ya about the raising of the wrist, Socrates himself was permanently pissed.
So you like Kant?
LOL I have a book that includes Kant through Sartre, but haven't gotten into it yet.
I admire the progress of the Enlightenment with the Christian Philosophers, but I am still trying to pin down where everything goes from there...
Hegel figures prominently, but where does it go at that point?
If Iran gets the bomb, peace will reign in the Middle East.
What Iran should do :
(1) Dump the United Nations and join BRICS it will become BRIICS . UN is only a puppet of Satan USA.
(2) Use BRIICS currencies only to trade in oil & gas etc
(3) Buy anything & everything from BRIICS nations , they have everything.
(4) Outsource nuclear activity to North Korea (& also carryout secretly) gain nuclear bombs as fast as possible & develop cruise missiles which can reach Satan America (if Iran can launch satellites , it can develop ICBM too)
(5) Do not sell any oil & gas to west (America, Europe & their allies)
It would be very much in Washington's best interests to make for a much better trade and geopolitical relationship with Iran. There is so much that can go bad if they try to walk away from this, and fail to then capitalize on relaxing the tensions right across that region. the last thing that area needs is more bitterness and more reaction to Western strangling of another economy.
That went so well in Iraq, after 1990, didn't it? So well the families and children that you starved with the oil for food program then, have been joining ISIL and other radical groups, ever since.
You really want to do that to Iran Barry? Because they will build nukes if you do that, and they will feel a bit passionate about the quid-pro-quo principle.
These things should go without saying, and if it were not for a certain war-militating lobby, they would.
Lets face the facts: Eventually the radical Islamists aka Iran will have the all dreaded nuke bomb with catastrophic capability to use them at will. The world will see this reality w/in a 10yr. period. Do you really believe they haven't taken steps to hide the necessary means to that end right under noses of the so-called 'six world powers' before any deal even started? Are we really that naive?
No, we are not naive.
In fact I said something like that several times, over the past few years, in here. But was more frank, so I also got shouted down for saying I have a hard time believing that given the scale of their program, and the time which they have had that tech, that they do not already have a significant stash of weapon-grade HEU as early as 2005.
People aren't ready to accept it yet, because they don't want to acknowledge it, and the ramifications. However, it did not take Pakistan that long to perfect the technology, and build a weapon-grade HEU stock, now did it? Frankly, I think Iran is the more tech savvy, affluent and capable country with a far better industrial base and engineering and technical testing capacity. they have also had help for DPRK and others. And Iran has either been formally at war, or in proxy war and under dire threat for most of that time, and were in the axis of evil doer category, so they certainly had more than enough motive. Almost more motive than Pakistan had, to get on with it ASAP.
So I already presume they have a substantial stash of HEU, which they keep under wraps, as a hedge against the US and Israel fucking them.
And inspectors won't find it either, as Iran will have learned all those lessons from watching Iraq during the 1990s. I think that is a reasonable conclusion in the circumstances.
But at the very least I think there's sufficient ambiguity here as to make it necessary and prudent to act in al respects as though that may be so.
Destabilizing them economically, as well as other ways, is not wise. So build good relations, remove the destabilizing factors. Then determine a diplomatic recipe for the long term that is going to keep the peace.
But push them around and they may feel it necessary to test ... and that would be bad for all.
Iran as a member of the UN C24 decolonisation committee openly supports Argentina's Malvinas claims (the majority of the committee of 24 is made up from states that are classified as being 'not free' or 'partially free' by the freedom index). So much for the human rights of the islanders to determine how and by whom they are governed. Argentina's Falklands' claim is debunked: https://www.academia.edu/10490336/Argentinas_Illegitimate_Sovereignty_Claims
They make it sound like any of this is difficult. For fucks sake are people this dumb? If there is a deal to be made, it could be done in 2 seconds.
There will be no deal.
Iran will not give any foreign power access to their military installations.
It's like the Iranian's asking the American's if they can have unrestricted access to all the installations in the Groom Lake area, it's just not going to happen.
US has been on Irans ass for 37 years. The Shah of Iran, who was a US puppet, was overrthrown by the people.This is and never was about nuclear weapons. Any and every excuse has been used to punish the people who rose up and booted US inflence from the country. The US armed Saddam and created the Iraq Iran war in the 80's. Iraq suffered defeat after defeat and finally quit. Saddam turned on his own people and with US and Brit supplied munitions gassed the Kurds in the north. US promissed the Kurds in the north of Iraq help against Saddam refused an assistance once the rebellion ensued. CIA propaganda created the Gulf War on behalf of SA, Kuwait and qatar. Overland pipelines to Europe were still stalled because the US could not control Iraqi Kurds. Syria also refused to capitulate and that battle continues. The gold dinar for oil plan was put forward by Kadaffi and after a CIA false flag plane crash in Scotland, well we all know what ensued. The BS goes on and on like a horror movie with millions of casualties, countries lay in ruins with US taxpayers footing the bill.
This will be a good opportunity for the US to show the rest of the world that their foereign policy is not run from Tel Aviv. Ha Ha Ha!
None of this matters. When Iran gets close to having their first nuke or shortly thereafter, they WILL be attacked by Israel. Of course the Israeli attack will be secretly backed by the US and Saudis.