There is a reasonable argument to be made that Iran is meddling in M.E. affairs of other countries. That said, the JCPOA does not preclude targeted military actions against Iran and it’s allies in Syria, Yemen, or various Hezbollah rat holes. So it didn’t need to be dismantled to drive that point home to Iran. But it was. Because Trump is a petulant asshole.
Absolutely this.
They want a war. Trump wants a war. Cadet Bonespurs has to show us how tough he is - with no risk to himself of course. It is also a chance to scuttle yet another thing that he associates with Obama.
This is the “Saddam has weapons of mass destruction” lie, all over again. But maybe worse.
I doubt Trump wants a war on his hands. It’ll cut into his golf outings.
I don’t don’t see why, it’s not like he’ll go anywhere near the thing.
Admirably concise first para:
But aside from that it’s gonna be TREMENDOUS! :rolleyes:
And just imagine the howls of righteous indignation we’ll hear from the right if the Democrats start trying to impeach him. “You can’t do that! We’re at war! Can’t change horses midstream!”
That may all be true. But even if that’s Trump’s secret motivation, I would think he would want to craft a reason that made logical sense. If the American people held their public servants to account (see below), we’d demand a rational explanation why Trump was reneging. We’d be entitled to one.
The U.S. is hardly in a position to criticize Iran on that. Countries meddle. The whole sanctions/deal/no-deal thing is us meddling in Iranian affairs.
I often heard it said that Trump’s base will believe what he tells them. If Trump tells them he didn’t collude with Russians or that he divested his business interests, he doesn’t have to actually do it. The upside is that he doesn’t have to start a war to prove his toughness. He just has to say he’s tough.
Horrifically stupid.
Iraq was a despot run shit-show with a population of 25.6 million.
Iran is a much more advanced nation of 80 million. It will be no cake walk and if we were stupid enough to invade with troops, I’ll place the wager now that we will suffer considerable casualties - much greater than we have TO DATE in Iraq and Afghanistan combined.
He could claim that Iran tried to attack and is now a giant smoking crater. Those idiots would believe anything.
How are you feeling after that 2 1/2 year coma? Trump never makes logical sense. Ever. He’s ruled by impulse and ego. He’s a gigantic two-year-old.
Europe is still in.
If Europe can make a deal work without the US that will be pretty geopolitically interesting, and a big blow to US prestige. They’d have to put a significant amount of effort into it, but the economy of the European Union taken together is just as big as the US, and nobody doubts that the US could make this sort of deal by themselves without Europe, if they wanted to.
That would put Israel in an unfortunate spot, being allied with the US, if the US government has effectively cut themselves out of decisions and influence in this area.
The people I know who are against the deal- which is most of them, I think- believe that Iran is cheating and playing with nukes anyway.
I’ll admit, I was against the Iran deal when it was first proposed for pretty much that reason.
Oh, I know. I was trying to address that later in my post. I just think it’s important to continue pointing how little sense he often makes. There have been a lot of political positions over the years that I have disagreed with, but I can understand the arguments behind them. I don’t even see an attempt to rationalize this; at least, no public attempt.
Is it just Europe that’s still in? According to Wikpedia, the JCPOA is:
If the European Union can apply pressure (based on the size of its economy) equivalent to the U.S., then adding those other countries (minus the U.S., now) would carry even more.
However, your link says only that the UK, France, and Germany are still committed to the deal. I haven’t heard is the rest are staying, too. I would expect them to, since their leaders are not as arational as Trump.
In his address today Trump didn’t mention the international inspections. He didn’t mention US intelligence. All he had to support this catastrophic decision was Bibi’s slide show.
As much as I think pulling out of the Iran deal is one of the more bone-headed things Trump has done, Congress has to take a fair amount of the blame for this. If we had had an actual, functioning Congress while the Iran deal was being negotiated, it’s possible that we could have had a Senate-ratified treaty with Iran, which would have made it more difficult for us to back out of the deal under future administrations. Unfortunately, Congress has been so dysfunctional that this was never a possibility.
I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again - one of the greatest harms this administration has done is to show the rest of the world that America can no longer be trusted. Sure, changing administrations have taken different tacks from their predecessors - this is only natural. But it’s always been within certain boundaries. In 2016 we demonstrated to the entire world that we are capable of electing an intellectually incurious, mendacious, narcissistic, tantrum-prone toddler-in-grown-up-clothing, while simultaneously electing a Congress unwilling or unable to contain said man-child. This is going to color future foreign relations for at least a generation, if not longer, and that’s assuming we don’t do it again.
Judging from the right-wing defenses of Trump’s action I’m seeing, “sheer partisan spite” actually IS the main reason, for most. There’s also some conspiracy theorizing and some fanboyism of John Bolton mixed in.
Some of the ‘people’ cheering this on Twitter and Facebook are almost certainly paid or programmed by the Kremlin, of course. The price of oil is going to go up, and that can only help Putin’s personal bank accounts and those of his favorite oligarchs.
^This is absolutely one of Trump’s incentives to go to war (with Iran, Korea, or both).
IF trump where a horse, it’s gonna drown anyway. What we have is a horses ass. Can’t swim, can’t even walk. Can only shit over everything.
Fuck 'em. Let them get mad. Let them complain that the obvious criminal asshole THEY elected gets impeached. We’ll manage just fine thank you.
That and keep a stupid campaign promise to his stupid supporters.
This absolutely.
The thing about any/all of those countries keeping the deal together is that the US will sanction the companies from all those countries that do business with Iran. So the country itself may not have sanctions against Iran, but very few of the major companies in that country will touch Iran, fearing the US sanctions against their company will cut them off from US trade and banking systems.