RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/19783/iran-deal-congressional-approval

When President Joe Biden entered the White House… he eased off on sanctions and made it blatantly obvious he would do almost anything for a deal with Iran.

The consequence has been uranium enrichment from 5% to 60%, and with some material up to 84%, according to IAEA suspicions — verging on the levels needed for a bomb.

Biden was so fixated on gaining a deal that he allowed Moscow to take the lead on international negotiations, and his plans even envisaged Russia getting control of Iran’s highly enriched uranium. All of this as Putin has been threatening the West with his own nuclear weapons and savaging Ukraine while US taxpayers spend billions of dollars to counter him.

In return for virtually nothing, Tehran would get an initial $20 billion release of frozen assets with perhaps hundreds of billions more to follow, plus US undertakings not to add further sanctions or pursue resolutions against Iran in the UN Security Council or the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

This freeze-for-unfreeze deal makes no sense on any level, especially with Iran, a country that has a track record of breaching the terms of the JCPOA not to mention its documented violations of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty which it signed.

With Iran’s long history of violence across the region and around the world, the administration can’t point to any signs of a reformed, more peacefully-inclined regime that might provide some rationale for thinking it can be dealt with like a civilised country.

The list really does go on and on. It is proof positive of Iran’s continued violent intent which will be enabled and fuelled by the huge cash injection Biden is proposing. Some of this money will also of course be funnelled into Iran’s nuclear weapons programme.

Biden will also be peering down the barrel of further policy failure if Ukraine cannot prevail against Russian military might despite enormous quantities of US aid. He knows that if Kyiv cannot prevail, some of the responsibility for that will lie at his own door, given his drip-feeding of weaponry when a deluge was not only necessary but also possible. It will represent another defeat for the US and NATO on his watch.

Add to all that Biden’s misjudgement in the Middle East: not only his appeasement of Iran but also his petulant and insulting treatment of Saudi Arabia, which opened the door to the Chinese Communist Party becoming a major regional power broker.

Israel, above all nations, cannot afford for Iran to become a nuclear-armed state. It is Tehran’s number-one target. Jerusalem cannot take any chances with a regime that has repeatedly stated its intention to wipe Israel off the face of the earth and is developing the means to do so.

What is clear is that Biden has no more intention of standing by his repeated undertakings to prevent a nuclear-armed Iran than Obama had. Like his Democratic Party predecessor, Biden has rolled over to the inevitability of Tehran getting the bomb and is opting for a policy of containment based largely on appeasing the ayatollahs, camouflaged by a nuclear agreement. It amounts to nothing less than capitulation to Iranian blackmail.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/19775/us-troops-syria

The primary agenda of the Russian-Iranian meeting was reportedly “to discuss expelling the United States from Syria, which may indicate Russia’s intent to facilitate Iranian-backed attacks on US forces.”

Above all, the US presence is important as a blocking force to deny Iran an uninterrupted land bridge to Lebanon and the eastern Mediterranean, and to check the Iranian regime’s long-term expansionist dream of “exporting the revolution.”

Iran already effectively controls three countries in addition to its own – Iraq, Lebanon and Yemen – and has been broadening its influence throughout Latin America.

Any drawdown of the US troop presence at al-Tanf will also tempt adversarial “great powers” in Syria — such as Iran, Russia and especially Turkey — to attack US allies in the region, starting with the Kurdish-majority Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).

The US presence, in addition, greatly helps safeguard the liberty of countless Syrians from the tyrannical Syrian regime of President Bashar al-Assad…

The pro-democratic forces in Syria and border regions in Iraq also help to prevent the remnants of the Islamic State (ISIS) from reconstituting itself into a robust terrorist entity, as they have already started to do.

US Assistant Secretary of Defense Celeste Wallander, during her September 2022 visit to the region, characterized the mission of these forces as “to ensure the enduring defeat of ISIS.”

Departure also would likely further decrease confidence in US pledges to defend vulnerable democracies throughout the world. Both Taiwan and archipelago countries in Southeast Asia would probably be the most affected by any US plan that abandoned the Kurds to Turkey, Iran and ISIS.

A withdrawal of US forces from their current Syrian redoubts will almost certainly imperil the sovereignty of Iraq, Syria as well as the mission of Kurdish troops. These missions include: guarding prisons that hold hundreds of incarcerated ISIS jihadists as well as monitoring the expansive displaced persons camp at al-Hol, which hosts tens of thousands of the wives and children of ISIS jihadists.

If the Kurds are not able to execute their mission of suppressing ISIS, the failure would quickly lead to a rapid expansion of the terrorist group.

[C]losure of the US mission in Syria would cause alarm among allies and risk accelerating an already precipitous decline in US influence throughout the Middle East…. There is little doubt that the image of US primacy on the world stage, as after the catastrophic withdrawal from Afghanistan, will deteriorate even further. Ally and adversary alike will seek non-American alternatives to protect their national interests.

Although continued US troop presence in Syria is not without risk, withdrawal from the region would no doubt trigger an even greater risk to America’s interests — while remaining in Syria accomplishes much at minimal cost.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/19758/dangerous-nuclear-deal

“I urge the Administration to remember that U.S. law requires that any agreement, arrangement, or understanding with Iran needs to be submitted to Congress.” — Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Texas), Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, in a letter to US President Joe Biden, June 15, 2023.

“INARA [the Iran Nuclear Agreement Review Act of 2015] was enacted with strong bipartisan support to ensure Congressional oversight of U.S. policy regarding Iran’s nuclear program…. This definition makes clear that any arrangement or understanding with Iran, even informal, requires submission to Congress.” — Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Texas), Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, in a letter to US President Joe Biden, June 15, 2023 [Emphasis added].

[T]he return to the nuclear deal means that the current sanctions against Tehran will be lifted and the regime would reportedly receive $100 billion a year “to Destabilise [the] Region,” as well as legitimately to rejoin the global financial system. Through the nuclear deal, the Iranian regime will again buy itself a blank check to advance its aggressive and fundamentalist policies across the Middle East, just as it did after the 2015 nuclear deal, but this time with the potential of threatening other countries with its nuclear breakout capability.

“To give them another windfall of cash like we did as a result of the 2015 nuclear deal, which led to an expansion of their proxy wars in the Middle East, it doesn’t make any sense. It’s not in our national interest…. They’re gonna fuel their proxy wars and they’re seeking domination and control in the Middle East…. No, it’s not a good deal. It wasn’t a good deal in 2015. It’s not a good deal now.” — Retired U.S. Army General Jack Keane, The Hill, June 18, 2023.https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/19758/dangerous-nuclear-deal

“I urge the Administration to remember that U.S. law requires that any agreement, arrangement, or understanding with Iran needs to be submitted to Congress.” — Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Texas), Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, in a letter to US President Joe Biden, June 15, 2023.

“INARA [the Iran Nuclear Agreement Review Act of 2015] was enacted with strong bipartisan support to ensure Congressional oversight of U.S. policy regarding Iran’s nuclear program…. This definition makes clear that any arrangement or understanding with Iran, even informal, requires submission to Congress.” — Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Texas), Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, in a letter to US President Joe Biden, June 15, 2023 [Emphasis added].

[T]he return to the nuclear deal means that the current sanctions against Tehran will be lifted and the regime would reportedly receive $100 billion a year “to Destabilise [the] Region,” as well as legitimately to rejoin the global financial system. Through the nuclear deal, the Iranian regime will again buy itself a blank check to advance its aggressive and fundamentalist policies across the Middle East, just as it did after the 2015 nuclear deal, but this time with the potential of threatening other countries with its nuclear breakout capability.

“To give them another windfall of cash like we did as a result of the 2015 nuclear deal, which led to an expansion of their proxy wars in the Middle East, it doesn’t make any sense. It’s not in our national interest…. They’re gonna fuel their proxy wars and they’re seeking domination and control in the Middle East…. No, it’s not a good deal. It wasn’t a good deal in 2015. It’s not a good deal now.” — Retired U.S. Army General Jack Keane, The Hill, June 18, 2023.

The Biden Administration, in an attempt to revive the Iran nuclear deal, has been quietly negotiating with the theocratic regime of President Ebrahim Raisi, known — for his crimes against humanity and his involvement in a massacre of nearly 30,000 political prisoners — as “the Butcher of Tehran.”

https://amgreatness.com/2023/06/28/biden-abroad-the-moral-and-material-collapse-of-u-s-foreign-policy/

The American post-Cold War order from the Ronald Reagan through George W. Bush administration is over.

Barack Obama began its erosion with his tired lectures about the past sins of the United States.

Obama empowered radical Islamists. He invited Russia back into the Middle East after a forty-year hiatus. He snored while Vladimir Putin swallowed large areas of Ukraine. He nonchalantly allowed ISIS almost to take over Iraq. And he authored the Libyan misadventure.

Joe Biden has greatly amplified what Obama inaugurated. He accentuates the Obama-authored foreign policy disasters by his own family corruption.

If the U.S. had an honest media, a disinterested Department of Justice, and a professional FBI, the Biden family would likely be facing felony bribery charges and an impeachment vote for leveraging the interests of the U.S. for a few millions of Ukrainian and Chinese cash.

Biden has forfeited any moral credibility America once had in sermonizing to the world about the advantages of transparent democracy.

Instead, Washington under Biden went full Third-world. His family got rich from his offices, and Joe Biden warped government agencies in efforts to take out his next possible presidential rival.

Antony Blinken, Biden’s current Secretary of State, is known mostly for meekly accepting a dressing down from Chinese diplomats in 2021 and subsequent ritual humiliations.

Blinken was also the author of the 2020 election shenanigan of soliciting former intelligence authorities to publish a preposterous lie that Hunter Biden’s laptop had all the “hallmarks” of “Russian disinformation.” Blinken’s inspired farce was dreamed up to aid a then struggling candidate Biden in his last presidential debate.

The net result of the Obama-Biden continuum has been the moral and material collapse of U.S. foreign policy.

Americans are bewildered that China is now buzzing our jets. It plays chicken with American warships.

It mocks our homeland defenses by sending a spy balloon with impunity across the continental United States.

It is defiantly mum about its creation of a gain-of-function virus under the auspices of the People’s Liberation Army, despite the ensuing Covid epidemic that killed over 1 million Americans.

The weird reaction of the Biden administration to these affronts is either to contextualize Beijing’s aggression or to ignore them entirely.

Under the earlier Obama-Biden “reset” of Russia, we also paid little attention to the past aggressions of Vladimir Putin, appeased his provocations, and earned the 2014 Russian take-over of the Ukrainian border and Crimea.

https://www.frontpagemag.com/still-appeasing-after-all-these-years/

Despite the Biden administration’s two years of cringing, futile negotiations with the Iranian theocrats, he’s back with yet another disastrous proposal–– an unwritten “understanding” regarding the mullahcracy’s efforts to build nuclear weapons. But the regime is close, perhaps mere months, to having enough enriched uranium at the purity needed to manufacture weapons. The current outreach, if successful, will lead to a much more dangerous Middle East, especially for our allies like Israel and Sunni Muslim states.

The “understanding” as reported does nothing to fix the deep flaws in our foreign policy toward Iran for the last 44 years, particularly the failings of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action signed in 2015 by the U.S. and six other world powers. The provisions of this new plan include pledges from Iran not to enrich uranium any closer to the 90% needed for nuclear weapons, along with the return of American hostages. As a down payment, Iran a few weeks ago received from Iraq $2.76 billion after Biden waived sanctions on the funds. But don’t worry, Iran will spend the windfall on “food and medicine,” an old bait-and-switch we saw Saddam Hussein pull on us after the first Gulf War.

In return for our feckless generosity, Iran will receive further sanctions relief and other payments totaling as much as $20 billion, with a promise of no new sanctions, even as Iran keeps possession of its 60% enriched uranium, enough for five bombs. Nor is it clear the mullahs will face inspections and censures from the International Atomic Energy Agency. By the way, there’s no word on an IAEA finding in February that Iran has already enriched uranium to 84%, a claim that Iran brushed off as an “inspector’s error.”

As the Wall Street Journal editorial said, ‘“Trust but verify’ is being turned on its head. There’s no trust and little verification. The new strategy is hope and pay.”

Moreover, these terms are even worse than the JCPOA that serially has failed to slow down Iran’s march to nuclear weapons, its international adventurism, or its support for terrorism. The “understanding” merely reprises the fatal assumption that signing multinational agreements and joining globalist institutions, absent a credible threat of force, can slow down or stop an aggressor. In particular we shouldn’t put our faith in Iran. After all, in 1970 Iran had signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, but after the ’79 revolution secretly began violating its terms. So it shouldn’t be surprising that the mullahs started violating the JCPOA before the ink on the agreement had dried.