Donald Trump and the art of breaking a deal

Donald Trump and the art of breaking a deal

Context

With anti-Iran people getting key posts in the U.S. President’s team, the nuclear deal with Iran becomes the target

A difficult choice

• Under U.S. law, the deal has to be certified every 90 days by the President. Mr. Trump has grudgingly certified compliance twice since his election but didn’t certify it the third time
• So Mr. Trump faces a difficult choice here.
  • In less than two months, he will have to decide either to live with the agreement or pull the U.S. out of it.
  • The rising anti-Iran rhetoric, new actions and the rejig at the White House all suggest that the latter may happen.

Rationale behind the nuclear agreement with Iran

• To stop Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons
• The only alternative to a diplomatic deal to stop Iran going nuclear was war, which would have been disastrous as Iran is a much stronger and more networked country than, say, Iraq or Libya. Closer cooperation between the U.S. and Iran has other benefits as, for e.g. both countries have a shared interest in stabilising Afghanistan and Iraq and defeating the Taliban and the Islamic State.

Irrational Trump administration

• Undoing previous policy decisions: Trump wants to undo most of his predecessor’s policy achievements

Example: He withdrew the U.S. from the Trans-Pacific Partnership and the Paris climate deal. The Trump administration imposed tighter sanctions on Cuba last year

• Iran, the chief troublemaker in West Asia: Trump’s world view, Iran is the troublemaker-in-chief in West Asia

Example: In the initial months of his presidency, Mr. Trump had travelled to Saudi Arabia where he joined a summit of mostly heads of Sunni nations to hit out at Iran

• Disrupting power dynamics in West Asia: In Mr. Trump’s view, or in the view of America’s West Asia allies such as Saudi Arabia and Israel, the nuclear deal allows Iran to join the diplomatic and economic mainstream of the region
  • This has upset the existing power dynamics in West Asia
  • The Saudis and the Israelis are as much afraid of an Iran with nuclear power as they are of an Iran as a non-nuclear regional power.

Fickle superpower: Not an easy way forward

• If U.S. could pull out of the nuclear deal the Europeans are unlikely to follow suit, at least for now
• The U.S. could impose fresh sanctions on Iran, but the possibility of the UN Security Council backing the sanctions is negligible
• So the immediate consequence would be further diplomatic isolation of Washington damaging the U.S.’s reputation as a dealmaker

Conclusion

While one President went to the extent of signing an agreement with a hostile nation, the next President is determined to undo it! How would it encourage other countries such as North Korea to trust diplomatic engagement with the U.S.?