As Seen from Afar 05/07/2018

THE IRAN NUCLEAR ACCORD; WILL TRUMP DENOUNCE IT TOMORROW?

US president Donald Trump today tweeted:

I will be announcing my decision on the Iran Deal tomorrow from the White House at 2:00pm.

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 7, 2018

Under the international deal, the Islamic Republic has agreed to limit its nuclear activities in return for reduced economic sanctions. Britain, France and Germany have been working behind the scenes for weeks in an effort to save the accord, which was closed during the Obama administration, and also signed by Russia and China. Trump, on the other hand, has made it clear right from the start of his campaign that he would pull out of the deal because it was mad, insane, the worst deal ever, horrible, laughable and disastrous among other things.

I could try to explain how and why Trump is trying to sell Americans his ideas on the deal and how terribly wrong it would be if the US pulled out of the agreement, but I’ll leave that to someone who can do that so much better, and far less boring, than I ever could: John Oliver:

In the past few weeks we’ve seen the head of states of the European dealmakers in this accord visit Washington to try and appease the American president and persuade him to stay on board by suggesting to iron out the flaws of the current deal and then negotiate a better deal with Iran.

French President Emmanuel Macron had to admit defeat after his much-televised bromance with his American colleague. Macron afterwards said he believes US President Donald Trump will pull out of the Iran nuclear deal next month “for domestic reasons,” describing the US as “insane” for its constant global policy U-turns, according to a reports from the Guardian.

Next in line was German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who was not granted more than a sober working lunch with president Trump.  Merkel’s rational approach failed too and she went home without that important success to her name.

She later had to defend the Iran nuclear deal again in an interview with an Israeli TV channel. Merkel told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has vehemently criticized the internationally brokered accord for not doing enough to contain Iran’s nuclear ambition: “We believe it is better to have this agreement, even if it is not perfect, than to have no agreement. We will continue to discuss this, but Germany will watch very closely to ensure that this agreement will be fulfilled.”

Time is running out, so the UK sent forth British foreign secretary Boris Johnson who tried an altogether different approach. He wasn’t scheduled to meet with Trump on his short visit to Washington, so he appeared on Fox & Friends on Monday morning to court Trump on his favorite TV show:

Johnson said Mr Trump was “right to see the flaws in the deal”, though he argued they could be fixed. In typical British understatement, the foreign secretary said without the accord, “Plan B does not seem, to me, to be particularly well developed at this stage”. I think the remark may have been lost on both Trump and Fox & Friends hosts.
Johnson continued with: “If you do that you have to answer the question what next? What if the Iranians do rush for a nuclear weapon? …Are we seriously saying that we are going to bomb those facilities at Fordo and Natanz? …Is that really a realistic possibility? Or do we work round what we have got and push back on Iran together?”

He added: “There doesn’t seem to me at the moment to be a viable military solution.”

But like most leaders have learned by now, flattery is the best way to score with president Trump, and in a separate interview during the visit, Boris Johnson discussed the possibility of Mr Trump winning the Nobel Peace Prize.

“If he can fix North Korea and if he can fix the Iran nuclear deal then I don’t see why he is any less of a candidate for the Nobel Peace Prize than Barack Obama, who got it before he even did anything,” he told Sky News.

Well, tomorrow at 2:00pm we’ll learn if this combined European effort has managed to change Trumps mind or not. Or the day after, or have his decision rescinded in an early morning Tweet. After all, Trump can do with all the diversion he can muster and he is known to have a change of heart now and again.

Cross-posted with Care2 here