Trump’s Bizarre and Dangerous Position on Iran Nuclear Deal

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson sent a brief letter to Congress informing them that the Trump administration is reviewing whether they should continue to comply with the Iran nuclear agreement even though they admit that Iran is in full compliance themselves.

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson certified to House Speaker Paul Ryan (R., Wis.) on Tuesday that Iran remained compliant with the deal as of April 18.

But he also said President Donald Trump was reviewing whether his administration would continue to roll back sanctions on Iran as required by the deal, given Tehran’s support for groups Washington designates as terrorist organizations.

“Iran remains a leading state sponsor of terror through many platforms and methods,” Mr. Tillerson wrote. “President Donald J. Trump has directed a National Security Council-led interagency review…that will evaluate whether suspension of sanctions related to Iran pursuant to the [nuclear deal] is vital to the national security interests of the United States.”

Mr. Trump harshly criticized the Obama administration’s deal with Iran, describing it as one of the worst U.S. diplomatic agreements in history.

Okay, let’s make this really simple. If Iran is in compliance with the deal, that means they aren’t making, indeed can’t make, any progress on developing nuclear weapons. Yes, they are still a state sponsor of Hezbollah and other Shiite terrorist groups, but that only makes Trump’s position all the more bizarre. Would you rather have an non-nuclear Iran funding and aiding Hezbollah and the Houths in Yemen, or a nuclear Iran doing so? The answer to that should be quite obvious. And it’s not as if the sanctions that we lifted on Iran as part of the nuclear agreement had prevented them from aiding those groups anyway. It’s an absolutely irrational position.

So why is Trump taking it? Because he’s not just against this agreement, he’s against all diplomatic agreements made with countries he doesn’t like. He’s too simpleminded and too focused on military action to ever think that they can do any good. He’s wrong about that. He’s about as wrong as you can be. But that’s pretty much par for one of his many golf courses.