A predominantly one-topic blog: how is it that the most imminent and lethal implication for humankind - the fact that the doctrine of "Mutually Assured Destruction" will not work with Iran - is not being discussed in our media? Until it is recognized that MAD is dead, the Iranian threat will be treated as a threat only to Israel and not as the global threat which it in fact is.
A blog by Mladen Andrijasevic
I loved the
book. We are 57 years back in time. The names are familiar: Control, Jim
Prideaux ,
Millie McCraig, Connie Sachs, George Smiley, Peter Guillam, Bland,
Alleline, Esterhase, Haydon…
But Europe has changed.
George
Smiley: “If I had an unattainable ideal, it was of leading Europe out of her
darkness towards a new age of reason. I have it still”. I would love to hear
what George would have said had he read
Douglas Murray’s The Strange Death of Europe: Immigration, Identity, Islam
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Why did I cancel my
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only to me and no one else. I gave them
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From the correspondence of Aug 27:
My comments are visible
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They are NOT
visible if I am not logged in, i.e. my comments are not visible to anybody
else . I browsed the comments to the same
article from my son's laptop without logging in and I could not find my
comments . As you can see, between Richard S Zoppo's comment
at 8:45 and Lacey Sheridan's comment at 8:15 pm should be my
comments posted at 8:22 pm and 8:26 pm. They are not there!!
So is this a
deliberate attempt to make me think that my comments are posted? I
demand an explanation. If I do not get one I will cancel my subscription to
the Washington Post
The full
transcript of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's speech to the
UN General Assembly:
Mr.
President, ladies and gentlemen, we're in the midst of a great revolution. A
revolution in Israel's standing among the nations. This is happening because so
many countries around the world have finally woken up to what Israel can do for
them. Those countries now recognize what brilliant investors, like Warren
Buffet, and great companies, like Google and Intel, what they've recognized and
known for years: that Israel is THE innovation nation. THE place for
cutting-edge technology and agriculture, in water, in cybersecurity, in
medicine, in autonomous vehicles. You name it, we've got it.
Those
countries now also recognize Israel's exceptional capabilities in fighting
terrorism. In recent years, Israel has provided intelligence that has prevented
dozens of major terrorist attacks around the world. We have saved countless
lives. Now, you may not know this, but your governments do, and they're working
closely together with Israel to keep your countries safe and your citizens
safe. I stood here last year on this podium, and I spoke about this profound
change in Israel's standing around the world. And just look at what has
happened since, in one year.
Hundreds
of presidents, prime ministers, foreign ministers and other leaders have
visited Israel, many for the first time. Of these many visits, two were truly
historic. In May, President Trump became the first American president to
include Israel in his first visit abroad. President Trump stood at the Western
Wall, at the foot of the Temple Mount, where the Jewish people - or rather the
Jewish people's temples stood for nearly 1,000 years, and when the president
touched those ancient stones, he touched our hearts forever.
In July,
Prime Minister Modi became the first Indian prime minister to visit Israel. You
may have seen ten pictures. We were on a beach in Hadera, we rode together in a
Jeep outfitted with a portable desalination device that some thriving Israeli
entrepreneur invented. We took off our shoes, waded into the Mediterranean, and
drank seawater that had been purified only a few minutes earlier. We imagined
the endless possibilities for India, for Israel, for all of humanity.
In the
past year, Israel has hosted so many world leaders, and I had the honor of representing
my country on six different continents. One year, six continents. I went to
Africa, where I saw Israeli innovators increasing crop yields, turning air into
water, fighting AIDS. I went to Asia, where we deepened our relations with
China and with Singapore and expanded our cooperation with our Muslim friends
in Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan. I went to Europe, where in London and Paris,
Saloniki and Budapest, we enhanced our security and economic ties. I went to
Australia, becoming the first Israeli prime minister to visit our great allies
down under, and just last week, I went to South America, visiting Argentina and
Colombia, and then I went on to Mexico, becoming, if you can believe it, the
first Israeli prime minister ever to visit Latin America.
After 70
years, the world is embracing Israel, and Israel is embracing the world.
(Applause)
One year,
six continents. Now, it's true: I haven't yet visited Antarctica, but one day,
I hope to go there. I want to go there, too, because I heard that penguins are
also enthusiastic supporters of Israel. Now, you laugh, but penguins have no
difficulty recognizing that some things are black and white, are right and
wrong, and unfortunately, when it comes to UN decisions about Israel, that
simple recognition is too often absent.
It was
absent last December when the Security Council passed an anti-Israel resolution
that set back the cause of peace. It was absent last May when the World Health
Organization adopted - you have to listen to this - the World Health
Organization adopted a Syrian-sponsored resolution that criticized Israel for
health conditions on the Golan Heights. As the great John McEnroe would say,
you cannot be serious. I mean, this is preposterous. Syria has barrel-bombed,
starved, gassed and murdered hundreds of thousands of its own citizens and
wounded millions more, while Israel has provided life-saving medical care to
thousands of Syrian victims of that very same carnage. Yet who does the World Health
Organization? Israel.
So is
there no limit to the UN's absurdities when it comes to Israel? Well,
apparently not. Because in July, UNESCO declared the Tomb of the Patriarchs in
Hebron a Palestinian World Heritage Site. That's worse than fake news; that's
fake history. Mind you, it's true that Abraham, the father of both Ishmael and
Isaac, is buried there, but so, too, are Isaac, Jacob, Sarah, Rebecca - Sarah's
a Jewish name, by the way - Sarah, Rebecca and Leah, who just happened to be
patriarchs and matriarchs of the Jewish people. Well, you won't read about that
in the latest UNESCO report, but if you want to, you can read about it in a
somewhat weightier publication. It's called "the Bible." I highly
recommend it. I hear it even got four and a half out of five stars on Amazon.
And it's a great read. I read it every week.
Ladies and
gentlemen, a moment to be serious. Despite the absurdities, despite the
repetition of these farcical events, there is change, slowly but surely. There
are signs of positive change, even at the United Nations.
Mr.
Secretary-General, I very much appreciate your statement that denying Israel's
right to exist is anti-Semitism, pure and simple. Now that's important because
for too long, the epicenter of global anti-Semitism has been right here at the
UN, and while it may take many years, I'm absolutely confident that the
revolution in Israel's ties with individual nations will ultimately be
reflected here in this hall of nations.
I say that
because there's also a marked change in the positions of some of our key
friends. Thanks to President Trump's unequivocal support for Israel in this
body, that positive change is gathering force. So thank you, President Trump.
Thank you for supporting Israel at the UN, and thank you for your support,
Ambassador Nikki Haley. Thank you for speaking the truth about Israel.
(Applause)
But ladies
and gentlemen, here at the UN, we must also speak the truth about Iran, as
President Trump did so powerfully this morning. Now, as you know, I've been
ambassador to the UN, and I'm a long-serving Israeli prime minister, so I've
listened to countless speeches in this hall, but I can say this: None were
bolder, none were more courageous and forthright than the one delivered by
President Trump today. President Trump rightly called the nuclear deal with
Iran - he called it "an embarrassment." Well, I couldn't agree with
him more. And here's why: Iran vows to destroy my country. Every day, including
by its chief of staff the other day.
Iran is
conducting a campaign of conquest across the Middle East, and Iran is
developing ballistic missiles to threaten the entire world.
Two years
ago, I stood here and explained why the Iranian nuclear deal not only doesn't
block Iran's path to the bomb, but actually paves it. Because the restrictions
placed on Iran's nuclear program have what's called "a sunset
clause." Now let me explain what that term means. It means that in a few
years, those restrictions will be automatically removed, not by a change in
Iran's behavior, not by a lessening of its terror or its aggression: they'll
just be removed by a mere change in the calendar. And I warned that when that
sunset comes, a dark shadow will be cast over the entire Middle East and the
world because Iran will then be free to enrich uranium on an industrial scale,
placing it on the threshold of a massive arsenal of nuclear weapons.
That's why
I said two years ago that the greater danger is not that Iran will rush to a
single bomb by breaking the deal, but that Iran will be able to build many
bombs by keeping the deal.
Now, in
the last few months, we've all seen how dangerous even a few nuclear weapons
can be in the hands of a small rogue regime. Now imagine the danger of hundreds
of nuclear weapons in the hands of a vast Iranian-Islamist empire with the
missiles to deliver them anywhere on earth. I know there are those who still
defend the dangerous deal with Iran, arguing that it will block Iran's path to
the bomb. Ladies and gentlemen, that's exactly what they said about the nuclear
deal with North Korea, and we all know how that turned out.
Unfortunately,
if nothing changes, this deal will turn out exactly the same way. That's why
Israel's policy regarding the nuclear deal with Iran is very simple: Change it
or cancel it. Fix it or nix it. Nixing the deal means restoring massive
pressure on Iran, including crippling sanctions until Iran fully dismantles its
nuclear weapons capability. Fixing the deal requires many things, among them
inspecting military and any other site that is a suspect, and penalizing Iran
for every violation. But above all, fixing the deal means getting rid of the
sunset clause. And beyond fixing this bad deal, we must also stop Iran's
development of ballistic missiles and roll back its growing aggression in the
region.
I remember
when we had these debates. As you know, I took a fairly active role in them -
and many supporters of the deal naively believed that it would somehow moderate
Iran. It would make it a responsible member, so they said, of the international
community. Well, you know, I strongly disagreed. I warned that when the
sanctions on Iran would be removed, Iran would behave like a hungry tiger
unleashed, not joining the community of nations, but devouring nations one
after the other. And that's precisely what Iran is doing today.
From the
Caspian Sea to the Mediterranean, from Tehran to Tartus, an Iranian curtain is
descending across the Middle East. Iran spreads this curtain of tyranny and
terror over Iraq, Syria, Lebanon and elsewhere, and it pledges to extinguish
the light of Israel. Today, I have a simple message to Ayatollah Khamenei, the
dictator of Iran: The light of Israel will never be extinguished.
(Applause)
נצח
ישראל לא ישקר.
(Applause)
Those who
threaten us with annihilation put themselves in mortal peril. Israel will
defend itself with the full force of our arms and the full power of our
convictions. We will act to prevent Iran from establishing permanent military
bases in Syria for its air, sea and ground forces. We will act to prevent Iran
from producing deadly weapons in Syria or in Lebanon for use against us. And we
will act to prevent Iran from opening new terror fronts against Israel along
our northern border. As long as Iran's regime seeks the destruction of Israel,
Iran will face no fiercer enemy than Israel.
But I also
have a message today for the people of Iran: You are not our enemy. You are our
friends. (Farsi: Shoma duste ma hesteed.) One day, my Iranian friends, you will
be free from the evil regime that terrorizes you, hangs gays, jails
journalists, tortures political prisoners and shoots innocent women like Neda
Soltan, leaving her choking on her own blood on the streets of Tehran. I have
not forgotten Neda. I'm sure you haven't, too. And so, the people of Iran, when
your day of liberation finally comes, the friendship between our two ancient
peoples will surely flourish once again.
Ladies and
gentlemen, Israel knows that in confronting the Iranian regime, we are not
alone. We stand shoulder-to-shoulder with those in the Arab world who share our
hopes for a brighter future. We've made peace with Jordan and Egypt, whose
courageous president, Abdel-Fattah al-Sissi I met here last night. I appreciate
President al-Sissi's support for peace, and I hope to work closely with him and
other leaders in the region to advance peace.
Israel is
committed to achieving peace with all our Arab neighbors, including the
Palestinians. Yesterday, President Trump and I discussed this, all of this, at
great length. I appreciate President Trump's leadership, his commitment to
stand by Israel's side, his commitment to advance a peaceful future for all.
Together, we can seize the opportunities for peace, and together we can
confront the great dangers of Iran.
The
remarkable alliance between the United States and Israel has never been
stronger, never been deeper. And Israel is deeply grateful for the support of
the Trump administration, the American Congress and the American people.
Ladies and
gentlemen, in this year of historic visits and historic anniversaries, Israel
has so much to be grateful for. One hundred and twenty years ago, Theodore
Herzl convened the First Zionist Congress to transform our tragic past into a
brilliant future by establishing the Jewish state. One hundred years ago, the
Balfour Declaration advanced Herzl's vision by recognizing the right of the
Jewish people to a national home in our ancestral homeland. Seventy years ago,
the United Nations further advanced that vision by adopting a resolution
supporting the establishment of a Jewish state. And 50 years ago, we reunited
our eternal capital, Jerusalem, achieving a miraculous victory against those
who sought to destroy our state.
Theodore
Herzl was our modern Moses, and his dream has come true. We've returned to the
Promised Land, revived our language, ingathered our exiles, and built a modern,
thriving democracy. Tomorrow evening, Jews around the world will celebrate Rosh
Hashanah, the beginning of our new year. It's a time of reflection, and we look
back with wonder at the remarkable, the miraculous rebirth of our nation, and
we look ahead with pride to the remarkable contributions Israel will continue
to make to all nations.
You look
around you, and you will see these contributions every day. In the food you
eat, the water you drink, the medicines you take, the cars you drive, the cell
phones you use, and in so many other ways that are transforming our world. You
see it in the smile of an African mother in a remote village who, thanks to an
Israeli innovation, no longer must walk eight hours a day to bring water to her
children. You see it in the eyes of an Arab child who was flown to Israel to
undergo a life-saving heart operation. And you see it in the faces of the
people in earthquake-stricken Haiti and Nepal who were rescued from the rubble
and given new life by Israeli doctors. As the prophet Isaiah said, (says in
Hebrew first) "I've made you alight onto the nations, bringing salvation
to the ends of the earth."
Today, 27
hundred years after Isaiah spoke those prophetic words, Israel is becoming a
rising power among the nations, and at long last, its light is shining across
the continents, bringing hope and salvation to the ends of the earth.
Happy new
year. Shanah tovah from Israel. Thank you. *****
Winston Churchill’s presented
his Sinews of Peace, (the Iron
Curtain Speech),at Westminster College in Fulton,
Missouri on March 5, 1946:
“From Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the
Adriatic an iron curtain has descended across the Continent.”
We face this decision not
only in North Korea. It is far past time for the nations of the world to
confront another reckless regime, one that speaks openly of mass murder, vowing
death to America, destruction to Israel and ruin for many leaders and nations
in this room.
The
Iranian government masks a corrupt dictatorship behind the false guise of a
democracy. It has turned a wealthy country with a rich history and culture into
an economically depleted rogue state whose chief exports are violence,
bloodshed and chaos.
The
longest suffering victims of Iran's leaders are, in fact, its own people.
Rather than use its resources to improve Iranian lives, its oil profits go to
fund Hezbollah and other terrorists that kill innocent Muslims and attack their
peaceful Arab and Israeli neighbors.
This
wealth, which rightly belongs to Iran's people, also goes to shore up Bashar
al-Assad's dictatorship, fuel Yemen's civil war and undermine peace throughout
the entire Middle East.
We
cannot let a murderous regime continue these destabilizing activities while
building dangerous missiles. And we cannot abide by an agreement if it provides
cover for the eventual construction of a nuclear program.
The
Iran deal was one of the worst and most one-sided transactions the United
States has ever entered into. Frankly, that deal is an embarrassment to the
United States, and I don't think you've heard the last of it, believe me.
It
is time for the entire world to join us in demanding that Iran's government end
its pursuit of death and destruction. It is time for the regime to free all
Americans and citizens of other nations that they have unjustly detained. And
above all, Iran's government must stop supporting terrorists, begin serving its
own people and respect the sovereign rights of its neighbors.
The
entire world understands that the good people of Iran want change and, other
than the vast military power of the United States, that Iran's people are what
their leaders fear the most.
This
is what causes the regime to restrict internet access, tear down satellite
dishes, shoot unarmed student protesters and imprison political reformists.
Oppressive
regimes cannot endure forever, and the day will come when the people will face
a choice: Will they continue down the path of poverty, bloodshed and terror, or
will the Iranian people return to the nation's proud roots as a center of
civilization, culture and wealth, where their people can be happy and
prosperous once again?
The
Iranian regime's support for terror is in stark contrast to the recent
commitments of many of its neighbors to fight terrorism and halt its finance.
In
Saudi Arabia early last year, I was greatly honored to address the leaders of
more than 50 Arab and Muslim nations. We agreed
that all responsible nations must work together to confront terrorists and the
Islamic extremism that inspires them.
If
you think America feels slightly unstable at present, relax. At least you’re
not European.
Currently,
Britain is still going through the fallout from last year’s Brexit vote. A year
after that shock result, Prime Minister Theresa May put herself before the
public to strengthen her hand in negotiations with Brussels. In their wisdom,
the British public responded by clobbering May in a general election that
stripped her party of its majority in Parliament.
Meanwhile,
France has just seen the first presidential election in which neither of the
two main parties even made it through to the final round. Instead, the country
chose young leader Emmanuel Macron, who had to form his party after being
elected. All this is against the usual backdrop of a eurozone staggering from
crisis to crisis and a political elite that celebrates when the far-right Austrian
Freedom Party “only” receives 46 percent of the votes for the presidency.
In
the midst of all this chaos, one country and one woman appear to be standing
strong: Germany and its chancellor, Angela Merkel.
On Sept.
24, the Germans will go to the polls. These are the first federal elections
since 2013, and quite a lot has happened since then.
The minds
of German voters will be on many things. They will be thinking about how to
stabilize the eurozone, the 19 EU countries that have adopted the euro as their
common currency. They will also be wondering how to stop other countries from
following Britain in exiting the European Union. During that process, Berlin
(along with Paris) will have to pull off the double trick of persuading people
that the building is not on fire and reassuring them that the fire doors are in
any case jammed. But one more thing also hovers over these elections.
It is
now seven years since Chancellor Merkel told her country in a speech in Potsdam
that “multiculturalism has utterly failed.” It had been a mistake, she
admitted, to think that the guest workers invited into the country since WWII
would leave. They did not leave. They stayed. Since then, thanks to growing
immigration from the developing world, parallel societies have formed in
Germany. All of which was a damning, unprecedented admission by the chancellor.
But then in 2015 she did something even more unprecedented and with far more
damning consequences. Having admitted that mass immigration into her country
had been a disaster when it had been at a relative low point, she opened up her
country’s borders to bring in a historically unprecedented number of migrants.
During
2015 up to 1.5 million economic migrants and asylum seekers from Africa, the
Middle East and Far East entered Germany, adding an extra 2 percent to the
country’s population in just one year. Merkel’s actions spurred a crisis across
the entire continent. In the days and months following her unilateral decision,
she and her colleagues attempted to bully other European leaders to take on a
share of the problem she had presented them with. Some supported her. Others
bailed.
As I argue
in my latest book “The Strange Death of Europe:
Immigration, Identity, Islam,” there are specific local and
historical reasons why the German chancellor did what she did in August 2015.
But she also exacerbated an immigration challenge which threatens the whole
future of our continent. Any culture would find it hard to accommodate the
rapid movement of so many people. But for it to happen at the same time that
the European continent is suffering from such a weight of historical guilt,
fatigue and lack of self-belief makes it all but impossible.
The
situation Merkel identified as a failure in 2010 was turned into a disaster by
that same leader during her subsequent term in office.
Naturally,
like other leaders across Europe, the German government occasionally recognizes
it must do something about this. Its main answer is to occasionally talk tough
about the problem. Like the politicians of Sweden and other countries, it even
occasionally suggests that it will start deporting the hundreds of thousands of
illegitimate asylum seekers who (by the EU’s own figures) should never have
entered Europe in 2015. But the words “horse,” “gate,” “shut” and “bolted” are
on everybody’s minds, even when not on their lips.
In
regional elections last September, Merkel’s party was severely punished by the
electorate who elected the anti-immigration Alternative for Deutschland party
to the country’s regional assemblies. Moreover, the AfD was just three years
old when it beat Merkel’s own party into third place in her own constituency.
The chancellor subsequently gave what was reported as an “apology,” saying that
Germany should have been better prepared for the 2015 crisis. In reality, this
was no apology at all.
With
the rise of politicians like Geert Wilders in Holland and Marine le Pen in
France, there were those who predicted a drubbing for Merkel this year. But
both Wilders and Le Pen under-performed in their national polls earlier this
year. The AfD is also struggling to break through, and it appears that the
German people already expressed their anger last year. This year they look set
to maintain the status quo. A recent poll showed most Germans (63 percent) now
to be satisfied with the job the Chancellor is doing.
It was Hilaire
Belloc who famously gave the advice: “Always keep ahold of nurse/For fear of
finding something worse.” The German people — surveying the continent around
them — are most likely to hold on. The realization that nurse is part of the
problem may have to wait for another day.
“As an unaccompanied child he
was allowed entry to the UK and after being processed through a migrant centre
in Kent, was found a home with a foster family in Sunbury on Thames.
However detectives will be now seeking to establish if those
responsible for the failed attack had traveled to Britain as genuine refugees,
or if they were actually members of Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Isil)
who had been sent to specifically carry out an attack.”
But how is this possible?
This must be going through the heads of many Europeans. Even if they had a
criminal record in the country of origin what is it that makes them suppress their
compassion for fellow human beings and plan such an atrocity?
Well, Europeans are well aware
what political ideologies of the twentieth century had made their supporters do. But
they seem not quite aware what the ideology of the twenty-first century is
capable of.
Here is a short film 'The Last Day of
Silence' about the planned march in London on September 23rd which explains
the ideological drive behind the attacks.
With regard to “A-G
tells Sara of intent to indict” (September 8), the recently investigated
affairs were the Prepared Food Affair, the Waiters Affair, the Electrician
Affair and the Father’s Homecare Affair. Apparently, Sara Netanyahu will likely
be indicted only in the Prime Minister’s Residence Affair.
This comes at a time
when US Defense Secretary James Mattis says that the Americans “are not looking
to the total annihilation of a country, namely North Korea, but as I said, we
have many options to do so.” Has Israel got its priorities right?
I have been reading CharlesKrauthammer’s
Things That Matter: Three Decades of Passions,
Pastimes and Politics when I came to this article published in Time in
2006. Could not be more relevant today.
Like many physicists who worked on the Manhattan Project, Richard Feynman could
not get the Bomb out of his mind after the war. "I would see people
building a bridge," he wrote. "And I thought, they're crazy, they
just don't understand, they don't understand. Why are they making new things?
It's so useless."
Feynman was convinced man had finally invented
something that he could not control and that would ultimately destroy him. For
six decades we have suppressed that thought and built enough history to believe
Feynman's pessimism was unwarranted. After all, soon afterward, the most
aggressive world power, Stalin's Soviet Union, acquired the Bomb, yet never
used it. Seven more countries have acquired it since and never used it either.
Even North Korea, which huffs and puffs and threatens every once in a while,
dares not use it. Even Kim Jong Il is not suicidal.
But that's the point. We're now at the dawn of
an era in which an extreme and fanatical religious ideology, undeterred by the
usual calculations of prudence and self-preservation, is wielding state power
and will soon be wielding nuclear power.
We have difficulty understanding the mentality
of Iran's newest rulers. Then again, we don't understand the mentality of the
men who flew into the World Trade Center or the mobs in Damascus and Tehran who
chant "Death to America"--and Denmark(!)--and embrace the glory and
romance of martyrdom.
This atavistic love of blood and death and,
indeed, self-immolation in the name of God may not be new--medieval Europe had an
abundance of millennial Christian sects--but until now it has never had the
means to carry out its apocalyptic ends.
That is why Iran's arriving at the threshold of
nuclear weaponry is such a signal historical moment. It is not just that its
President says crazy things about the Holocaust. It is that he is a fervent
believer in the imminent reappearance of the 12th Imam, Shi'ism's version of
the Messiah. President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has been reported as saying in
official meetings that the end of history is only two or three years away. He
reportedly told an associate that on the podium of the General Assembly last
September, he felt a halo around him and for "those 27 or 28 minutes, the
leaders of the world did not blink ... as if a hand was holding them there and
it opened their eyes to receive" his message. He believes that the Islamic
revolution's raison d'être is to prepare the way for the messianic
redemption, which in his eschatology is preceded by worldwide upheaval and
chaos. How better to light the fuse for eternal bliss than with a nuclear
flame?
Depending on your own beliefs, Ahmadinejad is
either mystical or deranged. In either case, he is exceedingly dangerous. And
Iran is just the first. With infinitely accelerated exchanges of information helping
develop whole new generations of scientists, extremist countries led by
similarly extreme men will be in a position to acquire nuclear weaponry. If
nothing is done, we face not proliferation but hyperproliferation. Not just one
but many radical states will get weapons of mass extinction, and then so will
the fanatical and suicidal terrorists who are their brothers and clients.
That will present the world with two futures.
The first is Feynman's vision of human destruction on a scale never seen. The second,
perhaps after one or two cities are lost with millions killed in a single day,
is a radical abolition of liberal democracy as the species tries to maintain
itself by reverting to strict authoritarianism--a self-imposed expulsion from
the Eden of post-Enlightenment freedom.
Can there be a third future? That will depend
on whether we succeed in holding proliferation at bay. Iran is the test case.
It is the most dangerous political entity on the planet, and yet the world
response has been catastrophically slow and reluctant. Years of knowingly
useless negotiations, followed by hesitant international resolutions, have
brought us to only the most tentative of steps--referral to a Security Council
that lacks unity and resolve. Iran knows this and therefore defiantly and
openly resumes its headlong march to nuclear status. If we fail to prevent an
Iranian regime run by apocalyptic fanatics from going nuclear, we will have
reached a point of no return. It is not just that Iran might be the source of a
great conflagration but that we will have demonstrated to the world that for
those similarly inclined there is no serious impediment.
Our planet is 4,500,000,000 years old, and
we've had nukes for exactly 61. No one knows the precise prospects for human
extinction, but Feynman was a mathematical genius who knew how to calculate
odds. If he were to watch us today about to let loose the agents of extinction,
he'd call a halt to all bridge building
U.S. Permanent Representative to the United Nations
U.S. Mission to the United Nations
New York City
September 5, 2017
AS DELIVERED
Thank you very much.
It’s great to see so many people in the room, and thank you for hosting me
today. Arthur Brooks is one of the coolest people I know. The Conservative Heart was
brilliantly written and impacted me greatly, so I value his friendship and the
contributions AEI continues to make.
I’m here today to
speak about Iran and the 2015 nuclear agreement. This is a topic that should
concern all Americans, as it has a serious impact on our national security and
the security of the world. It’s a topic that comes up frequently at the United
Nations. And it’s a topic we’ve been looking at carefully, including recently
visiting with the Iran nuclear monitors at the International Atomic Energy
Agency in Vienna. We were impressed by the IAEA team and its efforts.
Director General Amano
is a very capable diplomat, and he’s a serious person who clearly understands
the critical nature of his task. In our discussion, Amano made an observation
that stood out to me. He said that monitoring Iranian compliance with the
nuclear deal is like a jigsaw puzzle. Picking up just one piece doesn’t give
you the full picture. That’s a very appropriate metaphor, and it goes well
beyond the work of the IAEA. It goes to the entire way we must look at Iranian
behavior and American security interests. Many observers miss that point. They
think, “Well, as long as Iran is meeting the limits on enriched uranium and
centrifuges, then it’s complying with the deal.” That’s not true. This is a
jigsaw puzzle.
Next month, President
Trump will once again be called upon to declare whether he finds Iran in
compliance with the terms of the deal. It should be noted that this requirement
to assess compliance does not come from the deal itself. It was created by
Congress in the Iran Nuclear Agreement Review Act, also known as the
Corker-Cardin law. That’s a very important distinction to keep in mind, because
many people confuse the requirements of the deal with the requirements of U.S.
law. I’m not going to prejudge in any way what the president is going to decide
next month. While I have discussed it with him, I do not know what decision he
will make. It is his decision to make and his alone.
It’s a complicated
question. The truth is, the Iran deal has so many flaws that it’s tempting to
leave it. But the deal was constructed in a way that makes leaving it less
attractive. It gave Iran what it wanted up-front, in exchange for temporary
promises to deliver what we want. That’s not good.
Iran was feeling the
pinch of international sanctions in a big way. In the two years before the deal
was signed, Iran’s GDP actually shrunk by more than four percent. In the two years
since the deal and the lifting of sanctions, Iran’s GDP has grown by nearly
five percent. That’s a great deal for them. What we get from the deal is not so
clear.
I’m here to outline
some of the critical considerations that must go into any analysis of Iranian
compliance, and I hope to debunk some of the misperceptions about the decision
the president will face next month.
The question of
Iranian compliance is not as straight forward as many people believe. It’s not
just about the technical terms of the nuclear agreement. It requires a much
more thorough look. Iranian compliance involves three different pillars. The
first is the nuclear agreement itself, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action,
or JCPOA. The second pillar is UN Security Council Resolution 2231, which
endorsed the nuclear deal, but also restricted numerous other Iranian
behaviors. And the third pillar is the Corker-Cardin law, which governs the
president’s relationship with Congress as it relates to Iran policy.
Before diving into
these details, it’s important to lay a foundation for exactly what we’re
dealing with when we talk about the Iranian regime. Judging any international
agreement begins and ends with the nature of the government that signed it.
Does it respect international law? Can it be trusted to abide by its
commitments? Is the agreement strong enough to withstand the regime’s attempt
to cheat? Given those answers, is the agreement in the national interest of the
United States?
The Islamic Republic
of Iran was born in an act of international lawbreaking. On November 4, 1979, a
group of Islamic revolutionary students overran the U.S. Embassy in Tehran. In
violation of international law, they held 52 American Marines and diplomats
hostage for 444 days. For the 38 years since, the Iranian regime has existed
outside the community of law-abiding nations. Henry Kissinger famously said
that Iran can’t decide whether it is a nation or a cause. Since 1979, the
regime has behaved like a cause – the cause of spreading revolutionary Shiite Islam
by force. Its main enemy and rallying point has been, and continues to be, what
it calls the “Great Satan” – the United States of America. And the regime’s
main weapon in pursuit of its revolutionary aims has been the Islamic
Revolutionary Guard Corps, or IRGC.
Soon after the
revolution, the IRGC was created to protect the revolution from its foreign and
domestic enemies. The IRGC reported not to elected government, but to the
Supreme Leader alone. Soon after its own creation, the IRGC founded Hezbollah
to spread Iran’s influence and its revolution abroad. Then came the bombing of
the U.S. embassy in Beirut in 1983 – 63 Americans killed. Then came the bombing
of the Marine barracks – 241 Americans killed. Then the kidnapping and murder
of CIA station chief William Buckley. In 1985, a TWA airplane was hijacked. The
body of a U.S. Navy diver was dumped on the runway at the Beirut airport. In
1988, U.S. Marine Colonel Robert Higgins, a UN peacekeeper in South Lebanon,
was kidnapped and executed. Under the IRGC’s direction, Hezbollah then expanded
its lethal reach to Europe, Africa, Asia, and the Americas in search of victims
to kill. In 1994, a Jewish community center in Buenos Aires was bombed – 85
killed. In 1996, a truck bomb blew up Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia – 19 U.S.
airmen killed.
Throughout the Iraq
war, the number one killer of U.S. troops was improvised explosive devices, or
IEDs, the deadliest of which were supplied by the IRGC. Thousands of American
men and women were wounded or killed. In 2005, Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik
Hariri was assassinated. In 2011, the U.S. disrupted an IRGC plot to bomb an
American restaurant less than two miles from here. The target was the Saudi
Ambassador.
Today, Hezbollah is
doing the Iranian regime’s dirty work supporting the war crimes of Syria’s
Assad. And it is building an arsenal of weapons and battle-hardened fighters in
Lebanon in preparation for war. This is the nature of the regime and its quest
to overturn the international order. Its power and influence has grown over
time, even as it remains unaccountable to the Iranian people. It’s hard to find
a conflict or a suffering people in the Middle East that the Iranian regime,
the IRGC, or the proxies do not touch.
In parallel with its
support for terrorism and proxy wars, Iran’s military has long pursued nuclear
weapons, all while attempting to hide its intentions. For decades, the Iranian
military conducted a covert nuclear weapons program, undeclared and hidden from
international inspectors. In 2002, Iranian dissidents revealed the existence of
a uranium enrichment plant and heavy water reactor – both violations of Iran’s
safeguards agreement with the IAEA. The regime went on to break multiple
promises to abide by international inspections and limits. It hid its nuclear
weapons development and lied about it until it got caught.
In 2009, American,
British, and French intelligence revealed the existence of a secret uranium
enrichment plant deep inside a mountain, deep inside an IRGC base. The British
Prime Minister summed up Iran’s behavior well, calling it, “the serial
deception of many years.”
It was soon after this
that President Obama began negotiating a deal with Iran. The deal he struck
wasn’t supposed to be just about nuclear weapons. It was meant to be an opening
with Iran, a welcoming back into the community of nations. President Obama
believed that after decades of hostility to the U.S., the Iranian regime was
willing to negotiate an end to its nuclear program.
Much has been written
about the JCPOA. I won’t repeat it all here. Let’s just say that the agreement
falls short of what was promised. We were promised an “end” to the Iranian
nuclear program. What emerged was not an end, but a pause. Under the deal, Iran
will continue to enrich uranium and develop advanced centrifuges. We were
promised “anytime, anywhere” inspections of sites in Iran. The final agreement
delivered much less. The promised 24/7 inspections apply only to Iran’s
“declared” nuclear sites. For any undeclared but suspected sites, the regime
can deny access for up to 24 days.
Then there’s the
deal’s expiration dates. After 10 years, the limits on uranium, advanced
centrifuges, and other nuclear restrictions begin to evaporate. And in less
than 10 years, they have the opportunity to upgrade their capabilities in
various ways. The JCPOA is, therefore, a very flawed and limited agreement. But
even so, Iran has been caught in multiple violations over the past year and a
half.
In February 2016 –
just a month after the agreement was implemented – the IAEA discovered Iran had
exceeded its allowable limit of heavy water. Nine months later, Iran exceeded
the heavy water limit again. Both times, the Obama Administration helped Iran
get back into compliance and refused to declare it a violation. If that’s not
enough, the biggest concern is that Iranian leaders – the same ones who in the
past were caught operating a covert nuclear program at military sites – have
stated publicly that they will refuse to allow IAEA inspections of their
military sites. How can we know Iran is complying with the deal if inspectors
are not allowed to look everywhere they should look?
Another major flaw in
the JCPOA is its penalty provisions. Whether an Iranian violation is big or
small – whether it is deemed material or non-material – the deal provides for
only one penalty. That penalty is the re-imposition of sanctions. And if
sanctions are re-imposed, Iran is then freed from all its commitments that it
made. Think about that. There is an absurdly circular logic to enforcement of
this deal. Penalizing its violations don’t make the deal stronger, they blow it
up. Iran’s leaders know this. They are counting on the world brushing off
relatively minor infractions – or even relatively major ones. They are counting
on the United States and the other parties to the agreement being so invested
in its success that they overlook Iranian cheating. That is exactly what our
previous administration did.
It is this
unwillingness to challenge Iranian behavior for fear of damaging the nuclear agreement
that gets to the heart of the threat the deal poses to our national security.
The Iranian nuclear deal was designed to be too big to fail. The deal drew an
artificial line between the Iranian regime’s nuclear development and the rest
of its lawless behavior. It said “we’ve made this deal on the nuclear side, so
none of the regime’s other bad behavior is important enough to threaten the
nuclear agreement.” The result is that for advocates of the deal, everything in
our relationship with the Iranian regime must now be subordinated to the
preservation of the agreement.
The Iranians
understand this dynamic. Just last month, when the United States imposed new
sanctions in response to Iranian missile launches, Iran’s leaders threatened
once again to leave the JCPOA and return to a nuclear program more advanced
than the one they had before the agreement. This arrogant threat tells us one
thing: Iran’s leaders want to use the nuclear deal to hold the world hostage to
its bad behavior. This threat is a perfect example of how judging the regime’s
nuclear plans strictly in terms of compliance with the JCPOA is dangerous and
short-sighted. More importantly, it misses the point.
Why did we need to
prevent the Iranian regime from acquiring nuclear weapons in the first place?
The answer has everything to do with the nature of the regime and the IRGC’s
determination to threaten Iran’s neighbors and advance its revolution. And that
is where the other two pillars that connect us to the nuclear deal come into
play. The second pillar directly involves the United Nations. When the nuclear
agreement was signed, the Obama Administration took Iran’s non-nuclear activity
– the missile development, the arms smuggling, the terrorism, the support for
murderous regimes – and rolled it up into UN Security Council Resolution 2231.
Critically, included
in this supposed “non-nuclear” activity is the IRGC’s ongoing development of
ballistic missile technology. You can call it “non-nuclear” all you want –
missile technology cannot be separated from pursuit of a nuclear weapon. North
Korea is showing the world that right now. Every six months, the UN
Secretary-General reports to the Security Council on the Iranian regime’s
compliance with this so-called “non-nuclear” resolution. Each report is filled
with devastating evidence of Iranian violations. Proven arms smuggling.
Violations of travel bans. Ongoing support for terrorism. Stoking of regional
conflicts. The Secretary-General’s report also includes ample evidence of
ballistic missile technology and launches. The regime has engaged in such
launches repeatedly, including in July of this year when it launched a rocket
into space that intelligence experts say can be used to develop an
intercontinental ballistic missile. They are clearly acting in defiance of UN
Resolution 2231 by developing missile technology capable of deploying nuclear
warheads. Unfortunately, as happens all too often at the UN, many Member States
choose to ignore blatant violations of the UN’s own resolutions.
In this way, we see
how dangerously these two pillars of Iran policy work together. The
international community has powerful incentives to go out of its way to assert
that the Iranian regime is in “compliance” on the nuclear side. Meanwhile, the
UN is too reluctant to address the regime’s so-called non-nuclear violations.
The result is that Iran’s military continues its march toward the missile
technology to deliver a nuclear warhead. And the world becomes a more dangerous
place.
That’s where the third
pillar of our Iran nuclear policy comes in: the Corker-Cardin law. As you
recall, President Obama refused to submit the Iran deal to Congress as a
treaty. He knew full well that Congress would have rejected it. In fact,
majorities in both houses of Congress voted against the deal. Among the “no”
votes were leading Democrats like Senators Chuck Schumer, Ben Cardin, and Bob
Menendez.
Despite President
Obama’s constitutionally questionable dodge of Congress, the legislative body
did attempt to exercise some of its authority with passage of the Corker-Cardin
law.
The law requires that
the president make a certification to Congress every 90 days. But, importantly,
the law asks the president to certify several things, not just one. The first
is that Iran has not materially breached the JCPOA. That’s the one everyone
focuses on. But the Corker-Cardin law also requires something else – something
that is often overlooked. It asks the president to certify that the suspension
of sanctions against Iran is appropriate and proportionate to Iran’s nuclear
measures and that it is vital to the national security interests of the United
States.
So regardless of
whether one considers Iran’s violations of the JCPOA to have been material, and
regardless of whether one considers Iran’s flouting of the UN resolution on its
ballistic missile technology to be “non-nuclear,” U.S. law requires the
president to also look at whether the Iran deal is appropriate, proportionate,
and in our national security interests. Corker-Cardin asks us to put together
the pieces of the jigsaw puzzle.
Under its structure,
we must consider not just the Iranian regime’s technical violations of the
JCPOA, but also its violations of Resolution 2231 and its long history of
aggression. We must consider the regime’s repeated, demonstrated hostility
toward the United States. We must consider its history of deception about its
nuclear program. We must consider its ongoing development of ballistic missile
technology. And we must consider the day when the terms of the JCPOA sunset.
That’s a day when Iran’s military may very well already have the missile
technology to send a nuclear warhead to the United States – a technology that
North Korea only recently developed.
In short, we must
consider the whole picture, not simply whether Iran has exceeded the JCPOA’s
limit on uranium enrichment. We must consider the whole jigsaw puzzle, not just
one of its pieces. That’s the judgment President Trump will have to make in
October. And if the president does not certify Iranian compliance, the
Corker-Cardin law also tells us what happens next. What happens next is
significantly in Congress’s hands. This is critically important and almost
completely overlooked. If the president chooses not to certify Iranian
compliance, that does not mean the United States is withdrawing from the JCPOA.
Withdrawal from the agreement is governed by the terms of the JCPOA. The
Corker-Cardin law governs the relationship between the president and Congress.
If the president finds
that he cannot certify Iranian compliance, it would signal one or more of the
following messages to Congress. Either the administration believes Iran is in
violation of the deal; or the lifting of sanctions against Iran is not
appropriate and proportional to the regime’s behavior; or the lifting of
sanctions is not in the U.S. national security interest. Under the law,
Congress then has 60 days to consider whether to re-impose sanctions on Iran.
During that time, Congress could take the opportunity to debate Iran’s support
for terrorism, its past nuclear activity, and its massive human rights violations,
all of which are called for in Corker-Cardin.
Congress could debate
whether the nuclear deal is in fact too big to fail. We should welcome a debate
over whether the JCPOA is in the U.S. national security interest. The previous
administration set up the deal in a way that denied us that honest and serious
debate.
If the president finds
that he cannot in good faith certify Iranian compliance, he would initiate a
process whereby we move beyond narrow technicalities and look at the big
picture. At issue is our national security interest. It’s past time we had an
Iran nuclear policy that acknowledged that.
