A stream of migrants at the southern border. A creeping debt ceiling that Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell has hinted might collapse the market. A lingering pandemic. Dust-ups with France over a nuclear submarine deal with Australia. President Joe Biden’s to-do list is overflowing. The last thing Biden needs is a new crisis with Iran.
Unfortunately, if the diplomatic process over Iran’s nuclear program doesn’t start moving again, Washington and Tehran could very well find themselves in a crisis situation both want to avoid. There is time to stop short of the looming cliff. But that won’t happen if Biden leans back on a maximum pressure strategy of intense sanctions and diplomatic pressure.
The Biden administration says it remains committed to the diplomatic track. During his first address to the U.N. General Assembly this week, Biden reiterated that he is “prepared to return” to the 2015 nuclear deal if Iran does the same. The new Iranian president, Ebrahim Raisi, said similar words. In an ideal world, returning to the accord would be a relatively simple proposition. Nothing, however, is simple between the United States and Iran.
That’s certainly the view from U.S. officials such as special envoy Robert Malley, who has the unenviable responsibility of enticing the Iranians into meeting their nuclear commitments. He is now wrestling with a new Iranian government that is stacked with hard-liners and a new regime seemingly convinced that hitting pause on the talks (and using that time to refine its nuclear program) will pressure Washington into offering more concessions. So far, the Biden administration has no intention of playing ball.
The Iranian foreign ministry has indicated talks could resume in a few weeks. One hopes this is true and that both parties, instead of staring each other down in a counterproductive game of chicken, pick up where the negotiations left off back in June. Plan A, getting both sides back into an imperfect but good enough deal, continues to be the best option on the table. It is most likely to avert what could quickly spiral into a needless confrontation.
Plan B, according to Axios’s Barak Ravid, entails slapping more sanctions on Iran. But that’s hardly a sufficient alternative. Indeed, it’s essentially a regurgitation of the Trump administration’s maximum pressure strategy. That strategy effectively hammered the Iranian economy, decreasing Tehran’s crude oil exports by about 84%, and depriving the Iranian government of approximately $150 billion in much-needed revenue. Yet, the strategy failed to achieve the exact thing its architects (former national security adviser John Bolton and former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo) confidently predicted: an Iranian economy so hemmed in that a weakened Tehran would swallow its pride, drag itself back to the table, and wave the white flag of surrender. The result was the precise opposite: the installation of faster centrifuges, a greater stockpile of enriched uranium, higher grades of enrichment, and a far more aggressive Iranian foreign policy in the region.
Maximum pressure didn’t work the first time, and it’s inconceivable it would work a second time. Why U.S. officials would spend a moment even thinking about flirting with a failed strategy is almost incomprehensible.
Daniel DePetris (@DanDePetris) is a contributor to the Washington Examiner’s Beltway Confidential blog. His opinions are his own.
