Iran is aggressively trying to upgrade its conventional military capabilities with the help of Russia and China, two of the six world powers with which it recently agreed to swear off any desire for a nuclear weapon.
President Obama, in a bid to ward off criticism of what he considers his signature foreign policy achievement, had promised opponents and skeptics he would push back against this trend. But so far that hasn’t happened, and some lawmakers are growing impatient with what they consider the administration’s attempts to excuse violations of U.N. restrictions against Iran that remain in force.
“The ink isn’t even dry on President Obama’s nuclear agreement and Iran is already breaking rules,” Sen. David Perdue, R-Ga., said Thursday. “This should not come as a surprise to anyone since Iran has cheated on every deal. Americans expect our nation’s commander in chief to demand adherence to all international agreements, instead of allowing Iran to act aggressively without facing serious consequences.”
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Iran’s Oct. 11 test flight of a new long-range ballistic missile with a maneuverable warhead aimed at defeating anti-missile defenses, came at a bad time for the agreement reached in Vienna on July 14. The deal was formally adopted Sunday after 90 days, beginning the process of lifting punishing sanctions against Tehran. Opponents of the deal haven’t given up trying to keep the sanctions in place, and the test gives them new ammunition to keep up the fight.
On Friday, Senate Foreign Relations Chairman Bob Corker warned that Congress could move to prevent Obama from waiving sanctions against Iran if that country is seen as violating any other provisions of the agreement. The House already has passed a bill rescinding Obama’s authority to do so.
“The U.S. commitment to nonproliferation is meaningless if Iran can violate its international commitments without consequences,” the Tennessee Republican said. “This serious violation requires immediate action by the administration to deter Iran’s behavior.”
The administration insists that the new “Emad,” or “Pillar,” missile does not violate the deal, though U.S. officials on Friday charged that it violated U.N. Security Council resolutions barring development of such weapons. The missile, with an estimated range of 900 to 1,100 miles, is capable of hitting Israel and may also be capable of mounting a nuclear warhead if Iran were to develop one.
“The Iran nuclear deal solves a specific problem, which is making sure that they don’t possess a nuclear weapon, and it’s our best way to do that. It does not fully resolve the wide range of issues where we’ve got a big difference,” President Obama said Friday at a news conference with visiting South Korean President Park Geun-Hye of South Korea.
“And so we are going to have to continue to put pressure on them through the international community and, where we have bilateral channels, through bilateral channels to indicate to them that there are costs to bad behavior in the region and around the world.”
But on the heels of the test flight of Emad, Iranian officials on Wednesday unveiled a deep underground bunker packed with missiles at an unknown location and told state television they would soon be replaced by more advanced long-range missiles.
“As of next year, a new and advanced generation of long-range liquid and solid fuel missiles will replace the current products,” Brig. Gen. Amir Ali Hajizadeh, commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps’ Aerospace Division, was quoted as saying.
Tehran also is moving on acquiring weapons systems that could pose direct threats against U.S. forces operating in the Middle East. Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said a week ago that preparations were complete for the delivery of the advanced S-300 air defense system Iran purchased in 2007. The Obama administration has refused further efforts to block the sale of the missiles, which could threaten the ability of U.S. aircraft to strike Iran if it violates the nuclear deal.
Meanwhile, China also is looking to deepen defense cooperation with Iran, Adm. Sun Jianguo, deputy chief China’s People’s Liberation Army general staff, was quoted by the Defense Ministry as saying after a meeting Thursday in Tehran with Iranian military officials.
Both countries were part of the P5+1 group of world powers that negotiated the deal with Iran. In a last-minute concession, the negotiators agreed to allow a U.N. arms embargo against Iran to expire in five years or less, and restrictions on ballistic missile technology in eight years. Iran, backed by Russia and China, had insisted on the immediate lifting of both restrictions as part of the deal.
Russia and China are seen as eager to sell advanced military hardware to oil-rich Iran as a source of hard currency. Aside from air-defense systems such as the S-300, both countries have developed weapons such as anti-ship missiles, submarines and advanced torpedoes that could make it impossible for U.S. forces to project power in the air and water around Iran.
Though the Pentagon and many Democratic supporters of the deal wanted both restrictions to remain in place, the Obama administration agreed to allow them to expire and declared that leaving them temporarily in place was a “victory.” Secretary of State John Kerry later defended the move by saying Iran had a “very legitimate argument” for lifting the embargo.
The administration “is looking more naive by the day,” House Foreign Affairs Chairman Ed Royce said Sunday. “It’s sure tough to look at Iran’s actions over the last three months — let alone 35 years — and think Tehran will live up to its end of the nuclear bargain. If this is what the last 90 days look like, the next few years look like a disaster.”
In a letter sent Wednesday to Obama, Republican Sens. Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire and Mark Kirk of Illinois called the president’s insistence on keeping the missile issue separate from the nuclear deal “flawed,” and asked him to commit to keeping sanctions in place if Iran continues to violate U.N. restrictions.
