This Trump obsession has caused only harm — and remains a danger to the whole world
Whenever Donald Trump mucks around in any serious international situation, as the world’s self-anointed savior, odds are things will only get worse. Iran is a good example.
In 2015, the US was part of an international coalition that reached agreement with Iran that imposed restrictions on its civilian nuclear enrichment program in exchange for sanctions’ relief. The Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) was agreed to by the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council — China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States — as well as Germany and the EU, and supported by over 100 nations.
According to the Obama White House, the agreement “blocks every possible pathway Iran could use to build a nuclear bomb while ensuring -- through a comprehensive, intrusive, and unprecedented verification and transparency regime -- that Iran’s nuclear program remains exclusively peaceful moving forward.”
For three years the agreement worked as intended, with regular monitoring and verification of Iranian compliance by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). Every indication suggested that the agreement would remain in force, given the power of the broad international coalition that negotiated it and the consequences if Iran failed to comply.
Then in 2018, President Donald Trump blew up the agreement, pulling the US out.
Renewing US sanctions, Trump claimed JCPOA was a “terrible agreement” — i.e. because Barack Obama helped negotiate it — and Trump said he would negotiate a much better deal.
Of course, Trump never negotiated a better deal, like the better deal he never negotiated after pulling the US out of the Paris Climate Accord. With US sanctions renewed despite Iran's compliance with the agreement, Tehran unsurprisingly balked at continuing to cooperate, and the JCPOA fell apart.
Had Trump not pulled the US out, the JCPOA could very well have remained in existence today, as President Joe Biden would have maintained US involvement from 2021-2025. Instead, there has been no regular IAEA monitoring of Iran’s uranium enrichment program.
Iran has contended that it has no intention of building nuclear weapons, and US Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard concurred last year. However, the situation has remained precarious.
What would not have occurred had the JCPOA remained in place with US membership?
First, Trump would have had no rationale for bombing Iran’s nuclear facilities in 2025, in violation of international law. The US would still be part of the international coalition that was ensuring Iran’s nuclear compliance.
Second, Trump would not be threatening more military action if it Iran doesn't come to the negotiating table, using as pretext the lie that Iran is building a nuclear weapon. By pulling the US out of the JCPOA in 2018, Trump has created the very real possibility of yet another illegal US invasion.
With Iran staring down the barrel of a gun, Trump will try and accomplish what was successfully negotiated in 2015, then destroyed by him in 2018. For that, Trump deserves nothing but scorn — no matter where his reckless, irresponsible saber rattling leads.
In addition, since Trump reimposed heavy US sanctions in 2018, the Iranian economy has contracted severely. The sanctions have contributed to soaring inflation and unemployment, a collapsing currency, less accessible and affordable health care, and millions driven to poverty.
The sanctions have played a central role in the economic crisis that helped trigger the current violent protests and the Iranian government’s brutal response. Trump is threatening military action against the government stemming from protests by citizens whose economic woes he helped create.
In dealing with Iran, Trump has leaned heavily into the narcissism, megalomania, duplicity, and power-addiction that define him. By peevishly pulling the US out of the JCPOA, he turned a situation that had been dealt with successfully by the powerful international coalition into an international crisis.
Results also include the possibility of a broader Middle Eastern conflict.
Trump’s high-stakes involvements in the Russian-Ukrainian and Israeli-Palestinian wars have produced similarly disastrous results. By siding with Vladimir Putin and limiting US support to Ukraine, Trump strengthened Putin’s hand tremendously. Russia has continued the killing and devastation in Ukraine with impunity and is now practically assured to be rewarded handsomely for invading a sovereign democratic nation.
By siding with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Trump supported Israel’s genocide of the Palestinian people with military aid and refusing to condemn atrocities. Trump ensured that there will never be a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict so long as Netanyahu is in power and that the horrific suffering of the Palestinian people will only worsen.
At the end of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, narrator Nick Carraway comments on how chaos created by Daisy and Tom led to the deaths of Gatsby, Myrtle, and George Wilson.
Nick says, “They were careless people, Tom and Daisy – they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness … and let other people clean up the mess that they made.”
It will take the American people and freedom-loving nations of the world years to clean up the mess Trump is making. It will be left to history to reflect on the incalculable human damage that Trump has inflicted, and he is only getting started.
- Tom Tyner is a freelance editorialist, satirist, political analyst, blogger, author and retired English instructor.
