One can’t help but being cynically bemused over the mock expressions of surprised disappointment by our international leaders over the withdrawal by President Donald Trump from the Iran nuclear arms deal.
Anyone with a slight degree of common sense knows that it was just a matter of time before President Trump turned his back on the Iranian Nuclear Arms Agreement, formally agreed to by the USA State Department and by President Obama in July 2015. Congress had no say in the matter and it has never been ratified as a treaty by any of the other signing parties – Great Britain, France, Germany, Russia, China or Iran. Nonetheless, the agreement was hailed as the diplomatic pinnacle of Mr. Obama’s time in office.
Then, on Sept. 8, 2015 presidential candidates Donald Trump and Senator Ted Cruz along with former Governor of Alaska, Sarah Palin appeared at a Stop the Iran Deal Rally in Washington. Their opposition had nothing to do with the actual merits or otherwise of the accord. It had everything to do with electioneering and even more indelibly with President Trump’s intransigent determination to undo every national and international agreement, treaty, program, promise or initiative that had former President Barak Obama’s name attached to it. President Trump is single-mindedly committed to this goal. One can speculate on the reason or reasons behind this quest, but that doesn’t matter a twig. This personal mission underlies almost every policy decision emanating from the Oval Office.
For instance, who knows what President Trump really thinks of Mr. Putin? The fact is that Putin and Obama detested each other to the point that President Obama made every public effort he could to show his favour for Mr. Putin’s only potential political opponent – Dmitri Medvedev. That immediately made ‘Vladimir the Thug’ a partisan political ally of President Trump.
President Obama also had no use for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu – remember Netanyahu's speech to the Republican Senate, which met with a public scolding of the Israeli Prime Minister from the White House? This animosity even led to a U.S. Senate probe of the State Department (part of Mr. Obama’s administration), which was suspected of funnelling money to OneVoice Movement, an anti-Netanyahu American based non-governmental organization (with a subsidiary in Israel), pushing for the removal of Mr. Netanyahu from his post. President Trump has since declared Jerusalem the capital city of Israel. And he has been repaid by the Israeli government producing a document supporting Mr. Trump’s assertion that Iran has not complied with the nuclear arms agreement.
So, out with Obama’s Iranian Nuclear Arms Agreement and in will inevitably come a Trump-based proposition. Tehran is now waiting to see what happens with North Korea before deciding on how to respond to the American administration. It’s all part of the Art of Making Another Deal and earning President Trump a Nobel Peace Prize.
Meanwhile our Prime Minister is probably trying to determine when Canada should apologize to Tehran for harbouring U.S. diplomats in our embassy in 1979 and illegally supplying them with Canadian passports.
Alan Murdock is a local pediatrician.
