The Iran MOU is Worse Than it Looks
What the US-Iran Memorandum Reveals About America's Retreat from the Middle East.
When the "Memorandum of Understanding" between the United States and Iran, to end the current war, was first announced, official US comments were vague or evasive, those by Iran clear and precise, suggesting the Trump administration was struggling to downplay the magnitude of its defeat. Now that the text has been released, it's clear that defeat was even more comprehensive than expected. The central issues have been either ignored, resolved in Iran's favour, or deferred to a sixty-day period of further negotiations once the document is signed on June 19. Moreover, the administration has abandoned what means of leverage it might have retained to enforce Iranian compliance.
None of President Trump's (shifting) war aims has been achieved. Regime change has not taken place; indeed the most extreme faction in Tehran is more firmly in control than before war began, with baleful consequences for Iran's people and the region. There is no proposal to end Iran's support of terrorist proxies such as Hezbollah. While the Iranian military, including its ballistic missile capabilities, has been weakened, there was less damage than Trump claimed, and Iranian forces have been rapidly recovering during the successive ceasefires. Tehran has gone no further towards abandoning its pursuit of a nuclear weapon than it had already done under the 2015 agreement negotiated by the Obama administration, which Trump repudiated during his first term. The demand that Iran forego any capacity to enrich uranium, a reasonable demand given its history, has been quietly dropped. Further, any successor agreement will be harder to enforce and monitor, given Iran's recent efforts to conceal and protect its enriched uranium supplies and nuclear facilities.
While Trump has claimed the Strait of Hormuz will reopen without tolls, Iran has committed merely to pause tolls during the sixty days of further talks but retains control of the Strait, with future administrative arrangements to be negotiated with Oman and other Gulf states. Iran has demonstrated its newfound leverage through its capacity to close the Strait at will, with closure no longer a mere hypothetical possibility. Thus it retains de facto control, with any written formulation to the contrary that may emerge an empty formality. Among the most surprising of the Iranian demands to which Trump has agreed are the lifting of all unilateral and multilateral economic sanctions, the organization of a $300 billion reconstruction and economic development fund for Iran in conjunction with regional states, the removal of US forces near Iran, and a pledge not to reintroduce them.
The result is an Iran that is in significant ways stronger and more threatening than before the current war. The lifting of sanctions, the reconstruction fund (reparations by another name), and probably revenues from tolls in the Strait of Hormuz (euphemized as "fees", perhaps), make it wealthier, its miliary capabilities will continue to grow, and the present leadership is even less likely than any of its predecessors to make concessions to the US and its allies. And what follows the MOU may prove worse yet. Trump's unwillingness to accept the risks of renewed hostilities, demonstrated by his repeated threats of further military action, always withdrawn with breathtaking alacrity, frees the Iranians to be as intransigent as they wish in further negotiations. Spooked by rising energy prices and the political pain they may bring, Trump can be relied upon to concede again, beneath the surface bluster. And it beggars belief that, having cut his losses and implausibly claimed victory now, he would dare to confront Iran again. And were he to do so, he would find himself in a weaker position. The political costs of reaching agreement with others on reimposing sanctions, or of reintroducing military forces into the region, leaves Trump with less leverage over Iran than before, or, in language he might prefer, "no cards." And after this capitulation, he would find it hard to enlist regional support.
Worse, the Western position has been weakened not only in the Middle east but globally. After Iranian attacks on Gulf targets revealed the folly of Trump's expectations of rapid, effortless victory, the diversion of scarce air defence systems to the Middle East from the Asia-Pacific and Europe rattled US allies dependent on them for their security. It also revealed the fragility of a US military superiority based on small numbers of costly and sophisticated platforms that can be countered by cheap, scalable, dispersed drones and missiles. The waiver of some sanctions on Russia to limit the increase in energy prices has helped Putin's war on Ukraine, while China benefits from both the diversion of US military assets from Taiwan and the worldwide turn to greater reliance on renewable energy sources, where it is the dominant supplier.
The most troubling aspect of the emerging "deal" is the precedent it sets. The war began in part with the laudable goal of preventing an Iranian nuclear weapon, an objective shared by all US allies, however much they may have differed with Trump on the appropriate means. It quickly produced the closure of a major maritime passage, threatening the open commerce that is a pillar of the post-1945 liberal international order. All US allies also agreed on the need to reverse this, though here too there were differences with the Trump administration over means. Yet Trump is agreeing to a deal that achieves neither objectives, despite his vehement (if intermittent) public commitment to both. The predictable result is an accelerating loss of confidence in the US as a security guarantor.
And it is those who were most cooperative with Trump who have been most visibly abandoned. A year ago, much of the Arab world, notably the Gulf states, was inclined towards entering a coalition to contain Iranian power, including normalization of relations with Israel through adherence to the Abraham Accords. Having endured Iranian attacks against which the US failed to provide adequate protection, losing oil revenues with the closure of the Strait, and with Trump now accepting a strengthened Iran, these states are adjusting their policies to reduce their exposure to Iranian hostility, including the purchase of Tehran's goodwill through the "reconstruction fund." Expansion of the anti-Iran coalition and the Abraham Accords are now impossible.
Israel, which was closely integrated into US military operations against Iran, fares worst of all. It was not at the negotiating table when Trump surrendered to Iran's insistence that any ceasefire include Lebanon, where Israel is engaged in operations against Tehran's proxy, Hezbollah, whose missile and drone attacks have made much of northern Israel uninhabitable. As a result, Israel must either accept a military vulnerability no state can be asked to tolerate or incur Trump's ire by jeopardizing the ceasefire. Not only is Israel the state most directly threatened by Iran's terrorist proxies and its nuclear ambitions, it must now deal with Iran's newfound leverage to imperil relations with Washington and deepen its international isolation. Indeed, Trump has already publicly berated Prime Minister Netanyahu for standing in the way of peace by continuing operations in Lebanon. It's tempting to see a degree of poetic justice in this, since Netanyahu encouraged Trump to go to war, with talk of rapid military victory over Iran and painless regime change and has long tried to boost his domestic position by touting his closeness to Trump. But the damage is not merely to Netanyahu's political prospects, but Israel's security. An Israel perceiving existential threat and an emboldened Iran is hardly a situation conducive to regional stability, with the prospect of renewed war, on a larger scale and at a moment of Iran's choosing.
The acceptance by others of US leadership has always required both that others see their legitimate interests taken into account and that they believe they can rely upon US commitments. Trump's repeated denigration of, and threats towards, key allies have undermined the first. He has now given graphic illustration that the US is unreliable regarding the second. To be sure, some of the damage Trump has done may be undone by successors. And the military and economic weight of the US ensure it will remain a great power. But a country that has twice elected Trump, and allowed him to hijack one of the two parties, is not a reliable ally, and the unquestioned preeminence the US enjoyed after 1945 is unlikely to be regained. As the US is seen by both ally and adversary to retreat from the responsibilities of global leadership, the world's revisionist powers will be emboldened and the geopolitical landscape can only become less stable.
So long, US hegemony. We'll miss you when you're gone.
