Excellent piece by @vali_nasr. This insightful article by @ColinKahl & @NarangVipin makes similar points. wapo.st/2Kzrlpc?tid=ss…
Here are my 2 cents, adding a few additional points.
Here are my 2 cents, adding a few additional points.
1. The key difference b/w Iran and DPRK that my colleagues have highlighted is that Iran already has a deal with the US. Should Trump pull out of the #IranDeal, he'll lend credence to @khamenei_ir’s skepticism about dealing with the West & discredit Iranian advocates of dialogue.
2. US credibility is already moribund because the US has held up the deal’s economic benefits to Iran. There is no such thing as a broader, stronger deal to be built on the current accord’s ruins. @JZarif has already made this clear: presstv.com/Detail/2018/05…
3. The 2nd difference is that Kim Jong-un’s regime now has a small arsenal of nuclear weapons & means of delivering them. It is confident in its strong negotiating position with the ultimate deterrent in hand. By contrast, Iran gave away most of its nuclear leverage.
4. If Trump ratchets up the pressure on Tehran, Iranian leaders are likely to try to restore their leverage. That implies another cycle of escalation – another race of sanctions against centrifuges – and the risk of yet another war in a region in turmoil. crisisgroup.org/trigger-list/i…
5. 3rd difference is that as @vali_nasr points out, Iran is not a hermit totalitarian kingdom. & the nuclear issue has been a political football for years. In 2004, the moderate forces in Iranian politics suspended enrichment in hopes of securing economic incentives from Europe.
6. John Bolton, then at the State Department, obstructed those incentives (sound familiar?), contributing to the drubbing the moderates took in the 2005 elections that brought ultra-hardline Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to power.
7. Ahmadinejad’s economic mismanagement & failure to resolve the nuclear standoff, in turn, allowed the return to power of pragmatists who promised to deal with the West and get sanctions lifted.
8. Today, Trump’s efforts to deprive Iran of the JCPOA’s dividends are once again a boon for hardliners, who had suffered defeat after defeat at the polls since 2013. They smell blood.
9. Any hint that @HassanRouhani can be bullied into a more-for-less bargain w Trump would bring his political career to a humiliating end. No Iranian politician can afford to engage in talks with an admin who has insulted IRI more deeply than any of its predecessors.
10. 4th difference that is often overlooked is that U.S. enmity with North Korea is neither institutional nor ideological. The pundit class may like to pooh-pooh Trump’s upcoming summit with Kim Jong-un but there is no anti-North Korea lobby working overtime to scuttle it. B
11. By contrast, there is ingrained, decades-old resistance in Washington to any improvement of relations with Iran, however modest. Powerful insiders, including the pro-Israel lobby, and lately the firms lavishly remunerated by the Gulfies, spend millions to demonize Iran.
12. For politicians, Democrat and Republican, Iran bashing is free of cost and likely to pay off. Officials from both parties hold personal vendettas against a regime they blame for taking US diplomats hostage and targeting US forces in the region though proxies.
13. The Trump administration has little interest in North Korea’s awful human rights record or its chemical weapons, where as in the case of Iran, every infraction, big and small, is cited as justification for keeping the country in the cold.
14. The 5th difference is that U.S. allies in the Middle East, unlike in East Asia, don’t want a peaceful settlement. There is no Middle Eastern equivalent of South Korean president helped engineer the opening to the North and sold it to Trump as a US presidential achievement.
15. Iran’s regional foes are implacable. US allies in East Asia, who for the most part did not want to see war between the US and North Korea, Iran’s Middle Eastern rivals seem to be inciting US military intervention. They appear happy to fight Iran to the last American soldier.
16. His cookie cutter in hand, @realDonaldTrump will likely pay no attention to these crucial differences b/w the Iranian and North Korean cases. But the Iranians seem to have learned a big lesson from the North Koreans.
17. They point to the Trump admin’s newfound desire to engage Pyongyang as evidence that Tehran, too, can deal with Washington only from a position of nuclear-armed strength.
18. A senior Iranian official recently told me, “the [nuclear] bomb is increasingly seen as the rational option” in Tehran. Read more here: crisisgroup.org/middle-east-no…
19/19 If Iran does decide to pursue the North Korean model, Trump will have not only misinterpreted this momentous diplomatic challenge, but also manufactured a crisis with deadly potential outcomes. It won’t be the suspense that kills us.
