Posted on 05/08/2018 5:51:08 PM PDT by Eddie01
former President Barack Obama is calling President Trump's decision to pull the U.S. out of the 2015 Iran nuclear deal a "serious mistake" and said walking away from it "turns our back on America's closest allies."
"The reality is clear. The JCPOA is working -- that is a view shared by our European allies, independent experts, and the current U.S. Secretary of Defense," Obama said in a statement Tuesday, referring to the agreement's title, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action. "The JCPOA is in America's interest -- it has significantly rolled back Iran's nuclear program. And the JCPOA is a model for what diplomacy can accomplish -- its inspections and verification regime is precisely what the United States should be working to put in place with North Korea."
Trump withdraws from Iran deal: What's next? Obama released the statement following Mr. Trump's announcement Tuesday that the U.S. will withdraw from the nuclear agreement, which the Obama administration reached in 2015 between the U.S., Russia, China, Iran and three European nations -- France, Germany and Britain. The agreement, the cornerstone of Obama's foreign policy legacy, lifted most international and U.S. sanctions that were on Iran in exchange for the country agreeing to restrictions on its nuclear program and inspections to enforce compliance.
Iranian president slams Trump for pulling U.S. out of nuclear deal Mr. Trump slammed the agreement Tuesday as "a horrible, one-sided deal" and called it "defective at its core." Citing intelligence about Iran's past nuclear activities that Israel unveiled last week, Mr. Trump claimed there is "definitive" proof Iran violated the deal, but he didn't elaborate on that assertion.
Without mentioning Mr. Trump by name, Obama called Mr. Trump's announcement on the deal "so misguided" and said that Iran is complying with the agreement.
"That was not simply the view of my Administration," Obama said. "The United States intelligence community has continued to find that Iran is meeting its responsibilities under the deal, and has reported as much to Congress. So have our closest allies, and the international agency responsible for verifying Iranian compliance -- the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)."
Obama said the U.S. could "eventually be left with a losing choice between a nuclear-armed Iran or another war in the Middle East" without the deal.
"We all know the dangers of Iran obtaining a nuclear weapon," he said. "It could embolden an already dangerous regime; threaten our friends with destruction; pose unacceptable dangers to America's own security; and trigger an arms race in the world's most dangerous region," he said. "If the constraints on Iran's nuclear program under the JCPOA are lost, we could be hastening the day when we are faced with the choice between living with that threat, or going to war to prevent it."
He also said that "the consistent flouting of agreements that our country is a party to risks eroding America's credibility, and puts us at odds with the world's major powers."
Ian Bremmer, president and founder of Eurasia Group, echoed concerns about what the decision means for the U.S.' relationships with key allies. He said the biggest concern in the near term is that the U.S. has damaged its credibility with France, Germany and the United Kingdom -- all parties to the nuclear agreement.
"We've basically been telling these allies that their opinions don't really matter," Bremmer said.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron both recently traveled to the U.S. to meet with Mr. Trump. Their single most important message to him was: Do not unilaterally leave the Iranian deal, according to Bremmer, and that we don't have a plan B. But Mr. Trump did it anyway.
"The willingness of those countries to work with us going forward, the willingness to go their own way on broader security issues, on things like technology, on the markets, on economic trade -- they're not seeing the United State as an ally they can really count on," Bremmer said.
"And I think that really hurts when you have a country like China that's spending an awful lot of money, that's doing really well. That seems strategic … What worries me the most is the broader unwind," he said.
Macron tweeted Tuesday that "France, Germany, and the UK regret the U.S. decision to leave the JCPOA."
France, Germany, and the UK regret the U.S. decision to leave the JCPOA. The nuclear non-proliferation regime is at stake.
— Emmanuel Macron (@EmmanuelMacron) May 8, 2018 Meanwhile, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has been a leading critic of the deal, hailed Tuesday's move as "historic."
"The deal didn't reduce Iran's aggression, it dramatically increased it, and we see this across the entire Middle East," he said according to The Associated Press reports. "Despite the deal, the terrorist regime in Tehran is developing a ballistic missiles capability, ballistic missiles to carry nuclear warheads far and wide, to many parts of the world."
Did anyone axe The Brown Muzzie Clown for his opinion?
Obama plans to increase him Tantrum and Whine fest
Who cares what Traitorobama says?!?
What will they have to place in the Obama Library now?
I agreed with what BJ Clinton said about the Kenyan Oreo Usurper: The only thing he is good for is “getting coffee”.
HYSTERICAL! should I go retort with this song on Islamocommie’s twitter feed...LMAO!
The cherry on top of the parfait.
Says the guy who has never been right about anything at all.
Sit down and shut up Barrack!!
“What will they have to place in the Obama Library now?”
I can think of a few things, some we all might enjoy ...
... reruns of the videotape that caused Benghazi, and the tv interviews blaming the tape
... a statute of Ozymandias with poem at the entrance
... framed picture of BHO and Farrakhan
... framed picture of BHO in his muslim garb
... and the “original birth certificate” in protected helium environment that he used to prove he was born in Hawaii.
Americans who voted for the 0bama bin Biden ticket made a serious mistake....then again, I am convinced McCain and Romeny would have been just as bad.
He knows about it, so there must be TVs in the bathhouse...
Electing Obama was a serious mistake
Obummer, your whole freakin’ administration was a freakin’ mistake.
Hopefully, those people, both republican and democrat, who only “wanted to vote for the first black man,” will realize how foolish they were.
In plain words, Don’t judge a book by its cover.
America voted you and your Iran surrender treaty out Bozo.
Well, then, it appears the President is doing the right thing, beings how the ex-President whom I could never stand disagrees with what Trump is doing.
OH, SHUT UP OBASTARD, you couldn’t even finish selling us to the highest bidder.
Although you tried like hell.
Yes, yes, yes.... and Trump’s North Korea policy was going to start the war of wars that would destroy the earth...
Instead it brought the end of the Korean War... huh.
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