What you missed is that this is about politics not science. In politics perception is reality, and the perceptions of the international jerkwaters speak for themselves. Maybe it is just kicking the can down the road, as others have suggested, but that still means you have joined the game after having first refused to play.
"We have learned a historic lesson. If you expose to the world the dealings of the United States, they will ultimately back down."
is a disaster for us all.
I certainly didn’t miss that this is politics but this is how politics is handled. Telling them to stuff it and walk out surely feels good. However, what’s so much more important is getting these global political morons to understand what’s really important and that’s cooperating on nuclear, chemical and biological proliferation. Sometimes it makes sense not to call someone an a-hole to their face if there’s even the possibility you might get the tiniest shred of cooperation on other things. I don’t see that we gave much up much other than the temporary and fleeting satisfaction of telling them to blow carbon credits out their pie holes. ;-)