Slapping Iran with new economic sanctions over its Jan. 30 medium-range ballistic missile test, 70-year-old Donald Trump served notice that there’s a new sheriff in town. Calling the sanctions only “initial steps,” the Trump administration “put Iran on notice” that there would be consequences for provocations. “The Trump administration will no longer tolerate Iran’s provocation that threaten our interests,” said National Security Adviser Gen. Michael Michael Flynn. Trump complained through the campaign about former President Barack Obama’s Iranian Nuke Deal signed July 14, 2015, binding the U.S., Britain, France, Russian, China and Germany into the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action on Iran’s nuclear enrichment program. Negotiated by former Secretary of State John Kerry and Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javid Zarif March 26, 2015 to April 2, 2015, Trump didn’t like the deal.
Trump felt that the U.S. got badly out-negotiated in part because Zarif routinely threw fits, threatening to walk away from the deal. “The days of turning a blind eye to Iran’s hostile and belligerent actions toward the Unites State and the world community are over,” Flynn wrote in a White House statement. Limiting Iran’s production of enriched uranium, the agreement slows down what the U.S. and its allies sees as Iran’s feverish pursuit of nuclear weapons. Flynn insisted that Iran must stop supporting proxies in armed conflict around the Persian Gulf and Red Sea. When a Saudi warship was hit Dec. 31 in the Gulf of Aden by Iran-backed Houthi rebels killing three sailors, the U.S. took notice. U.S. officials said the attack on a Saudi warship was most likely intended for the United States. Whether that’s true of not, Iran armed-and-funded Houthi rebels against the Sanna government.
Iran rejected U.S. claims about violating the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Action Plan AKA Iran Nuke Deal. Insisting the State Department would be “undertaking a larger strategic review” of Iran’s behavior in the Mideast and North Africa, the White House reserved the right to respond appropriately. Iran’s Foreign Ministry accused the U.S. of supporting “regional terror groups,” referring to backing opposition groups opposed to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad,” indicating it would impose its own sanctions on the U.S. Calling its missile program “the undeniable and inalienable right of our nation under international law and the U.N. charters. Any foreign interference in this is a violation of international law,” said Iran’s Foreign Ministry. Flynn believes the Iran Nuke Deal prevents Iran from testing any missiles capable of delivering nuclear or conventional warheads.
Sanctioning a Lebanon-based network run by the Revolutionary Guards, the White House hopes to discourage Iran from more ballistic missile tests. “The list is actually so targeted and comparatively mild, it leads one to surmise that its may have been a set of targets by the Obama Administration . . .” said Adam Smith, former senior adviser to the U.S. Treasury Department Office of Foreign Assets Control. Whatever the impact of the sanctions, it puts Iran on notice that future provocations would be met with more consequences. “As such, the real test for which way the Trump team will go on Iran may well be not this list but the next one, whenever that occurs,” said Smith, anticipating more sanctions. Sanctioning Iran looks to sour U.S.-Iranian relations more than the already abysmal state-of-affairs. Trump accused Obama of paying ransom to get the July 14, 2015 Iranian Nuke Deal.
Calling Trump a political “amateur,” Iranian President Hassan Rouhini has begun Iran’s pattern of insults toward foreign leaders. Tweeting today “Iran is playing with fire,” Trump needs to play his cards closer to the vest or risk a rapid escalation. “I urge the Administration to bring clarity to their overall strategy towards Iran, and to refrain from ambiguous rhetoric—or provocative tweets—that will exacerbate efforts to confront those challenges,” said Sen. Mark Warner (D-Vir.). Germany’s new Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel urged Trump not to “conflate” the Nuke Deal with Iran’s rights to conduct other military operations. Nothing gives Iran’s Ayatollah Ali Khamenei more pleasure than to humiliate the U.S. publicly, or now that Trump’s in office, the new president. Treasury officials acknowledged that the new sanctions impact companies in the United Arab Emirates, Lebanon and China.
Getting into a war of words with Iran only helps the Ayatollah pound his chest with more anti-American rhetoric. Warner gave Trump some good advice to not openly litigate the current brouhaha over travel bans and missile tests in public. Many American Persians were offended that the travel ban included Iranians, because Iranians aren’t typically involved in Mideast-style terrorism in the U.S. Targeting Hassan Dehghan Ebrahimi, a Beirut-based official with the Revolutionary Guards Qud’s Force, put Iran on notice that ballistic missile tests have real consequences. If Iran continues to push the limits, newly minted Secretary of State Rex Tillerson will need all the help he can get from Russian President Vladimir Putin. Capitol Hill war hawks, like Sen. John McCain (R-Az.), have fought Trump on resetting U.S.-Russian relations. Having Putin as an ally can help with Iran.
