With the harshest sanctions on Iran having been lifted, and with the release of five Americans being held by Iran (admittedly in exchange for the United States granting clemency to seven Iranians and dismissing charges against fourteen others), President Obama said yesterday that the nuclear agreement with Iran is proof that a “smart, patient and disciplined” approach is better than war.
That is obvious. President George H.W. Bush proved that again and again. Germany united and East Europe free – all without war – is proof of that. As was President Reagan’s agreement with the Soviet Union to remove all intermediate range nuclear missile from Europe.
However, George H.W. Bush is also proof that sometimes, unfortunately, diplomacy doesn’t work. When Iraq invaded Kuwait in 1990, President Bush tried diplomacy. But it didn’t work. It took force to get Iraq out Kuwait. (Most Democrats back then voted against the authorization to use force against Iraq {even though the United Nations Security Council had already approved it}.) They said we should give sanctions a chance. In that regard. regardless of what you think of George W. Bush’s invasion of Iraq in 2003, approved by a lot more Democrats than the number who voted for the use of force in 1991, Iraq’s decade-long failure to comply to UN resolutions after 1991, which was at least part of the reason for the 2003 invasion, showed that a year or two of sanctions was not going to do the job.)
Further, whether the Iran agreement is ultimately a victory for diplomacy won’t be known for several years, if not more. Let’s wait to see if Iran really complies with the agreement, and what the other consequences of the agreement are, before we take too many victory laps for the deal.
I will, however, withdraw my criticism of the Administration for not reacting more strongly to Iran’s ballistic missile tests late last year. Apparently, the Administration didn’t want to impose any sanctions for those tests until after the five Americans were released. That was a legitimate reason to wait. Let’s hope that the sanctions that have now been imposed will do the job of preventing future violations of the UN resolutions against such tests.
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