What is to be done? (2)

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Power Line:

Scott Johnson

September 8, 2015

 

Yesterday I noted that the Obama administration has failed to comply with the condition precedent to Congress’s review of the deal with Iran (and the president’s authority to waive sanctions). I asked what is to be done.

 

I asked, Bill Kristol answered. Bill wears many hats, one of which is Chairman of the Emergency Committee for Israel. In this capacity he released the following statement addressing the question yesterday:

 

 

The Obama Administration has not complied with the legal requirement that it provide Congress “any additional materials” related to the Iran deal, including “side agreements, implementing materials, documents, and guidance, technical or other understandings, and any related agreements, whether entered into or implemented prior to the agreement or to be entered into or implemented in the future.” The Administration has not given Congress a key side agreement between Iran and the International Atomic Energy Agency, one which describes how key questions about the possible military dimensions of Iran’s nuclear program will be resolved, as well as how the verification regime will work.

 

Congress should not accept this evasion of the law by the Obama Administration. Congress should insist on the text of this and any other side agreements. Lacking this, Congress can and should take the position that the Iran deal has not been properly submitted to Congress to review, and therefore that the president has no authority to waive or suspend sanctions.

 

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[Valin]

Former Military Intel Chief: Iran Nuclear Deal Gives U.S. “Nothing But Grief”

TheTower.org Staff

09.08.15

 

The United States gets “nothing but grief” from the nuclear deal with Iran, the former head of U.S. military intelligence said today.

 

Lt. Gen. (ret.) Michael Flynn, who served as the head of the Defense Intelligence Agency from 2012 to 2014, said in an interview published on the website Medium that the deal could lead to the attempted elimination of Israel, a “large regional war” between Iran and Saudi Arabia, and a future in which Iran “can become even more hardline and crush all efforts at democracy and freedom. There is no longer a penalty for their harsh behavior towards their citizens.”

 

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When asked what Iran’s negotiating partners achieved by striking the deal, Flynn explained that the U.S. achieved very few positives:

 

 

 

Let’s start with Europe. Europe, Russia, and China get three big things: 1. A new market of 80 million people to buy their goods; 2. Cheap oil; and 3. An educated work force to open companies within Iran.

 

The U.S. gets nothing but grief. We did not get an apology for the 500 KIA and thousands of wounded military members in the Iraq war struck with Iranian explosively-formed penetrator IEDs. No apology for the hundreds of Marines killed in Beirut in the 1980s. None of the four current American hostages were released. No apology for the Americans killed in the Khobar tower terrorist attack. We did get a requirement to expand our security umbrella in the region for life. China will take the economic benefits and we will be stuck securing the region for the Chinese and Russians while the UN (IAEA) tries to monitor the Iranian nuclear advances that have historically failed.

 

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