Negotiating with adversaries from a position of weakness
Biden’s foreign policy doctrine in dealing with America’s adversaries is simple: Appease or concede first and then try to negotiate.
Take Iran, for example. Former President Donald Trump had the Iranian regime on the ropes with his maximum pressure policy of increasing economic sanctions until the regime blinked. But when Biden came into office, he blinked first.
Biden is extremely anxious to reenter the disastrous nuclear deal with Iran known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). The Biden administration sent signals that it was willing to negotiate the lifting of some economic sanctions in concert with Iran’s steps to reverse course and reduce its uranium enrichment to levels in compliance with the JCPOA. Biden all but begged for the U.S. to be indirectly involved in negotiations between Iran and the other remaining JCPOA participants - China, Russia, Germany, France, and the United Kingdom. Iran's delegation was meeting with representatives from these five countries in the same room, while messages were sent back and forth with U.S. representatives sitting separately at a different location.
Iran’s thugs thumbed their noses at the Biden administration after the talks had begun by announcing that the regime was going to increase its uranium enrichment level to its highest ever, at 60 percent. That is a stone’s throw from the 90 percent purity level needed to produce a nuclear bomb. The Iranian regime dramatically changed the dynamics of the negotiation process in its favor by giving itself more leverage. As one Israeli official put it, “The Iranians smell that the Americans want an agreement at any price.”
Biden should have pulled the U.S. out of these phony talks immediately. He also should have responded forcefully to Iran’s provocative move by slapping the Iranian regime and its leaders with more burdensome sanctions. Instead, Biden pathetically expressed displeasure with Iran’s enrichment of uranium to 60 percent purity while saying that he was pleased with the JCPOA talks. --->READ MORE HERE
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| Illustration by Linas Garsys/The Wash Times |
His diplomats, like Obama's, give without getting
Because Barack Obama struck me as a clever fellow, I never understood why, when negotiating with despots, he failed to utilize the leverage available to him.
For instance, he might have said to Russian President Vladimir Putin: “I want to reset our relations, but many Americans haven’t forgotten the Cold War. So, I need you to make clear that Russia today isn’t just the U.S.S.R. 2.0.”
To Raul Castro he could have said: “It’s high time for us to open diplomatic relations but you know the Miami crowd! If you’ll just ease up on dissidents a little, we can meet and go to a baseball game together in Havana, and maybe I’ll even have my picture taken under a portrait of Che Guevara!”
To Iran’s rulers, he should have said: “Many members of Congress, even within my own party, won’t approve the deal you want me to sign off on. So, at a minimum, I need you to demonstrate — verifiably — that you’re permanently out of the nuclear weapons business and won’t threaten your neighbors anymore.”
Instead, of course, President Obama gave without getting, and then postured as though he’d achieved spectacular victories. President Biden is now doing likewise. A few examples follow.
In February, the Biden administration lifted the foreign terrorist designation on the Houthi rebels in Yemen. Since then, they’ve been launching missiles and armed drones at Saudi cities and oil facilities, and they’ve turned down proposals for cease-fires. Mission unaccomplished. --->READ MORE HEREFollow links below to related stories:
Talks underway to restore Iran nuclear deal
Iran Expects US Sanctions to Be Lifted Under Biden
Reviving Obama’s Iran Nuclear Deal Means War, Not Peace
Biden’s Troubling Outreach to China
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