The Pragati Podcast: Nuclear War, Deterrence and Peace.

 Nuclear war feels unthinkable, but how much peace does nuclear deterrence guarantee? Do nuclear programmes truly deter or compel adversaries in the real world? And can we imagine a world where 20+ countries have nuclear weapons?

Vipin Narang joins Pavan Srinath on Episode 124 of The Pragati Podcast to dive into the world of nuclear weapons and strategy. He shares the evolution of our understanding of nuclear strategy from early ideas of mutually assured destruction.

The Pragati Podcast is a weekly talkshow on public policy, economics and international relations hosted by Pavan Srinath.

Vipin Narang is an Associate Professor of Political Science at MIT and a member of MIT’s Security Studies Programme. He published his first book Nuclear Strategy in the Modern Era in 2014, and is currently working on his second book, Strategies of Nuclear Proliferation, in which he explores how states pursue nuclear weapons. He is on Twitter at @NarangVipin.

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Reuters: As president, Biden would not trash all Trump's foreign policy legacy

Indeed, while Trump has sought to portray both Obama and Biden as “soft” on China, the previous administration pursued a tougher line against Beijing than Trump did initially. [...]

Tom Fletcher, a foreign-policy adviser to three past British prime ministers, said he did not expect big changes on China under a Biden administration, but a less abrasive style. [...]

O’Sullivan and others said Biden would likely seek to revive the Iran agreement and Asia trade deal, but not without revisions to secure the sort of “better deal” Trump often talks about getting.

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MSNBC: On Iran, Pompeo and Trump find themselves isolated and defeated

 There was some speculation among experts that countries like Britain, France, and Germany would at least pause as a diplomatic courtesy to consider the United States' position in more detail. Yesterday, however, they didn't see the point in delaying their rejection of Pompeo's demand. [...]

It's hard to overstate the scope of the White House's failure. I realize there's a lot of political news unfolding right now, but Trump and Pompeo have screwed up an important foreign policy -- making the United States and its allies less safe in the process -- to a staggering extent. [...]

It's not easy to (a) isolate the United States; (b) undermine our national security interests; and (c) bring friend and foe together in opposition to our demands, all at the same time. And yet, Trump and Pompeo have managed to pull it off.

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Politico: Pompeo lashes out as U.N. Security Council rejects extension to Iran arms embargo

 The Security Council "rejected a reasonable resolution to extend the 13-year old arms embargo on Iran and paved the way for the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism to buy and sell conventional weapons without specific UN restrictions in place for the first time in over a decade," Pompeo said in a statement. "The Security Council’s failure to act decisively in defense of international peace and security is inexcusable." [...]

A bipartisan group of 387 members of Congress urged the Trump administration in May to extend the arms embargo. House Foreign Affairs Chair Eliot Engel said at the time that "Iran continues to be a danger to the United States, our interests, and our allies. We need a realistic and practical strategy to prevent Iran from becoming a greater menace.” [...]

France, Germany and the United Kingdom had also pushed back on a U.S. threat to impose sanctions on Iran if the Security Council voted to let the embargo expire. The U.S. negotiated the right to do so under the 2015 Iranian nuclear deal. But the European countries argued the U.S. was not in a position to use the so-called snapback option after withdrawing from the Iran nuclear deal in 2018.

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WorldAffairs: Susan Rice Reflects: Life in the Situation Room

Susan Rice worked for the US State Department during some of the most challenging periods this country has ever faced, from Black Hawk Down in Somalia to the Iran Nuclear Deal. In her new book, “Tough Love, My Story of the Things Worth Fighting For,” she describes the family struggles, ancestral legacies, and personal experiences that led her to the White House and the United Nations. Susan Rice joins Jane Wales, Vice President at The Aspen Institute, to share her experiences, and offer her perspectives on today’s foreign policy challenges.

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CNN: Iran has called Trump's bluff

Iran's latest provocation is further evidence that Trump's policy on Iran is turning into a disaster. That may offer some comfort to Trump's critics, but it should not. Iran's actions, which put it closer to a nuclear bomb, are extremely troubling because they raise the risks of war in the world's most unstable region and boost the incentive for further nuclear proliferation among its Sunni Arab rivals. [...]

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo sounded the alarm on Thursday, saying, "Iran is positioning itself for a rapid nuclear breakout." That was a far cry from his swaggering response last year, when he predicted the sanctions in Iran would force Tehran to change its behavior. When asked what the administration would do if Iranians restarted their nuclear program, he replied, "We're confident that the Iranians will not make that decision." He was wrong. [...]

Instead of achieving the goal of moving Iran's nuclear capability further into the future and persuading the regime to restrain its aggressive behavior against its neighbors, American policy has aggravated all the ills that made Iran a regional threat. Iran is steadily breaking the restrictions imposed by the nuclear deal and showing no restraint in its regional interventionism, another area of concern for the deal's critics.

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WorldAffairs: Ratcheting up the Pressure: Assessing the Risks of Trump's Iran Policy

In May 2018, President Trump withdrew the United States from the Iran nuclear deal, and re-imposed crippling economic sanctions against Tehran. Iran responded by restarting elements of its nuclear program and sponsoring militant attacks against US interests and allies in the Middle East. Trump claims he will keep the pressure on until Iran agrees to a better nuclear deal, while Iranian leaders insist they will not negotiate under duress. Colin Kahl, Steven C. Házy senior fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies' Center for International Security and Cooperation and former national security advisor to the vice president of the United States, speaks with WorldAffairs CEO Jane Wales about Trump's Iran strategy and how it risks igniting war with the country.

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The Atlantic: Trump the Bulldozer

But over the past year and change, there’s been a shift: Trump, having shed himself of the aides most likely to try to divert him or change his mind, has followed through on several of the biggest unfulfilled threats I highlighted back then. The catch is that while Trump is getting his way, many of these policies are not turning out as well as the president hoped—as illustrated by severe market jitters on Monday over the escalating trade war between the U.S. and China. [...]

This is the template for what has happened in several of the cases where Trump had appeared to fold but has since followed through. Aides who felt he was acting either against the national interest or against his own interest have been shipped out: Cohn, Defense Secretary James Mattis, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster, Chief of Staff John Kelly. They’ve been replaced by advisers who either encourage Trump, like Navarro, or are determined to enable rather than encumber him, such as acting Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney and the television pundit Larry Kudlow, who succeeded Cohn.

In retrospect, the May 2018 announcement that Trump would withdraw from the nuclear-nonproliferation deal with Iran looks like a turning point. Trump had lambasted the deal as a candidate, but once entering office, he repeatedly recertified Iranian compliance with the agreement, bowing to the will of his aides. He seemed more ready to fire aides than to keep but overrule them. But starting with his withdrawal from the deal, Trump has begun following his instincts more fully.[...]

Negotiations with North Korea have gotten nowhere after two summits—though to his credit Trump did walk away from the second meeting, in Vietnam, when he felt no progress was being made. And Trump is now pursuing diplomatic negotiations with Iran on what appears to be, as with NAFTA and USMCA, just a rewrite of the deal that was previously in place, though whether anything will come of the push is unclear.

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The Atlantic: Two Crises, One Existential Dilemma for Boris Johnson

Britain’s choice is a difficult one. It prizes its “special relationship” with Washington, largely centered on intelligence-sharing and defense, but as a member of the EU, it is much more closely intertwined with European economies. Throughout the presidency of Donald Trump, London has also showed itself far more willing to strike out against the U.S. position, aligning itself with Brussels, Paris, and Berlin on a range of foreign-policy questions from climate change to tariffs—and, crucially, the Iranian nuclear deal. [...]

There are concerns inside the British government that Washington will in turn use its newfound leverage to pull Britain more firmly into its foreign-policy orbit. The U.S. could push for greater British cooperation in restricting the Chinese telecom giant Huawei, which Washington says is a national-security risk; it could demand favorable terms in any future trade deal; or it could attempt to force London to take a harder line against Iran. This prospect is being taken seriously not only here in London but in other European capitals, according to conversations I have had with three senior U.K. officials at the core of Brexit and Iranian policy making, as well as multiple European diplomats, British politicians, and foreign-policy experts. Many of the officials and diplomats I interviewed requested anonymity to speak candidly about these fears. [...]

Until now, the two issues—that of Brexit, and efforts to save the Iran nuclear deal—have been almost entirely distinct. While Johnson has spoken of the great prize of a rapid-fire U.S. trade deal, he has held the U.K. line opposing the Trump administration’s strategy on Iran, maintaining the European alliance hoping to keep the deal intact despite the uptick in Iranian hostility. However, some of the officials I spoke with said fears have been raised that as prime minister, facing an economic crisis caused by his hard-line Brexit policy, Johnson may prove more susceptible to U.S. leverage to break away from France and Germany to secure concessions on trade. [...]

The Trump administration has voiced confidence its strategy is working. The president himself has tweeted that the Iranian regime was lashing out because of the U.S. sanctions. “Their Economy is dead,” he said “and will get much worse. Iran is a total mess!” British government officials, however, see scant evidence that U.S. efforts are working. According to the three senior U.K. officials, there remains little motivation for Britain to abandon the European alliance, because London still believes the best way of stopping Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon is the 2015 nuclear deal, officially known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, or JCPOA.

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Politico: Trump’s better deal with Iran looks a lot like Obama’s

At times, analysts and former officials say, it sounds like Trump wants to strike a deal that essentially mirrors the agreement that his White House predecessor inked — even if he’d never be willing to admit it. Iranian officials seem willing to egg him on, saying they’ll talk so long as Trump lifts the sanctions he’s imposed on them and returns to the 2015 Iran deal. And as European ministers warn that the existing deal is nearly extinct, Trump may feel like he is backed into a corner and running out of options. [...]

He’s said he’s “not looking for war,” wants to talk to Iran without preconditions and isn’t interested in regime change. He called off a military strike on Iran over its downing of an unmanned U.S. drone, overriding the advice of several top aides. His main public demand is that Iran not build nuclear weapons. In return, Trump has offered to help revive Iran’s sanctions-battered economy. [...]

Several European officials express astonishment at the audacity of the Trump administration demanding that Iran adhere to the deal when the U.S. the one who breached the agreement in the first place. Some said they were not surprised that Iran may have taken actions in the Persian Gulf as payback for the U.S. abandonment of the deal. 

Europeans “know that the original sin causing the current escalation in the Gulf is the U.S. violation of the Iran nuclear deal,” said Nathalie Tocci, an adviser to European Union foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini. “At the same time, they are terribly concerned about the escalation and the threat it poses to the Middle East and to Europe itself.” [...]

Perhaps sensing this, Trump on Tuesday went out of his way to note that he didn’t want to oust the government in Tehran. “We're not looking, by the way, for regime change because some people say [we are] looking for regime change,” he said. “We're not looking for regime change.”

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The Conversation: Iran’s leader is losing his grasp on power. Does this mean diplomacy is doomed?

This was Rouhani’s greatest achievement and riskiest gamble. He faced the ire of hard-liners in Iran who continue to have a formidable presence in the parliament, as well as the security and judicial system.

They accused Rouhani of selling out Iranian sovereignty and betraying the ideals of the Islamic revolution by scaling back Iran’s nuclear program and subjecting it to an unprecedented international monitoring regime. [...]

This realisation has seriously undermined Rouhani, who appears to have adopted the language and posture of the hard-liners in relation to the US. It is unclear if this can save him in office, or embolden his critics who seem to be gaining significant momentum. [...]

Iran’s recent breaches on uranium enrichment and stockpiles were incremental steps to exert pressure on European leaders to adhere to their promises of sanctions relief. This strategy was predicated on the assumption that Europe has more to lose with the collapse of JCPOA than a rift with the United States. It can only be described as a desperate move, showing that Rouhani is fast running out of options.

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Slate: Iran Is Right

I take no joy in reporting this, as the ruling regime in Tehran ranks among the world’s most detestable and oppressive. It’s a sad day when the American president and his top officials outdo the mullahs in mendacity. [...]

First, and most obviously (though it’s surprising how few news stories mention this up high, if at all), Iran was not the first country to breach the deal’s terms. In May 2018, President Donald Trump withdrew the U.S. from the deal, for no good reason other than he didn’t like it, despite the fact that international inspectors had repeatedly attested that the Iranians were in compliance with its terms. Then Trump not only re-imposed economic sanctions, which had been lifted with the signing of the deal, but also imposed “secondary sanctions” on any country that did business with Iran—even the five powers (Britain, France, Russia, China, Germany, along with the European Union) that had co-signed it.

Second, even in its (quite delayed) response to Trump’s withdrawal, Iran did not violate the accord. Paragraph 36 of the JCPOA states that if one signatory of the pact believes that some others “were not meeting their commitments” under the deal, then, after certain meetings and consultations, it would have “grounds to cease performing its commitments.” [...]

Fourth, leveling secondary sanctions against other countries doing business with Iran is a violation of the spirit, and possibly the letter, of international law. It is permissible and even proper to punish countries or companies that violate sanctions imposed by, say, a U.N. Security Council resolution. But the JCPOA is a Security Council resolution—No. 2231—enshrined as international law in July 2015, around the same time the U.S. and the other five countries signed it as a multinational deal with Iran.

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Forbes: Europe Circumvents U.S. Sanctions On Iran

The three governments announced the successful implementation of INSTEX at a meeting of the Joint Commission of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) on June 28, 2019. The meeting was chaired on behalf of the EU by the Secretary General of the European External Action Service (EEAS), Helga Schmid, and was attended by representatives of China, France, Germany, Russia, the United Kingdom, and Iran. [...]

This was widely seen as a setback for the EU, which had been hoping that SWIFT would defy the U.S. and maintain payment services to Iran. But European governments were still determined to find a way of keeping trade with Iran going. If SWIFT wouldn’t help, they would create something to replace SWIFT for Iranian trade. Thus, INSTEX was born.

Exactly how does INSTEX facilitate trade with Iran without making sanctions-busting cross-border payments? In a word – barter. INSTEX matches the Euro payments of companies buying goods from Iran with the Euro receipts of companies selling goods to Iran. Imagine a company based in France wants to sell transport equipment to a buyer in Iran. Receiving Euro payments directly from that buyer would break U.S. sanctions. So instead, the French company would register the sale documentation with INSTEX. INSTEX would look on its own books for a company buying foodstuffs from Iran. It would match the two cash flows so that in effect the two European companies pay each other. The goods would still travel to and from Iran, but the money would stay entirely within the EU. [...]

Secondly, as the JCPOA statement indicated, the aim is to open INSTEX to third countries. China and Russia were both present at the meeting, and both have an interest in trading with Iran. Crucially, their trade could include oil. The European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR) observes that “the SPV is more likely to succeed if it links with revenues related to Iran’s oil exports to countries such as China, India, and Japan.”

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ABC News: Iran may stand down on nuclear threat after Europe, China work to bypass US sanctions

It's a sign of the Trump administration's isolation on the world stage when it comes to the Iran nuclear deal, as it tries to cripple Iran financially and drive it to the negotiating table for a "more comprehensive deal" -- something Iran has said won't happen. [...]

Under the JCPOA, Iran agreed to limitations on and inspections of its nuclear program in exchange for lifting most sanctions on the country. But after President Donald Trump withdrew the U.S. from the accord in May 2018, the U.S. has reimposed sanctions, including on Iran's oil exports, and tried to enforce them vigorously. That's scared away European businesses from Iran and caused the country's economy to contract dramatically. [...]

The European Union announced Friday that INSTEX, its mechanism for financial transactions that will bypass U.S. sanctions, is finally operational, and two or three transactions are already being executed, according to Araghchi. Several European countries have already announced that they will join, and perhaps even more important to its success, China also expressed interest Friday.

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The Huffington Post: Trump Blew Up The Iran Nuclear Deal. Now He Wants Allies To Help Him Get An Iran Nuclear Deal.

Trump prepares to meet Thursday and Friday with leaders of the world’s largest industrial economies at the G-20 summit in Japan with the idea, according to the White House, of gaining their cooperation in lowering tensions with Iran. “This is a chance for the president to engage with a number of different international leaders, among our closest partners and allies, to obtain their support and to have discussions about how we can encourage Iran to enter into negotiations,” a senior administration official said this week on condition of anonymity. [...]

“He’s taken his usual tactic, which is aggravate everyone in advance, up the ante, be obnoxious, with the hope of then acting like the non-abusive parent in the face-to-face meeting,” said Wendy Sherman, the former State Department official who led the U.S. negotiating team for the Iran agreement that Trump scrapped. “What that gets him is not really clear at this point.” [...]

rump also turned his attacks against Vietnam for its tariffs — “Vietnam takes advantage of us even worse than China” — and Japan, also for purportedly taking advantage of the United States through its defense treaty: “If Japan is attacked, we will fight World War III. We will go in and we will protect them and we will fight with our lives and with our treasure. We will fight at all costs, right? But if we’re attacked, Japan doesn’t have to help us at all. They can watch it on a Sony television.” [...]

Adding to the difficulties, she said, is Trump’s tendency to swing from position to position, often undercutting his own administration’s work. Trump went from threatening “fire and fury” on North Korea to praising its dictator within weeks. He threatened to shut the border with Mexico, then reversed. He threatened tariffs on Mexico, then reversed on that, too.

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The Guardian: The Trump administration is trying to make war with Iran inevitable

Like the recent oil tanker attacks in the Gulf of Oman, the Trump administration has framed the drone incident as if it occurred in a vacuum – implying that the Iranians are launching these (alleged) attacks without provocation, and providing an aura of legitimacy to a possible American military response. [...]

The current Iran predicament is the result of a years-long campaign by the same people who pushed for invasion of Iraq. Instead of learning from the Iraq debacle, they’ve decided that any means, including a potentially catastrophic war with Iran, are justified in order to achieve regime change in Tehran. Their public arguments for escalation with Iran have generally been cloaked as criticism of Barack Obama’s Iran nuclear agreement, by disingenuously calling for what they know is an unachievable “better deal”. [...]

But instead of capitalizing on these gains, the Trump administration threw it all away to take a different path. Slowly, over time, Trump officials ramped up their bellicose rhetoric toward Iran; falsely accused Tehran of coordinating with al-Qaida (presumably to invoke the 2001 Authorization for the Use of Military Force as legal justification for a possible attack); pulled out of the JCPOA; and imposed sanctions so devastating that the Iranians were almost certain to lash out, whether in the form of the minor skirmishes we’ve seen in recent weeks or rejection of the terms of the 2015 nuclear accord.

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Today in Focus: Is John Bolton trying to drive Trump to war with Iran?

John Bolton, who has been called “the most dangerous man in the world”, was not Donald Trump’s first pick for his national security adviser. But after a series of resignations, he was plucked from a life of Fox News appearances to reprise his career as the foremost military hawk in the US. Now he has his sights set on Iran and has pushed for a buildup of US military assets in the Gulf.

The Guardian’s world affairs editor, Julian Borger, tells Anushka Asthana that as tensions rise, so do the chances of an accidental – or deliberate – escalation towards war. The echoes of the drumbeat to war in Iraq in 2003 are all too apparent, and it was Bolton’s role in that crisis that prompted a Guardian columnist to attempt to make a citizen’s arrest of him in the tranquil surroundings of the Hay literary festival in 2008. George Monbiot describes how he came out second best from that encounter.

Also today: the Guardian has updated its style guidance for journalists writing and talking about the environment. Instead of “climate change” the preferred terms are now “climate emergency, crisis or breakdown” and “global heating” is favoured over “global warming”. The editor-in-chief, Katharine Viner, explains why precision in language is important in reporting on the climate and why the changes have been made now.

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Associated Press: Analysis: Iran supreme leader comments signal strategy shift

Since first publicly accepting the nuclear deal, under which Iran agreed to limit its enrichment of uranium in exchange for the lifting of economic sanctions, Khamenei issued a warning not to trust the U.S. A letter he sent to Rouhani in October 2015 said the deal had “numerous ambiguities and structural weaknesses that could inflict big damage on the present and the future of the country.” [...]

Their immediate ouster, however, is unlikely. Khamenei had similarly worsening relations with hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and reformist President Mohammad Khatami in their second terms. Zarif himself publicly tendered his resignation in February after not attending a surprise meeting in Tehran between Syrian President Bashar Assad and Khamenei, only later to agree to stay on. [...]

Analysts believe Iran in part may be playing for time, waiting to see if Trump will be re-elected in 2020. Rouhani’s own term runs out in 2021, allowing Khamenei to swap out “discredited negotiators” like Zarif, said Mehdi Khalaji, an analyst at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy who is Shiite theologian by training, Khamenei also could send negotiators from the Guard, rather than from the presidency, to allow them to negotiate on Iran’s ballistic missile program, which the paramilitary force controls.

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Politico: EU’s Iran fight is not about Iran (or Trump)

Infuriated by Italy's induction into an expanded version of the so-called E3 club — the trio of France, Germany and the United Kingdom that helped negotiate the nuclear deal along with the European External Action Service — Spain has blocked proposed language on Iran intended for approval by EU governments. [...]

The Council conclusions aim to walk a diplomatic tightrope, by not raising any doubts about the EU's commitment to the nuclear deal despite the withdrawal of the U.S., but also holding Iran to account for a continuing pattern of military meddling in the Middle East and at least two recent assassination plots in Denmark and the Netherlands. [...]

The spat stems from an effort by the EU last year to address other concerns about Iran, including its role in wars in Yemen and Syria, without creating the perception that the discussions were taking place in the same format that led to development of the nuclear accord. The nuclear deal was brokered by the E3+3 — the EU, France, Germany and the U.K. plus Russia, China and the United States.

For the new framework, the EU established the E4 — adding Italy. But that move was seen by some EU countries, including Spain, as a bit of home-country favoritism by Mogherini, a former Italian foreign minister. Others saw it as an effort to appease Rome, which was annoyed at being excluded from the E3 while Berlin was included.

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Al Jazeera: Why Saudi Arabia's foreign policy is failing

At the beginning of the Cold War, Riyadh took a backseat in most regional conflicts, leaving the rowdy revolutionaries of the Arab world (Egypt, Iraq and Syria) to take the lead. On Palestine, for example, the Saudis decided to keep a low profile. Although Riyadh backed the war efforts of the so-called "ring states" - the Arab countries surrounding Israel - it always refrained from getting involved in a direct military confrontation with the Zionist state. When it decided to get involved - for example by leading the 1973 oil embargo - it always did so through soft or economic power. [...]

Throughout the Cold War, Saudi Arabia also played a quiet albeit important role in the international arena, contributing to the eventual collapse of the Soviet Union. In the 1980s, it joined Pakistan and the United States in their efforts to support armed groups resisting the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, funding most of the CIA programmes to arm and train the Mujahideen. The House of Saud also helped plunge oil prices in the second half of the 1980s, bringing the oil-dependent Soviet economy to its knees. [...]

For the first time in its recent history, Saudi Arabia found itself completely exposed, with no one to fall back on but itself. To add insult to injury, the Obama administration showed little sensitivity towards Saudi concerns as it sought rapprochement with Iran, leaving Riyadh deeply worried about its security. As the feeling of insecurity in the House of Saud grew, "backseat" diplomacy gave way to a more assertive foreign policy; the tactics, however, remained more or less the same: confrontation by proxy. [...]

Not only has MBS created more enemies than he can handle, but he has also chosen the wrong allies. He has embarked on a dangerous path of normalisation with Israel, believing that it would pay back in the long run. But with this decision, he risks losing the hearts and minds of the Arab people to Turkey and Iran, both of which have positioned themselves as champions of the Palestinian cause.

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