Featured Joe Biden reaffirms he will seek return to Iran nuclear deal

[Indus Pakistan]

Well

May I ask are you Iranian or Pakistani?

Ps. Quality discussion going on here gents. Joy to read.

@Philosopher et al

 

[vi-va]

Return JCPOA? What terms?
Sleepy Joe can NOT just return without Iran further concession, otherwise Republic will make a hell a lot of trouble in Senate.
Also if I am Joe, I will ask concession from Iran as well. Why not.
It seems to me that Iran is more than glad to rejoin JCPOA, so definitely there are more rooms to renegotiate.
I would say Obama is not doing well on the first JCPOA negotiation. Apparently there are more room to pressure Iran, at least Trump did that for years, make more damage, but no bombs made.

Joe will take Trump legacy, and take advantage of it. Rouhani will be the most unpopular president in Iran history book, and I expect him step down soon later in 2021.

By the way, I am on Iran side. I am just analyzing from a normal Chinese view.

 

[Death Professor]

Iran will fall for it again.

It's not like they have a choice. They killed their general and I was concerned as to how Iran would react. Later, the Iranians shot down their own passenger plane and I got my answer. They are as incompetent as Indians if not more, they can't walk the talk.

Now, they killed their top scientist and what will be response of Iran, hold some rallies, burn some of government building in their own country, chant "death to america" and suck it up like before. I was/am expecting zero retaliation from Iran, they will keep on doing what they are good at "proxies". And thats it.

 

[Arian]

Return JCPOA? What terms?
Sleepy Joe can NOT just return without Iran further concession, otherwise Republic will make a hell a lot of trouble in Senate.
Also if I am Joe, I will ask concession from Iran as well. Why not.
It seems to me that Iran is more than glad to rejoin JCPOA, so definitely there are more rooms to renegotiate.
I would say Obama is not doing well on the first JCPOA negotiation. Apparently there are more room to pressure Iran, at least Trump did that for years, make more damage, but no bombs made.

Joe will take Trump legacy, and take advantage of it. Rouhani will be the most unpopular president in Iran history book, and I expect him step down soon later in 2021.

By the way, I am on Iran side. I am just analyzing from a normal Chinese view.

His second term will end in August 2021 anyway. And a president cannot get elected more than two times in Iran. So, he will be flushed down the toilet for good.

And you're absolutely right. Trump proved that no matter how much you pressure the Islamic Republic regime, they do not have the balls for making a bold, game-changing move. And you are absolutely right that Biden will use Trump's legacy to reach a better deal; better for Americans, of course. What people fail to understand is that the status quo is pretty good for the Americans. They're literally having their cake and eating it too. Why would Biden want to change that without Iran trying to change the status quo?

 

[HAIDER]

It's called game of "good cop/bad cop" and Iran will fall for it again. Then in the next election cycle Iran will get screwed again by the "bad cop". Thus are fools in this world. What is that about fool me once, fool me twice????

Well, its time for Iran to cash out the situation in its favor wisely, even its short term. Right now Iran went through alot in the form of assassinations . But its time to absorb those losses and look for bigger economic gains.

 

[Indus Pakistan]

They killed their general and I was concerned as to how Iran would react. Later, the Iranians shot down their own passenger plane and I got my answer.

Throwing stones in glass houses is not a good idea. How did Pakistan react when America literally 'invaded' Pakistan when it attacked Abottabad. Or how did it react to dailt American droning of it's territory?

 

[Death Professor]

Throwing stones in glass houses is not a good idea. How did Pakistan react when America literally 'invaded' Pakistan when it attacked Abottabad. Or how did it react to dailt American droning of it's territory?

You failed to mention many, salala incident, raymond davis, memo gate etc. 2010-2012 were extra bit bad for us. Our establishment was severely compromised, but we recovered. I hope some day there will be a proper investigation of those years and made public. Anyways, that happens when one makes a super power his strategic partner and still follow one's own line. We know our place on this earth and we played in those constraints. But unlike us, Iranian think they are some sort of a beast, hence making US it's prime enemy. We meddle what we could handle, but Iran has a habit of biting more than it could chew. Sure, they say they "killed OBL" allegedly, but was he our top general or top nuclear scientist? So no, our house ain't made of glass, we have our issues, but its certainly not made of glass.

Also do tell did we downed our own passenger plane as a reaction? You can't genuinely compare the two.

 

[Philosopher]

People should bare in mind that ultimately members here are just spectators and do not influence the situation. I see many requests of Iran should do X or Y which go contrary to what Iran has done, is doing and most certainly will do. Thus a more constructive use of time is seeing the political landscape for what it is and analysing what is likely to occur. There is a horse race going on and some people are dreaming the outcome if they were flying on a Pegasus instead. All these emotional and hot-headed statements some are resorting to will not amount to anything. Moreover, let us not arrogate to ourselves to think we could do a better job than someone like Khamenei who is a sage in geopolitics. I will say this again, if some of you were given Khamenei's power today, you may make some rash changes, but I guarantee if you were also given his knowledge and insight, you would keep things the same. If there was a viable and better option for Iran, It would have done it.

So, what is realistically going to happen? Yes, Iran and the US will return to the terms of the deal. It is best to witness the outcome of that in the coming years. And to throw a counterfactual statement, wonder how the situation would have turned out if Trump had remained in office.

 

[retaxis]

Maybe Iran tells america to shove it and just goes ahead with developing Nukes. Will america be game enough to do something?

 

[vi-va]

His second term will end in August 2021 anyway. And a president cannot get elected more than two times in Iran. So, he will be flushed down the toilet for good.

And you're absolutely right. Trump proved that no matter how much you pressure the Islamic Republic regime, they do not have the balls for making a bold, game-changing move. And you are absolutely right that Biden will use Trump's legacy to reach a better deal; better for Americans, of course. What people fail to understand is that the status quo is pretty good for the Americans. They're literally having their cake and eating it too. Why would Biden want to change that without Iran trying to change the status quo?

Rouhani should take a very close look into North Korea case. Those Americans are not reasonable guys you can really negotiate with.

 

[TheImmortal]

Return JCPOA? What terms?
Sleepy Joe can NOT just return without Iran further concession, otherwise Republic will make a hell a lot of trouble in Senate.
Also if I am Joe, I will ask concession from Iran as well. Why not.
It seems to me that Iran is more than glad to rejoin JCPOA, so definitely there are more rooms to renegotiate.
I would say Obama is not doing well on the first JCPOA negotiation. Apparently there are more room to pressure Iran, at least Trump did that for years, make more damage, but no bombs made.

Joe will take Trump legacy, and take advantage of it. Rouhani will be the most unpopular president in Iran history book, and I expect him step down soon later in 2021.

By the way, I am on Iran side. I am just analyzing from a normal Chinese view.

Even the resident Chinese member has a better grasp of the situation than many on this board.

Thank god none of you are in charge of Iran. You would be taken out of some hole like Gaddafi and Saddam.

Appeasement never works.

Turks are watching this and taking notes for their own nuclear drive. Saudis too.

May I ask are you Iranian or Pakistani?

Ps. Quality discussion going on here gents. Joy to read.

@Philosopher et al

He’s not Iranian.

 

[SalarHaqq]

Trump proved that no matter how much you pressure the Islamic Republic regime, they do not have the balls for making a bold, game-changing move.

You don't pressure a country in order to test whether it will make game changing moves, you do so to reach specific, pre-defined objectives and extract concrete concessions. In that sense, Trump's pressure campaign failed miserably. Its explicitly stated objective was to force Iran to the negotiation table and to accept more unfavorable terms than the JCPOA itself. But Iran did not comply and resisted the pressures.

And you are absolutely right that Biden will use Trump's legacy to reach a better deal; better for Americans, of course. What people fail to understand is that the status quo is pretty good for the Americans. They're literally having their cake and eating it too. Why would Biden want to change that without Iran trying to change the status quo?

I agree that this is what the Biden regime will try to do. An unconditional return of the US to the JCPOA is unlikely in my opinion. And of course the reformists and moderates in Iran are going to be willing to accept the new conditions. However, it is also highly unlikely that Majles and Supreme Leader would ratify such demands.

Key will be the upcoming presidential election, which the Americans aren't oblivious to. So we might see them relax certain restrictions imposed on Iran without reintegrating the JCPOA, in order to provide ammunition to Iranian liberals for the 2021 election. If Zarif is elected, this will increase chances for American participation in a JCPOA revised to America's benefit. But even in that scenario, I consider it unlikely that Majles and Supreme Leader will play along this time around.

 

[TheImmortal]

Source for these numbers?

Before Trump:

EIA estimates that Iran's oil net export revenues totaled $55 billion in 2017. projects. According to EIA estimates based on tanker-tracking data reported by ClipperData, Iran's crude oil and condensate exports averaged 2.5 million b/d in 2017, about 0.2 million b/d higher than the 2016 average (Figure 4)

https://www.eia.gov/international/content/analysis/countries_long/Iran/pdf/iran_exe.pdf

With complete oil embargo

According to the data, Iran is exporting as much as 600,000 barrels daily, using ship-to-ship transfers with transponders turned off to avoid detection, skirting U.S. sanctions. The daily average number compares with an estimate of 227,000 bpd made in a U.S. Congressional report, NBC’s Raf Sanchez wrote on Twitter

Iranian Oil Exports Much Higher Than Official Data Suggests | OilPrice.com

Iran is exporting a lot more crude oil than U.S. figures suggest, data from TankerTrackers.com has revealed

www.google.com

The amount actually sold on black market and sold as Iraqi oil is impossible to know

Thus the only thing Biden will give Iran is waivers to export oil to friendly countries to Iran. Thus Iran is looking at possible less than 2M barrels extra of oil export.


Is this your idea of tangible economic benefits?

Iran will once again give away another round of leverage (uranium deposits, scuttle Fordow, and stop construction of underground centrifuge site) just to be able to sell some more oil for 4 years.

I mean what else can someone expect from someone so naive that takes the Biden’s words as gospel.

The return “deal” is going to force a second more punishing JCPOA 2.0 then force a third even more punishing JCPOA 3.0 deal in a few years that will totally gut Iran.

Meanwhile you will have given up leverage to return to JCPOA. Given up even more leverage to to get to JCPOA 2.0

This is how US destroyed Saddam from 1990 to 2003.

They are masters at moving the goalpost. And the Europeans will go along with it. And if Iran tries to say “hey wait we already had a deal why should we get another one” they will paint as an uncompromising monster in the court of public opinion.

 

[Arian]

You don't pressure a country in order to test whether it will make game changing moves, you do so to reach specific, pre-defined objectives and extract concrete concessions. In that sense, Trump's pressure campaign failed miserably. Its explicitly stated objective was to force Iran to the negotiation table and to accept more unfavorable terms than the JCPOA itself. But Iran did not comply and resisted the pressures.

Actually, you do. You first put pressure on them to see their reaction. If you see no reaction, you will progressively increase pressure on them and entrench them. A game changing move is a move that leads to them recalculating their strategy. As long as they see no such move, they will continue to entrench Iran militarily, economically and politically.

As I said, the US is pretty happy with the status quo. Why shouldn't they be? They have isolated Iran with minimal cost.

If you look at the game from Trump's perspective as a tactic to show him triumphant and strong in the eye of the public, you can say that Trump's maximum pressure campaign failed miserably. If you look at it from the perspective of the US as a system, the very fact that you and I are now discussing the issue of returning to the JCPOA shows that their maximum pressure campaign has worked. So, one can say that Trump's maximum pressure campaign worked and the next US administration is going to inherit a leverage in the next negotiation, if there will be one.

I agree that this is what the Biden regime will try to do. An unconditional return of the US to the JCPOA is unlikely in my opinion. And of course the reformists and moderates in Iran are going to be willing to accept the new conditions. However, it is also highly unlikely that Majles and Supreme Leader would ratify such demands.

Key will be the upcoming presidential election, which the Americans aren't oblivious to. So we might see them relax certain restrictions imposed on Iran without reintegrating the JCPOA, in order to provide ammunition to Iranian liberals for the 2021 election. If Zarif is elected, this will increase chances for American participation in a JCPOA revised to America's benefit. But even in that scenario, I consider it unlikely that Majles and Supreme Leader will play along this time around.

I don't know to be honest. Decisions like this are made by the system, not only one person. Everyone knows that I hate Rouhani with a passion, but I don't think he is solely responsible for the JCPOA scandal. Khamenei gave him the green light and allowed him to stay in power for 8 years.

 

[TheImmortal]

US policy of containment relies on making Iran have the least amount of money possible in order to strain its finances in expanding its reach and war machine.

Now who here willing believe US will say “yes Iran here is a brand new nuclear deal and you can get extra 50-75 billion dollars to build your war machine and expand your war chest” ???

I mean Iran is in a strict containment policy. Why would you feed your enemy and make them stronger?

Iran did nothing under Nuclear deal (mined some ships, attacked an oil facility, shot a US drone, stole a British tanker). Yet it suffered (100B in economic damages, nuclear scientist killed, top IRGC killed, numerous damages in Syria).

So if I was US I’d just leave sanctions on and walk away and allow Israel to keep wacking Iran with a stick.

No reason to abandon policy of containment, its working.