Pro-Con: Is it time to revise the Iran nuclear agreement?

Yes: Congress, Trump should work to improve Obama’s flawed pact

President Donald Trump has not killed the Iran nuclear deal. Instead, he has asked Congress to fix its worst flaws.

Our lawmakers can, and should, work with Trump to redress the gaps in U.S. policy toward Iran — and they can do so without violating the deal.

Some argue the U.S. should not mess with the deal because “it’s working” and Iran is complying with its obligations. But the president’s recent de-certification of the accord was not based solely on a claim of Iranian noncompliance.

Rather, Trump argues that the sanctions relief Iran received through the deal has not been proportional to the security benefits gained by the United States. This issue requires serious consideration.

The agreement is fundamentally flawed because it lifts meaningful constraints on Iran’s non-nuclear activities in the Mideast region without requiring any concessions from Iran outside its nuclear portfolio.

The deal lifts important international restrictions on providing advanced and offensive weaponry to Iran in just three years. It also provides Iran with significant financial relief without any constraints on how the money can be used.

The pact “calls on” but does not actually require Iran to limit its ballistic missile program. It does not mention the activities of Iranian proxies and armed forces throughout the region.

The deal’s concessions to Iran would not pose such a serious threat to U.S. national security if Iran were a responsible regional actor or had begun to moderate its non-nuclear harmful behavior.

Indeed, the Obama administration apparently intended for the nuclear deal to lead the Iranian regime to voluntarily change its approach to regional activities.

Iran, however, has not indicated it will roll back its Middle East adventurism or its support for terrorism. It has only increased its involvement in regional conflicts, especially in Syria and Iraq, with the deployment of its own conventional forces and tens of thousands of proxies, including Lebanese Hezbollah.

The U.S. must confront and roll back Iran’s increasing aggressiveness, and fear of undermining the deal must not stop America from doing what’s right.

Nonetheless, immediately withdrawing from the deal would be unwise. The ideal outcome for the U.S. is one that retains the restrictions on the Iranian nuclear program while also curtailing Iran’s other negative activities.

This is feasible. The deal does not constrain the U.S. or the international community from imposing additional sanctions or other pressure on Iran’s ballistic missile program and regional activities. Iranian claims that new non-nuclear pressures would violate the deal should not deter the U.S. from imposing them.

Congress must work to extend restrictions on Iran’s procurement of advanced weaponry well into the future. It should also develop additional forms of pressure to isolate Iran.

Most important, Congress should conduct these efforts in concert with our European allies and others willing to support the cause. Because Iran’s ballistic missile program is central to its national security doctrine, the country is unlikely to agree to meaningful restrictions on these programs without substantial coercive measures.

Any solution to the shortcomings of the Iran deal most likely will entail an international effort to compel Iran to capitulate on some of its non-nuclear bad behavior.

American national security will be best served by recognizing — and acting upon — the reality that the nuclear deal as written will not resolve the threats posed by Iran.

No: Deal with Iran is working; Trump should leave it alone

By refusing to certify Iran’s compliance with the multilateral nuclear deal, President Donald Trump is evading his responsibility under a law adopted by Congress. His action will accomplish nothing and may cause great harm.

The certification is a procedure under the Iran Nuclear Review Act of 2015. The law was adopted by Congress to require the president to certify, every 90 days, that Iran is complying with the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, which subjects Iran’s nuclear program to limitations and special inspection in return for lifting sanctions that were in place against Iran at the time.

As specified by the Iran Nuclear Review Act, certification is to relate to Iran’s compliance. The president is to certify that the suspension of anti-Iran sanctions remains “appropriate and proportionate to the specific and verifiable measures taken by Iran with respect to terminating its illicit nuclear program.”

Under a side document to the Plan of Action, monitoring is done by the International Atomic Energy Agency.

On Aug. 31, that agency reported it has been able to monitor and has found no deviation by Iran. Trump’s Cabinet secretaries agree that Iran is complying. So does Trump alter-ego Nikki Haley, our ambassador at the United Nations.

Trump himself does not contest that Iran is complying. Trump has declined to certify on the basis of issues wholly outside the Plan of Action, prominently, Iran’s recent testing of ballistic missiles and its support for various elements in the broader Middle East picture that Trump characterizes as terrorist. A memo to the White House: Iran is fighting against the Islamic State in both Syria and Iraq.

Congress should tell Trump that his refusal to certify is invalid because he is raising extraneous issues. Congress should ignore Trump’s action.

But the Republicans in Congress are trying to come up with revisions to the Plan of Action, in particular, to amend its so-called “sunset” provisions on various Iranian obligations so that the plan will bind Iran longer.

This effort is a nonstarter even if this famously dysfunctional Congress can find language for a revised Plan of Action on which it can agree.

The Plan of Action is not simply between Iran and the United States. It involves Iran on one side, and on the other the European Union plus France, Germany, Britain, Russia, China and the United States.

The other parties on our side have said they will not ask Iran to renegotiate. And Iranian President Hassan Rouhani has refused to negotiate. So any proposal Congress devises to redo the Plan of Action it will be a dead letter.

The judgment of the countries that joined with us and with Iran in fashioning the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action was that dragging other issues into the mix would complicate an already complex negotiation and, in effect, doom it.

By his non-certification, Trump has turned public opinion in Iran sharply against the United States and has driven President Rouhani into the arms of the less-moderate elements in Iran who opposed any nuclear deal as an assault on Iran’s sovereignty. In the longer term there is little prospect of benefit.

Iran has said all along that its nuclear program is like those of many countries, aimed at production of power for peaceful purposes. It denies it was trying to build nuclear weapons.

Whether it was may never be known. But the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action called for inspections that are more intrusive than the inspections required under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.

For now, the Plan of Action is being observed by all parties, including the United States, and sanctions remain lifted. Hopefully President Trump will find this act of non-certifying a sufficient show of displeasure and will leave things as they are.

This story was originally published October 26, 2017 at 2:34 PM with the headline "Pro-Con: Is it time to revise the Iran nuclear agreement?."