The US administration under Donald Trump seems to be raising the spectre of tension everywhere in the world. Soon after coming into power, the controversial American president lambasted China for allegedly extracting trade concessions from the sole superpower besides taking on Washington’s European allies, lecturing them to contribute more financial resources towards the security of their territories. Later, Trump hurled threats at North Korea and Venezuela but that is not the end of the story.
Now, the supreme commander of the American armed forces has stunned the world by declaring that he intends to abandon the Iran nuclear deal. This left even his Western allies flabbergasted. Even the senior officials of his government think that such a decision would not serve US national interests. Defence Secretary James Mattis said recently that staying with the deal, under which Iran had accepted strict curbs on its nuclear programme in exchange for sanctions relief, was in the national security interests of the US. Gen Joseph Dunford, the chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, has warned against pulling out of the multilateral deal, which was signed by some of Washington’s closest allies. He fears such a step would affect US credibility and could hinder its ability to strike security agreements in the future.
It is not only these two senior officials who have expressed support for keeping the deal intact but Trump’s Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and National Security Adviser HR McMaster are also of the opinion that the deal should not be abandoned. Both of them are thought to have advised Trump not to withhold certification.
According to Guardian, “The European signatories to the deal – the UK, France and Germany – have urged Trump to uphold it, and are focusing their energies on lobbying Congress not to reimpose sanctions, which could prove fatal to the agreement.” But, despite all this, Trump seems to be determined to wash his hands of the nuclear agreement and is expected to withdraw his endorsement of it.
The newspaper notes, “Adding to the mood of uncertainty hanging over Washington, Trump used a group photograph before a dinner with military leaders and their spouses to warn cryptically that the evening represented “the calm before the storm”. But the question is: will this storm be selective targeting only Washington’s enemies, leaving its allies and friends unharmed. Sagacious souls believe natural calamities are ruthless and unpredictable but man-made disasters sometimes turn out to be more merciless and fickle. Nature does not have a gargantuan appetite for blood and human corpses but the history of wars and human brutalities suggest that man’s thirst for death and destruction is insatiable.
American policies have already led to wars and conflicts in various parts of the world. We have IS wreaking havoc in parts of the Middle East, Asia, and occasionally Europe. African states are grappling with the menace of Al-Shabab and Boko Haram. Afghanistan and Pakistan are battling extremists created and trained by the CIA during the cold war after the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan.
Now, the possible scrapping of the Iran nuclear deal will trigger a new crisis. Iran will intensify its efforts to go nuclear because the destruction of Iraq, Libya and Syria clearly indicates the weak are doomed. The three countries had – at some point of their history – aspired to be nuclear powers but a combination of assurances, concessions and threats convinced them to give up such ambitions. They thought that would save them but today they stand destroyed.
Over a million people perished in these countries. Syria alone suffered a loss of over 200 billion dollars. Libya, one of the richest countries in modern Africa, is in a shambles and Iraq with the second highest graduates in the Arab world has been reduced to a sectarian battle zone. The West shattered the belief of these states in international law, reinforcing the notion of might is right. Many in these states feel they would have never been invaded and destroyed had their armies been armed with the lethal agents of destruction called nuclear weapons.
Does Trump think that Tehran – which has closely watched the destruction of these states and, in case of Syria, made hectic efforts to protect it from the IS – will sit idle after the US has scrapped the nuclear deal? Iranian clerics will seize this opportunity to pressure their moderate leadership into acquiring nuclear arms. Anti-American feelings will not run high just in the streets of Tehran but in those of Iraq, Lebanon, Yemen, Pakistan and Syria as well.
Such action on the part of the Oval Office’s incumbent will also shatter the credibility of Washington’s Western allies that engaged Tehran for years, convincing the country to strike the deal. Trump’s possible imprudent decision will vindicate Pyongyang’s claims that America is not trustworthy, prompting the pariah state to invest its energies in securing its borders from an unpredictable, Machiavellian enemy.
If Iran attempts to go nuclear, other states in the Middle East will follow suit. Saudi Arabia is believed to have made efforts in the past to seek nuclear technology but abandoned its intension of going nuclear. But once Tehran is equipped with nuclear capability, no power on earth will be able to prevent Riyadh from making efforts to acquire weapons of mass destruction. Israel might try to carry out strikes to prevent Tehran from acquiring such technology but such action on will spell disaster, engulfing not only the Middle East but regions beyond it as well.
Therefore, it is important that the elected king of America pay heed to senior officials’ advice and consult Washington’s Western allies, who are convinced that Tehran has been abiding by the deal’s rules, before staging any political or strategic drama. If Trump really goes ahead with his plan, then the world will say publicly what Tillerson recently said privately about his boss.
The writer is a Karachi-based freelance journalist.
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