Letters from an American - The MOU Ignites a Firestorm

Starting point is 00:00:06 June 17, 26. A senior U.S. official read the text of the 14-point Memorandum of Understanding with Iran over the phone to reporters today, and there's a reason it has ignited a firestorm. A memorandum of understanding is usually a non-binding agreement outlining shared goals and intentions, but in this case, although there is much vague or confusing language in the text, what the White House says is an MOU, actually has firm language in it. First of all, after months of the White House insisting Trump does not need congressional approval for his strikes against Iran because they did not constitute a war, the MOU straight up calls the conflict the current war. The MOU commits the U.S. and Iran and their allies to stop military operations on all the all of, fronts, including in Lebanon, a reference to Israel's bombing of what it says are Hezbollah camps there.

Starting point is 00:01:13 Israel has suggested it will not consider itself bound by any such agreement. But as Anton Tryonvosky points out in the New York Times, the language will enable Iran to pressure the U.S. over Israeli attacks in Lebanon or Israel's occupation of southern Lebanon in what Israel calls a security zone. The MOU says the U.S. will terminate all types of sanctions against Iran, and it lifts the U.S. blockade of Iranian ports, giving Iran the access to world trade the U.S. previously prevented in order to pressure the regime. It also permits Iran to begin selling oil immediately on the world market. The MOU says Iran will will use its best efforts, not a guarantee,

Starting point is 00:02:06 for the safe passage of commercial vessels through the Strait of Hormuz with no charge for 60 days only. It continues. Iran and Oman will decide how to define the future administration and maritime services in the Strait of Hormuz, an indication that Iran intends to charge fees for transit of the Strait. The MOU says the U.S. will thaw frozen Iranian assets immediately and also develop a definitive,

Starting point is 00:02:41 mutually agreed plan with at least $300 billion for the reconstruction and economic development of Iran to repair the damage from U.S. and Israeli strikes. It says the U.S. will grant all required licenses, waivers, and permissions needed for the relevant financial transactions, apparently readmitting Iran to full participation in world financial markets. In exchange for these concessions, Iran reaffirms in the MOU that it will not try to develop or procure a nuclear weapon. That word reaffirms is important. It signals that Iran is simply reiterating what it said in the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, or JCPOA, that Trump tore up in 2018. But unlike the JCPOA, the MOU contains no language about a process to guarantee Iran's promise not to pursue a nuclear weapon.

Starting point is 00:03:50 When a reporter asked Trump about that absence, he said that what would guarantee Iran's compliance is fear of renewed U.S. bombing. But Iran has shown it can withstand such attacks, and in any case, the U.S. has no stomach for them. It looks as if Trump's war on Iran has cost the U.S. the lives of 13 service members, injuries to 400 more, and at least 132. billion dollars so far in immediate costs, lost income, and higher consumer costs, only to leave the U.S. in a significantly worse place with regard to Iran than before Trump started bombing. The costs to the world have been significantly higher in terms both of lives, beginning with more than 175 Iranian schoolchildren and their teachers, and of economies. Journalist David Schuster reported that the Iranian government is declaring total victory.

Starting point is 00:04:59 Former Secretary of State Anthony Blinken posted, By President Trump's own terms, the war is a failure. The Iranian regime is intact and its military wing more empowered, while the Iranian people are more impoverished, repressed, and desperate. The only achievement of the ceasefire, is the likely reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, which was open before the war started, and we will apparently pay Iran to do so.

Starting point is 00:05:30 Don't expect to return to normal anytime soon, if at all, he warned. In a press opportunity today in France, where he was attending the Group of Seven, or G7 conference, an informal forum of industrialized democracies, Trump twice told reporters that he didn't want to be like President Herbert Hoover. Although he got the history of Hoover's role in the Great Depression wrong, Trump's point seemed clear. He didn't want to be the person to trigger an economic catastrophe.

Starting point is 00:06:05 And therein lay the rub for Trump and his war on Iran. So long as Iranian leaders could credibly threaten the passage of ships through the Strait of Hormuz, they could throttle about a fifth of the world's oil supply and much of its fertilizer, plundering, the globe into crisis. The terms of the MOU heavily favor Iran, but the strait gives its leaders leverage over Trump and the U.S. This was precisely the scenario that past U.S. presidents sought to avoid by negotiating with Iran rather than bombing it.

Starting point is 00:06:40 Selling the MOU in the U.S. is going to be rough. When a reporter asked Trump today why he didn't stick around for the signing ceremony, with this Iran peace deal, the famously camera courting president answered, I might, but I'd rather, this is a memorandum of understanding. It's very important, but it might not be the kind of a document that I should be signing. The reporter responded, There is some element to this where you send the vice president. If it works out great, you look like a genius for sending him.

Starting point is 00:07:13 If it doesn't work out, it's the vice president's fault. Trump responded, I like that idea. This way, if it works out, I'm going to take the credit. If it doesn't work out, I'm blaming J.D. You better be careful, J.D. He's going to turn his plane around and get the hell out of here. Yeah, I like that idea. I think that's a good idea.

Starting point is 00:07:35 Maga lawmakers, like Senator Tommy Tuberville, a Republican of Alabama, seemed willing to go along with the measure, saying, I trust President Trump. I trust Vice President Vance. We don't need to listen to anybody up here on Capitol. Hill. Let's trust these two. But John Neffle of Media Matters reported that MAGA figures who have been all in on the war on Iran are revolting against the MOU. Trump's Iran deal gives the Islamic Republic big wins up front and America nothing, wrote the New York Post. Journalist David Schuster reported

Starting point is 00:08:15 that Republican senators are furious with Trump. Senator Bill Cassidy, a Republican of Louisiana, who lost his primary to a Trump-backed challenger a month ago, posted, Reagan is rolling over in his grave. Iran's nuclear ambitions were not curbed, and they have learned that threatening the Strait of Hormuz works, and will undoubtedly leverage it in the future. Now Iran gets to build brand new infrastructure under this deal. Before the war, the strait was open, Iran was being crushed by sanctions, and 13 service members were still alive. Now 13 Americans are dead, families have paid billions at the pump, sanctions will be lifted, and the bombing has stopped. This is the worst foreign policy blunder in decades. By tonight, Trump loyalist Senator Roger Marshall,

Starting point is 00:09:11 a Republican of Kansas, was defending the idea of Iran having missiles, despite the fact that ending Iran's missile program was one of Trump's stated reasons for starting the war in the first place. Marshall told CNN's Caitlin Collins that he preferred that they not have missiles, but that the key issue is that they have to be able to defend themselves. National Security scholar Joseph Stibb posted, It's like the last 40 years of the Republican Party's foreign policy didn't happen. After setting Vance up to take the fall for the deal, tonight at a dinner with French President Emmanuel Macron at the Palace of Versailles, Trump signed the MOU himself.

Starting point is 00:10:00 It was a moment when a knowledge of history would have been useful. As Midas touch noted, it was at Versailles after World War I that the Allied powers forced Germany to sign the Treaty of Versailles, one of the most famous surrender documents in modern history. Earlier in the day, asked by a Midas Touch reporter about Trump's cognitive decline at the G7, Senator John Ossoff, a Democrat of Georgia, said, The president has been humiliated on the world stage, and many Americans are increasingly concerned about his stability and his capacity in the office.

Starting point is 00:10:43 It's deeply distressing to Americans across the political spectrum to see a president so incompetent and so incapable, attempting and failing to represent the nation internationally. Over a gif of James Bond saying, he's quite mad, you know, national security scholar Tom Nichols called today the weirdest and most astonishing. day in U.S. foreign policy in decades. Letters from an American was written and read by Heather Cox Richardson. It was produced at Soundscape Productions, Dead in Massachusetts. Recorded with music composed by Michael Moss.

Letters from an American - The MOU Ignites a Firestorm

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