Trump, Iran and talks

There is considerable irony to be perceived in the possibility that the ever-shifting position of President Trump vis-à-vis Iran will unify that much-divided country. Iran has for at least a year been riven by internal divisions that have erupted into violence, and the ruling regime may not be as durable as it thinks it is. Add to the mix Trump saying that he has a feeling that America and Iran may be talking ‘pretty soon’ — and in the same breath saying ‘… and maybe not and that is OK too’. Make of that what you may, and the White House code breakers are already wrangling the President’s latest wander into the hinterlands of the screaming mad when it comes to foreign policy.

The offer to meet the Iranian leadership ‘without preconditions’ is on the face of it encouraging, particularly as America is due to re-tighten the sanctions screw on 6^th August. It also has to be seen in the light of the meeting between Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un which was (a) opaque and (b) of little substance by way of outcome. Leading Iranian figures are already either sceptical or dismissive or both, calling America untrustworthy — which is not unlike the pot calling the kettle black — and arrogantly unilateral, which it is.

Iran is involved in a range of conflicts either by proxy or directly that America also has interests in. It is actively contributing to regional instability with a view to discomforting its own arch-enemy Saudi Arabia. Oil is thick in the mix as are relations between America and some of its (shrinking) European allies which have their own agendas when it comes to Iran and they do not mirror those of America. Bringing Trumpian contrariness to the table seems to have done little beyond further fan smouldering fires. The Trump presidency has yet to get its very own shooting war — not that it needs one — but the mercurial commander-in-chief has an itchy trigger finger. It would have been infinitely preferable to let the back-channellers do their work before Trump dived in. We watch with a degree of trepidation.

Published in The Express Tribune, August 2^nd, 2018.

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