Editors Note: It is the KCP policy to seek out diverse views on various issues of the day. All Op-Eds reflect the views of the writer and may or may not reflect the views of KCP.
Whether you trust the Iranians, whether you think they have the ability to sneak, creep, or crawl, it doesn’t matter, because the discussion is over. It is done!
For 20 months the negotiators for the United States, Britain, France, Germany, Russia, China and Iran negotiated a very complex and thorough agreement that does not allow Iran to create a nuclear weapon. They can be inspected 24/7 and every ounce of uranium can be monitored. What matters now, is that 90 countries support it and they are moving forward to work with Iran. They are making deals and signing business contracts. Most experts think that this is a very good deal for the United States and the countries that negotiated it.
On Sunday Britain re-opened their embassy in Tehran and Iran re-opened their embassy in London to great fanfare. The negotiating countries will lift sanctions. Is there anyone so foolish that they think this can be undone? This is a bell that can not be un-rung.
The same neocon voices, such as Dick Cheney’s, who swore that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction and that they were moving them around on trucks and they were hidden so well that all the inspectors could not find them, are the same voices saying such things as “there is a better deal,” “you can’t trust the Iranians,” “they are the biggest sponsors of state terrorism”. They were wrong then and they are wrong now. They cost the United States trillions of dollars and thousands of lives for Americans and far more for Iraq. It is they who destabilized the Middle East which has produced ISIS and thousands of migrants escaping for their lives. Do they acknowledge in any way that they are responsible for disaster in the Middle East. No, they do not! Once again they deny allowing diplomacy to work, which will most likely lead to another disastrous war.
This accord is overwhelmingly supported by experts in the field. Here is just a sampling of those who have come out in support of the accord:
Top Nuclear Scientists http://www.timesofisrael.com/
340 American Rabbis sent a letter in support (http://www.timesofisrael.com/
100 U.S. Ex-Ambassadors (http://thehill.com/policy/
In one recent example, three dozen retired generals and admirals released an open letter endorsing the agreement as “the most effective means currently available to prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons.” NYTimes August 17th
Ex-Mossad chief, Efrain Halevy (http://www.npr.org/2015/07/
Others that support the deal include former AIPAC executive director Thomas Dine and former Israeli Navy commander and Shin Bet head Ami Ayalon
And not to be forgotten, the vast majority of Iranian people, who don’t seem to count to Americans as having a legitimate voice. The Iranian people who are waiting for a chance to have sanctions lifted so they can resume a normal life and who believe that once this deal goes through and commerce flows again in their country, that the moderate Iranian voice will have more legitimacy against the reactionary old guard.
