THE FOG OF THE IRAN MOU. President Donald Trump and administration officials are hailing the new memorandum of understanding to end the Iran war. But no one outside the small circle of negotiators on both sides has seen the document. Reports on what it contains are contradictory and confusing. It appears the confusion might last all week, since Trump said Monday that the MOU will probably be made public on Friday, after a formal signing ceremony in Geneva.
So no one in the public can say what is in the deal. But after listening to the president’s statements as well as those of senior administration officials who spoke with reporters after the announcement, it appears best to keep expectations low.
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The most basic point to make is that it does not appear that the MOU — which is just a page and a half long — is an agreement to settle the issues that led to war in Iran. Rather, it appears to be an agreement to guide later negotiations to end the war. At best, the world is in for two more months of negotiations.
What the current MOU appears to concretely accomplish is to undo two major developments from the start of the war: Iran’s closing of the Strait of Hormuz and the U.S.’s imposition of a blockade on Iran. Under the deal, it appears the strait will be reopened and the blockade lifted.
Obviously the United States and ally Israel have inflicted enormous damage on Iran. It will take a long time for Iran to recover once the war ends. But in the case of the strait and the blockade, the MOU appears to be a deal to get the U.S. and Iran back to where things stood before the war began. Back then, the strait was open and there was no U.S. blockade of Iran. Now, after months of war and then negotiations, under the MOU — if it works — the strait will be open and there will be no U.S. blockade of Iran.
It appears the MOU can be divided into an aspirational part, that is, what Iran will get if it fulfills this or that obligation; and a concrete part, which is what will be done immediately when the document is formalized. In a call Monday, a senior administration official laid out both. “The basic template here is that if they’re willing to behave like a normal country, then we’re willing to treat them like a normal country, to the great prosperity of the people of Iran, of the Gulf region, and the United States,” the senior administration official said. “Second thing I’d say is it provides for the immediate opening of the Strait of Hormuz and the combined lifting of the naval blockade.”
By “behave like a normal country,” the official meant that Iran had to give up its nuclear program, promise never to pursue a nuclear weapon, turn over its nuclear materials, and stop supporting terrorism around the region. All of that is apparently covered in the MOU, but without any sort of detailed agreement on exactly how Iran would accomplish those things. Instead, the MOU outlines the negotiations that will take place in (at least) the next two months on those subjects.
As far as the strait and the blockade are concerned, the deal is clearer: The strait is opened and the blockade is lifted. There had been concerns on the U.S. side that an immediate lifting of the blockade would produce a windfall for Iran. The blockade is the main U.S. way of exerting economic pressure on Iran. Officials say it costs Iran $500 million a day, and quickly lifting the blockade would essentially give the Iranians that much relief every 24 hours.
Now, a set of White House talking points suggests the relief will come proportionally as Iran opens the strait. “It runs step for step,” the White House said. “As Iran restores traffic, the United States winds down the blockade in proportion. Iran performs, the relief follows, and American leverage holds the entire way.” Of course, by that principle, if Iran opens the strait quickly, the blockade will be lifted quickly, and U.S. leverage will be substantially decreased in the process.
How it will all work is not clear. Perhaps we’ll know more in a couple of days if the MOU sees the light of day before the signing ceremony. But in the meantime, everyone remains in the dark.
