A Deal That Sets the Clock Back to February

On his 80th birthday, the President announced what he called a major deal with Iran. A 60-day ceasefire. The Strait of Hormuz reopened, by his account permanently toll-free. The U.S. naval blockade of Iranian ports lifted. He thanked Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin for helping get it done, and he called it a win.

Read the reported terms, and here is what this deal actually is. Not a deal at all. A surrender. It sets the clock back to February.

Back to before any of this started. Before the bombing, before the blockade, when the Strait was open and the war had not begun. Every objective this administration named to justify that war is still sitting on the table. No regime change. No unconditional surrender. No commitment to turn over enriched uranium. No commitment to stop enriching it, not now and not on any date down the road. Nothing on the Houthis or Hezbollah. The Revolutionary Guard is more firmly in control of the country than it was before the first bomb fell.

All of it got pushed into negotiations that are supposed to happen during the 60 days. The President spoke about these issues as if Iran had already conceded them. If that were true, they would be in the agreement. They are not. And the items left out are exactly the ones that speak to who that regime is. Iran is not likely to move on them in two months.

So what exactly was won here? A problem this administration created in the first place. The war reopened a question that had already been answered in February, and the deal answers it the same way again. We bombed for months to end up right where we started.

And we got there alone. This war was started without any real attempt to build a coalition with our allies first, a national embarrassment from the opening day. Then, when Trump could not finish the mess he had made, he called on those same allies to come to our aid, and turned around and criticized them when they declined to join an ill-conceived, poorly thought-out operation they were never consulted on.

Then set it next to the agreement this President spent years calling the worst deal ever made. Obama's 2015 deal capped Iran's enrichment at 3.67 percent, far below the 90 percent you need for a weapon, and it held that cap for 15 years. It required enriched uranium to be removed from the country. Outside inspectors verified all of it, and Iran complied until Trump tore up the agreement. The deal reported this week sets no limit on Iran's nuclear program at all. It says nothing about the proxies. It carries no penalty if Iran simply refuses to concede when the 60 days run out.

It achieves less than the deal he called a catastrophe.

The reason is not hard to find. Oil prices are up. Inflation is up. The pressure is here at home. Unwilling to send ground troops and out of cards, he chose to back down, take the status quo we had in February, and call it a victory. He even floated making us the guardian of the Middle East in return for 20 percent of the region's revenue, an idea that lands badly with our friends in the Gulf and worse with Americans who want out of that region entirely.

The Strait reopening is good. Steadier prices are good. The hardcore supporters can be sold on the rest, told this was a masterstroke and a great victory. Everyone else can read. They will see a president who started a war he could not finish, gave away the leverage, and is now asking the country to applaud the cleanup.

It is the arsonist who sets the fire, shows up to help put it out, and demands credit for solving a problem he created.

KMI