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Source: https://www.thefp.com/p/why-trumps-iran-threats-dont-work
Mr. President, Give Up on a Nuclear Deal with Iran
(Free Press) Eli Lake - President Trump has been giving diplomacy a chance since April and he has little to show for it. As Trump learned last month, the price for a temporary opening of the strait is too high. Trump would not only have to commit to reviving the economy of a regime that struggles to pay its soldiers, but also concede that Hizbullah, Iran's proxy in Lebanon, had a right to continue to hold that country hostage. The negotiation to get the hard-liners in Tehran to sign a nuclear pact is folly. The main reason is that the nuclear program being negotiated has largely been destroyed. The only thing left to do is to secure what the president has called the "nuclear dust," what remains of the highly enriched uranium buried deep beneath the remains of Iran's underground facilities in Isfahan and Natanz. But at this point it's hardly necessary. Iran's regime, for now and in the near to medium term, cannot get to that material either. And even if they could, they no longer have the centrifuge cascades or the workshops to turn that uranium into a nuclear weapon. Even still, if U.S. sensors and satellites detect an effort to secure that material, our military has the capability to end those efforts as they begin. The right strategy now is to play a longer game. Stop trying to get the Iranians to admit defeat. For now, just keep the military and the blockade in place as they are. This will disabuse Iran's leaders of the hope that Trump is desperate to cut a deal that will revive its war machine and economy. When Trump threatens war only to back away, he only makes the battered and impoverished regime in Iran look stronger than they really are. Their nuclear program, built up over three decades at the cost of hundreds of billions of dollars and international sanctions and censure, is today largely rubble and ash. That is an accomplishment of Israeli and American arms.