This from Sir Harold Evans writing at the New York Daily News:
What Obama gets wrong about Iran
Why have the negotiations with the Obama administration and Iran become such a critical national security issue? Look at the record of betrayals of trust that have enabled Iran to operate 19,000 centrifuges and another 1,008 IR2m machines that can produce bomb-grade, fissionable material five times faster than the other centrifuges. Back in 2005, the West was saying to Iran “zero centrifuges.” Let me repeat: Zero. Next we were talking of a compromise at 5,000 centrifuges. In seven negotiations from 2005 and 2013, the negotiations can be summed up in one word: Retreat. A series of capitulations have left Iran with “the right” to enrich uranium so now it has thousands of kilograms of enriched uranium. That’s enough to produce a bomb, contrary to the Obama’s commitment to Congress that he would not allow Iran to have nuclear weapons.
The progressive weakening of the Obama administration’s position was analyzed in November 2011 in a penetrating Washington Post report by Michael Makovsky and Blaise Misztal. It’s gotten weaker since then. What was “unacceptable” has been demoted to one of our highest national security issues. Now the United States seems prepared to make a deal that not only would suspend and ultimately lift the sanctions, but to do that while leaving Iran as a threshold nuclear power. This is the classic definition of a Bad Deal. And worse. Iran is on track to put a nuclear warhead on intercontinental missiles with a range reaching beyond Europe. This puts the whole civilized world at risk of nuclear blackmail and it threatens the very existence of Israel.
This is why Netanyahu was invited to address the House on a bipartisan basis. The fuss about this being a breach of protocol is ridiculous in light of the administration’s acceleration of trust in Iran. The American people understand. In a poll, more than 81% say Iran cannot be trusted. So, too, do many members of Congress from both parties. The extraordinary breaking of ranks by the ranking Democrat of the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee, Sen. Robert Menendez, bears repeating: “The more I hear from the administration and its quotes, the more it sounds like talking points that came straight out of Tehran.” The senator is wholly justified in his move to impose new escalating sanctions on Tehran if negotiations fail to conclude an agreement that clearly limits Iran’s nuclear program. He has not forgotten that the real power in Iran is the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, a ruthless theocrat — and one who continued the campaign of international terrorism that has marked Iran ever since its revolution.
A lot more at the site.
Sir Harold Evans is no journalistic slouch - quite the history including Editor of the Sunday London Times for 14 years.
