{"id":109847,"date":"2017-12-04T16:27:00","date_gmt":"2017-12-04T16:27:00","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2023-01-08T10:55:42","modified_gmt":"2023-01-08T10:55:42","slug":"let-keep-talking-nuclear-rope-dope","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cvnextjob.com\/index.php\/2017\/12\/04\/let-keep-talking-nuclear-rope-dope\/","title":{"rendered":"Let&#39;s Keep Talking (Nuclear Rope-a-Dope, Round #65)"},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px;\" class=\"sharethis-inline-share-buttons\" ><\/div><h3 class=\"post-title entry-title\" itemprop=\"name\"><\/h3>\n<div class=\"post-header\"> <\/div>\n<p>By all accounts, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan&#8217;s weekend diplomatic  mission to Iran was a failure. Despite Mr. Annan&#8217;s efforts, Tehran has  made it very clear that it has no plans to stop enrichment of uranium, a  key step in developing nuclear weapons. And, for good measure, the  Iranians held a highly-publicized dedication ceremony for their new  heavy water plant near Khondab, just days before Annan arrived in  Tehran. Translation: the Iranians aren&#8217;t really worried about the  prospect of sanctions over their refusal to comply with various U.N.  resolutions regarding their nuclear program.<\/p>\n<p>But that won&#8217;t keep  the two sides from continuing diplomatic conversations. Before he left  Tehran, Mr. Annan extracted a vague promise from Adolph Jr. (err,  Iranian President Ahmadinejad) on Iran&#8217;s &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/regimechangeiran.blogspot.com\/2006\/09\/iran-snubs-annan-and-rejects-nuclear.html\">preparedness and commitment to hold negotiations<\/a>&#8221;  on its nuclear program. In other words, don&#8217;t get your hopes up, and  don&#8217;t expect anything approaching serious talks on the issue. But, there  is that promise to talk, and (as we&#8217;ve pointed out before), the process  means more to the U.N. and the State Department crowd than concrete,  verifiable agreements.<\/p>\n<p>If you have any doubts about the truth of  that statement, consider the European reaction to recent developments in  Iran. Barely 24 hours before Annan left Tehran, EU foreign ministers  gave Iran another fornight to &#8220;clarify&#8221; its position on the nuclear  issue, giving the regime even more wiggle room, and postponing any sort  of decisive action on the matter. Little wonder that Iran doesn&#8217;t take  diplomatic efforts seriously, but they&#8217;re more than willing to continue  the process, since it buys more time for their nuclear scientists.  It&#8217;s  the latest incarnation of the nuclear &#8220;rope-a-dope&#8221; strategy that Iran  has been using for months, with considerable success.  No reason to  change that approach now, especially when the U.N. remains wedded solely  to the diplomatic process.    <\/p>\n<p>In a <a href=\"http:\/\/www.opinionjournal.com\/editorial\/feature.html?id=110008891\"><em>WSJ<\/em> editorial posted Sunday<\/a>,  Claudia Rosett recounts the absolute futility of U.N. efforts to reign  in Tehran&#8211;and why those efforts will never bear fruit. As she reminds  us, military force is probably the only viable means for denying Iran  the bomb, and when it comes to that option, the U.S. will, once again,  do most of the heavy lifting.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By all accounts, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan&#8217;s weekend diplomatic mission to Iran was a failure. Despite Mr. Annan&#8217;s efforts, Tehran has made it very clear that it has no plans to stop enrichment of uranium, a key step in developing nuclear weapons. And, for good measure, the Iranians held a highly-publicized dedication ceremony for their [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cvnextjob.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/109847"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cvnextjob.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cvnextjob.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cvnextjob.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cvnextjob.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=109847"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/cvnextjob.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/109847\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cvnextjob.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=109847"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cvnextjob.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=109847"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cvnextjob.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=109847"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}