WASHINGTON: After leaving the Iran nuclear deal, Washington wants to move forward by offering to build a "coalition" to counter the multiple "threats" posed by the Tehran regime -- but Europeans intent on saving the 2015 accord may thwart that effort.
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Monday will unveil a new "diplomatic roadmap" for Iran -- how America plans to "address the totality of Iran's threats," according to the State Department's director of policy planning, Brian Hook.
Washington is looking to draft a "new security architecture and a better security framework, a better deal," Hook told reporters ahead of the speech, the first major policy address by Pompeo since he became America's top diplomat.
"The US will be working hard to put together a coalition," State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert said, flagging Washington's bid for a multilateral approach after its unilateral withdrawal from the accord.
President Donald Trump has long trashed the deal with Iran -- concluded under his predecessor Barack Obama, together with Britain, China, France, Germany and Russia -- saying it did not do enough to curtail Tehran's nuclear ambitions.
The Republican leader also said it did not go far enough in restricting Iran's ballistic missile program, or its intervention in regional conflicts from Yemen to Iraq and Syria.
"We need a new -- a framework that's going to address the totality of Iran's threats," Hook said.
So far, the guidelines of this new strategy are unclear.
The big unknown is whether European leaders, who were bitterly disappointed by Trump's decision to ditch the deal, would be willing to return to talks with his administration any time soon.
For now, the European Union is trying to persuade Iran to stay in the 2015 agreement, even without Washington's participation.
The re-establishment of the US sanctions that were lifted after the Iran nuclear deal was signed will force European companies to choose between investing in Iran or trading with the United States.
In reality, there is no choice -- European companies cannot afford to forsake the US market.
And with investment from Europe -- which had been the main carrot dangled before the Iranians to right their struggling economy -- now stymied, Tehran may have little incentive to hold up its end of the bargain.
The Europeans have tried to squeeze a little flexibility out of Washington to help out their firms, but to no avail.
"They tell us, 'We want the sanctions to hurt, there won't be any exemptions,'" said one European official.
Some in the US administration are calling for a "North Korea scenario," meaning the imposition of sanctions so severe that they force Iran back to the negotiating table.
By reimposing the sanctions, Washington aims to "bring economic pressure to bear on Iran," Hook said.
"It was economic pressure that brought the Iranians to the table a few years ago."
But Jake Sullivan, a former Obama administration official who is now a researcher at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said "the idea that we are going to be able to reconstruct sanctions at the same level (as 2015) is a flawed concept."
"The more aggressive the US is in telling the Europeans basically, 'We have you under our thumbs,' the more the Europeans are going to say: 'We will find any means we possibly can to not let you do that to us,'" he said Friday.
Washington has meanwhile sought to downplay the differences with its allies.
"We agree with the Europeans on much, much more than we disagree on," said Hook, citing "a lot of progress" during talks with Paris, London and Berlin that aimed to find solutions to Trump's concerns.
The US official also mentioned French President Emmanuel Macron's proposal of a "new deal," based on the 2015 accord, but offering a broader strategy on Iran.
But those negotiations, and Macron's proposal, pre-dated the abrupt US withdrawal from the accord.
Are they still on the table? And how could an accord be reached now if it was impossible 10 days ago?
"We are waiting to see more details," said a European official.
Another European official warned: "But if it is a question of building a coalition to push for regime change in Iran, the Europeans won't be on board."
For Sullivan, the next phase is one in which "the punishment is the strategy -- squeezing Iran and keeping them in the penalty box for as long as possible, and as much as possible, with the hope of regime change, but if it's not regime change, (then) a weaker regime."
US trying to move forward after quitting Iran nuclear deal
US trying to move forward after quitting Iran nuclear deal
Mystery of CIA’s lost nuclear device haunts Himalayan villagers 60 years on
- Plutonium-fueled spy system was meant to monitor China’s nuclear activity after 1964 atomic tests
- Porter who took part in Nanda Devi mission warned family of ‘danger buried in snow’
NEW DELHI: Porters who helped American intelligence officers carry a nuclear spy system up the precarious slopes of Nanda Devi, India’s second-highest peak, returned home with stories that sent shockwaves through nearby villages, leaving many in fear that still holds six decades later.
A CIA team, working with India’s Intelligence Bureau, planned to install the device in the remote part of the Himalayas to monitor China, but a blizzard forced them to abandon the system before reaching the summit.
When they returned, the device was gone.
The spy system contained a large quantity of highly radioactive plutonium-238 — roughly a third of the amount used in the atomic bomb dropped by the US on the Japanese city of Nagasaki in the closing stages of the Second World War.
“The workers and porters who went with the CIA team in 1965 would tell the story of the nuclear device, and the villagers have been living in fear ever since,” said Narendra Rana from the Lata village near Nanda Devi’s peak.
His father, Dhan Singh Rana, was one of the porters who carried the device during the CIA’s mission in 1965.
“He told me there was a danger buried in the snow,” Rana said. “The villagers fear that as long as the device is buried in the snow, they are safe, but if it bursts, it will contaminate the air and water, and no one will be safe after that.”
During the Sino-Indian tensions in the 1960s, India cooperated with the US in surveillance after China conducted its first nuclear tests in 1964. The Nanda Devi mission was part of this cooperation and was classified for years. It only came under public scrutiny in 1978, when the story was broken by Outsider magazine.
The article caused an uproar in India, with lawmakers demanding the location of the nuclear device be revealed and calling for political accountability. The same year, then Prime Minister Morarji Desai set up a committee to assess whether nuclear material in the area near Nanda Devi could pollute the Ganges River, which originates there.
The Ganges is one of the world’s most crucial freshwater sources, with about 655 million people in India, Nepal, and Bangladesh depending on it for their essential needs.
The committee, chaired by prominent scientists, submitted its report a few months later, dismissing any cause for concerns, and establishing that even in the worst-case scenario of the device’s rupture, the river’s water would not be contaminated.
But for the villagers, the fear that the shell containing radioactive plutonium could break apart never goes away, and peace may only come once it is found.
Many believe the device, trapped within the glacier’s shifting ice, may have moved downhill over time.
Rana’s father told him that the device felt hot when it was carried, and he believed it might have melted its way into the glacier, remaining buried deep inside.
An imposing mass of rock and ice, Nanda Devi at 7,816 m is the second-highest mountain in India after Kangchenjunga.
When a glacier near the mountain burst in 2021, claiming over 200 lives, scientists explained that the disaster was due to global warming, but in nearby villages the incident was initially blamed on a nuclear explosion.
“They feared the device had burst. Those rescuing people were afraid they might die from radiation,” Rana said. “If any noise is heard, if any smoke appears in the sky, we start fearing a leak from the nuclear device.”
The latent fear surfaces whenever natural disasters strike or media coverage puts the missing device back in the spotlight. Most recently, a New York Times article on the CIA mission’s 60th anniversary reignited the unease.
“The apprehensions are genuine. After 1965, Americans came twice to search for the device. The villagers accompanied them, but it could not be found, which remains a concern for the local community,” said Atul Soti, an environmentalist in Joshimath, Uttarakhand, about 50 km from Nanda Devi.
“People are worried. They have repeatedly sought answers from the government, but no clear response has been provided so far. Periodically, the villagers voice their concerns, and they need a definitive government statement on this issue.”
Despite repeated queries whenever media attention arises, Indian officials have not released detailed updates since the Desai-appointed committee submitted its findings.
“The government should issue a white paper to address people’s concerns. The white paper will make it clear about the status of the device, and whether leakage from the device could pollute the Ganges River,” Soti told Arab News.
“The government should be clear. If the government is not reacting, then it further reinforces the fear.”
