While the American president-elect has suggested that he will “dismantle” the deeply flawed agreement to limit the Islamic Republic’s nuclear program, Joseph Lieberman and Mark Wallace argue that U.A. interests would be better served by first enforcing it—as the Obama administration has refrained from doing—and then trying to renegotiate it:
To date, the Iranian regime has made clear it has no intent to honor the spirit or letter of the JCPOA, [as the deal is formally known]. Iran’s pattern of reckless behavior has accelerated over the past year. Its anti-American, anti-Israel, and anti-Arab rhetoric has grown stronger, and its actions have matched its rhetoric. . . . In June, the State Department again designated Iran the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism. . . .
With U.S. leadership, a new coalition [including Israel and America’s Arab allies] could address the policy omissions in the JCPOA by, for example, securing an agreement with Iran to curb its regional aggression, state sponsorship of terrorism, and domestic repression of human rights. In exchange, Iran could be given broad-based sanctions relief and even normalization of relations.
However, if Iran refuses, the United States and our allies will have great leverage to hold Tehran accountable under the existing accord. Iran has already twice exceeded its allotted limit for heavy water; it has test-fired multiple ballistic missiles, in defiance of UN Resolution 2231, which endorses the nuclear deal; and, according to German intelligence estimates, Iran has continued its “illegal proliferation-sensitive procurement activities” at a “quantitatively high level.” The United States and its partners have closely adhered to the letter of the JCPOA; they should demand that Iran do the same. . . .
If Iran does not change course, the president-elect should make clear he is prepared to impose a new round of comprehensive secondary sanctions against Iran—and then to walk away, with cause, from the JCPOA. Then it will be time, as the president-elect has said, to tear up this agreement
Read more on Washington Post: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/global-opinions/how-trump-should-renegotiate-the-iran-deal/2016/12/06/b78ddf3e-bb0d-11e6-91ee-1adddfe36cbe_story.html