By Bonnie D. Jenkins
This week marks the beginning of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty Review Conference in New York. It is a conference that takes place every five years and is an opportunity for the States Parties to that treaty to discuss aspects of implementation that are working and, of course, problematic. The Review Conferences have not produced a consensus document in the last two meetings, and the Conference failed in 2022 because Russia had last-minute concerns with passages in the document on Ukraine, rather than a nuclear issue. Secretary of State Blinken spoke at the opening ceremony for the United States at the 2022 Review Conference, and we had a dedicated Ambassador to that Conference, along with a team of experts from across the U.S. government. I joined the delegation on several occasions in my previous role as Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security. The U.S. delegation arrives in New York this week with the New START treaty no longer in force, a war in Iran partly the result of the U.S. withdrawal from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) in 2018, and a lack of clarity about China’s growing nuclear program. We also, for the first time in decades, have no Ambassador leading the delegation since that position has not been filled.
Of the issues noted above, uppermost in people’s minds today is the war in Iran and its related issues of a potential Iranian nuclear weapon. As I think about where we were when we celebrated that JCPOA achievement in 2015, to where we are today, I recognize some of the causes for the current situation—the role of personal grievance and racial animus in fueling policy decisions; the limits of our constitutional design in situations where raw politics overshadows practical national security interests; the disrespect for international law and treaties; and plain old-fashioned recklessness.
Let’s start with the former. In 2015, Iran, Russia, China, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, and the United States negotiated the JCPOA. It was narrow in scope by design. The goal was to address the most immediate problem: preventing Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon. It was not meant to solve every problem between Iran and the West. It was not a settlement of regional conflicts, including Iran’s ballistic missile program and its regional proxies. It was meant to stop any Iranian advancement of nuclear weapons development, buy time to develop more diplomatic relationships, relieve sanctions on Iran, and increase transparency.
It was working. The JCPOA enabled the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to establish an unprecedented inspection regime; constrain pathways to weaponization; and implement verifiable limits on fissile material that provided the international community with the most transparent view of Iran’s nuclear program.
Then Trump took office. In 2018, the United States withdrew from the agreement. The withdrawal was put forth as a policy correction, but it was mostly theater. The U.S. withdrew from the Iran deal not because it had failed to prevent Iran from moving towards nuclear weapons. It was canceled because, among other excuses, Trump disliked Obama so much that he couldn’t live with one of Obama’s major achievements. At the time of the withdrawal, Trump said, “I was very proud to have knocked out the Iran nuclear deal by President Barack Hussein Obama.” The New Times reported that Trump frequently framed his opposition to the deal in highly personal and political terms, viewing it as a component of his predecessor’s legacy that he was actively trying to dismantle.
Politics motivated by personal grievance is not unique. But when those politics are racialized, they take on a more sinister and pernicious quality. When the objective is to take your predecessor’s name off achievements because you can, rather than to constructively build on his policies, national security becomes collateral damage.
America’s allies in Europe—who had invested significant diplomatic capital in the JCPOA—were furious. Iran had every reason to trust America would uphold its end of the bargain, but then, it did not, and sanctions snapped back unilaterally. Hardliners in Iran who were skeptical of negotiations with the West got the better hand. The inspection regime began to weaken, and transparency—our most valuable tool—evaporated. Over time, the room for diplomatic solutions diminished while opportunities for conflict grew. The administration’s strategy: tear apart the structure, allow the security environment to deteriorate, then cite that deterioration as a cause for coercive measures, is one we are seeing both domestically and abroad.
Which brings me to my second point. The framers of the Constitution rightly worried about executive overreach. To that end, they built checks and balances into the constitutional structure. But foreign policy, particularly our nonproliferation regime, has depended on legalized guardrails but also, importantly, on political norms, regional and subject-matter expertise, and institutional continuity. But what happens when our political system stops subscribing to norms? The administration can say what it wants, and the balancers are quiet. They lack either the will or the mechanism to enforce consequences for poor decision-making. The President is then left with all the formal powers of the office, and few informal constraints to stop bad behavior.
When policy decisions are made on the basis of malice or ignorance, they are almost always bad decisions. Foreign policy should be crafted by actual experts who are held accountable by congressional oversight and who look beyond partisan politics to further America’s interests. As the U.S. starts discussions this week in NY, we enter weaker, having shown our willingness to ignore treaties and promises based on personal vendettas and racial prejudices. To hell with nuclear nonproliferation. Domestic dysfunction has international consequences; when domestic bigotry is allowed to influence decision-making at the highest levels of power, people suffer all over the world.
In his rush to tear up Iran’s agreement and spark “a war as we’ve never seen before,” Trump has possibly made it far more likely that Iran will pursue advanced nuclear capabilities than had we stayed in a deal we negotiated from a position of strength. Pointing fingers isn’t fun. But if we don’t understand causation, we’ll be doomed to repeat these mistakes. Trump decided that destroying an agreement under Obama was a net positive for America. Institutional weaknesses in our constitutional order enabled that decision and its aftermath today.