Nuclear Winter Is Coming: Trump Tells Macron U.S Will Leave Iran Deal (Updated)

By Karoli Kuns — May 8, 2018

After ten years of negotiating a deal with Iran to limit their nuclear program and successfully implementing it, Donald Trump has taken the first step toward war with Iran while turning his back on our steadfast allies, France, Germany and the United Kingdom by announcing the U.S. withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal.

The New York Times reports that in addition to giving Trump a thrill as he unwinds President Obama's signature foreign policy achievement, it gives him the power to act in a dictatorial fashion as he attempts to levy more sanctions to cripple Iran's economy.

The United States is preparing to reinstate all sanctions it had waived as part of the nuclear accord — and impose additional economic penalties as well, the person said.

A second person familiar with negotiations to keep the 2015 accord in place said the talks collapsed over Mr. Trump’s insistence that sharp limits be kept on Iran’s nuclear fuel production after 2030. The deal currently lifts those limits.

Iran is not North Korea. They will not comply with the deal after today and will return to the program of building up their nuclear arsenal. Furthermore, they will also raise their middle finger -- as will every other country on the planet -- to the prospect of doing any kind of deal with the US or anyone associated with us. Let the Middle East arms race begin!

Donald Trump has just made the world a far less safe place. Make your plans, because nuclear winter is coming.

UPDATE: Reaction is pouring in from people who actually think about these things and bother to understand the world we live in, unlike the shitgibbon in the White House.

CNN’s Amanpour: “I would describe pulling out of this deal [nuke deal] as possibly the greatest deliberate act of self-harm and self-sabotage in geo-strategic politics in the modern era.” @camanpour

— Mohsen Milani (@milanimohsen) May 8, 2018

This is garbage dealmaking. The hardliners in Iran are thrilled. They are getting their nuclear program back, in exchange for nothing. And remember that people like Bolton will never concede, that Iraq was a mistake.

— Brian Schatz (@brianschatz) May 8, 2018

I can’t even fathom the stupidity of publicly abrogating a nuclear deal with Iran and fucking over our European allies mere weeks before trying to negotiate one with North Korea and our East Asian allies.

— southpaw (@nycsouthpaw) May 8, 2018

The Iran deal provides substantially more provision for verification of denuclearization & ongoing monitoring of such than will exist in this new post-Iran-deal reality. Watch arguments for war in the coming months take the shape of "we can't be sure Iran isn't building a bomb."

— Spencer Ackerman (@attackerman) May 8, 2018

Forget everything else. This act by an unqualified reality show grifter should in itself be grounds for impeachment because it makes our country less safe. It is a flagrant violation of the U.S. Constitution and his oath of office

Update 2: This whole thread by David Rothkopf is worth reading, but this tweet summarizes it well.

Accordingly pulling out of the Iran deal should not be seen merely as a stand-alone mega-blunder. It is part of a Trump foreign policy that is doing systematic, serial, and profound damage to the United States, our allies, our alliances, and the international system.

— David Rothkopf (@djrothkopf) May 8, 2018

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