Given his past failures, can Obama strike a verifiable nuke deal with Iran?

DENVER — The United States and other members of the P5+1 have agreed to extend the deadline for reaching a nuclear deal with Iran by several months. While administration officials, including Secretary John Kerry, have indicated progress in the most recent round of discussions, considerable space remains between the positions of the two sides.

However, Congress and American public should be wary of the talks’ extension. This administration is eager for an agreement it could tout as a signature foreign policy achievement. 

And for good reason. Its record on foreign policy is marked more by failure than success, especially on conflict-related issues. The lack of progress on so many pressing issues raises doubts about the administration’s competence and judgment to reach a deal with Iran – a state with longstanding, venomous animosity toward the US and our Mideast allies, a record of promoting terrorism against the US and those allies, and a history of perfidy on its nuclear weapons program.

Let’s review some of the more notable failures of the Obama administration in the Middle East.

First, there was President Obama’s 2009 Cairo speech. In it, he attempted to chart a new direction for US policy in the region, ultimately raising expectations to impossible levels. Some even claimed that he unwisely accepted US blame for that conflicted region’s ills. 

While the president’s intentions may have been noble, his speech in hindsight constituted mere rhetoric. Our friends were left uncertain of our continued leadership in the region. Our enemies — Iran, Al Qaida and now the Islamic State — felt emboldened. In the dog-eat-dog world of the Middle East, the alpha dog yielded.

In Egypt, the US mismanaged the tumultuous path after the Arab Spring. It stood by and allowed a long-time ally, Hosni Mubarak, to be toppled. While its ability to prevent Mubarak’s removal was limited, the consequent rise of the Muslim Brotherhood should have been obvious. 

When that happened and the Brotherhood’s president, Mohammed Morsi, made one calamitous pro-Islamist, anti-democratic decision after another, the US resisted and even opposed the popular revolution and armed forces decision to remove him. Consequently, the US alienated many Egyptians and one of our closest Arab allies on counterterrorism, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and containment of Iran.

In Libya, the US supported the NATO air plan to weaken and topple Muammar Qaddafi but chose to “lead from behind.” After Qaddafi’s death, the US effectively disengaged. Subsequently, rival pro- and anti-government tribes, clans and Islamist factions engaged in an all-out knife fight for power. The result has been a nation rapidly approaching failed-state status.

The administration’s call for renewed negotiations between Israelis and Palestinians, led by the newly installed and supremely optimistic John Kerry as Secretary of State, drove both sides to resist, given the near-total absence of common ground for resuming talks. 

No one was surprised when the talks expired last spring without progress. Historical and newly irreconcilable issues – including settlements, borders, Israel as a “Jewish state” and prisoners in Jerusalem – remained unsettled.

The breakdown in the negotiations and the administration’s pell-mell dash to rapprochement with Iran have led to unprecedented cracks in what had been the US’s previously rock-solid relationship with Israel and even unheard-of public chastisement of Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu. The Israelis may share blame for the relationship’s apparent slide. Nevertheless, they fear the future of this touchstone of their foreign and national security policies.

They are not alone. Traditional Arab allies like Saudi Arabia, Jordan, the UAE and Egypt voice similar fears about US commitment to the region. Their questioning of that commitment results from the administration’s failure to consult adequately on the key strategic issue of Iran and the nuclear negotiations, its inexplicable outreach to Hamas supporters Turkey and Qatar during last August’s conflict in Gaza between Hamas and Israel, and its inability to articulate a comprehensive approach to the Syrian civil war.

Syria may be the saddest tragedy. The administration decdied to provide only rhetorical/political support to what had been a respectable moderate opposition at the outset of that civil war. What ensued was predictable sectarian mayhem, abetted by Iran and Hezbollah. 

Failure to follow through on a presidential red line when Syrian President Assad employed chemical weapons against civilian populations stunned America’s friends in the region and reinforced our enemies’ claims that America was a spent force in the Middle East. Iran, Al Qaida and even Russia — which had frustrated every US effort in the UN Security Council to condemn Assad for his atrocities — were only too happy to fill the void. Assad, meanwhile, remains secure in Damascus. 

In Iraq, an administration determined to fulfill a campaign pledge withdrew US military forces at the end of 2011 against the judgment of American and Iraqi military commanders. The chance to negotiate a status of forces agreement was not adequately pursued and Iraqi political leaders rightly doubted our resolve. Following the withdrawal of US troops, Iraq’s Shia PM Nouri al Maliki began a systematic purge of Sunnis from his government and estrangement of predominantly Sunni provinces in Anbar and Nineveh. 

Not surprisingly, the Sunni extremist Islamic State moved in with minimal Iraqi resistance, established control in those provinces and threatened Baghdad. The premature withdrawal of American troops must be considered a contributing factor to Iraq’s current precarious state.

Finally, the US was late to respond to the Islamic State, which began moving into Iraq in the fall of 2013. Only after IS had captured Fallujah, Ramadi and Mosul and threatened Iraq’s Kurdish region and nearby minorities, did the US act. Its air campaign has met with limited success. 

The continuing inability of either Iraqi forces or Kurdish militia to defeat IS on the battlefield and push it out of Iraq suggests this fight will indeed be long. Meanwhile, there is no strategy to deal with the Islamic State in Syria, or Assad for that matter.

Given this string of failures — admittedly not all of the administration’s making but nevertheless indicative of its problematic instincts about the region — it is reasonable to ask whether the administration has the judgment and competence to address an issue that carries such far-reaching strategic implications for the US and our Israeli and Arab allies. The US simply cannot afford to enter into anything other than an airtight, verifiable agreement that ensures Iran never possesses nuclear weapons.

To prevent another administration misjudgment in the region, the Congress must insist that it review and approve any accord reached between the P5+1 and Iran.

Gary Grappo is a retired senior Foreign Service officer from the State Department. He has served in the Middle East, including as US ambassador to the Sultanate of Oman, Head of Mission of the Jerusalem-based Office of the Quartet Representative, and Minister Counselor for Political Affairs at the US Embassy in Baghdad.