Key Dem: US-Iran relations may get worse before they get better

It could be at least a decade before the nuclear deal with Iran leads the Middle Eastern country to abandon its regional aggression and proactively engage with the rest of the world, a key Democratic senator said Thursday.

Nearly a year after the White House announced the terms of the landmark accord, Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.) warned that it is unlikely to herald better relations any time soon.

{mosads}In fact, it’s likely to get worse, he said.

“Over the next 10 to 20 [years,] I think it is possible,” Coons, a senior member of the Foreign Relations Committee, said during a discussion at the Council on Foreign Relations. “They are an incredibly educated, sophisticated people with a lot of resources and a lot of capabilities.

“But the orientation, the ideology of the current regime in any reasonable prediction of how they’re likely to behave in the next couple of years … I think only suggests a hardening of the position of the regime in the short term.”

The prediction, according to Coons, places tremendous responsibility for the future of U.S.-Iran relations in the hands of the next U.S. president.

Over the next seven to 10 years, he noted, a series of mechanisms in the deal begin to scale back, giving Iran more leeway in how it conducts itself. As critics of the deal repeatedly point out, that could allow the country to begin expanding nuclear capabilities again or engaging in other forms of hostility.

“That’s exactly the moment I think we will be at greatest risk,” he said.

The nuclear accord sets limits on Iran’s ability to build a nuclear weapon for at least a decade in exchange for the rollback of international sanctions that have severely damaged its economy.

The White House has maintained that the agreement was intended solely to target Iran’s potential nuclear weapons program and not its broader relationship with the world, but officials clearly hope it also serves as a window to increased diplomatic engagement.  

Discussions between senior U.S. and Iranian diplomats, which once seemed unthinkable, now occur with relative frequency.

Yet while there may be signs of some opening, Iran has remained aggressive throughout the region, supporting military efforts in Yemen, Iraq and Syria at odds with those of U.S. allies such as Saudi Arabia. And the country continues testing ballistic missiles and threatening the destruction of Israel, which have hampered its ability to reintegrate with the rest of the world.

Virtually all Republicans and many Democrats opposed the nuclear deal, arguing the agreement gave Iran an eventual path to building a nuclear weapon and did little to tamp down its regional aggression.

Presumptive GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump has said he will demand Iran return to the negotiating table to hammer out an agreement more aligned with U.S. interests.

According to Coons, that path would lead to folly, especially if it in doing so, Washington also alienates its European allies, as critics warn Trump would do.

In response, Iran would likely take “stronger steps to indicate a willingness to return to more active enrichment or more active research,” he said.

“An effort at renegotiating it — even a blustering, half-hearted attempt — would be unproductive.”