Opinion

What a Gallic grip can achieve

April 27, 2018

It is surprising what a bone-crushing white-knuckle handshake can achieve. When, at their first meeting, President Donald Trump inflicted it on his French opposite number Emmanuel Macron, the Frenchman was ready for him and gave as good as he got, so that Trump’s right hand turned white and he appeared glad to escape from the Gallic grip.

That subtle but widely-noted humiliation might well have meant that Trump would take against the feisty little French president. Instead, however, the president so warmed to Macron he decided to invite him to Washington for the first state visit of his incumbency. This doubtless annoyed British premier Theresa May and those politicians and officials in London who regularly boast of the “special relationship” the UK is supposed to enjoy with Americans.

In fact, this week Trump made a point of hailing his special relationship with Macron and France. The two presidents seem to have got on extremely well indeed. But not so well that Macron was able to persuade the American to row back on his clear intention to tear up Obama’s nuclear deal with Iran, which Trump has rightly described as “insane”. It now seems certain that next month, with widespread backing on Capitol Hill, Trump will announce that the deal must be renegotiated and make clear that until it is, fresh economic sanctions will be organized.

It does seem though that Macron has had a useful input into the nature of those renegotiations. The talk from Trump is now about looking more widely at Iran’s aggressive behavior in the Middle East. Macron is seeking to renew France’s historic involvement in Syria and Lebanon, where Iranian meddling has contributed so substantially to the disaster that has overtaken Syrians and now also threatens the Lebanese. It seems that Macron promoted the view, held here in the Kingdom and elsewhere in the Gulf, that Iran’s nuclear ambitions are part of a wider policy to assert itself by disrupting and interfering in the internal affairs of its Arab neighbors.

Therefore, as and when Iran is obliged to return to talks, they will not simply be the deeply-unrealistic Obama deal on its nuclear program. The whole worrying issue of the tenor of Tehran’s belligerent foreign policy will be placed firmly on the negotiating table. As with Trump’s upcoming meeting with North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un, the president will have a mountain to climb with the Iranians. Thanks to Obama, the ayatollahs have been freed from an economic headlock. Reimposing effective sanctions could take several years and this time, it is unlikely that Russia will cooperate with Washington’s leadership of the international community. Nor should it be forgotten that the Iranian regime was able to mitigate the effects of the original sanctions thanks to cross-border smuggling from Russia that Moscow did little to hinder.

However, if Trump pulls off the denuclearization of North Korea, his hand will be considerably strengthened when he turns to the ayatollahs. The support President Macron has already displayed when French missiles along with those from the US and UK rained down on Syrian chemical weapons facilities should not be discounted. The strong relationship Trump and Macron have forged already appears to be producing a genuinely realistic reappraisal of the wider threats posed by Iran and how they can best be thwarted.


April 27, 2018
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