Trump Adviser Flails Trying to Defend Threat of Iran Nuclear Program

Source: The New Republic · Bias: Left

Summary

U.S. special envoy Steve Witkoff is back showing just how clueless the Trump administration is when it comes to warmaking.Asked Tuesday night by Fox News’s Sean Hannity to explain America’s negotiations with Iran last summer, Witkoff said the Iranians “opened up by telling us they had the unalienable right to enrich. To which we responded … that we had the unalienable right to stop them from enriching.”Witkoff portrayed the Iranians as stubborn, alleging the country’s officials gloated about their enriched uranium. “It was a clear threat,” he said. “They were boasting about having it.”Witkoff then added: “They said to us—and this was some challenge—‘You’re not going to get from us diplomatically what you could not achieve militarily.’ Now, yes, we had destroyed their three main enrichment and conversion centers … that was clear. They, of course, didn’t want to admit it.”Setting aside the insinuation that Iranian officials were literally taunting the U.S. into going to war with them, Witkoff is somehow arguing that the Trump administration destroyed Iran’s uranium enrichment capabilities with its June strikes but also that Iran was still actively enriching uranium, and bragging about its enrichment, after these facilities were destroyed.Witkoff has a track record of being concerningly obtuse on Iran. Previously, experts questioned whether Iran’s nuclear reactors could even produce the type of uranium he claimed they could.More recently, Witkoff was asked by CNBC’s Sarah Eisen how he thought the war in Iran would end. His response? “I don’t know, Sarah.”

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Trump Adviser Flails Trying to Defend Threat of Iran Nuclear Program
The New Republic

Trump Adviser Flails Trying to Defend Threat of Iran Nuclear Program

Left

U.S. special envoy Steve Witkoff is back showing just how clueless the Trump administration is when it comes to warmaking.Asked Tuesday night by Fox News’s Sean Hannity to explain America’s negotiations with Iran last summer, Witkoff said the Iranians “opened up by telling us they had the unalienable right to enrich. To which we responded … that we had the unalienable right to stop them from enriching.”Witkoff portrayed the Iranians as stubborn, alleging the country’s officials gloated about their enriched uranium. “It was a clear threat,” he said. “They were boasting about having it.”Witkoff then added: “They said to us—and this was some challenge—‘You’re not going to get from us diplomatically what you could not achieve militarily.’ Now, yes, we had destroyed their three main enrichment and conversion centers … that was clear. They, of course, didn’t want to admit it.”Setting aside the insinuation that Iranian officials were literally taunting the U.S. into going to war with them, Witkoff is somehow arguing that the Trump administration destroyed Iran’s uranium enrichment capabilities with its June strikes but also that Iran was still actively enriching uranium, and bragging about its enrichment, after these facilities were destroyed.Witkoff has a track record of being concerningly obtuse on Iran. Previously, experts questioned whether Iran’s nuclear reactors could even produce the type of uranium he claimed they could.More recently, Witkoff was asked by CNBC’s Sarah Eisen how he thought the war in Iran would end. His response? “I don’t know, Sarah.”

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