Susan Rice called the preliminary agreement between the Trump administration and Iran a "strategic blunder" on Sunday, and she said it was built on a "flimsy, two-page memorandum of understanding." Lindsey Graham’s push on Iran came as Rice said the United States had already given away too much.
Rice told News' This Week with Jonathan Karl that "It's egregious, Jon, because so many concessions were granted up front in this flimsy, two-page memorandum of understanding that wouldn't normally and shouldn't have been granted until after there was not only a full comprehensive deal to at least deal with their nuclear program, but also that those provisions that were negotiated had been agreed," and she called it "a very bad outcome."
Susan Rice on ABC News
Rice served as Barack Obama's national security adviser when the 2015 Iran nuclear deal was negotiated. That agreement, formally known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, was signed in July 2015 and set out strict terms on enrichment, centrifuges and uranium stockpiles, with United Nations inspectors allowed to monitor adherence.
By contrast, the newer memorandum says the Islamic Republic of Iran reaffirms that it shall not procure or develop nuclear weapons, but it does not definitively state enrichment limits. It also says the United States of America and the Islamic Republic of Iran agreed to resolve the disposition of stockpile enriched material through a mutually agreed mechanism, with the minimum methodology to be down blending on site under the supervision of the International Atomic Energy Agency.
Iran and the Trump memorandum
Rice quoted the memo’s language on the stockpile issue and said the two sides would discuss enrichment and other mutually agreed matters related to the Islamic Republic of Iran's nuclear needs. She said that structure left the hardest questions for later, even as the document moved ahead on the easier terms first.
Rice also said Iran is now able to sell all of its oil and all of its oil products on the market unimpeded. She said Iran would get access to tens of billions of dollars of frozen assets within the next 60 days if the memorandum is implemented, and she said those assets could fund Iran’s terrorist proxies.
United States of America and the
The memorandum also says the United States and Gulf partners plan to develop a definitive, mutually agreed plan with at least USD 300 billion for the reconstruction and economic development of the Islamic Republic of Iran. Rice’s criticism landed on the same day the agreement was being discussed publicly, leaving the deal’s enrichment limits, stockpile handling and broader economic terms to be worked out under the memorandum’s own process.
