Via the AP: A deal could likely be signed tomorrow, July 13th, 2015
From the Times Of Israel.
Addition: Christopher Dickey has more:
‘In the worst of all possible worlds (which often seems to be where we’re headed these days), heavy sanctions would remain in force. Iran would take a hard line, pushing forward with more nuclear development and fewer, weaker, or no inspections, and once again the world very likely would be headed toward a major war in the Middle East with Israel leading the way lest its very survival be called into question by nuclear-armed mullahs. In such a fight, Washington would soon find itself with little choice but to join in.’
Actually, this doesn’t sound that implausible. After all, taking force off the table, not getting the Saudis, Israelis, nor many Republicans in Congress on board; having Russia revert to invasion games and Syria devolve into a chaotic civil war and IS flare up in the chaos is not exactly the kind of projection of respect and competence we need in the region.
The lifted sanctions will continue to fund all the things going on (Assad, Hizbollah, the Revolutionary Guard’s machinations), and it’s not really clear the deal means much to people with whom we possibly cannot do business.
A bad deal could easily be worse that no deal. A decent deal could buy 10-15 years against a deliverable-nuke-having Iranian regime, if the Iranian regime were to honor it, but that’s a big ‘if.’
It seems the logic leading to the current American administration is: Peace or bust.
We’ll see how this plays out.
A few days ago, The American Interest had a good 17:00 min roundup from four different guests: Their take on the deal.