In its capitulation to Iran on nuclear proliferation, the Obama administration is "risking national security" to "secure a presidential legacy," GOP Sen. Tom Cotton said Tuesday during an address to the Heritage Foundation.
"What started as an unwise policy has now descended into a dangerous farce," Cotton said of the Obama administration’s ongoing negotiations with Iran over nuclear enrichment capabilities.
"One can only suspect an unspoken entente between the Obama administration and Iran: the U.S. won’t impose new sanctions on Iran and will allow it to develop threshold nuclear capabilities, while Iran won’t assemble a bomb till 2017."
Allowing Tehran to have any nuclear capabilities whatsoever would be "quite literally apocalyptic," according to Cotton, who called for complete disarmament and the end of "appeasement, conciliation, and concessions" with Tehran.
The first-term Arkansas senator, who is an Iraq and Afghanistan veteran, also wants "immediate crippling sanctions" and a more credible military threat from the U.S., according to
The Washington Post’s Jennifer Rubin.
That threat should include "offering to transfer advanced weapons like surplus B-52 bombers and 30,000-pound bunker-busting bombs to Israel," Cotton said. "Perhaps Israel already has the capabilities to retard Iran’s nuclear program — I leave that assessment in the capable hands of the government of Israel — but a congressional offer, whether or not accepted, can remove any doubts in the minds of Iran’s ayatollahs."
And the 114th Congress must use its constitutional authority to vote on any final nuclear agreement with Iran, according to Cotton.
"While our president believes he can go it alone on negotiating this deal, ultimately only Congress has the constitutional power to permanently lift sanctions on Iran," he said. "And if the president believes he can go it alone on a deal with Iran, Congress should act to prevent him from doing so.
"Indeed, we might even go as far as legislating that any deal found unacceptable would be undone or voided at the start of the next administration."
The United States continues to concede to Iran’s demands to enrich uranium, he said, "asking only that its centrifuges be disconnected instead of dismantled, permitting research and development into advanced centrifuges, excluding the military dimensions of Iran’s nuclear program and its ballistic-missile program from the scope of the negotiations, and even agreeing to an expiration date for any final deal.
"In return for these concessions to Iran, the U.S. has given and will give Iran billions of dollars more in sanctions relief. What’s wrong with this picture?"
If Congress is somehow not able to stop Obama from
lifting sanctions on Iran, it will persist into the next administration to reimpose them, Cotton said.
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