U.S. Seeks New Iran Sanctions

HONOLULU — A top national security official says the United States is reaching out to international partners in an effort to build support for a new round of sanctions against Iran's regime.

National Security Council chief of staff Denis McDonough told reporters the administration will revisit its options against Iran in the new year and is gauging the views of U.S. friends and allies about "the next step in the process."

McDonough says both unilateral or United Nations sanctions are options. Earlier in the day, Obama spoke about the flaring violence in Tehran. He praised "the courage and the conviction of the Iranian people" while condemning Iran's Islamic government for attacking demonstrators with "the iron fist of brutality."

Comments

[Scent]

12:51 PM on 12/29/2009

Sanctions.

Well there are as always diverse possibilities. The sanctions in place now are completely ignored by US companies and US politicians demand european companies to get out of a market we want even if it means their ruin.

- You want a cheap Caterpillar? - Iran has its own office for that company. - A german company now ruined was made by us to stop trading only to get Caterpillar the contracts.
- You want cheap Coke? - Look closely at all the pictures from shoppin centres and streets. Coke is huge in Iran.
- You want piping far reactors? - A french company, now ruined, was made by our ambassador to stop trading with Iran and - guess what - a US company went right in.
- You want to work for Exxon, Mobile, or any US oil company and speak arabic? - Guess where You go if you want to p dollar for your work? - Right - Iran's offices of those corporations.

We always knew how to make friends, right? When Iraq made huge contracts with France and Russia for oil we massacred 2 Million lives and now the contracts are ours. - And then we wanted France to help us fight a war against their own companies.

So what do new sanctions mean? - More betrayal of our allies and mor massacres where ever needed.

Because profit is our holy ghost and prime directive. Morals never entered into it.

[GardenerNorCal]

10:54 AM on 12/29/2009

If human rights were truly grounds for sanctions then we would have sanctions against China and huge sanctions against Israel.

Is anyone aware that an international peace coalition has been refused entrance to Gaza by both Egypt and Israel to commenorate the 1st anniversary of the Palestianian holocaust of last year. Does anyone care that Gaza has not been rebuilt aid is still being denied to them but the settlements are expanding?

[SantaFeConservative]

10:45 AM on 12/29/2009

Bush needs to stop making these aggressive moves ... oh wait ...

[lazercat2008]

10:39 AM on 12/29/2009

Because sanctions have worked so well for the last 30 years.

[jsarets]

08:58 AM on 12/29/2009

Our sanctions against Iraq in the 90s caused an estimated 350,000 civilian deaths, many of them children who died of waterborne infections because the sanctions prohibited Iraq from importing chemicals and spare parts needed to maintain their water treatment facilities.

In his video statement explaining his reasons for the 9/11 attacks, Osama Bin Laden listed three main grievances, one of which was the devastating impact of our sanctions on Iraq.

Sanctions are crimes against humanity, fundamentally no different than the firebombing of Dresden or the nuclear attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. They indiscriminately immiserate civilian populations in retribution for the behavior of their governments, who are often the only beneficiary due the increased dependence on government-sponsored smuggling operations.

This is one of the reasons why they hate us. We, the nation that often complains that our enemies hide behind human shields, routinely resort to holding civilian populations hostage in misguided attempts to gain leverage over governments whose primary source of popular support is that they have the nerve to resist American full-spectrum dominance over the world.

The Iranian people are turning against their government. Why in the world would we want to turn them against us -- again?

[Richard Pearce]

03:09 PM on 12/29/2009

There is a flaw in your argument. Iran is a much different country than Iraq, which is why it has shrugged off the US sanction regime. It EXPORTS food, it EXPORTS consumer goods, it EXPORTS pharmaceuticals.

The reason for the US to stop imposing sanctions on Iran, and start treating Iran as a nation that must be negotiated with on a pretty equal footing is not that the sanctions kill Iranians, it is because the sanctions have so little effect, other than to alienate the general population of Iran from the US.

And if you think that if these young hotheads who are rioting in Iran succeed in taking power, the things about Iran that most vex the US will change, you need to learn a lot more about Iran.

From the nuclear program, to seeing Iran as the regional power, to Sharia law and having Islam as part of the government, the 'Reform' movement is in agreement with the Moderates and Conservatives. The basic disagreement is who gets to be in power, and how closely the people who are presently in power reflect what the population wants. And the feeling by the 'reformers' that they represent the true majority of the population lacks credibility inside Iran, where 80% of the population regards Ahmadinejad as the legitimate elected president.

[instagladiator]

08:46 AM on 12/29/2009

Obama's Nobel Peace Prize:
The committee said it honored Obama for his "extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples."

Obama's statement of Iran Government:
"the iron fist of brutality." (which is not much different from what your last POTUS said by placing the "Axis of Evil" tag on them.)

Provocation, from inside and out, will eventually prevail and that is the sad part.

[Oubastet]

09:17 AM on 12/29/2009

Agreed.

[lazercat2008]

10:41 AM on 12/29/2009

It's not like President Obama made the decision to get the scrap of metal. Anyway they really gave it to candidate Obama.

[banja]

08:42 AM on 12/29/2009

we need crippling sanctions, cut off their gasoline supply, make Ahmadinejad scream.

[Oubastet]

08:36 AM on 12/29/2009

We need to stay completely out of this situation. The most Obama should have done was to verbally declare the violence against the Iranian people a disgrace to humanity and the Ahmadinejad regime -- but more sanctions are 1) worthless, 2) useless, 3) a laughingstock, because none of our sanctions have worked yet.

We don't need to be stepping into another situation that we don't belong in. If this becomes an Iranian civil war, (and you can bet that it won't, because without external interference, there truly isn't enough force behind the protestors -- whether we/they like that fact or not), then it needs to be what it needs to be. Nothing we can or would do would in any way help things over there.

We would be mistakenly lending our support to a cause whose outcome is suspicious at best, and a tragedy at worst... Then add to this the fact that we know exactly why (OIL! OIL! OIL!) we're truly there. Our motives would be -- and ARE -- muddied by our own self-serving purposes.

So no, this isn't about human rights as far as the US is concerned. Time to catch our breath and back away before the temptation of launching into yet another war grips our national psyche.

[instagladiator]

08:49 AM on 12/29/2009

So, when is the US Revolution Part II going to begin? Because what you suggest (reasonable as it is) is is not going to happen.

[Oubastet]

09:15 AM on 12/29/2009

I k now it's not going to happen. I know we will eventually decide to get our sorry selves right into the center of things in Iran. The above is just my opinion of what would be right and wise.

As for the US Revolution II, (odd thought, isn't it?), hmmmmm....

Nope, that's not going to happen either, because there aren't enough people ready, willing or able to rise up. (Not that I would necessarily support that). Heck, most citizens can't even be bothered to write letters to their congressmen and senators.

Can you imagine asking them to take to the streets with more than bad picket signs and a lot of rhetoric?

[truislam]

10:57 AM on 12/29/2009

If you're not part of the solution you're part of the problem. Don't criticize potential answers unless you can propose one yourself. It is high time America took steps to support the opposition to Iran's brutal religious stranglehold. Iran's radical religious leaders are to actual Islam what David Koresh and Jim Jones were to Christianity. They should have been unmasked for their ignorance long before they acquired so much power and influence. We need to support the opposition in every possible way.

Silence is consent.

[Oubastet]

12:06 PM on 12/29/2009

I understand and agree that Ahmadinejad's current regime is not what true Islam is about. And your example of Koresh and Jones in regards to Christianity is a very apt comparison.

But our silence, (were the US to actually be silent about this), is not consent any more than Iran's non-interference in the eight years of a dreadful Bush "regime" was consent to what was going on here.

As the Christian extreme right-wing attempts to remold the US into a "Christian Nation", (which it is not and never has been, despite propaganda to the contrary), if things get hairy here... Should Iran step in? Should ANY other country step in? Or is it a situation to be handled by the US alone? (My vote: Alone)

What's going on in Iran cannot be seen in light of only religion, because it is also about power, corruption, a foreign citizenry, and an entire region that the US has been interfering in for far too long. I've noted in other posts here on HP that we only manage to get ourselves embroiled over there when we want something from an area, namely oil and oil rights. Take our failed responses to Darfur and Rwanda -- where we had nothing to "gain" -- as a sad and telling contrast. (cont.)

[Oubastet]

12:11 PM on 12/29/2009

(cont)

Stepping into Iran right now, the US's motives would again be self-serving.... So take the story a few years down the line, when Mousavi finally tells us we can no longer control anything there, that we have no right to be there, and that we don't have the rights to oil there... What then? Should the US interfere once more and see to it that Mousavi is overthrown? We've been known to do that on occasion.

The US is in a quandry on this sort of thing. When we step in, we're branded as foreign aggressors. When we don't step in, people stomp and kick and scream and demand that the US "do something".

In the meantime, Ahmadinejad is going to continue his brutality, and one of his current favorite excuses is that the US is behind the protestors. Our involvement now will only lend strength to his argument and make it worse for them and for the entire nation of Iran.

I maintain my opinion, that the best thing we can do for the time being, is to be silent.

[StAlphonso]

07:43 AM on 12/29/2009

"The next step in the process."

Hmmmm, where have we heard this phrase before?

Getting the hell out of the Middle East would be such a novel idea. Oh, wait...but that's what they want us to do.

[MajorKong]

07:21 AM on 12/29/2009

The protesters broke the law. They got what they deserved.

Oh wait, this isn't the China story? This is about Iran?

Barbarians! Authoritarian thugs! Down with the regime!

[Oubastet]

08:28 AM on 12/29/2009

I'm glad someone else noticed the contradiction.

[Papa Swamp]

07:20 AM on 12/29/2009

New sanctions because
- the last ones were so successful?
-nuclear program has been stopped?
-cutting off people's supplies leads to freedom?

The US has had one disastrous policy after another....for decades.

How about we get completely out of their business and let the people of Iran take care of themselves?

[instagladiator]

08:27 AM on 12/29/2009

Ah, but provocation will prevail as has been proved in the past.

[afreeman3]

07:11 AM on 12/29/2009

if the west does help bring down the Islamic Republic, what then, nation building?

[Horatiu]

06:40 AM on 12/29/2009

It's exactly like the US has acted during the Cold War: crying for the oppressed people in Eastern Europe, encouraging them to find against communist tyranny with empty hands and simply facing repression and bloodbaths was just another way to weaken the world's second superpower at that time: the Soviet Union. The US put pressure on East European communist leaders to allow their citizens to move to the West. As soon as the Soviet Union surrendered those same people faced limitations and refusals when trying to settle in the US.

It's the same thing in Iran: I don't think Washington gives a damn about democracy in Iran. With or without Khamenei and Ahmadinejad, Iranians are still Islamists, and even a so-called "reformist" leader cannot establish an American friendly Jeffersonian democracy in Tehran.

All that matters is to weaken Iranian leadership, their desire to build a nuclear arsenal and to destroy Iranian influence in the region. So, let's not get hypocritical. For plain geopolitical reasons Washington would welcome a bloodbath in Tehran.

[Rubiconski]

03:56 AM on 12/29/2009

Obama decries the crackdown against the rabble in iran and yet obama monetarily supports the Israelis who bomb their captive natives in the worlds largest prison camp with phosphorous bombs on live TV for all the world to see. to the tune of billlions of taxpayer dollars each and every year.

Hypocrite much, mr president?

Would 9-11 have happened to us if we did not support Israel? i certainly dont think so. and neither does anybody else.

[truthbringer]

03:45 AM on 12/29/2009

guys, sanctions are about Iran's illegal and opaque nuclear program and it's belligerence about it. Iran is a bad new regime for everyone.. The US, Israel, the Arabs and even the Iranian people.

[Rubiconski]

04:01 AM on 12/29/2009

Those adorable brown people aren't ready to govern themselves.

Lucky for them they have us to tell them what kind of government they want.

Let us take up the white man's burden once again! Pip pip!

[eweqo]

04:35 AM on 12/29/2009

so you support Iran's government killing and torturing their citizens?

[Godweiser]

10:13 AM on 12/29/2009

Good show, now step aside and allow yourselves to be ruled by a superior civilization. That's a good lad...