Out of Order: Europe and United States Fight Over Iran, is the United States Sanctioning Itself in the Foot?

July 19, 2018
2 min read
Photo credit: rawf8/Shutterstock

In Episode IX of Out of Order Rachel Tausendfreund talks with GMF fellows Douglas Hengel, Joshua Kirschenbaum, and Andrew Small about transatlantic fights with Iran and the future of sanctions The sanctions regime against Iran that led to the JCPOA is widely considered one of the most successful implementations of sanctions ever, and also the EU’s biggest foreign policy success. But in May President Trump announced that the United States would withdraw from agreement, leaving allies and rivals scrambling to respond. Europe has announced its intentions to preserve the deal and has promised to come up with a plan by November 2019, signaling a willingness to defy U.S. sanctions to do so — and Russia and China are all too happy to cooperate. The foreign ministers of France, Germany, and the United Kingdom, met with their counterparts from China, Russia, and Iran in Vienna in early July to continue work on their JCPOA rescue plans. With GMF fellows Douglas Hengel, Joshua Kirschenbaum, and Andrew Small, Rachel Tausendfreund discusses the role sanctions have played in the global order and the problem of dollar dominance and potential U.S. overreach. Will the EU be able to set up an alternative to shield its companies from secondary sanctions? How does China stand to benefit? And if U.S. allies are able to team up with China and Russia and defy U.S. sanctions, will this be the beginning of the end of unilateral sanction power, or of sanctions generally? ---

Think or Tanks: Josh: https://piie.com/publications/working-papers/eu-financial-services-polic... Doug: https://foreignpolicy.com/2018/02/09/trumps-use-of-sanctions-may-be-unsu... Andrew: https://macropolo.org/ Rachel: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt5610554/

 For more read a TTake by Doug, Josh, and Andrew on the Iran deal options: “Three Views on U.S. Withdrawal from Iran Deal, and Europe and China’s Response“ http://www.gmfus.org/blog/2018/05/30/three-views-us-withdrawal-iran-deal... Three Views on U.S. Withdrawal from Iran Deal, and Europe ... www.gmfus.org If We Keep Our Cool, We Can Make it to New Negotiations And Joshua Kirschenbaum’s policy brief : “The United States and EU Can Still Avoid Conflict Over Iran Sanctions” http://www.gmfus.org/publications/united-states-and-eu-can-still-avoid-c...