Alwaght- The US President Barack Obama addressed the international deal on Iran's nuclear program at American University on 5 August.
Mr. Obama said that those who are opposing nuclear deal with Iran are the same people who voted for 2003 war of Iraq, warning that without nuclear deal, there will be another war in the West Asia.
The Wednesday address comes just one day after Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell announced that the Senate would debate the Iran nuclear deal in September, following a five-week summer recess.
Despite Iran's officials pronouncements that Iran has never sought nuclear weapon and never will, particularly the country's supreme leader who issued a Fatwa (religious verdict) against making, holding and using nuclear bombs, Obama argued that the deal with Iran is the best way to prevent the country from acquiring a nuclear weapon and to prevent war, and that the deal being rejected by Congress would lead to detrimental effects on the US itself.
"The choice we face is ultimately between diplomacy and some sort of war, maybe not tomorrow, maybe not 3 months from now, but soon. Military action will be far less effective than this deal in preventing Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon," the US President claimed.
Obama criticize those who oppose diplomacy saying that, "Between now and the congressional vote in September, you are going to hear a lot of arguments against this deal, backed by tens of millions of dollars in advertising. And if the rhetoric in these ads and the accompanying commentary sounds familiar, it should, for many of the same people who argued for the war in Iraq are now making the case against the Iran nuclear deal".
Emphasizing that Americans "still live with the consequences of the decision to invade Iraq", president Obama said that "America didn't just have to end that war. We had to end the mindset that got us there in the first place…a mindset characterized by a preference for military action over diplomacy, a mindset that put a premium on unilateral U.S. action over the painstaking work of building international consensus, a mindset that exaggerated threats beyond what the intelligence supported".
Obama said that walking away from the deal is "fantasy" due it being a delicate international agreement between many sovereign states, not just the US and Iran, and that those other partners would not support a stricter deal.
"Those who say we can walk away from this deal and maintain sanctions are selling a fantasy. Instead of strengthening our position, as some have suggested, Congress’s rejection would almost certainly result in multilateral sanctions unraveling."
"We would have to cut off China from the American financial system. And since they happen to be major purchasers of our debt, such actions could trigger severe disruptions in our own economy, and by the way, raise questions internationally about the dollar’s role as the world’s reserve currency," Obama warned.
