NPR's Leila Fadel asks former Deputy National Security Adviser Jon Finer about U.S. efforts to cultivate global support to economically isolate and pressure Iran.
So how much support can the Trump administration expect to get from G20 countries for this economic pressure campaign against Iran? Jon Finer joins me now to discuss. He's a senior distinguished fellow at Yale Law School who served as principal deputy national security adviser in the Biden administration. Good morning, Jon.
FADEL: OK. So Scott Bessent is saying things are going great – we've gotten enthusiastic support for this economic pressure campaign. But does it matter if China's not on board, the biggest buyer of Iranian oil?
FINER: Well, Leila, oil is the biggest input to Iran's economy, to its government revenues. And China buys 90-plus percent of Iran's oil. So not only does China's participation, support or at least acquiescence to these sanctions matter, in some sense, it's really the entire game. And so a major question that's facing the Trump administration in advance of Xi Jinping's visit later this month is, will China actually curtail its economic activity with Iran on a very full agenda, with tech competition in Taiwan? And is the United States administration ready to put enough pressure on China to do that? And I think the real question is about whether either of those things is true.
FADEL: Now, the way that the administration has described this is with threats to sanction countries who keep doing business with Iran. Does that put the U.S.-China detente, trade relations at risk?
FINER: Well, look, diplomacy is always a mix of carrots and sticks. The Obama administration pressured countries during the run up to the JCPOA to limit their economic activity with Iran. Sanctions can be a major component of getting a country to agree to a deal they might not otherwise agree to. But with China, it's much more challenging. China sees itself as a peer of the United States. They do not see themselves as vulnerable to American pressure.
And they have cards to play, too, in the relationship with the United States, as we saw when the Trump administration put a lot of economic pressure on China last year and China responded by withholding rare earth minerals from the United States, which made the Trump administration back down pretty quickly. So if this does escalate, it's not as if China doesn't have its own version of pressure to put back on the United States and continue down the path their own.
FADEL: And this request for support is coming at a time of tensions with other G20 countries, including Canada, over tariffs. How far do you anticipate other G20 countries going to pressure China with the U.S.?
FINER: In past instances where sanctions has worked to try to convince Iran to do things it didn't necessarily want to do, like reach the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, the nuclear deal under Obama, it was because the whole world had rallied behind the U.S. diplomatic effort to get Iran to put constraints on its nuclear program. And that meant countries like China and Russia and, of course, our European allies actually voted for sanctions in the United Nations that were ultimately placed on Iran and led to the negotiation that brought about the deal. In this instance, there is zero chance that those countries are going to be broadly supportive. Yes, the European countries are going to be on board. But as we discussed earlier, they are not the ones doing the bulk of the economic activity with Iran. So their support, while an important part of an overall approach, is not going to move the needle.
FADEL: The Trump administration has made one major miscalculation after another since the decision it took to bomb Iran in the first place. The military campaign has not been swift, as promised. There are no signs of regime change. In fact, it's a more entrenched government. And Iranian officials are refusing to submit to U.S. demands in negotiations and so talks keep falling apart. Is this focus now on economic warfare going to be any different?
FINER: Well, you said it as well as I could. But one thing I think it's important to point out is Iran is under tremendous economic pressure.
FINER: You're seeing massive consumer price inflation inside Iran. Their economic activity and growth has been dramatically scaled back as a result of this war. But the big question from the very beginning has been, will any of that actually change the policy, the calculus, the agreement of Iran to do the kind of deal that the Trump administration can support? Iran did a deal with the Trump administration. It unraveled. I think Iran would probably do a version of that deal again. But nothing that I've seen suggests that Iran is going to actually acquiesce to some of the very severe demands that the Trump administration is making against them just because of this increased economic pressure. They're willing to endure the pain and make their population endure the pain. And that's why this is so hard.
FADEL: If you were advising the president right now, what would you tell him to do at this point?
FINER: I think the United States should do a version of what it did before, take the best deal that is available to them. Get back in the room and negotiate with the Iranians, now with this added layer of pressure that they've put on, whatever impact it might have. And get out of this war that they never should've gotten into in the first place and that is costing us dramatically, including in terms of our military readiness in other parts of the world.
FADEL: Jon Finer is a senior distinguished fellow at Yale Law School who served as principal deputy national security adviser in the Biden administration. Thank you.
