President-elect Joe Biden has signalled a willingness to return to the soft diplomacy with Iran that marked Barack Obama’s term in the White House, after four years of Trump who chose to stand up to Tehran rather than appease it.
“We are very happy to see Trump leave,” Iran’s leader said in televised comments at a cabinet meeting.
“Thank God, these are his final days,” Rouhani added, calling Trump a “tyrant”, “the most unruly, lawless president” and a “terrorist and murderer.”
At the same time Joe Biden had trouble simply identifying the main protagonists in the area.
In 2018, Trump pulled Washington out of a landmark Obama-negotiated JCPOA nuclear deal with Tehran and reimposed punishing sanctions.
“This was a horrible one-sided deal that should have never, ever been made,” Trump said. “It didn’t bring calm, it didn’t bring peace, and it never will.”
As Breitbart News reported, Maj. Gen. Soleimani was the commander of Iran’s elite military forces, the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps-Quds Force, as well as the commander of Iranian-controlled Shia militia forces in Iraq, Syria, and around the world.
It was a strike that drew immediate censure from the United Nations.
Just last week a pair of U.S. B-52H Stratofortresses flew a show-of-force mission across the Persian Gulf in a display intended to deter attacks from Iran. The bombers were joined by fighter escorts from Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and Qatar.
The aircraft, assigned to Louisiana’s Barksdale Air Force Base-headquartered 2nd Bomb Wing, flew a short-notice nonstop mission the military said was “designed to deter aggression” and assure allies and partners the United States can rapidly deploy military power.
Such shows of strength by the U.S. under Trump’s leadership led Rouhani’s government to repeatedly signal its openness to the prospect of a Biden administration.
