he U.N. Security Council today passed resolution 1929 attaching further sanctions to Iran for pursuance of nuclear programs condemned by the International Atomic Energy Agency. The Obama administration is doing its best to put a good face on a major disappointment: After sixteen months' effort, they have succeeded in delivering less international support than did the Bush administration for a problem everyone agrees is growing rapidly worse.
Sanctions have been the centerpiece of the Obama administration's approach. Secretary Clinton proclaimed last summer we would coalesce the international community around "crippling sanctions." President Obama more recently reaffirmed that sanctions would be "significant." Yet the sanctions outlined in Resolution 1929 are so modest that even the White House sounded sheepish in its announcement of the resolution's passage:
The resolution reaffirms the international community's willingness to resolve international concerns over Iran's nuclear program through negotiations, while laying out the steps that Iran must take to restore international confidence in its nuclear program, thereby allowing for the suspension or termination of these sanctions.
Continue reading Kori Schake at Foreign Policy’s Shadow Government…
