Brett McGurk is a CNN global affairs analyst who served in senior national security positions under Presidents George W. Bush, Barack Obama, Donald Trump and Joe Biden.
The 14-point “Memorandum of Understanding” is among the oddest international agreements in recent memory. Short on detail, its two pages purport to grant significant up-front American concessions to Iran in exchange for opening the Strait of Hormuz, which was already open before the war President Donald Trump started in February and now hopes to end.
The document has come under withering criticism from many Republicans, while being met with a “told you so” flair from Democrats who point to the Obama-era nuclear deal by comparison: a 159-page agreement that placed limits on Iran’s nuclear program.
Meanwhile, Iran has interpreted the MOU to not even require unimpeded access to the Strait of Hormuz — the one issue the Trump administration cited as the reason for the agreement in the first place. Iran has fired drones at commercial ships violating its interpretation of the deal. The US struck targets inside Iran in response — and to uphold its interpretation of the deal.
Nearly everything the US says the deal means — from releasing funds for Iran to buy American soybeans, to sanctions relief only in exchange for Iranian actions — Iran in return says the deal means something different — with no restrictions on where frozen funds are spent, and sanctions relief as a precondition even for further talks.
