The Art of the Deal

In Ali Abbasi’s The Apprentice, the film’s titular subject, Donald Trump, has his political mythology, by turns, dissected and distilled into a brutal education in winning; attack first, concede nothing, and, above all, declare victory even when facts may indicate the opposite. The film’s dramatisation of Trump’s rise under the impervious tutelage of McCarthy-allied lawyer Roy Cohn presents deal brokering as more a matter of domination than negotiation. Cohn’s lessons are in equal parts simple and sly; the notion of admitting defeat absurd, apologies non-occurrent and the perception of one’s own weakness an unthinkable circumstance to be averted at any cost.

It is unclear what of Abbasi’s film – the product of journalist Gabriel Sherman’s meticulous interrogation of an array of Trump’s colleagues, peers and employees dating ‘[from] the 80s’, is precisely true – and what slips into the realm of dramatisation and hearsay. When supplemented, however, with a mild dose of Trump’s own writings (or, perhaps more accurately, those of his ghostwriters) the underlying theme that Trump views deal-making as a site for dominance undoubtedly passes the precipice of truth. For Trump, it seems, in any negotiation, parties can be divided into two camps; one triumphant, exiting the room laden with the fruits of victory, and one leaving the very same space beaten and bruised, forced to explain why retreat, in this case, served as strategy.

In such a context, situating the now signed and published 14-point US-Iran memorandum of understanding beneath the banner of Trumpist victory proves an awkward endeavour. The details of the text have been ravaged by American and Israeli commentators alike, while Iranian outlets have heralded victory amidst the most unlikely of circumstances. ‘It was the American President’ brags Iran’s Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei ‘who out of desperation … [brought] this [deal] about’.

At first, it almost immediately seemed that the deal lay in tatters; terminating military operations ‘on all fronts’ represented a key aspect of the text for signatories and their allies, an instruction Israel treated more as a suggestion when it continued its invasion of Lebanon. In response, flights transporting Iranian negotiators for further talks in Switzerland remained on Tehran’s tarmac, while US Vice President JD Vance too altered his travel itinerary in favour of remaining stateside.

Nevertheless, Trump appeared able to rein in Israeli premier Netanyahu. US officials announced a ceasefire between Israel and Hizbollah on June 19. So then, imbued with a new lease of life, perhaps turning to the substance of the text remains a prescient endeavour.

It is not difficult for the passive observer to believe there exists a truthful underbelly to Khamenei’s bleatings, given a quick glance at the memorandum; the text reads more as a codification of retreat than the conclusion of a campaign launched with maximalist ambitions. Washington’s aims at the genesis of the conflict were immodest to say the least; ensuring Iranian regime change was overtly implied, the weakening of Iran’s regional proxy network and the degradation of its missile and nuclear capabilities declared and the reassertion of American regional hegemony a given.

Yet as the war dragged on, the correlation between its duration and the increasing haziness of what conditions would constitute US victory soon became clear. US officials, by mid-March, were adept at dodging questions concerning the latter, while simultaneously espousing silent confusion as to what might halt the former. What is now clear is that the memorandum secures none of the US’ original ambitions. It neither removes the Iranian regime nor dismantles its nuclear infrastructure or entrenched proxy network. Instead, it promises the swift removal of the US blockade on the Strait of Hormuz, the termination of US sanctions, and the streamlining of cash (‘at least’ $300 billion to be precise) to Tehran’s depleted coffers.

The memorandum bestows upon Iran a plethora of concessions which would have seemed fantastical in January; US recognition of Iranian sovereignty, an end to direct US military pressure, sanctions relief, a carte blanche to sell oil, access to frozen funds and a viable pathway to capital for reconstruction. In exchange, Iran pledges not to develop nuclear weapons and to allow the resumption of commercial traffic through the Strait of Hormuz. Iran’s commitment to work out the details of a final settlement is not insignificant, but nor is it irreversible, and Tehran’s diplomatic history shows that promises absent of intrusive verification, penalties and controlled sequencing possess a short half-life indeed.

The nuclear clause, one of Iran’s few concessions, provokes perhaps the largest question surrounding the memorandum’s long term viability. Tehran has issued similar promises before, notably under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and the 2015 JCPOA. Yet after Washington’s abandonment of the latter in 2018, Iran progressively exceeded the deal’s limits by expanding enrichment and accumulating stockpiles which shortened the gulf between civilian capacity and weapons potential. 

It is worth noting that Iran’s violations of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and the JCPOA preceded the devastating losses it suffered throughout the present conflict. If such military and economic degradation was, in part, facilitated by the state’s lack of a nuclear umbrella, how likely might it be that the Iranian regime now views the development of such a deterrence more crucial than ever before, regardless of its public assurances?

An asymmetric deal, one where US pressures ease immediately but Iran’s most important obligations are delegated to a later date and are merely subject to the party’s ‘best efforts’, may be, for some in Washington, a palatable cost for ending the war. Regardless, it is a far harder sell as an instance of Trump’s art of the deal in action. Iran gains survival, legitimacy and finance; Washington gains de-escalation and only the possibility of renewed restraint. 

Yet in the face of apparent triumph, Iran’s own losses can become easily obscured. While the memorandum has bought a degree of diplomatic breathing space for Tehran, its price was the state’s absorption of extraordinary losses. Ayatollah Khamenei, and indeed much of Iran’s political and military leadership, were eliminated during the first day of the war, Iran’s navy has almost entirely made port on the reefs of the Persian Gulf, and its wider security apparatus has been degraded to the point of near non-existence.

Departing from the material to the fiscal, Iran's economy has been set back years, unemployment is rampant, inflation nigh stratospheric and the US blockade of the Strait of Hormuz stripped the state of almost $6 billion over April and May alone. The regime may survive, but its strength has been severely depleted. If the US left the negotiations bruised and beaten in the figurative sense, then Iran both entered and exited discussions in the same state, but in a comparatively literal manner.

On June 17 Trump enjoyed the hospitality of French President Emmanuel Macron amidst the grandeur of the Palace of Versailles. Upon learning that the memorandum had been finalised, a number of aides were soon dispatched, at Trump’s request, to procure a printer so that the document could be signed in short order. Perhaps the irony of signing the memorandum at a location where victors have historically dictated the terms of surrender was lost on Trump, or perhaps he simply did not care. The President nevertheless appeared enthusiastic to ink a document which failed to attain any of Washington’s original ambitions. At Versailles, the ‘art of the deal’ met the reality of exhaustion, and it is now Trump who must return home to explain why retreat, in this instance, should be understood as strategy instead.

Image: Flickr/White House (Daniel Torok)

Licence: public domain.

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