Trump cabinet picks signal harder line on Iran

Donald Trump's stunning election win is set to usher in a seismic change in US policy towards Iran. After four years of Joe Biden, whose administration has taken a softer stance towards Iran than its predecessor, President-elect Donald Trump’s statements and cabinet appointments signal a return to a hardline policy on Iran.

Before Trump’s re-election, there were already signs that Iran would loom large as a foreign policy concern for his administration. While on the campaign trail, Trump was vocal about supporting Israel in its strikes against Iran-backed proxies in the Middle East. Following Iran’s missile attack on Israel on 1 October, Trump said in a speech that Israel should "hit the Iranian nuclear first and worry about the rest later”.

This is in stark contrast to former president Barack Obama’s election campaign rhetoric on Iran in the run-up to his first term in office when he made it clear that his priority regarding the Middle East was to broker a nuclear deal with Iran.

Trump withdrew the US from the nuclear deal during his first presidential term. The Biden administration attempted to reverse that decision but never succeeded. Instead, according to a state-run Iranian news site, Iran Online, Iran’s nuclear enrichment went from 3.67% at the start of the Biden administration’s term to 60% today. Trump will not tolerate letting Iran continue down the path of achieving weapons-grade uranium enrichment.

The run-up to the US presidential election was also overshadowed by news of a thwarted Iranian plot to assassinate Trump. The US Department of Justice announced on 8 November that three people had been charged in connection with the plot, which the Department of Justice said was ordered by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). While Iran has denied responsibility, in September, Trump posted on X (formerly Twitter) that there are "big threats on my life by Iran... Moves were already made by Iran that didn’t work out, but they will try again." The president-elect will not accept spending his time in office worrying about a new Iranian attempt on his life.

Lineup of Iran hawks

Trump’s selection of several Iran hawks to serve in key political, security, and defence positions in his incoming administration indicates that Washington’s direction of travel appears to be one of increased pressure on Iran.

Trump has selected Marco Rubio as Secretary of State. Rubio has been openly supportive of an Israeli strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities and of Israel’s campaign against Hezbollah in Lebanon.

After Iran’s missile attacks on Israel in October, he posted on X: “Israel should respond to Iran the way the US would respond if some country launched 180 missiles at us. And they should do in Lebanon what we would be demanding our leaders do if terrorists were launching anti-tank rockets at us from a neighbouring country, forcing 60,000 Americans to evacuate their homes and farms for almost a year.”

Like Rubio, Mike Waltz, Trump’s selection as national security advisor, posted in support of an Israeli strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities in the aftermath of Iran’s missile attack on Israel in October, writing on X: “So far...it’s important to note what hasn’t been hit in Iran: 1. Kharg island where 80% of Iran’s oil exports funnel (but doing so would cause oil prices to spike just before the election) 2. Natanz nuclear facilities, which are 200 miles outside Tehran (and Biden publicly said he didn’t support). This might be Israel’s last best chance to diminish Iran's nuclear programme and shut down their cash.”

Waltz also said that Iran’s plot to assassinate Trump happened because Tehran felt emboldened by the weakness of the Biden administration. Waltz’s comments echo those of Trump’s selected director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), John Ratcliffe. In an appearance on Fox News in April, Ratcliffe blamed the Biden administration for a series of blunders that he said emboldened Iran.

Trump’s choice of Secretary of Defence, Peter Hegseth, also spoke openly about the benefit of a military attack on Iran. In an appearance on Fox News in 2020, Hegseth equated the Iranian regime with the Islamic State (IS), saying both export terrorism, and said that targeted military attacks on Iran would drag it back to the negotiating table but in a much-weakened position.

He continued, “What better time than now to say ‘we’re starting the clock, you’ve got a week, you’ve got X amount of time before we start taking out your energy production facilities. We take out key infrastructure, we take out your missile sites, we take out nuclear developments, we take out port capabilities.'”

The alignment of Trump, Rubio, Waltz, Ratcliffe, and Hegseth in favour of increasing pressure on Iran makes such a course of action highly likely. However, how this increased pressure will be articulated remains to be seen. The four appointees’ statements vary between supporting military action by Israel and having the US take direct action against Iran, while Trump himself does not want the US to be dragged into another war in the Middle East.

But Israel’s fight with Iran’s proxies and its attacks on Iran have exposed the proxies’ and Iran’s weaknesses and limitations, which will facilitate the formulation of a calibrated US-led strategy towards Iran and its proxies.

Bringing Europe on board

It is also likely that the US will steer European countries to agree to implement what is known as “snapback” regarding UN resolutions on Iran. Trump’s appointed US ambassador to the UN, Elise Stefanik, is another backer of maximum pressure on Iran and is expected to work towards rallying European allies around this goal. Snapback would mean restoring past UN resolutions on Iran and returning the nuclear deal to the drawing board, reinstating all the sanctions that the nuclear agreement had waived.

So far, nuclear deal signatories Britain, France, and Germany have resisted taking such a step. But the Trump administration can use the gravity of the October 7, 2023, Hamas attack on Israel to persuade Europe of the need to take a different path.