Remember When USA Gave Money to Iran?

 Nadene Goldfoot                                                   

How could Iran afford to buy so many ballistic missiles to use against Israel?  Here's when they had lots of money.  

WashingtonCNN — 

The Obama administration secretly arranged a plane

 delivery of $400 million in cash in 2016 on the same day Iran released four

 American prisoners and formally implemented the nuclear deal, US 

officials confirmed Wednesday.

President Barack Obama approved the $400 million transfer, which he had 

announced in January as part of the Iran nuclear deal. The money was flown 

into Iran on wooden pallets stacked with Swiss francs, euros and other 

currencies as the first installment of a $1.7 billion settlement resolving claims 

at an international tribunal at The Hague over a failed arms deal under the 

time of the Shah.

7The Wall Street Journal revealed this week that in January 2016, the Obama administration secretly airlifted $400 million in cash to Iran.

The Wall Street Journal broke news that the Obama administration secretly airlifted $400 million in cash to Iran. The money was owed as part of a failed arms deal prior to the 1979 Islamic Revolution. But the payment coincided within the release of four Americans imprisoned in Tehran, raising questions about cash for prisoners.                                                 

                                                  Tammy Baldwin, Wisconsin Senator 

In 2015, Baldwin, Democrat,  voted with Democrats against a Republican effort to block Democratic former President Barack Obama’s nuclear deal with Iran. Republicans failed to get the 60 votes needed to block the deal, which lifted U.S. sanctions on Iran in exchange for limiting Iran’s nuclear capabilities. In other words, the Democrats took off the sanctions preventing Iran from receiving money!  Iran's nuclear capabilities have just gone underground, secretly developing to the level it is at today.  

Then,  Baldwin was one of the first U.S. senators to urge the Biden administration to  refreeze the money after the Hamas attacks on Israel. She joined a bipartisan group of 13 senators in an Oct. 13 letter to U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken.

The 2015 agreement didn’t send money to Iran, but rather freed up Iranian assets previously frozen under sanctions. U.S. Treasury Secretary Jack Lew who  told lawmakers in July 2015 that Iran would gain access to an estimated $56 billion under the deal, though other estimates from Iranian officials placed that number lower.

Donald Trump criticized the move today at his rally in Portland, Maine.

DONALD TRUMP (R), Presidential Nominee: Four hundred million in cash. It's being flown in an airplane to Iran. I wonder where that money really goes, by the way. Right? I wonder where it really goes.  Well, it went to either in their pockets, which I actually think more so, or toward terrorism, probably a combination of both.

Besides this amount, another commentator said that President Barack Obama's administration had given $150 billion to Iran, effectively, they argued, funding Hamas.  Thus, Obama managed to give Iran $150 billion + $400 million=150.4 billion US$

The Biden administration on November 14, 2023,  extended a sanctions waiver to allow Iran to access upwards of $10 billion in electricity revenue once held in escrow in Iraq. The waiver allows Baghdad to continue purchasing electricity from Iran and, in a change from past policy, for Iran to convert its revenue into euros and draw on the money for budget imports out of Iraq and Oman. So now, $150.4 billion + $10 billion =

$160.4 billion dollars.  

The extension comes just over a month after Hamas — a terrorist group armed and funded by the regime in Tehran — conducted a surprise attack on Israel, killing 1,200 Israelis and kidnapping more than 240, which would be the October 7th massacre . Other proxies financed and armed by Tehran have attacked U.S. troops in Iraq and Syria with rockets and drones.

The July waiver came just as an unacknowledged nuclear understanding between the United States and Iran, evading the congressional review requirement of the 2015 Iran Nuclear Agreement Review Act. Weeks later, the administration agreed to release another $6 billion in Iranian funds frozen in South Korea as part of a deal to secure the release of Tehran’s American hostages

According to the Associated Press, U.S. officials insist Iran can only spend the released funds on humanitarian purchases, including food, medicine, medical equipment, and agricultural goods. Yet opponents of the waiver note that money is fungible and that the waiver will allow the regime to free up funds to continue arming its anti-U.S. and anti-Israel proxies.  Is this still happening?  

Since the war, Tehran has steadily expanded its missile arsenal. It has also invested heavily in its own industries and infrastructure to lessen dependence on unreliable foreign sources. It is now able to produce its own missiles, although some key components still need to be imported. Iran has demonstrated that it can also significantly expand the range of acquired missiles, as it has done with Nodong missiles from North Korea, which it then renamed.  Iran’s missiles can already hit any part of the Middle East, including Israel. Over time, Tehran has established the capacity to create missiles to address a full range of strategic objectives. 

• Iran’s indigenous Fateh-110 family of solid-fuel missiles have achieved the precision necessary to destroy military and critical-infrastructure targets reliably, as demonstrated during its January 2020 attack against U.S. forces stationed at Ayn al Asad airbase in Iraq using Zolfaghar missiles. 
  
  
  
  
  
  
• Netanyahu showed all in the UN in 2018 how close Iran was to having nuclear power to use in their missiles, and the USA didn't listen because they went out to lunch.  They simply walked out just before he spoke.

Today, on October 11, 2024,  Iran has significantly advanced nuclear capabilities, possessing a large stockpile of enriched uranium, including material close to weapons-grade, which could theoretically be used to produce multiple nuclear weapons if further enriched, though the US intelligence community currently assesses that Iran is not actively pursuing the development of a nuclear device; however, experts warn that Iran could produce a nuclear weapon relatively quickly if it chooses to do so, with estimates of "breakout time" ranging from several months to a year depending on the level of enrichment required.

Resource:

https://iranprimer.usip.org/resource/irans-ballistic-missile-program

ttps://www.fdd.org/analysis/2023/11/15/iran-receives-access-to-10-billion-thanks-to-u-s-sanctions-waiver/

https://www.fdd.org/analysis/2023/11/15/iran-receives-access-to-10-billion-thanks-to-u-s-sanctions-waiver/

https://www.cnn.com/2016/08/03/politics/us-sends-plane-iran-400-million-cash/index.html

https://www.newsweek.com/us-give-iran-150-billion-barack-obama-jack-posobiec-1835083

https://www.baldwin.senate.gov/about/about-tammy

https://www.iranwatch.org/our-publications/articles-reports/irans-nuclear-timetable-weapon-potential#:~:text=Dividing%20the%202%2C295%20SWU%20by,revised%20April%2013%2C%201995).