Donald Trump is going to end up slapping sanctions on camels, sheep and water buffalo before his feud with Iran is all said and done.
The administration on Tuesday sanctioned the country’s space agency along with a couple of affiliates following last week’s failed rocket launch which Trump lampooned in a truly juvenile tweet.
Here’s the official word from OFAC enforcement:
Specially Designated Nationals List Update
ASTRONAUTICS RESEARCH INSTITUTE (a.k.a. AEROSPACE RESEARCH INSTITUTE; a.k.a. ASTRONAUTICS SYSTEMS RESEARCH CENTER), P.O. Box 15875-3885, Tehran, Iran; 15th St, Mahestan St, Iran Zamin St, Shahrak Ghods, Tehran 1465774111, Iran; Aerospace Rd, Mahestan Rd, Iran Zamin Rd, PO Box 14665-834, Tehran, Iran; Shahrak-e-Ghods, Zamin St, Mahestan St, 15 Metri St, Iran; Additional Sanctions Information – Subject to Secondary Sanctions [NPWMD] [IFSR].
IRAN SPACE AGENCY, No 57/2, Saie St, Vali E Asr St, Tehran, Iran; Additional Sanctions Information – Subject to Secondary Sanctions [NPWMD] [IFSR].
IRAN SPACE RESEARCH CENTER, Iran; Additional Sanctions Information – Subject to Secondary Sanctions [NPWMD] [IFSR]
This is the second sanctions action the US has taken against Iran in the last five days. On Friday evening, the US sanctioned the Adrian Darya 1 and its captain, citing credible intelligence which indicated the vessel was headed to Syria to transfer its cargo to smaller ships.
The tanker was detained in July off Gibraltar which, much to the Trump administration’s chagrin, decided to release the vessel last month upon receiving assurances from Tehran that it wouldn’t ultimately find its way to Syria, but rather to port, in the Mediterranean.
The ship stopped transmitting its location on Monday, according to ship-tracking data compiled by Bloomberg. Its last known location was somewhere between Cyprus and the Syrian coast.
“The United States will not allow Iran to use its space launch program as cover to advance its ballistic missile programs”, Mike Pompeo said Tuesday, explaining the decision to sanction the Iran Space Agency. “Iran’s August 29 attempt to launch a space launch vehicle underscores the urgency of the threat”, he added, referencing the launchpad accident depicted in Trump’s controversial tweet.
“The United States of America was not involved in the catastrophic accident during final launch preparations for the Safir SLV Launch at Semnan Launch Site One in Iran”, Trump said Thursday. You could almost hear him laughing in the tweet. “I wish Iran best wishes and good luck in determining what happened at Site One”.
Its not immediately clear what impact Tuesday’s OFAC action will have, or whether the new sanctions are merely symbolic like many of the other measures Trump has taken against the Iranians of late, including the farcical sanctions on Khamenei.
Trump seems to be aware of the extent to which the effort to squeeze the theocracy has reached the point of diminishing returns. In June, he told reporters that “it’s hard to believe” the US can sanction Iran further. Iran has, at times, adopted a similarly incredulous tone. “Are there any other sanctions left for the US to impose?” a spokesman for the foreign ministry asked, half-jokingly, over the summer. “[Trump] knows full well that if pressure and sanctions were the answer, they would have yielded results much earlier”, the person added.
In any event, if Iran isn’t allowed to advance its space program, one supposes that rules out any celestial shootouts between Trump’s “Space Force” and the IRGC’s star command.
