Make no mistake: under President Trump, the United States is exercising every means available to strangle the corrupt mullahs' regime in Tehran that is dedicated to destruction of the United States, as soon it is able to complete the genocide of Jews and the destruction of Israel.  With clear eyes focused on the goal of containing and, if possible, overthrowing this evil cabal in control of one of the world's most ancient and sophisticated civilizations, the Trump administration is overcoming resistance from purported allies who would rather make profits off the mullahs than destroy them.

Writing at Legal Insurrection, Vijeta Uniyal lays out the way that the U.S., especially Steve Mnuchin's Treasury Department, outmaneuvered Angela Merkel and got the German central bank, the Bundesbank, to revise its regulations and thereby be able to block the Iranians from withdrawing $400 million in cash from a bank it owns in Germany and shipping it to Tehran.  Now that Barack Obama is no longer shipping pallets of cash to the mullahs, they must be running out of hard currency to send to Hamas, Hezb'allah, and all the other terror groups they support.  Currency denominated in Iranian rials, which are crashing in value, is useless in paying terrorists, so they need hard currency denominated in euros and dollars – exactly like what Obama sent them.

Germany's central bank, the Bundesbank, has revised its regulations to stop Iran from withdrawing €320 million ($400 million) in cash from the country's bank accounts.  Under the new conditions, the Bundesbank can stop cash transfers that violate US Treasury sanctions, the German newspaper BILD disclosed.

The drastic measure to physically ship the cash out of Germany demonstrates Tehran's demising trust in the European financial institutions as the US Treasury tightens screws on the regime's worldwide financial operations.  The transaction is "one of the largest cash transfers ever in German history," a spokesman for the country's finance minister admitted.

Last month, the Iranian regime initiated steps to withdraw €320 million from German bank accounts and transfer the cash to Tehran.  The money in question is held by Hamburg-based European-Iranian Trade Bank, in which the regime owns a majority-stake.

The BILD broke the story on Wednesday:

The Bundesbank has amended its general terms and conditions with regards to the 'cash transactions.' According to these terms the central bank can demand clarifications and guarantees from the counterparty seeking a cash transfer.

The central bank can refuse the transaction till procedures get clarified.

Even when no suspicion of terrorism financing or nuclear armament may exist, the Bundesbank can deny cash transfer – for instance in case of a US embargo. [Translation by the author]

So, for the moment, the cash transfer is stalled.  But it is unlikely to un-stall because of President Trump's threat to invoke sanctions on anyone who helps Iran in its quest for nuclear weapons.  Hard currency shipments definitely would help.

Chancellor Merkel is not amused:

In July, Reuters news agency reported [the] Trump administration's efforts to stop the massive cash delivery to Tehran and the German government's hostility to such a measure:

Richard Grenell, a longtime critic of the [Iran nuclear] accord, told the mass-circulation daily Bild that the U.S. government was extremely concerned about Tehran's plans to transfer hundreds of millions of euros in cash to Iran.

"We encourage the highest levels of the German government to intervene and stop the plan," Grenell said. ...

Grenell's comment drew a rebuke from Johann Wadephul, deputy leader of Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservatives in parliament, who said the transaction should not be blocked on political grounds if it passed legal muster.

"The statement of the U.S. ambassador is once again unsettling and difficult to reconcile with his diplomatic role," Wadephul told Reuters.

But people who deal with global money markets understand the awesome power of the United States Treasury to punish through sanctions.  The worlds of politics and finance are connected, to be sure, but frankly, the central bankers function at a level that is far more self-assured and globally connected than mere politicians.  The fact the Secretary Mnuchin is totally comfortable, an insider in what a friend with years in finance calls "The Money Club," makes him an effective actor in obtaining Bundesbank cooperation, even in contradiction with the apparent wishes of the German chancellor.

It's not just Germany's Bundesbank that has taken similar steps.  The EU-owned investment bank has also agreed to comply with the US sanctions.  As Legal Insurrection reported in June, EU's own lending arm, the European Investment Bank (EIB), has broken ranks with Brussels by rejecting the proposal to work in Iran.  The EU bank fears that doing business with Tehran in violation of the US treasury regulations will hamper its ability to raise money on international capital markets, media reports suggest. ‏

Germany's Bundesbank and European Investment Bank have shunned Iranian business, not primarily out of some moral consideration, but to avoid financial losses from litigation and secondary sanctions resulting from violating the US sanctions on Iran.

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