Iran Is Closer to Building a Nuclear Bomb Than It Has Ever Been

SLATE Magazine- May 9th,2023

BY FRED KAPLAN

Exactly five years ago, Donald Trump withdrew from the Iran nuclear deal in one of the dumbest moves of his presidency—the dumbest when it comes to foreign policy.

This is not a partisan statement. It’s also true that President Joe Biden’s failure to reverse Trump’s misstep ranks as the most puzzling—and may prove to be most catastrophic—decision in his term of office so far.

But Trump’s move on May 8, 2018, set the stage for whatever disasters may come of it. By the time he pulled the plug, Iran was well on its way to dismantling its nuclear program. International inspectors, who were granted full access to suspect sites, said in all of their routine reports that Iran was in full compliance with the deal’s terms.

Now the inspectors are gone, and Iran is closer to building an atom bomb than it ever has been.

Why did Trump abrogate the deal? First, he didn’t much like arms-control agreements of any sort. Second, he particularly distrusted Iran, a view bolstered by his friendship with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (ignoring the fact that most Israeli military and intelligence officers supported the deal). Finally, and perhaps most significantly: To Trump’s mind, nothing Obama ever did could be touted as a success, so the Iran deal—a resounding success by all objective measures—had to be pummeled as (in Trump’s oft-repeated words) “the worst deal ever.”

It’s worth recounting here what the Iran nuclear deal—formally called the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA)—did and did not do. Basically, it required Iran to dismantle almost all of its nuclear program; in exchange, the U.S. would lift almost all of its economic sanctions. In the main clauses, Iran had to:

• Destroy all of its uranium enriched to 3.75 percent and limit further enriched uranium to 3.5 percent. (Weapons-grade uranium is enriched to 90 percent.)

• Cut its uranium stockpile by 90 percent (to 300 kilograms, not enough to build one A-bomb).

• Destroy two-thirds of its centrifuges—the devices that enrich uranium—and refrain from building advanced models, which spin faster.

• Export the spent fuel from its research reactors, which could otherwise be reprocessed into plutonium.

• Stop all work on metallurgy related to the casings for uranium or plutonium bombs.

• Allow officials from the International Atomic Energy Agency to inspect all known and suspected nuclear sites with 24 hours’ notice.

The limits on uranium would expire in 10 years (by 2016) but those on centrifuges would last 20 years and IAEA’s monitoring of uranium mines and mills would last 25 years.

In exchange, the U.S. would lift sanctions, which it had imposed when Iran started developing its nuclear program—but it would not lift the sanctions that had been imposed as a penalty for producing ballistic missiles or for sponsoring terrorism.

When Trump pulled out, he reimposed all the economic sanctions—not only on Iran but also on any country doing business with Iran. For nearly a year, Iran’s diplomats tried to find ways around the restrictions—as did several EU countries, though to no avail. (The Europeans weren’t willing to be barred from transactions in dollars for the sake of their paltry trade with Iran.)

Read more on the original:

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2023/05/trump-iran-nuclear-deal-withdrawal-five-years-later.html