How times change

In 2007, when he was beginning his run for president, Senator Obama told a conference of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) that “the world must work to stop Iran’s uranium-enrichment program.”

 

On October 22, 2012, during a presidential debate with Mitt Romney, Mr. Obama said: “Our goal is to get Iran to recognize it needs to give up its nuclear program and abide by the U.N. resolutions that have been in place. . . . But the deal we’ll accept is — they end their nuclear program. It’s very straightforward.”

In December 2013 at a Brookings Institution forum, President Obama said: “They don’t need to have an underground, fortified facility like Fordow in order to have a peaceful nuclear program. They certainly don’t need a heavy-water reactor at Arak in order to have a peaceful nuclear program. They don’t need some of the advanced centrifuges that they currently possess.”

 

The agreement does not come close to meeting these statements and promise.

Under the deal, Iran will keep its entire nuclear infrastructure. After the IAEA certifies compliance with easy-to-meet requirements.

 

Iran is currently enriching uranium with about 9,000 centrifuges. About 6,000 will be kept operational; about 5,000 will continue to enrich. Another 10,000 — many non-operational — will be put in storage or unplugged. However, no centrifuges will be destroyed or removed from the country. 

 

Iran also will continue to develop advanced uranium centrifuges while the agreement is in effect. However, unlike the interim agreement, which set the stage for the nuclear talks and barred Iran from testing advanced centrifuges with uranium (a provision Iran violated in mid 2014), the new agreement requires only that R&D of advanced centrifuges be tested “in a manner that does not accumulate enriched uranium.”  

 

Iran will be allowed to do more-intensive testing of advanced centrifuges than was permitted during the nuclear talks.

 

Iran is supposed to dilute its enriched-uranium stockpile, convert some of it to fuel plates for a small research reactor, or sell it on the open market. Diluting its enriched uranium could be reversed in a few months — possibly much faster if Iran uses advanced centrifuges.

 

Iran has agreed to replace the core of its Arak heavy-water reactor, which is under construction, so it will produce less plutonium and to send the spent fuel rods of this reactor out of the country. However, it will be permitted to operate the Arak reactor, a significant reversal of pre-2013 U.S. policy that work on this reactor be halted permanently because it is a serious nuclear-proliferation threat. Because of this new provision, Iran will develop its expertise on operating and building heavy-water reactors during the period the agreement is in effect.

 

Verifying this agreement will be impossible, since the “24/7” inspections promised by President Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry in their speeches today apply only to Iran’s declared nuclear program and supply chain. The IAEA can “press” for inspections of military sites and other suspect nuclear sites, but the agreement does not provide for any penalty if Iran refuses to grant IAEA inspectors access.

 

A major U.S. concession concerns Iran’s eleventh-hour demand to lift embargoes on conventional arms and ballistic missiles. The conventional-arms embargo will stay in place for five years, and the ballistic-missile embargo will be in place for eight years but will be lifted sooner if the IAEA definitively clears Iran of any current work on nuclear weapons. The IAEA is very unlikely to find evidence of current nuclear-weapons work, as it won’t be allowed to inspect non-declared nuclear sites where this activity is taking place. This means these embargoes could be lifted much sooner.

Would Obama have won the 2008 or 2012 presidential elections if he gave even a hint of a deal like this? 

Would Congress have supported this abrupt change in American foreign policy if the president had kept it informed about his nuclear diplomacy with Iran and consulted with the Hill during the talks?

Where's the media and their reporting of a flip flopper or does that only apply to the GOP.    Where is the call of liar liar pants on fire?  Where is the American public with their 30 second attention span on foreign policy issues and their short term memory good until the end of the day?