by Jim Lobe

First, it wanted the Senate to pass a binding bill (Kirk-Menendez, or S. 1881) that was certain to sabotage the nuclear negotiations between Iran and the P5+1 (the U.S., Britain, France, China, and Russia plus Germany). When that stalled in mid-January at only 59 co-sponsors, all but [...]]]> via LobeLog

by Jim Lobe

First, it wanted the Senate to pass a binding bill (Kirk-Menendez, or S. 1881) that was certain to sabotage the nuclear negotiations between Iran and the P5+1 (the U.S., Britain, France, China, and Russia plus Germany). When that stalled in mid-January at only 59 co-sponsors, all but 16 of whom were Republicans, it initiated discussions about a non-binding resolution essentially endorsing Kirk-Menendez and laying out the conditions for a final “acceptable” agreement with Iran that was also certain to be rejected by Tehran.

It seems now that AIPAC, whose annual policy conference got underway Sunday and is scheduled to last through Tuesday despite ominous warnings of a new winter storm that may limit its 14,000 attendees’ lobbying capabilities, has been reduced to rounding up senators willing to sign a letter to Obama that softens or eliminates some of its previous language but suggests that some of its key demands — most notably, the abandonment by Iran of all uranium enrichment — may still be a sine qua non for Congressional acquiescence to lifting sanctions if and when a final agreement is reached. Gaining as many signatures on that letter as possible is now the top priority in AIPAC’s legislative agenda (although it will also continue pressing lawmakers to co-sponsor or otherwise support S. 1881).

The proposed letter is currently signed by six senators divided in equal parts between Republicans and Democrats. On the Republican side are Lindsey Graham, who’s been wanting to attack Iran for a really long time now; Mark Kirk; and Kelly Ayotte. On the Democratic side are Robert Menendez, Charles Schumer, and Christopher Coons. Of course, Kirk, Menendez, and Schumer were the three out-front and public co-sponsors of what became know as the Kirk-Menendez bill, while the three other letter signers also became co-sponsors. And, of course, Graham’s co-sponsorship, coupled with his long history of war-mongering, makes it difficult for the letter’s Democrats to indignantly insist, as they have in the past, that the letter is designed to reduce — rather than increase — the chances of war. (H/T to Ali)

One has to believe that if AIPAC could’ve gotten one of the Democrats who didn’t co-sponsor S. 1881, they would have preferred him or her to be among the original signatories of the letter. Their absence suggests that the group could run into similar resistance among Democrats even with a much toned-down letter. Indeed, a failure to get more than 59 senators to sign on to a mere letter — which, as I understand it, the administration still strongly opposes due to the baleful impact it could have on the P5+1 negotiations (both on Rouhani’s position and in light of the rapidly rising tensions with Russia over Ukraine ) — would constitute another very serious and highly embarrassing setback for AIPAC amid reports that some of its dissatisfied far-right backers are now mulling the possibility of creating a new lobby group.

But the letter appears to be part of a strategy to overcome that 59-senator threshold. By first asking recalcitrant Democrats to co-sponsor Kirk-Menendez, AIPAC knows it will likely be turned down, at least at this point. But then, by making a second “ask” — to sign a more innocuous-sounding letter — it no doubt believes that a number of Democrats who are uncomfortable about rebuffing AIPAC and/or not sounding “tough” on Iran and/or vesting complete confidence in Obama’s diplomacy strategy at a moment when it is under attack from the right over Ukraine, Syria, etc. etc., will go along in hopes that the Israel lobby will give them a gold star for campaign contribution purposes and not darken their doorway for at least a few months. It seems like a sound strategy, and, if successful, it would help demonstrate to AIPAC’s donors that its effectiveness has not diminished too much, in spite of its recent defeats.

Several points about the letter deserve highlighting:

First, AIPAC has dropped the “wag the dog” provision that called on Washington to provide all necessary help, including military support, to Israel in the event that its leaders felt compelled to attack Iran’s nuclear program. It also forgoes explicit military threats. And, of course, it is non-binding.

Second, it is ambiguous at best about whether its signers find acceptable any final agreement that permits Iran to engage in any uranium enrichment. Its ruling out any recognition of a “right to enrichment”; its demand that such an agreement preclude any “uranium pathway to a bomb;” and its insistence that any agreement cannot lead to any enrichment elsewhere in the region suggest that its authors have not given up on Israel’s “zero-enrichment” position, a stance that the administration and Tehran and Washington’s P5+1 partners all believe is completely unrealistic.

On the other hand, the assertion that there is “no reason for Iran to have an enrichment facility like Fordow” is more intriguing, depending on how you interpret its meaning. It may mean that the enrichment facility at Natanz is kosher, in which case it accepts future Iranian enrichment and demands only that an underground facility like Fordow, which is far more difficult to attack, be dismantled. Or it may mean that it objects to Fordow simply because it is an enrichment facility, thus making Natanz equally objectionable. Indeed, the ambiguity may be deliberate on AIPAC’s part, designed to appeal to those senators who choose to believe that the letter gives the administration the flexibility to accept a limited enrichment program, when, in fact, the letter’s intention is to reduce or eliminate that flexibility.

Third, the letter’s demand that any final agreement “must dismantle Iran’s nuclear weapons program” is tendentious  and provocative, not to mention factually inaccurate, simply because neither U.S. nor Israeli intelligence believes that Tehran has made a decision to build a weapon. What we know — and the Iranian authorities admit — is that it has a nuclear program with elements that could contribute to building a bomb, IF and only IF a decision is made to do so. So how do you dismantle a nuclear weapons program if your intelligence agencies believe there is no such thing?

You may see other problems with the language, the ambiguities of which, as noted above, may be intended to rope senators back into the AIPAC fold and get them to sign on to a letter that could be used against them in the future if they try to stick to the administration’s determination to exhaust diplomatic options. Much will now depend on the attitude taken by both the administration and the ten Democratic Senate chairs who came out early and strongly against a vote on Kirk-Menendez.

by Jim Lobe

The chief Democratic co-sponsor of the Kirk-Menendez “Wag the Dog” bill, Sen. Robert Menendez, took to the floor of the Senate Thursday to express his opposition to a letter from 42 of his Republican colleagues declaring their determination to get a vote on the bill but also re-asserting [...]]]> via LobeLog

by Jim Lobe

The chief Democratic co-sponsor of the Kirk-Menendez “Wag the Dog” bill, Sen. Robert Menendez, took to the floor of the Senate Thursday to express his opposition to a letter from 42 of his Republican colleagues declaring their determination to get a vote on the bill but also re-asserting his strong support for it. His lengthy speech, at least prepared for delivery (and which can be found below), also laid out his views as to what a final agreement should include. The most important passage was this:

A final agreement should move back the timeline for nuclear breakout capability to beyond-a-year — or more and insist on a long-term, 20 year plus, monitoring and verification agreement. That is the only way to force Iran to abandon its nuclear weapons aspirations.

More specifically, he said:

Any final deal must require Iran to halt its advanced centrifuge R&D activities, reduce the vast majority of its 20,000 centrifuges, close the Fordow facility, stop the heavy-water reactor at Arak from ever possibly coming on-line. And it should require Iran’s full-disclosure of its nuclear activities — including its weaponization activities.

Clearly, this suggests that Menendez is prepared to accept a deal that would permit Iran to enrich uranium to low levels, which some analysts will see as a move toward the administration’s view that some enrichment is inevitable, but which was never explicitly excluded by the bill itself.

What was just as or more important as Menendez’s floor speech this afternoon, however, was the alacrity with which AIPAC responded. Less than two hours after the speech had concluded, AIPAC sent out the following release:

AIPAC commends Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Robert Menendez (D-NJ) for his strong and eloquent statement on the Senate floor today outlining the threat of Iran’s nuclear program and the imperative of dismantling it. We appreciate his commitment to ensure that any agreement with Iran “is verifiable, effective, and prevents them from ever developing even one nuclear weapon.”

We applaud Senator Menendez’s determined leadership on this issue and his authorship with Senator Mark Kirk (R-IL) of the Nuclear Weapon Free Iran Act. We agree with the Chairman that stopping the Iranian nuclear program should rest on bipartisan support and that there should not be a vote at this time on the measure. We remain committed to working with the Administration and the bipartisan leadership in Congress to ensure that the Iran nuclear program is dismantled.[Emphasis added.]

One can’t help but feel the timing of all this was more than coincidental. After all, throwing in the towel in what had been, until 10 days ago, an all-out effort by AIPAC to get the bill onto the floor, as well as its emphasis on “bipartisan support,” suggests that the group has reassessed its position in light of its failure to get more than 59 co-sponsors and the rising chorus of criticism about how the fight with the administration was threatening its relationship with the Democratic Party. The fact that the New York Times saw fit to publish a feature article about AIPAC’s setbacks no doubt also contributed to its reassessment, as did the news that both Hillary and Bill Clinton had come out against a vote on the sanctions bill. And, with the disclosure that 42 Republicans had signed a letter to Majority Leader Harry Reid promising to use every opportunity they could to force a vote on the measure — thus making the bill appear more partisan than it ever had before — it seems that AIPAC had to do something to preserve some semblance of bipartisanship, apparently even at the risk of embarrassing its most ardent advocate, Mark Kirk. It will be interesting to see what Kirk has to say about both Menendez’s speech and AIPAC’s full-throated endorsement of it.

All of this would appear to herald a renewed focus by AIPAC on legislation that would lay out acceptable terms for a final agreement, which will now serve accordingly as the centerpiece of its lobbying efforts when 14,000 of its members are expected to come to Washington for the group’s annual policy conference March 2-4. One wonders if one reason AIPAC issued its statement today was to ensure that it would get a top administration official to address the conference, a concern that was raised by both former AIPAC honcho Steve Rosen and AIPAC critic Peter Beinart during the recent contretemps between Obama and the lobby group. No doubt, Menendez’s terms for a final agreement will closely match those put forward by AIPAC at its conference which, in turn, no doubt closely match those that the Israeli government deems the best it can realistically demand of the Obama administration at this point.

In any event, for those who have the time, here is Menendez’s floor speech in full:

I come to the floor to speak about one of our greatest national security challenges – a nuclear-armed Iran.

Let me say at the outset, I support the Administration’s diplomatic efforts. I have always supported a two-track policy of diplomacy and sanctions.

I come to the floor to speak about one of our greatest national security challenges – a nuclear-armed Iran. I have long thought of this as a bipartisan national security issue – not a partisan political issue. And I know the distinguished Majority Leader feels similarly. This is — at the end of the day — a national security issue that we must approach in a spirit of bipartisanship and unity. We cannot be pressured by a partisan letter into forcing a vote on this national security matter. Let me say at the outset, I support the Administration’s diplomatic efforts. I have always supported a two-track policy of diplomacy and sanctions.

At the same time, I am convinced that we should only relieve pressure on Iran in exchange for verifiable concessions that will dismantle Iran’s nuclear program. Our success should be measured in years, not months.

And that it be done in such a way that alarm bells will sound — from Vienna to Washington, Moscow and Beijing — should Iran restart its program anytime in the next 20 to 30 years. I’m here to unequivocally state my intention – as Chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee – to make absolutely certain that any deal the Administration reaches with Iran is verifiable, effective, and prevents them from ever developing even one nuclear weapon.

Let’s remember that – while we in the Senate are not at the negotiating table – we have a tremendous stake in the outcome and an obligation, as a separate co-equal branch of government representing the American people, to provide oversight and an expression of what we expect as to what the end result should be.

But, it’s the Administration that is at the negotiating table with the Iranians – not us; and it’s the Administration that’s ultimately responsible for negotiating a deal to conclusively end Iran’s illicit nuclear program and it’s the Administration that will have to come back to Congress and tell us whether Iran will continue to be a nuclear threshold state.

My sincere desire is for the Administration to succeed. Nobody has worked harder for a peaceful outcome or to get Iran to comply with sanctions than I have.

Based on the parameters described in the Joint Plan of Action and Iranian comments in the days that have followed I am very concerned. This is not a nothing-ventured-nothing-gained enterprise.

We have placed our incredibly effective international sanctions regime on the line without clearly defining the parameters of what we expect in a final agreement.

As Ali Akbar Salehi, the Head of Iran’s nuclear agency said last month on Iranian state television about the agreement, “The iceberg of sanctions is melting while our centrifuges are also still working. This is our greatest achievement.”
Well, Mr. President, it’s my greatest fear. Any final deal must require Iran to dismantle large portions of its illicit nuclear program.

Any final deal must require Iran to halt its advanced centrifuge R&D activities, reduce the vast majority of its 20,000 centrifuges, close the Fordow facility, stop the heavy-water reactor at Arak from ever possibly coming on-line. And it should require Iran’s full-disclosure of its nuclear activities — including its weaponization activities.

For the good of the region and the world, Iran cannot remain a nuclear threshold state.

A final agreement should move back the timeline for nuclear breakout capability to beyond-a-year — or more and insist on a long-term, 20 year plus, monitoring and verification agreement. That is the only way to force Iran to abandon its nuclear weapons aspirations.

Anything less will leave Iran on the cusp of becoming a nuclear state while it re-builds its economy and improves its ability to break-out at a future date.

David Albright — a respected former IAEA Inspector – has said that for Iran to move from an interim to a final agreement, it would have to close the Fordow facility and remove between 15,000 and 16,000 of its 20,000 centrifuges.
Even after such dramatic steps, we are looking at a breakout time of between 6 and 8 months, depending on whether Iran has access to uranium enriched to just 3.5 percent – or access to 20 percent enriched uranium.

Dennis Ross — one of America’s preeminent diplomats and foreign policy analysts who as served under Democratic and Republican Presidents — has said Iran should retain no more than 10 percent of its centrifuges – no more than 2,000.
These estimates are crucial because, at the end of the day, we – in this body — will have to decide whether this is enough to merit terminating sanctions.

Is a 6 month delay in Iran’s breakout ability enough, even when combined with a robust 20 years inspection and verification regime?

Understanding that in allowing Iran to retain its enrichment capabilities, there will always be a risk of breakout.
It may be — that is the only deal we can get. The real question is whether it is a good enough deal to merit terminating sanctions.

My concern is that the Joint Plan of Action does not speak to these recommended centrifuge limitations Dennis Ross suggests. In fact, Iran has already made its views about the limitations of the agreement quite clear.

What the Joint Plan of Action does concede is that Iran will not only retain its ability to enrich – but will be allowed a mutually agreed upon enrichment program.

Here is what Iran’s Foreign Minister, Zarif has said about the interim agreement:

“The White House tries to portray it as basically a dismantling of Iran’s nuclear program. We are not dismantling any centrifuges, we’re not dismantling any equipment, we’re simply not producing, not enriching over 5 percent.”

President Rouhani was adamant in an interview on CNN that Iran will not be dismantling its centrifuges.

And, in an interview with Fareed Zakaria on CNN, President Rouhani said: “We are determined to provide for the nuclear fuel of such plants inside the country, at the hands of local Iranian scientists. We are going to follow on this path.”

Fareed Zakaria then asked him: “So there will be no destruction of centrifuges — of existing centrifuges?”
To which Rouhani said: “No. No, not at all.”

In fact, Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister, Abbas Araghchi said that Iran would comply with the interim agreement by removing the connections between networks of centrifuges that have been used to enrich uranium to 20 percent, so that they can enrich only to 5 percent and he said:

“These interconnections can be removed in a day and connected again in a day.”

Clearly, their intentions to retain their capability – notwithstanding the agreement — are clear.

And in January, Hassan Rouhani tweeted: “Our relationship with the world is based on Iranian nation’s interest. In Geneva agreement, world powers surrendered to Iranian nation’s will.”

When this tweet was broadly reported-on, Rouhani took it down.

And in a speech when Rouhani was leaving his post as Iran’s chief nuclear negotiator in 2005, he said:
“While we were talking with the Europeans in Tehran, we were installing equipment in parts of the [uranium conversion] facility in Isfahan, but we still had a long way to go to complete the project. In fact, by creating a calm environment, we were able to complete the work on Isfahan.”

I find these comments deeply troubling. I find the fact that — even after an agreement was reached in November — the Iranians reportedly fired a rocket into space to improve their ability to develop a long-range ballistic missile system.
In an interview with Reuters, U.S. missile defense expert, Riki Ellison, said of the report: “If it’s true, they continue to expand and grow their long range missile capabilities regardless of their overture to the West with self-reduction of their nuclear capabilities.”

These realities – these statements – these actions – are just as much about the spirit of the interim deal as it is about the letter of the deal and places in question the political will of the Iranians — and our ability to reach a verifiable agreement with those who have been so willing to deceive.

In terms of both Iran’s political will and its ballistic missile capability, James Clapper, Director of National Intelligence, said: “Tehran has made technical progress in a number of areas — including uranium enrichment, nuclear reactors, and ballistic missiles — from which it could draw if it decided to build missile-deliverable nuclear weapons. These technical advancements strengthen our assessment that Iran has the scientific, technical, and industrial capacity to eventually produce nuclear weapons. This makes the central issue its political will to do so.”

So what that analysis reveals is that – years of obfuscation, delay, and endless negotiation – has brought them to the point of having – according to the Director of National Intelligence – the scientific, technical, and industrial capacity to eventually produce nuclear weapons.

As to their will to do so, I would say that what they are hiding at Parchin Military Industrial Complex – if revealed, would clearly show their will is to build a nuclear bomb. The only thing that has thwarted that will is crippling sanctions.
In my view, the Iranians are negotiating in bad faith, as we have seen them do in the past.

They say one thing behind closed doors in Geneva, and say another thing publically.

I know the Administration will say this is what President Rouhani needs to do for his domestic audience, but his deeds need to go beyond his words, and they need to be verifiable.

In fact, in testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and the House Foreign Affairs Committee, David Albright of the Institute of Science and International Security and an expert on the proliferation of atomic weapons, said that under the interim agreement:

“The breakout time, if Iran used its currently installed centrifuges, would lengthen from at least 1 to 1.6 months to at least 1.9 to 2.2 months.”

That effectively means, without dismantling currently installed centrifuges, Iran has a breakout time of 6 to 8 weeks unless we demand real concessions in a final agreement.

Another major concern is the Arak heavy water reactor — a facility that Dennis Ross has described as “grossly inefficient for producing electricity, but not for generating plutonium for nuclear weapons.”

The Senate was told that the facility would be taken care of in the final agreement – which most of us understood to mean it would be dismantled.

Now, the Joint Plan of Action and the implementing agreement suggest something less than dismantlement.
The implementing agreement says Iran has to “take steps to agree with the IAEA on the conclusion of a safeguards approach to Arak.”

Iran has not provided required design information for Arak — and in the final agreement it seems possible that either Iran will be allowed to complete the reactor and operate it under IAEA safe-guards or the reactor will be simply mothballed – not dismantled – mothballed or perhaps converted to a light-water facility which carries its own risks.
Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister has said that the Arak reactor is the fastest way to get the material for a nuclear weapon.
So, while I understand the agreement also does not permit Iran to construct a related reprocessing facility at this time, the implication of the agreement’s language is that the final agreement will not actually require the dismantling of the Arak reactor, meaning that Arak could — at a future date — give Iran a relatively quick path to a weapon.

I find that simply unacceptable.

In my view, Iran’s strategy, consistent with their past approaches that have brought them to a nuclear threshold state, is to use these negotiations to mothball its nuclear infrastructure program just long enough to undo the international sanctions regime.

Iran is insisting on keeping core elements of its programs – enrichment, the Arak heavy-water reactor, the underground Fordow facility, and the Parchin military complex.

And, while they may be subject to safeguards — so they can satisfy the international community in the short-run – if they are allowed to retain their core infrastructure, they could quickly revive their program sometime in the future.
At the same time, Iran is seeking to reverse the harsh international sanctions regimes against them.

Bottom line: They dismantle nothing. We gut the sanctions.

Troubling signs have already appeared.

Since the interim deal was signed there was an immediate effort by many nations – including many European nations — to revive trade and resume business with Iran.

There have been recent headlines that the Russians may be seeking a barter deal that could increase Iran’s oil exports by 50 percent.

That Iran and Russia are negotiating an oil-for-goods deal worth $1.5 billion a month — $18 billion a year – which would significantly boost Iran’s oil exports by 500,000 barrels a day in exchange for Russian goods.

A coalition of France’s largest companies are visiting Tehran. Iran welcomed more than 100 executives from France’s biggest firms on Monday, the most senior French trade mission in years.

And, since November there have been 20-plus trade delegations from Turkey, Georgia, Ireland, Tunisia, Kazakhstan, China, Italy, India, Austria, and Sweden.

Iran’s economy is recovering.

The Iranian rial — which had plummeted from an official rate of 10,440 rials to the dollar to a staggering 41,000 in October 2012 — has begun to recover. As of January 29, that rate is about 25,000 rials to the dollar. International Monetary Fund figures also show Iran’s negative growth rate turning around, with Iran having a projected growth rate of 1.28 to almost 2 percent in 2014 and 2015.

As Mark Dubowitz, Executive Director of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies testified before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee this week, the $7 billion in actual relief Iran will definitively receive under the Joint Plan of Action is very significant – comprising approximately 35 percent of Iran’s fully accessible cash reserves, which are estimated to be $20 billion.

So, while the Iranian economy is accurately described as being much larger, the assessment that this is a drop in the bucket is simply not accurate.

Moreover, that relief fails to consider the $4-5 billion in revenue that Iran would have lost if we had not suspended sanctions on Iran’s crude oil exports.

Sanctions relief — combined with the “open for business sign” that Iran is posting — is paying returns.

It seems to me that the sanctions regime we’ve worked so hard to build is starting to unravel before we ever get a chance to conclude a final agreement with Iran.

The fact is any final deal as inadequate as the one I’ve outlined, will end any pressure on Iran for the foreseeable future.

Put simply, we need a policy that guarantees Iran does not acquire nuclear weapons capability.

To understand how to proceed, we must understand the facts. We need to put the negotiating into context.

First, Iran has a history of duplicity with respect to its nuclear program, using past negotiations to cover up advances in its nuclear program and — most startlingly — at the undeclared Fordow enrichment site, buried deep in a mountain to prevent its discovery and potential destruction.

That begs the obvious question: Why would someone bury such a facility so deep that it could not be discovered if it was solely for peaceful purposes?

It seems unlikely – as Iran’s leaders have made clear in recent days — that Iran will make any concessions that fundamentally dismantle its nuclear program.

The fact is Iran is simply agreeing to lock the door on its nuclear weapons program – as is – and walk away and should they later walk away from a deal as they have in the past, they can simply unlock the door and continue their nuclear weapons program from where they are today.

Sounds a lot like North Korea.

Let’s not forget that President Rouhani, as the former negotiator for Iran, boasted: “The day that we invited the three European ministers to the talks, only 10 centrifuges were spinning at Natanz. We could not produce one gram of U4 or U6. We did not have the heavy water production. We could not produce yellow cake.

Our total production of centrifuges inside the country was 150. We wanted to complete all of these – we needed time. We did not stop. We completed the program.”

The simple truth is he admitted to deceiving the West.

Given President Rouhani’s own words on his country’s nuclear weapons ambition, it seems to me that a “good deal” is not one that equates dismantling with mothballing. A “good deal” would prevent Iran from being able to get back to work on its nuclear weapons program from where it left off.

Second, despite diplomatic entreaties to the Iranians in recent years – where hands were extended and secret talks were pursued – Iran has grown its support and advocacy for terror.

The history of Iranian terror against U.S. citizens and interests is lengthy and robust, grounded in the view that the United States is the Great Satan — and it’s funding and support of Hezbollah that has carried out attacks against American interests.

241 American servicemen died in the 1983 Marine Corps barracks bombing in Lebanon, 19 in Khobar Towers bombing in Saudi Arabia.

In recent years, we’ve traced responsibility for lethal actions against American troops in Iraq and Afghanistan to Iran, as well as the fortunately thwarted attack on the Saudi Ambassador at a Washington restaurant in 2011.

Today, Iran is actively sponsoring a proxy war in Syria sending money, weapons and fighters on a weekly basis.
Simultaneously, it is sponsoring attacks against Sunnis in Iraq and promoting regional sectarian violence that could easily result in a broader regional conflict.

While smiling at our negotiators across the table, they are simultaneously plotting in the backroom.

With all of this in mind, I believe in the wisdom of the prospective sanctions I proposed. I believe in the lessons of history that tell us Iran cannot be trusted to live up to its word without external pressure. I believe that an insurance policy that guards against Iranian obfuscation and deception is the best way forward.

My legislation – cosponsored by 59 Senators – would simply require that Iran act in good faith, adhering to the implementing agreement, not engage in new acts of terror against American citizens or U.S, property — and not conduct new ballistic missile tests with a range beyond 500 kilometers.

The legislation is not the problem. Congress is not the problem. Iran is the problem. We need to worry about Iran, not the Congress.

We need to focus on Iran’s long history of deception surrounding its nuclear program and how this should inform our approach to reaching a comprehensive deal.

To those who believe that — if negotiations do not result in a deal or if Iran breaks the deal — we can always impose new sanctions then let me be clear: if negotiations fail, or if Iran breaks the deal, we won’t have time to pass new sanctions.
New sanctions are not a spigot that can be turned off-and-on as has been suggested.

Even if Congress were to take-up and pass new sanctions at the moment of Iran’s first breach of the Joint Plan of Action, there is a lag time of at least 6 months to bring those sanctions on line — and at least a year for the real impact to be felt.
This would bring us beyond the very short-time Iran would need to build a nuclear bomb, especially since the interim agreement does not require them neither to dismantle anything, and freezes their capability as it stands today.

So let everyone understand – if there is no deal we won’t have time to impose new sanctions before Iran could produce a nuclear weapon.

Everyone agrees that the comprehensive sanctions policy against Iran – which was led by Congress and originally opposed by the Administration — has been an unquestionable, success.

Iran’s oil exports fell to 1.1 million barrels a day in the first 9 months of 2013 – down from 1.5 million barrels in 2012.
The fall in exports was costing Iran between $4 billion and $8 billion a month in 2013 and the loss of oil revenue had caused the rial to lose two-thirds of its value against the dollar, and caused inflation to rise to more than 40 percent.
There is no dispute or disagreement that it was the economic impact of sanctions that has brought Iran to the negotiating table in the first place.

But passing those sanctions and having them in place long enough to be effective took time we no longer have.
The question now is whether our goals align. Has the ideology of the regime altered so substantially in the last 6 months that they are suddenly ready to forswear a 20 year effort to develop nuclear weapons or are they, as the Supreme leader has stated, seeking to beat us at the game of diplomacy – “to negotiate with the Devil to eliminate its evil” — and retain their nuclear threshold and enriching abilities while degrading the sanctions regime.

And let’s not forget that it’s the Ayatollah who holds the nuclear portfolio and his main goal is preservation of the regime.

It is the Ayatollah who gave the green light to Rouhani to negotiate. Why? Because the sanctions were causing the Ayatollah to be concerned about regime change taking place within Iranian society due to the sanctions’ consequences on the Iranian economy. Now, who benefits from the sanctions relief? The Ayatollah, according to a Reuters story with the title: “Khamenei’s business empire gains from Iran sanctions relief.”

I have worked on Iran’s nuclear issues for 20 years, starting when I was a member of the House pressing for sanctions to prevent Iran from building the Bushehr nuclear power plant and to halt IAEA support for their uranium mining and enrichment programs.

For a decade I was told that my concern had no basis — that Iran would never be able to bring the Bushehr plant on line, and that Iran’s activities were not a concern.

History has shown us that those assessments — about Iran’s abilities and intentions — were simply wrong.
The fact is Iran’s nuclear aspirations did not materialize overnight.

Iran has been slowly, methodically working up to this moment for decades – and now, if its capability is mothballed rather than dismantled – they will remain at the cusp of becoming a declared nuclear state should they chose to start again because nothing will have changed if nothing is dismantled.

Make no mistake — Iran views developing a nuclear capability as fundamental to its existence.

It sees the development of nuclear weapons as part of a regional hegemonic strategy to make Tehran the center of power throughout the region.

This is why our allies and partners in the region – not just Israelis, but the Emiratis and the Saudis — are so skeptical and so concerned.

Quite simply our allies and partners do not trust Iranian leaders, nor do they believe that Iran has any intention of verifiably ending its nuclear weapons program.

So, while I welcome diplomatic efforts, and I share the hope that the Administration can achieve a final comprehensive agreement that eliminates this threat to global peace and security, I am deeply – deeply skeptical.

The simple and deeply troubling fact is — Iran is literally weeks to months away from breakout, and the parameters of the final agreement — laid out in the Joint Plan of Action — do not appear to set Iran’s development-capacity back by more than a few weeks.

The Joint Plan of Action conceded, even before negotiations had even begun, Iran’s right to some level of enrichment despite a U.N. resolution calling for Iran to suspend enrichment.

It provides no guarantees that we’ll resolve our concerns about Iranian weaponization activities, that Iran will cease advanced centrifuge research, that the IAEA will gain access to the Parchin military base, that Iran will dismantle thousands of centrifuges, or that the Iranians will disclose the scope of their activities.

It suggests that the resolution for the Arak heavy-water reactors, which can provide a quicker plutonium pathway to nuclear weapons, may be to put it under IAEA safeguards, rather than requiring its dismantlement.

We don’t have time for Iran to hedge and obfuscate.

There should be no chance for Iran to buy more time, which, in effect, leaves us exactly where we are – just hitting a pause-button — with the state of play unchanged and Iran weeks from breakout.

To me, that’s a bad agreement and, in my view, we should be negotiating from a position of strength – in the case of Iran, holding fast on economic sanctions and a credible threat of force should Iran proceed with its nuclear efforts.

Last Tuesday night, in the State of the Union, the President said: “If John F. Kennedy and Ronald Reagan could negotiate with the Soviet Union, then surely a strong and confident America can negotiate with less powerful adversaries today.”

But I would point out to my colleagues that they did so from a position of strength. President Kennedy sent U.S. warships to face down the Soviets in Cuba, and Ronald Reagan dramatically built-up U.S. military might.
We need to negotiate with Iran from a position of strength.

The concerns I have raised here are legitimate. They are not – as the President’s press secretary has said – “war-mongering.” This is not saber rattling. It is not Congress wanting to “march to war,” as another White House spokeswoman said — but exactly the opposite.

At the end of the day, trying to keep the pressure on Iran to completely satisfy the UN’s — and the international community’s — demands for Iran to halt and reverse its illicit nuclear activities is the best way to avoid war in the first place.

Iran has proven in the past it won’t negotiate in good faith except when it has no other choice – as the tough sanctions we passed have proven by getting Iran to the table.

Iran says it won’t negotiate with a gun to its head.

Well, I would suggest it is Iran that has put a nuclear gun to the world’s head.

So, at the end of the day, name-calling is not an argument, nor is it sound policy.

It is a false choice to say a vote for sanctions is equivalent to war-mongering.

More pressure on Iran does not — in any way — suggest that Congress wants war, or that the Iranians feel backed into a corner and will – themselves — choose war over reason.

So let’s stop talking about war-mongering.

Let’s instead fixate on the final deal which, in my view, cannot and should not rely simply on trust, but on real, honest, verifiable dismantlement of Iran’s capability to produce even one nuclear bomb.

The ball is in the Administration’s court, not in Congress’.

In fact, the agreement specifically states: “The U.S. Administration, acting consistent with the respective roles of the President and the Congress, will refrain from imposing new nuclear-related sanctions.”

The agreement acknowledges that the Administration – not Congress – will refrain from imposing new sanctions.
The Administration knew it could not bind Congress to refrain from imposing new sanctions – because Congress is a separate co-equal branch of government.

So let’s focus on what was agreed to by those at the table rather than attributing blame to those who were not.
We will not be the scapegoats for a bad deal if it does not take the nuclear weapons option off the table by insisting on dismantling existing capability, not simply mothballing it.

Let me say, I want diplomacy to work. I want it to produce the results we all hope for and have worked for.
But, at a minimum, we need to send a message to Iran that our patience is not unlimited and that we are skeptical of their intentions.

And a message to the international community that the sanctions regime has not weakened, that this is not an opportunity to re-engage with Tehran.

I would urge everyone to look at the legislation I’ve drafted with my colleague from Illinois and members of both Caucuses as a win for the Administration.

They’ve succeeded in convincing us to provide up-to-a-year window to negotiate.

I believe that is significant and generous given Iran’s history of treachery and deceit.

If Iran’s steps away from the negotiations or does not live up to its agreement it will be because they aren’t serious about reaching a comprehensive deal.

I have heard the concerns of the Administration. I know we share the same goals.

And we have taken steps in the Foreign Relations Committee in pursuit of those goals.

We worked with them to pass legislation to help reform the Organization of American States.

We have moved 129 nominees.

We worked through Labor Day – in a bipartisan effort — to quickly pass a resolution authorizing the use of military force in Syria which gave the President the ability to go to Russia and get a deal to end the use of chemical weapons in Syria.

We passed — and the President signed PEPFAR into law – the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief.

We worked with the Administration on Embassy Security after Benghazi.

We worked with countless Administration officials and held two hearing on the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.

In all of these instances, I have worked closely with the Administration.

And my intention now is to assist the Administration again in its negotiations by keeping the pressure on Iran which has always proven an unreliable negotiating partner at best.

In my view, it’s time to put Iranian rhetoric to the test. If we are to take President Rouhani at his word when he said in Davos last week that Iran does not seek nuclear weapons — if that’s true, then the Iranian government should not have any problems with the obvious follow-up to that claim – starting with the verifiable dismantling of its illicit nuclear infrastructure. That is all the sanctions legislation does.

We should settle for nothing less.

Let’s be clear, I do not come to this floor in opposition, I come in comity, and in the spirit of unity that has always dictated our foreign policy, but the Senate has an obligation to challenge assumptions in a free and open debate.
That is what is most extraordinary about our government and it echoes in the many debates that have been held in this Chamber on war and peace, on justice, freedom, and civil rights.

At the end of the day, we have an obligation to speak our minds in what we believe is in the best interest of this nation.
It is in that spirit that I come to the floor today.

As General George Marshall said, “Go right straight down the road, to do what is best, and to do it frankly and without evasion.” Today, I am advocating for what I believe is in our national interest, and doing as frankly on comprehensively as I can.

As John Kennedy said about having differences of opinion: “Let us not be blind to [them], but let us also direct our attention to our common interests and to the means by which those differences can be resolved.”

The Administration and the Senate have a common interest – to prevent a nuclear-weapons-capable-Iran. We have differences as to how to achieve it. We have an obligation to debate those differences and concerns. But I will not yield on a principled difference.

It is our obligation to debate the issues — express our differences and concerns — and come to this floor to work together to resolve them.

by Jim Lobe

The year of 2014 is starting well for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), the premier organization of this country’s Israel lobby.

Not only has it been clearly and increasingly decisively defeated — at least for now and the immediate future — in its bid to persuade [...]]]> via LobeLog

by Jim Lobe

The year of 2014 is starting well for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), the premier organization of this country’s Israel lobby.

Not only has it been clearly and increasingly decisively defeated — at least for now and the immediate future — in its bid to persuade a filibuster-proof, let alone a veto-proof, super-majority of senators to approve the Kirk-Menendez “Wag the Dog” Act that was designed to torpedo the Nov. 24 “Joint Plan of Action” (JPA) between Iran and the P5+1. It has also drawn a spate of remarkably unfavorable publicity, a particularly damaging development for an organization that, as one of its former top honchos, Steve Rosen, once put it, like “a night flower, … thrives in the dark and dies in the sun.”

Consider first what happened with the Kirk-Menendez sanctions bill, named for the two biggest beneficiaries of “pro-Israel” PACs closely associated with AIPAC in the Congressional campaigns of 2010 and 2012, respectively. Introduced on the eve of the Christmas recess, the bill then had 26 co-sponsors, equally divided between Democrats and Republicans, giving it an attractive bipartisan cast —  the kind of bipartisanship that AIPAC has long sought to maintain despite the group’s increasingly Likudist orientation and the growing disconnect within the Democratic Party between its strongly pro-Israel elected leadership and more skeptical base, especially its younger activists, both Jewish and gentile. By the second week of January, it had accumulated an additional 33 co-sponsors, bringing the total to 59 and theoretically well within striking distance of the magic 67 needed to override a presidential veto. At that point, however, its momentum stalled as a result of White House pressure (including warnings that a veto would indeed be cast); the alignment behind Obama of ten Senate Committee chairs, including Carl Levin of the Armed Services Committee and Dianne Feinstein of the Intelligence Committee; public denunciation of the bill by key members of the foreign policy elite; and a remarkably strong grassroots campaign by several reputable national religious, peace, and human-rights groups (including, not insignificantly, J Street and Americans for Peace Now), whose phone calls and emails to Senate offices opposing the bill outnumbered those in favor by a factor of ten or more.

The result: AIPAC and its supporters hit a brick wall at 59, unable even to muster the 60 needed to invoke cloture against a possible filibuster, let alone the 77 senators that AIPAC-friendly Congressional staff claimed at one point were either publicly or privately committed to vote for the bill if it reached the floor. By late this week, half a dozen of the 16 Democrats who had co-sponsored the bill were retreating from it as fast as their senatorial dignity would permit. And while none has yet disavowed their co-sponsorship, more than a handful now have (disingenuously, in my view) insisted that they either don’t believe that the bill should be voted on while negotiations are ongoing; that they had never intended to undercut the president’s negotiating authority; or, most originally, that they believed the mere introduction of the bill would provide additional leverage to Obama (Michael Bennet of Colorado) in the negotiations. Even the bill’s strongest proponents, such as Oklahoma’s Jim Inhofe, conceded, as he did to the National Journal after Obama repeated his veto threat in his State of the Union Address Tuesday: “The question is, is there support to override a veto on that? I say, ‘No.’”

The Democratic retreat is particularly worrisome for AIPAC precisely because its claim to “bipartisanship” is looking increasingly dubious, a point underlined by Peter Beinart in a Haaretz op-ed this week that urged Obama to boycott this year’s AIPAC policy conference that will take place a mere five weeks from now. (This is the nightmare scenario for Rosen who noted in an interview with the JTA’s Ron Kampeas last week that the group’s failure to procure a high-level administration speaker for its annual conference “would be devastating to AIPAC’s image of bipartisanship.”) According to Beinart:

The appearance of bipartisanship is essential to AIPAC’s business model. And yet that bipartisanship is, in some ways, a ruse. The group’s hawkish foreign policy stances on both Iran and the Palestinians are far more in line with Republican than Democratic public opinion. Demographically, AIPAC is increasingly populated by Orthodox Jews, who – in contrast to American Jewry as whole—generally vote Republican. It’s true that the Iran sanctions bill AIPAC is pushing has garnered 19 [sic] Democratic—along with 43 Republican—co-sponsorships. But congressional sources say bluntly that many of those Democratic senators are only supporting the bill because AIPAC, and like-minded groups, want them to.

Indeed, the growing tension between AIPAC, which takes its orders from Bibi Netanyahu and whose leadership is probably to the right even of him, and Democrats has become increasingly apparent, especially in ways that must make the organization acutely uncomfortable. Thus, earlier this month, Rabbi Jack Moline, the director of the National Jewish Democratic Council (NJDC), which normally toes AIPAC’s line on any Israel-related issue, publicly accused it of using “strong-arm tactics, essentially threatening people that if they didn’t vote a particular way, that somehow that makes them anti-Israel or means the abandonment of the Jewish community.” Moreover, AIPAC’s pressure tactics — bolstered by Bill Kristol’s neoconservative Emergency Committee for Israel (ECI) — against the head of the Democratic National Committee, Florida Rep. Debbie Wasserman-Schultz, appear to have backfired badly, as the head of the group’s Southeastern states director, Mark Kleinman, felt compelled to issue a public defense of the congresswoman earlier this week as it became clear the bill was actually losing support among Democratic lawmakers. “People don’t forget these kind of attacks,” one veteran Capitol Hill lobbyist told me last week. “There is a cost to pay.” Finally, the fact that AIPAC, after a full month of all-out lobbying, was able to add only three Democrats to the initial list of co-sponsors, while all but two Republican senators (Paul and Flake) signed on, leaves the bill with an overwhelmingly partisan look. (This, of course, raises once again, as M.J. Rosenberg has been reminding us, the question of where Hillary Clinton stands on the most important foreign policy issue of Obama’s second term and why she won’t speak out.)

As Doug Bloomfield, a former chief AIPAC lobbyist told me at the end of last week about the bill:

It turned out to be a Republican game of gotcha. Iran is really a secondary issue; it’s all just gotcha. That’s the politics; you want to make the other side look bad, in this case, to portray Obama as soft on Iran and an unreliable friend of Israel.

…Take a look at AIPAC today. In the early years, there were no strings with $200 donations, but a $200,000 contribution, that comes with chains. The biggest contributors now are Likud and Republican. That doesn’t come with strings; it comes with chains. In my experience, it was taken over by a board of major contributors who are micro-managers.

…When Reagan came in and had a Republican Senate, one of the board members urged firing all of the staff associated with Democrats. Now they’re working with the Republicans in the Congress to undermine a President. What is the message? The great irony of this whole campaign on sanctions is that its raison d’etre was to put pressure on the Iranians to come to the table. It worked, so why don’t they declare victory? Why push for more sanctions that, as the president warned, could scuttle these talks? The first reason is that this has been their primary issue. Like the old cliche about real estate, “Location, location, location,” for them it’s been “Iran, Iran, Iran.” Israel and the peace process is in a distant second place… Number two is that this institution is very tight with Bibi Netanyahu, and it’s also his Number One issue. He says we can’t do anything with the Palestinians until we remove the nuclear threat from Iran. And how? To totally dismantle its nuclear program. As long as you hold to that, you don’t have to deal with the Palestinians.

Moreover, the disconnect between AIPAC and Democrats also mirrors what appears to be happening within the Jewish community itself. This was demonstrated in part by the fact that, of the 11 Jewish members of the Senate, only four co-sponsored the bill (and three of them have been among those who have retreated from full-throated support), while six, including Levin and Feinstein, publicly backed Obama. Moreover, this was one issue in which the upstart J Street came out early and unequivocally against AIPAC and prevailed. And then there was the remarkable letter obtained by Mondoweiss from nearly 60 prominent Jewish New York celebrities, artists, religious figures, donors, and philanthropists to newly elected Mayor Bill de Blasio admonishing him for kissing AIPAC’s ring during a recent off-the-record meeting with senior officials of the organization:

…[W]e do know that the needs and concerns of many of your constituents–U.S. Jews like us among them–are not aligned with those of AIPAC, and that no, your job is not to do AIPAC’s bidding when they call you to do so. AIPAC speaks for Israel’s hard-line government and its right-wing supporters, and for them alone; it does not speak for us.

This is not the kind of publicity AIPAC enjoys.

Nor can it be happy that the trips to Israel for promising politicians and lawmakers sponsored by AIPAC’s “educational” arm, the American Israel Education Foundation (AIEF), and specifically whether they should be publicly disclosed, have become an issue in the Republican primary campaign for the attorney-general of Nevada, in Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s home state, as disclosed in this JTA item Thursday. Like AIPAC and its meeting with de Blasio, AIEF, which took 81 members of the House — or about 20 percent of all House members — on an all-expenses paid trip to Israel during the August recess in 2011, much prefers to maintain a low profile, at least in this country.

For Bloomfield, AIPAC’s entire management of the Iran issue has been characterized by “inept handling and poor judgment”, and, instead of claiming victory for its sanctions strategy, it looked like “another rightwing group that prefers war over negotiations, domestic partisanship over diplomacy.”

Of course, none of this means that the battle over Iran policy is won, but it does suggest that AIPAC’s membership has some serious thinking to do about the group’s relationship to Democrats and to the broader Jewish community. Nor does it necessarily mean that we have finally reached a “tipping point” regarding the lobby’s hold over Congress and U.S. Middle East policy. But this is unquestionably a significant moment. (Rosenberg has a good analysis about AIPAC’s defeat out on HuffPo today that is well worth reading.) 

by Jim Lobe

In its latest report on Iran’s nuclear program, the Iran task force of the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs (JINSA) admits that it is divided over the value of the Joint Plan of Action (JPA), the Nov. 24 agreement between Iran and the P5+1, but that [...]]]> via LobeLog

by Jim Lobe

In its latest report on Iran’s nuclear program, the Iran task force of the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs (JINSA) admits that it is divided over the value of the Joint Plan of Action (JPA), the Nov. 24 agreement between Iran and the P5+1, but that if after six months from the date of the JPA’s signing on Jan. 10 no final agreement is reached, the U.S. should support an Israeli attack on Iran if its government decides to carry one out. I’ll reprint the the executive summary below, but here’s the final paragraph:

The United States should move immediately to impose new sanctions and consider even tougher actions against Iran if no acceptable final is [sic] agreement is in place 180 days after the JPA’s formal implementation on January 20. At that time, the United States should do nothing that would impinge upon Israel’s ability to decide what actions it must take at that time, and indeed should support Israel if it takes military action.

This passage, of course, mirrors the provision in the Kirk-Menendez “Wag the Dog” Act of 2013 that similarly urges the U.S. to back Israel if its government feels “compelled to take military action in legitimate self-defense against Iran’s nuclear weapon program,” although it pushes the date forward to July 20 instead of at any time.

Now, JINSA claims that it has U.S. national security interests at heart, but it’s difficult to understand how U.S. backing for an Israeli attack on Iranian nuclear facilities will serve U.S. national interests if negotiators are still trying to work out the details of a final agreement six months from now. Indeed, such a move would be potentially catastrophic, not only for possibly involving the U.S. in a new Middle East war with a much bigger adversary than the Taliban or Iraq or Libya, but also because most experts believe that it would put a swift end to the international nuclear non-proliferation regime, isolate both Israel and the U.S., destroy the sanctions regime that the Obama administration has so painstakingly put together, and induce Iran to kick out IAEA inspectors and take its nuclear program underground. Most experts believe an Israeli attack could set back Iran’s nuclear program two years at most. So here we have JINSA insisting that we shouldn’t do anything to discourage Bibi Netanyahu to go for it!

As reader of this blog know, the JINSA task force is simply the latest incarnation of a mainly neoconservative group originally put together under the hawkish Bipartisan Policy Center in 2008. When its first report came out in the fall of that year, I called it a “roadmap to war” and have been diligently following its periodic reports ever since. Its membership has changed over time–it was weighted heavily toward staunchly pro-Israel personalities from both parties at the outset; it’s now disproportionately populated by former Bush aides, such as former Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Eric Edelman (who is co-chair of the task force), former Assistant Secretary of State for Arms Control and Nonproliferation Steve Rademaker, Dick Cheney’s former national security adviser John Hannah, and former State Department Counselor Eliot Cohen–although its ultra-hawkish message has remained consistent. As has its staff director, Michael Makovsky, a Churchill biographer who served as an oil expert in the Pentagon’s Office of Special Plans in the run-up to the Iraq war and previously lived on a settlement on the West Bank, according to various reports that he has never denied, so far as I am aware. Makovsky became JINSA’s CEO last year, and he took BPC’s task force with him.

Of course, the most interesting member of the task force is Amb. Dennis Ross, who served on the BPC task force at its birth until he entered the Obama administration in Jan. 2009 and soon found himself to be the NSC’s senior director for Iran until he left in late 2011 to become counselor of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. Ross co-chairs the task force with Edelman.

Now, what is particularly curious about both Ross and this latest JINSA report is that the report doesn’t seem to correspond to his views. As you can see below, the executive summary asserts that the JPA is “deeply flawed,” but, at the report’s rollout Monday at JINSA headquarters, Ross spent most of his time defending the agreement (contrary to Jennifer Rubin’s assessment of his position–”Ex-Obama Adviser: Interim Deal is a Sham.”

“I’m not one of those who thinks the agreement is that bad,” he said, arguing, in effect, that he “could live with Iran having a limited enrichment program with a highly intrusive inspection regime,” unlike others on the task force who echo Netanyahu’s demand that Iran be permitted no enrichment.

That doesn’t mean that Ross isn’t a hawk. Indeed, he argued that the White House’s warning that adding new sanctions would destroy the diplomatic track and make war the only remaining option could easily be interpreted as bolstering Obama’s previous threat to take military action against Tehran unless a satisfactory agreement is reached. Ross made this argument in a more comprehensive exposition of his views about the JPA and the P5+1 process published in Politico Sunday, not an insignificant amount of which is inconsistent with the report by the task force which he chairs. Ross also made clear that he, like a couple other members of the task force, did not believe that a final agreement would be reached within six months, which, of course, raises the question of why the group set that as the date at which Israel should be given a green light to attack Iran.

I didn’t get a chance to ask Ross about that in the Q&A period. Makovsky, however, insisted that the report–except on the question of whether Iran could be permitted some enrichment as part of a final agreement–represented a consensus by the entire task force, which would include Ross. I asked Rademaker whether he thought that provision for an Israeli attack after 180 days was a good idea. “We didn’t have a long debate about this,” he told me, noting that “Israel is the most immediately threatened by Iran’s program.” He added that “there’s a lot of downsides to using military force,” but the threat of an Israeli attack could “enhance the prospect for successful diplomacy.”

In any event, here’s the executive summary:

Executive Summary

Preventing a nuclear-capable Iran remains the most pressing national security challenge facing the United States and its Middle East allies, and a permanent diplomatic settlement that fully addresses international security concerns remains the preferred means to achieve this objective. We judge this outcome to be more remote and harder to achieve now than before the P5+1 countries and Iran signed an interim deal in Geneva, known as the Joint Plan of Action (JPA), which went into effect January 20, 2014.

The JPA is intended as an interim arrangement that pauses parts of Iran’s nuclear program during negotiations for a longer-term settlement. But it also sets out so-called “elements of the final step of a comprehensive solution.” We believe the JPA is deeply flawed because the combination of interim and final concessions it contains undermine the effort to prevent a nuclear Iran.

Our previous report, issued in the run-up to Geneva, spelled out six principles to which any deal must conform to protect U.S. national security interests. To be acceptable, we argued any deal must require Iran to resolve outstanding international concerns, adhere to international legal requirements and roll back its nuclear program. It would also need to put in place a strict inspections regime and clear deadlines for Iran to uphold its commitments. Finally, we made the case that to obtain such a deal the United States would have to negotiate and enforce it from a position of strength, to make it unmistakably plain to Tehran that it has the most to lose from the failure of diplomacy.

The aim of this report is to: show where this agreement falls short of the parameters dictated by our principles; explain the risks generated by these shortcomings; and provide recommendations for pursuing a final agreement to prevent a nuclear Iran.

The JPA fails to meet the standards we had previously laid out, both in the interim and the long term. It allows Iran to retain enough key aspects of its nuclear program to continue progress toward nuclear weapons capability – including its 3.5 percent enriched uranium stockpile, existing enrichment capacity and ability to improve the performance of its extant centrifuges – and even authorizes it to construct an additional nuclear facility. But the JPA does not require Iran to address its unresolved legal obligations. Instead, it implicitly recognizes Iran’s proclaimed right to enrich in practice, undermining the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), and envisions a time limit on any Iranian concessions. Worse still, it suggests that after the conditions of a final deal lapse, Iran will “be treated in the same manner as that of any” state, as if it had not pursued nuclear weapons in defiance of international law or sponsored global terrorism for more than three decades. Finally, the JPA weakens U.S. leverage to pursue even this flawed long-term deal, both by beginning to unravel the existing international sanctions regime and by seeking to limit Congress’s power to pass additional measures. Overall, this does not buy time for the P5+1 to negotiate a final deal. Instead, the JPA makes it possible for Iran to progress toward undetectable nuclear weapons capability without even violating the agreement.

These shortcomings complicate prevention of a nuclear Iran, undermine the nonproliferation regime and contribute to regional instability. To stave off these risks, the United States must now do the best it can with what time remains to protect its security interests, as well as those of its allies in the region.

As we made clear in our previous reports, this task force continues to believe the optimal outcome would be an Iran with no enrichment capability whatsoever. Because the JPA precludes this, and contains the flaws outlined above, some task force members believe the deal is unacceptable. These task force members believe the United States must still press for a final agreement permitting Iran to keep only a civilian nuclear power program but no enrichment facilities or capabilities.

Other task force members believe the JPA, while not the best solution, provides an opportunity to test Iran’s true intentions definitively with an endgame proposal. By offering Iran much of what it claims to want – civilian nuclear power and enrichment – while also containing the most stringent possible limits to preclude nuclear weapons capability, U.S. negotiators can give Iran the chance to prove whether or not it is serious in its declared peaceful aims. To be acceptable, these task force members believe, a final deal must limit Iran to: no enrichment beyond 5 percent; no 20 percent enriched uranium stockpile, and no more than 1,000 kilograms (kg) of 5 percent; no second-generation centrifuges, and no more than 1,000 installed first-generation centrifuges; deactivation of the Fordow enrichment facility; and no plutonium track.

All task force members agree an acceptable final deal must require Iran to meet all of its international legal obligations, come clean about its past nuclear weapons research and work, and accept a much more intrusive inspections regime.

Given that the JPA grants Iran greater concessions than it extracts, and considering how close Iran is to nuclear weapons capability, it is critical such a final, permanent deal which fulfills our principles be put in place as soon as possible, preferably before the JPA’s six-month interim expires. Achieving this will require the United States to use all forms of leverage available to induce Iran to accept it, including intensified sanctions, credible military preparations, tighter cooperation with regional allies and clear support for a potential Israel strike.

The United States should move immediately to impose new sanctions and consider even tougher actions against Iran if no acceptable final is agreement is in place 180 days after the JPA’s formal implementation on January 20. At that time, the United States should do nothing that would impinge upon Israel’s ability to decide what actions it must take at that time, and indeed should support Israel if it takes military action.

via IPS News

Eight years ago, Stephen Rosen, then a top official at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) and well-known around Washington for his aggressiveness, hawkish views, and political smarts, was asked by Jeffrey Goldberg of the New Yorker magazine whether some recent negative publicity had harmed the [...]]]> by Jim Lobe

via IPS News

Eight years ago, Stephen Rosen, then a top official at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) and well-known around Washington for his aggressiveness, hawkish views, and political smarts, was asked by Jeffrey Goldberg of the New Yorker magazine whether some recent negative publicity had harmed the lobby group’s legendary clout in Washington.

“A half smile appeared on his face, and he pushed a napkin across the table,” wrote Goldberg about the interview. “’You see this napkin?’ [the official] said. In twenty-four hours, we could have the signatures of seventy senators on this napkin.”

Eight years later, the same official, Stephen Rosen, who was forced to resign from AIPAC after his indictment — later dismissed — for allegedly spying for Israel, told a Ron Kampeas of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency (JTA) that AIPAC needed to retreat from its confrontation with President Barack Obama after getting only 59 senators — all but 16 of them Republicans — to co-sponsor a new sanctions bill aimed at derailing nuclear negotiations between Iran and the so-called P5+1 (U.S., Britain, France, Russia, China plus Germany).

“They don’t want to be seen as backing down… I don’t believe this is sustainable, the confrontational posture,” he said.

If AIPAC had succeeded in getting 70 signatures on the bill, which the administration argued would have violated a Nov. 24 interim agreement between Iran and the P5+1 that essentially freezes Tehran’s nuclear programme in exchange for easing some existing sanctions for a renewable six-month period, that would have been three more than needed to overcome a promised Obama veto.

But, after quickly gathering the 59 co-sponsors over the Christmas recess, AIPAC and the bill’s major sponsors, Republican Sen. Mark Kirk and Democratic Sen. Robert Menendez, appeared to hit a solid wall of resistance led by 10 Democratic Committee chairs and backed by an uncharacteristically determined White House with an uncharacteristically stern message.

“If certain members of Congress want the United States to take military action, they should be up front with the American public and say so,” said Bernadette Meehan, a spokeswoman for the National Security Council. “Otherwise, it’s not clear why any member of Congress would support a bill that possibly closes the door on diplomacy and makes it more likely that the United States will have to choose between military options or allowing Iran’s nuclear program to proceed.”

Combined with a grassroots lobbying campaign carried out by nearly 70 grassroots religious, anti-war, and civic-action groups that flooded the offices of nervous Democratic senators with thousands of emails, petitions, and phone calls, as well as endorsements of the administration’s position by major national and regional newspapers and virtually all but the neo-conservative faction of the U.S. foreign policy elite, the White House won a clear victory over AIPAC and thus raised anew the question of just how powerful the group really is.

AIPAC’s inability to muster more support among Democrats, in particular, came on top of two other setbacks to its fearsome reputation over the past year.

Although they never took a public position on his nomination a year ago, the group’s leaders were known to have quietly lobbied against former Republican Sen. Chuck Hagel for Defence Secretary due his generally critical attitude toward Israel’s influence on U.S. policy in the Middle East.

Several groups and individuals closely aligned with AIPAC, notably the American Jewish Committee and the Anti-Defamation League’s (ADL) – both of which have joined AIPAC in lobbying for the new Iran sanctions bill – questioned or opposed Hagel. Ultimately, however, he won confirmation by a 58-41 margin in which the great majority of Democrats voted for him.

Eight months later, AIPAC and other right-wing Jewish groups lobbied Congress in favour of a resolution to authorise the use of force against Syria — this time, however, at Obama’s request, although clearly also with the approval of Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu.

But the popular groundswell against Washington’s military intervention in yet another Middle Eastern conflict — as well as the reflexive aversion by far-right Republicans to virtually any Obama initiative — doomed the effort.

Neither Hagel nor Syria, however, has approached the importance AIPAC has accorded to Iran and its nuclear programme which have dominated the group’s foreign-policy agenda for more than a decade. During that time, it has become used to marshalling overwhelming  majorities of lawmakers from both parties behind sanctions and other legislation designed to increase tensions — and preclude any rapprochement — between Tehran and Washington.

Last July, for example, the House of Representatives voted by a 400-20 margin in favour of sanctions legislation designed to halt all Iranian oil exports from Iran. The measure was approved just four days before Iranian President Hassan Rouhani’s inauguration.

Throughout the fall, AIPAC worked hard — but ultimately unsuccessfully — to get the same bill through the Senate.

Now, two months later and unable to muster even a filibuster-proof 60 votes in the Senate, AIPAC appears to have shelved the Kirk-Menendez bill, which, among other provisions, would have imposed sanctions if Tehran violated the Nov. 24 agreement or failed to reach a comprehensive accord with the P5+1 on its nuclear programme within a year.

“Clearly, the ground has shifted, dealing a huge defeat to AIPAC and other groups who have been aggressively lobbying for [the new sanctions bill],” wrote Lara Friedman, a lobbyist for Americans for Peace Now in her widely-read weekly Legislative Round-up, while other commentators, including Rosen, warned that overwhelming Republican support for the bill put AIPAC’s carefully cultivated bipartisan image at risk with Democratic lawmakers and key Democratic donors.

“They definitely lost this round and that has cost them a huge amount of political capital with the administration and with a lot of Democrats,” said one veteran Capitol Hill observer who also noted AIPAC faced “an almost perfect storm” of an administration willing to fight for a policy that also enjoyed strong support from the foreign-policy elite and an engaged activist community that could exert grassroots pressure on their elected representatives. “Senate offices were getting a couple of calls in favour [of the bill] and hundreds against. That certainly has to make a difference.”

“AIPAC and other hard-line groups remain a potent force in guaranteeing generous U.S. aid to Israel and hamstringing U.S. efforts to achieve a two-state solution, but their clout declines when they advocate a course of action that could lead to another Middle East war,” Stephen Walt, co-author of “The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy,” told IPS in an email exchange.

“The neoconservatives were able to push Bush & Co. to invade Iraq in 2003, but their success required an unusual set of circumstances and the American public learned a lot from that disastrous experience,” according to the influential Harvard international relations scholar.

No one, however, believes that AIPAC and its allies have given up. If the P5+1 negotiations should falter, the Kirk-Menendez bill is likely to be quickly re-introduced; indeed, one influential Republican senator said it should be put on the calendar for July, six months from Jan. 20 the date that Nov. 24 interim accord formally went into effect.

“It seems likely that advocates [of the bill] are getting ready to shift to some form of ‘Plan B’ [which], …one can guess, will look a lot like Plan A, but, instead of focusing on derailing negotiations with new sanctions, [it] will likely focus on imposing conditions on any final agreement — conditions that are impossible to meet and will thus kill any possibility of a deal,” according to Friedman.

That could include conditioning the lifting of sanctions on an agreement that includes a ban on any uranium enrichment on Iranian soil — a condition favoured by Netanyahu that Tehran has repeatedly rejected and that most experts believe would be a deal-breaker.

by Jim Lobe

The front-page article by Jodi Rudoren about Israel’s “Castle Strategy” in Sunday’s New York Times offers yet one more example — and right in the opening paragraph — of why the Kirk-Menendez “Wag the Dog” Act of 2013 is so dangerous to the security of the United [...]]]> via LobeLog

by Jim Lobe

The front-page article by Jodi Rudoren about Israel’s “Castle Strategy” in Sunday’s New York Times offers yet one more example — and right in the opening paragraph — of why the Kirk-Menendez “Wag the Dog” Act of 2013 is so dangerous to the security of the United States. Here it is:

After a Katyusha rocket fired from Lebanon landed in Israel last month, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu blamed Hezbollah, the Shiite militia, and its Iranian backers. But Israeli security officials attributed the attack to a Sunni jihadist group linked to Al Qaeda.

Unfortunately, Rudoren does not elaborate on what she calls this “disconnect,” but it once again strongly suggests that Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu has no hesitation about blaming Iran or its alleged surrogates, most importantly Hezbollah, for anything untoward, even when professionals in Israel’s national-security apparatus disagree. Perhaps Bibi is completely sincere in his belief that Hezbollah was behind this attack and that Israel’s intelligence community was wrong, in which case one has to ask whether the Israeli leader has his own “Office of Special Plans,” Scooter Libby and Dick Cheney to distort and politicize the intelligence to support his own policy preferences and whether our own Congress is paying attention.

But bearing in mind this disconnect between Israel’s political leadership and its national-security apparatus, consider two provisions in the Kirk-Menendez bill, otherwise known as the “Nuclear Weapon Free Iran Act of 2013.”

First, there’s the provision that requires the President to certify that “Iran has not directly, or through a proxy, supported, financed, planned, or otherwise carried out an act of terrorism against the United States or United States persons or property anywhere in the world.” If he does not so certify, then the enhanced sanctions set forth in the bill would automatically take effect. As Ed Levine pointed out in his analysis,

“…[I]f, say, Hezbollah were to explode a bomb outside a U.S. firm’s office in Beirut, the sanctions would go into effect (because Iran gives financial and other support to Hezbollah) even if Iran’s nuclear activities and negotiations were completely in good faith.”

Presumably, the same logic could well apply if a missile launched from Lebanon struck somewhere in northern Israel and a U.S. person were killed or injured in the strike, and the Israelis — meaning Netanyahu, as the head of government — claimed that Hezbollah was responsible. Remember back when the Begin government accused the PLO of responsibility for the attempted assassination of Israel’s ambassador to Britain — even though the Abu Nidal group, which had broken with the PLO eight years before and was openly at war with it – in order to justify Israel’s (ultimately disastrous) invasion of Lebanon in 1982?

Second, of course, is the “Wag the Dog” provision:

…if the Government of Israel is compelled to take military action in legitimate self-defense against Iran’s nuclear weapon program, the United States Government should stand with Israel and provide, in accordance with the law of the United States and the constitutional responsibility of Congress to authorize the use of military force, diplomatic, military, and economic support to the Government of Israel in its defense of its territory, people, and existence…

Again, as Sen. Dianne Feinstein argued last week, “…we cannot let Israel determine when and where the U.S. goes to war. By stating that the U.S. should provide military support to Israel should it attack Iran, I fear that is exactly what this bill will do.”

Again, Netanyahu’s rejection of the assessment of his own national security apparatus in order to further his efforts to mount up the charges against Iran and derail its negotiations with the P5+1 should give Congress — and Democrats, in particular — pause about moving this legislation.

In the Washington Post two weeks ago, Sen. Robert Menendez described his bill as an “insurance policy” designed to strengthen the administration’s hand in the negotiations, despite the fact that the administration has said the bill’s enactment is likely to either destroy the international sanctions regime or sabotage the negotiations. Indeed, I see the bill as akin to a fire insurance policy for the benefit of arsonists of whom Netanyahu may be the most important, although he is not alone. Others include Saudi Arabia and its intelligence chief, Prince Bandar; Al Qaeda or any of its regional affiliates, such as the one which presumably fired the missiles from Lebanon which Netanyahu blamed on Hezbollah; and the MEK. A lot of potential spoilers are out there, and you can bet they’re all hoping that the now-stalled Kirk-Menendez bill can regain momentum when Congress reconvenes next week.

by Jim Lobe

Ed Levine, an arms control specialist who worked for both Republican and Democratic senators for 20 years on the Intelligence Committee and another ten on the Foreign Relations Committee, has written a detailed and devastating analysis of S. 1881, the Kirk-Menendez bill, for the Center for [...]]]> via LobeLog

by Jim Lobe

Ed Levine, an arms control specialist who worked for both Republican and Democratic senators for 20 years on the Intelligence Committee and another ten on the Foreign Relations Committee, has written a detailed and devastating analysis of S. 1881, the Kirk-Menendez bill, for the Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation on whose advisory board he currently serves. We have reproduced it below, but it makes clear that, contrary to claims by the bill’s Democratic co-sponsors, the Iran Nuclear Weapon Free Act of 2013 is designed to torpedo the Nov. 24 “first step” nuclear agreement between Iran and the P5+1. Passage of the bill, Levine concludes, would “leave the United States closer to a Hobson’s choice between going to war with Iran and accepting Iran as an eventual nuclear weapons state.”

Indeed, it’s quite clear from Sen. Mark Kirk’s reaction (as well as those of other Republicans, including that of House Majority Leader Eric Cantor) to the implementation accord between the P5+1 that the entire purpose of the bill is to derail the Nov. 24 agreement, as opposed to acting as a “diplomatic insurance policy” to ensure that its terms are fulfilled, as Sen. Menendez argued last week in the Washington Post. Indeed, Senate Republicans, all but two of whom have co-sponsored the bill, are clearly doing the bidding of AIPAC and Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu in trying to subvert the Nov. 24 agreement, while the 16 Democratic senators who have signed as co-sponsors have insisted that the bill is intended to support that accord. One would think the very partisan difference in the understanding of the intent of the bill would lead some of these 16 Democrats to reconsider their support. That may well be beginning to happen anyway as a result of Sunday’s successful conclusion of the implementation accord, as pointed out in this report by Reuters. But the difference in intent will probably make it easier for the White House to keep the majority of Democrats from breaking ranks.

As of now, the bill has 59 co-sponsors, but the magic number is 67 — a veto-proof majority. While Senate staffers close to AIPAC claimed anonymously last week that they had that many, and at least ten more, committed “yes” votes if the bill came to the floor, the combination of Sunday’s implementation agreement and the clarity of purpose shown by Kirk and Cantor in their reactions to the accord probably diminishes the chances of their reaching that goal. Moreover, unless they get at least half a dozen more Democrats to co-sponsor, Majority Leader Harry Reid is considered unlikely to schedule a vote and almost certainly not before the Presidents’ Day recess in mid-February in any case. And if even a few current Democratic co-sponsors decide to drop their support, the bill may never see the light of day. (AIPAC’s annual Policy Conference here in Washington is March 2-4.)

This is Levine’s analysis:

S.1881, the “Nuclear Weapon Free Iran Act of 2013,” will undercut President Obama’s efforts to obtain a comprehensive solution to Iran’s nuclear activities. To the extent that it removes the diplomatic option, moreover, it will leave the United States closer to a Hobson’s choice between going to war with Iran and accepting Iran as an eventual nuclear weapons state.

Supporters of the bill, which was introduced on December 19 by Senators Menendez (D-NJ) and Kirk (R-IL), claim that enactment of it would not impede the E3+3 (AKA the P5+1) negotiations with Iran, but the text of Title III of the bill manifestly contradicts such claims. Specifically:

• Section 301(a)(2)(I) requires the President to certify, in order to suspend application of the new sanctions, that “Iran has not conducted any tests for ballistic missiles with a range exceeding 500 kilometers.” While this objective may be consistent with a UN Security Council resolution, it moves the goalposts by making the new sanctions contingent not just on Iran’s nuclear activities, but also on its missile programs. This paragraph also does not specify a time period (although the requirement in section 301(a)(1) for a certification every 30 days might imply one), so Iran’s past missile tests beyond 500 km might make it impossible for the President ever to make this certification.
• Section 301(a)(2)(H) requires the President also to certify that “Iran has not directly, or through a proxy, supported, financed, planned, or otherwise carried out an act of terrorism against the United States or United States persons or property anywhere in the world.” Once again, there is no time period specified, so Iran’s past support of terrorism might make it impossible for the President ever to make this certification. Even if a time period were clear, however, this language would mean that if, say, Hezbollah were to explode a bomb outside a U.S. firm’s office in Beirut, the sanctions would go into effect (because Iran gives financial and other support to Hezbollah) even if Iran’s nuclear activities and negotiations were completely in good faith. So, once again, the goalposts are being moved.
• Section 301(a)(2)(F) requires the President to certify that the United States seeks an agreement “that will dismantle Iran’s illicit nuclear infrastructure.” But while Iran may agree in the end to dismantle some of its nuclear infrastructure, there is no realistic chance that it will dismantle all of its uranium enrichment capability. In order for the President to make this certification, therefore, he will have to argue either that “you didn’t say all of Iran’s illicit nuclear infrastructure” (although that is clearly the bill’s intent) or that “if the negotiators agree to allow some level of nuclear enrichment in Iran, then the facilities are no longer illicit” (which begins to sound like statements by Richard Nixon or the Queen of Hearts).
• Section 301(a)(3), regarding a suspension of sanctions beyond 180 days, adds the requirement that an agreement be imminent under which “Iran will…dismantle its illicit nuclear infrastructure…and other capabilities critical to the production of nuclear weapons.” This raises the same concerns as does the paragraph just noted, plus the new question of what those “other capabilities” might be. At a minimum, such ill-defined requirements invite future partisan attacks on the President.
• Section 301(a)(4) reimposes previously suspended sanctions if the President does not make the required certifications. This paragraph applies not only to the sanctions mandated by this bill, but also to “[a]ny sanctions deferred, waived, or otherwise suspended by the President pursuant to the Joint Plan of Action or any agreement to implement the Joint Plan of Action.” Thus, it moves the goalposts even for the modest sanctions relief that the United States is currently providing to Iran. To the extent that the currently-provided sanctions relief relates to sanctions imposed pursuant to the President’s own powers, moreover, section 301(a)(4) may run afoul of the separation of powers under the United States Constitution.
• Section 301(b) allows the President to suspend the bill’s sanctions annually after a final agreement is reached with Iran, but only if a resolution of disapproval of the agreement is not enacted pursuant to section 301(c). The primary effect of this insertion of Congress into the negotiating process will be to cast doubt upon the ability of the United States to implement any agreement that the E3+3 reaches with Iran. The provision is also unnecessary, as most of the sanctions relief that would be sought in a final agreement would require statutory changes anyway.
• Section 301(b)(1) imposes a certification requirement to suspend the bill’s new sanctions after a final agreement with Iran has been reached, even if a resolution of disapproval has been defeated. This certification requirement imposes maximalist demands upon the E3+3 negotiators. Paragraph (A) requires that the agreement include dismantlement of Iran’s “enrichment and reprocessing capabilities and facilities, the heavy water reactor and production plant at Arak, and any nuclear weapon components and technology.” How one dismantles technology is left to the imagination. Paragraph (B) requires that Iran come “into compliance with all United Nations Security Council resolutions related to Iran’s nuclear program,” which would require its suspension, at least, of all uranium enrichment. In all likelihood, however, the complete suspension of enrichment either will be impossible to achieve through diplomacy or will be achieved only for a short time before Iran is permitted to resume an agreed level of enrichment of an agreed quantity of uranium under international verification. Paragraph (C) requires that all the IAEA’s issues regarding past or present Iranian nuclear activities be resolved – an objective that the United States and its allies surely share, but that may prove difficult to achieve even if the other objectives are realized. Paragraph (D) requires “continuous, around the clock, on-site inspection…of all suspect facilities in Iran,” which would likely be inordinately expensive and unnecessary, and might also impose safety hazards.

Taken as a whole, these requirements, however desirable in theory, build a bridge too far for the E3+3 to reach. If they are enacted, all parties to the negotiations will interpret them as barring the United States from implementing the sanctions relief proposed in any feasible agreement. Rather than buttressing the U.S. position in the negotiations, therefore, they will bring an end to those negotiations. Worse yet, they will create large fissures in the E3+3 coalition that has imposed international sanctions on Iran. Thus, even though the bill purports to support sanctions, it may well result in the collapse of many of them.

It is in that context that one should read the sense of Congress, in section 2(b)(5) of the bill, that if Israel is compelled to take military action against Iran’s nuclear weapon program, the United States should provide “military support” to Israel. While such support could be limited to intelligence and arms sales, there would be great pressure for the United States to take a more active military role. So this bill, by its many steps to close the window for diplomacy with Iran, could end the international sanctions regime and lead either to a nuclear-armed Iran or to a war in which U.S. armed forces might well be active participants.