by Eldar Mamedov

With only a little over a month to go before the deadline for a comprehensive deal on Iran’s nuclear program, a group of European, Gulf and Iranian academics and policymakers gathered Oct. 6-7 in Tehran to discuss the future of EU-Iran relations. The workshop, which was formally addressed by Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif, was organized by a trio of think tanks: the European Council on Foreign Relations, the European-Iranian Research Group, and the Iranian Foreign Ministry’s Institute for Political and International Studies.

The nuclear issue loomed large during the discussions that were held under Chatham House rules. While both sides acknowledged that a comprehensive agreement would unlock the full potential of EU-Iran relations, including improved economic ties and mutually beneficial cooperation in the fight against extremist groups like the Islamic State, their assessments of the EU’s role in the talks varied.

According to the Iranian perspective, Europeans have more at stake in the negotiations over Iran’s nuclear program than the Americans due to their historical and geographical proximity to Iran, their need to meet security challenges in the Middle East, and their desire to uphold a peaceful, rule-bound international order. Hence the Iranian hope that Europe could soften the American position on critical issues in the talks such as the future scope of the Iranian nuclear program and the removal of sanctions.

In particular, Tehran seeks an understanding with Europe on the “breakout”  issue, which it understands as the American concern over Iran’s capacity to produce enough highly enriched uranium for a nuclear weapon in a relatively short period of time. Yet the Iranian side claimed during the workshop that Iran’s conventional military superiority does not require nuclear weapons to boost its security. To the contrary, even the perception from neighboring countries that Iran might acquire nuclear weapons would trigger a regional nuclear arms race that would be to the detriment of everyone, including Iran. This would, in turn, weaken Iran’s strategic positioning. The Iranian side added that if the real issue is Western distrust of Iranian intentions, then this sticking point could be resolved through non-proliferation mechanisms, such as inspections.

The European participants agreed that an “imperfect deal”—letting some extra thousand centrifuges spin while subjecting Iran to an intrusive inspections regime—would be an acceptable price to pay for an agreement resulting in a new era of positive relations with Iran and alleviating some of the miseries afflicting the Middle East. But they were very skeptical about the political will in the continent to put pressure on Washington in what would inevitably be seen as a favor to Iran. This is because Iran’s “breakout” capacity is also a concern in Europe, and because Europeans see intrinsic value in strengthening the trans-atlantic bond, especially at a time when Europe needs American reassurances against a resurgent Russia. However, as one European participant said, Europe is a “reluctant US ally on Iran sanctions.” If talks fail due to perceived American—rather than Iranian—intransigence, there will be “growing unease” in Europe over sanctions, especially since many European companies are eager to exploit the potential of the Iranian market. Indeed, if the US Congress accordingly imposed new sanctions, the EU would be unlikely to follow suit, except in the event of major new breaches by Iran of its Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) obligations.

The failure to reach a deal is something that the Iranians clearly want to avoid, but not at any price. If the government sees the terms of the agreement as humiliating and politically unsellable to the Iranian public, it would prefer no deal at all. The Iranians are preparing for this contingency, including a renewed sanctions regime. The nuclear program would in the case of failed talks proceed anyway; the Iranians have pointed out that it is not possible to destroy their knowledge and technical capabilities. In this scenario, Iran would likely build new centrifuges to enrich uranium and sell oil at discounted prices to Russia, China, and Japan while waiting for the sanctions regime to go bust.

The message was thus very clear: this Iranian government is ready for a deal, but not desperate. The implication is that the Rouhani government is making the best possible offer Iran can make today, and if that offer is not accepted, a conservative backlash would ensue. Indeed, the hard-line opponents of Hassan Rouhani’s administration would feel their deep distrust of the West vindicated and the efforts of the president’s reformist-centrist coalition to normalize Iran’s relations with the West and set the country on a liberalizing trajectory would be undermined.

The European participants were of the opinion that even if a comprehensive agreement is not finalized, there might be a more limited deal. In any case, a return to the status quo that endured before the Joint Plan of Action was reached in Geneva last year is unlikely. All sides have invested too much political capital and energy into achieving a deal to stand by and watch as the entire diplomatic process is derailed. Striking a deal with Iran would also be a badly needed foreign policy success for the American president. Besides, the ongoing failure of the US-led coalition to significantly harm the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq might provide an additional incentive to reach out to Iran.

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The US stance on Iran’s uranium enrichment program, according to recent media reports, is softening.

In other words, Washington might agree to a technical workaround on the issue of dismantling centrifuges or accept a higher number of active centrifuges than it had previously been seeking in international negotiations with Iran.

But if the P5+1—that is, the five members of the UN Security Council plus Germany—and Iran fail to reach an agreement on a deal to limit Iran’s nuclear program by the November 24 deadline, the reason will be quite obvious, as this quote from a Western diplomat reveals: “On the core issues, we remain pretty far apart,” the diplomat told a group of journalists on September 26. “On enrichment, we are not there yet. … There are significant gaps, but we are still expecting significant moves from the Iranian side.”

Like Samuel Beckett’s Vladimir and Estragon, waiting the length of the play for a character who never appears on stage, the P5+1 have been “expecting significant moves from the Iranian side” on uranium enrichment for over seven months now, since talks on a comprehensive deal began in late February. Those moves haven’t materialized. Some politicians in the United States and Europe are both irritated and mystified at Iran’s “intransigence” in the face of US “flexibility.”

But they shouldn’t be.

Iran’s Concessions

Iran already made some pretty significant moves to reach last year’s interim agreement. Iran’s leaders agreed to freeze their nuclear program in place, to drastically cut their stockpile of enriched uranium, and to cooperate with stringent monitoring and verification processes—agreements that they have kept.

In return for these concessions, they got about $7 billion in sanctions relief and the promise of more negotiations. The deal to extend the talks that was reached in July gave them another $2.8 billion in sanctions relief. So, the total to date is $9.8 billion—which is a lot of money, but it’s less than 3 percent of Iran’s 2013 GDP. That number is similarly unimpressive when compared to the $100-plus billion in Iranian assets still frozen under the sanctions regime.

Also working against the possibility of “significant moves from the Iranian side” is that Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, by all available evidence, has more to lose politically by making major new concessions to the P5+1 than he does by walking away from the table. The Iranian public is prepared for the nuclear talks to fail and they’ve already decided that the United States and the rest of the P5+1 will be primarily responsible for their failure. That’s not to say that Iranian hardliners won’t use the failure of the talks to score political points against the moderate Rouhani. But whatever damage he would take in such a scenario pales in comparison to the amount of public hostility he would engender by agreeing to a deal that drastically cuts Iran’s enrichment capacity from where it is now—a concession that nearly three-quarters of the Iranian public would reject.

Logically, the P5+1 position makes little sense. If Iran were going to concede to the P5+1′s wishes with respect to uranium enrichment, why hasn’t it done so already? What has changed since July, when the first deadline for a deal came and went, that would make Iran more amenable to the P5+1 position now? If anything, the extension of talks has placed so much attention on Iran’s commitment to its enrichment program that to acquiesce to American demands would likely be more politically damaging for Rouhani now than if he had done so in July.

Rouhani’s Maneuvers

Rouhani’s recent speech to the UN General Assembly did not have the air of someone who was desperate to reach a nuclear agreement under any terms, given its emphasis on protecting Iran’s nuclear rights. He said:

We are committed to continue our peaceful nuclear program, including enrichment, and to enjoy our full nuclear rights on Iranian soil within the framework of international law. We are determined to continue negotiations with our interlocutors in earnest and good faith, based on mutual respect and confidence, removal of concerns of both sides as well as equal footing and recognized international norms and principles. I believe mutual adherence to the strict implementation of commitments and obligations and avoidance of excessive demands in the negotiations by our counterparts is the prerequisite for the success of the negotiations.

He made sure to place blame, should the talks fail, on unfair Western (i.e., American) demands and a desire to stifle Iran’s development, both points that polls say are critically important to the Iranian public:

Arriving at a final comprehensive nuclear agreement with Iran will be a historic opportunity for the West to show that it does not oppose the advancement and development of others and does not discriminate when it comes to adhering to international rules and regulations. This agreement can carry a global message of peace and security, indicating that the way to attain conflict resolution is through negotiation and respect, not through conflict and sanction.

Beyond Metrics

What’s worse is that, by waiting for Iran to concede on a few thousand centrifuges in order to lengthen its “breakout time,” the P5+1 risks missing the opportunity for a historic chance to reintegrate Iran into the international community. MIT nuclear security expert Jim Walsh has pointed out that in past arms control agreements, it is inevitably the process of reaching the agreement itself—and the political and diplomatic changes the agreement enables—that ensures the long-term success of the arms control process. The painstakingly negotiated details about numbers of armaments or uranium enrichment capacity are never as important as that political change.

A comprehensive nuclear deal has the potential to reincorporate Iran into the international community for the first time in 35 years and could cement the strength of Rouhani and his fellow moderates within Iran’s fractious internal political system. Changing Iranian politics and the way Iran interacts with the rest of the world would have immense benefits for arms control as well as on a vast array of other regional and international fronts, benefits that can’t be boiled down to a simple—and flawed—calculation of Iran’s nuclear breakout potential.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has observed that “no deal is better than a bad deal.” But the definition of a “bad deal” needs to be about more than breakout metrics and minimizing Iran’s enrichment capacity. The P5+1 must stop defining the success of a comprehensive deal purely on metrics and instead consider the intrinsic value that such a deal will bring with it. President Obama’s own address to the UN included a call to Iran’s leadership to “not let this opportunity pass.” The United States and the P5+1 would be well-advised to heed the same call.

This article was first published by Foreign Policy in Focus and was reprinted here with permission.

by Derek Davison

WASHINGTON—A top advisor to President Obama said that a deal over Iran’s nuclear program could lead to a new era of relations.

“A nuclear agreement could begin a multi-generational process that could lead to a new relationship between our countries,” said Phil Gordon, the White House Coordinator for the Middle East, North Africa, and the Gulf Region, in a speech Saturday to the National Iranian American Council (NIAC). “Iran could begin to reduce tensions with its neighbors and return to its rightful place in the community of nations.”

But the special assistant to the president put the onus on Iran for reaching a final nuclear deal.

“Negotiations over this issue are obviously enormously and technologically complex…but the issue itself can actually be boiled down to a very simple question: is Iran prepared to demonstrate to the world that its nuclear program is exclusively peaceful?”

“We strongly hope that it is, and the P5+1 [US, UK, Russia, France, China plus Germany] negotiations currently going on offer a real opportunity for it to do so,” he said.

Gordon added that the administration would only accept a deal that would “cut off all possible paths” to the development of a nuclear weapon.

Iran, a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), insists its nuclear program is peaceful but has been negotiating over it since 2006. The country’s economy has been seriously harmed by an international sanctions regime.

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said a comprehensive final accord would be a “historic opportunity for the West to show that it does not oppose the advancement and development of others and does not discriminate when it comes to adhering to international rules and regulations” in his Sept. 25 address to the UNGA.

“This agreement can carry a global message of peace and security, indicating that the way to attain conflict resolution is through negotiation and respect not through conflict and sanctions,” he said.

But no headway was made during talks between Iran and the P5+1 on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly last week as both sides try to reach a final deal by the self-imposed Nov. 24 deadline.

“We do not have an understanding on all major issues, we have some understandings that are helpful to move this process forward and we have an enormous number of details still to work through,” a senior US official told reporters in New York Sept. 26.

“We still have some very, very difficult understandings yet to reach, and everyone has to make difficult decisions and we continue to look to Iran to make some of the ones necessary for getting to a comprehensive agreement,” said the official, speaking on the condition of anonymity.

Beyond the discussion of the nuclear negotiations, Gordon touted dramatic improvements in US-Iranian relations just in the past year.

Noting that Secretary of State John Kerry and Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif have remained in regular contact since the historic Rouhani-Obama telephone conversation during last year’s UNGA, Gordon said: “we have gone from almost no [U.S.-Iran] contact at all, to contacts even at the foreign ministerial level being almost routine.”

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Last week I commented on the unhelpful habit of throwing everything Islamist, no matter how extreme or moderate, into a single conceptual bucket and writing off the whole lot as incorrigible adversaries. That habit entails a gross misunderstanding of events and conflicts in the Middle East, and has the more specific harm of aiding extreme groups at the expense of moderate ones. Shortly afterward Dennis Ross of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy presented a piece titled “Islamists Are Not Our Friends,” which illustrates almost in caricatured form some of the misleading attributes of the single-bucket attitude that I was discussing.

Ross’s article probably is not grounded in Islamophobia, although it partly appeals to such sentiment. The piece ostensibly is about how “a fundamental division between Islamists and non-Islamists” is a “new fault line in the Middle East” that provides “a real opportunity for America” and ought to guide U.S. policy toward the region. In fact it is a contrived effort to draw that line—however squiggly it needs to be—to place what Ross wants us to consider bad guys on one side of the line and good guys on the other side. The reasons for that division do not necessarily have much, if anything, to do with Islamist orientation. Thus anyone who has been unfriendly to Hamas or to its more peaceful ideological confreres in the Muslim Brotherhood are placed on the good side of the line, Iran and those doing business with it are put on the bad side, and so forth.

Ross tries to portray something more orderly by asserting that “what the Islamists all have in common is that they subordinate national identities to an Islamic identity” and that the problem with the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood was that “it was Islamist before it was Egyptian.” What, exactly, does that mean, with particular reference to the short, unhappy presidency of Mohamed Morsi? There were several reasons that presidency was both unhappy and short, but trying to push an Islamist-more-than-Egyptian agenda was not one of them. (And never mind that Ross is risking going places he surely would not want to go by making accusations of religious identification trumping national loyalty on matters relevant to U.S. policy toward the Middle East.) It would make at least as much sense to say that the current president, Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, was more authoritarian and more in tune with fellow military strongmen than he was Egyptian.

Where Ross’s schema completely breaks down is with some of the biggest and most contorted squiggles in the line he has drawn. He places Saudi Arabia in the “non-Islamist” camp because it has supported el-Sisi in his bashing of the Brotherhood and wasn’t especially supportive of Hamas when Israel was bashing the Gaza Strip. Saudi Arabia—where the head of state has the title Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques, the country’s constitution is the Koran, and thieves have their hands amputated—is “non-Islamist”? Remarkable. Conversely, the Assad regime in Syria, which is one of the most secular regimes in the region notwithstanding the sectarian lines of its base of support, is pointedly excluded from Ross’s “non-Islamist” side of the line because of, he says, Syrian dependence on Iran and Hezbollah. Of course, any such alliances refute the whole idea of a “fundamental division” in the region between Islamists and non-Islamists, but Ross does not seem to notice.

Getting past such tendentious classification schemes, we ought to ask whether there is a more valid basis on which we ought to be concerned about states or influential political movements defining themselves in religious terms. If we are to be not merely Islamophobes but true children of the Enlightenment, our concern ought to be with any attempt, regardless of the particular creed involved, to impose the dogma of revealed religion on public affairs, especially in ways that affect the lives and liberties of those with different beliefs.

Such attempts by Christians, as far as the Middle East is concerned, are to be found these days mainly among dispensationalists in America rather in the dwindling and largely marginalized Christian communities in the Middle East itself. In a far more strongly situated community, that of Jewish Israelis, the imposition of religious belief on public affairs in ways that affect the lives and liberties of others is quite apparent. Indeed, the demographic, political, and societal trends during Israel’s 66-year history can be described in large part in terms of an increasingly militant right-wing nationalism in which religious dogma and zealotry have come to play major roles. Self-definition as a Jewish state has been erected as a seemingly all-important basis for relating to Arab neighbors, religion is in effect the basis for different classes of citizenship, and religious zeal is a major driver of the Israeli colonization of conquered territory, which sustains perpetual conflict with, and subjugation of, the Palestinian Arabs.

When religious zealotry involves bloodshed, especially large-scale bloodshed, is when we when ought to be most concerned with its infusion into public affairs. The capacity for zealotry and large-scale application of violence to combine has increased in Israel with the steady increase of religiosity in the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and its officer corps. A prominent exemplar of this trend is Colonel Ofer Winter, commander of the IDF’s Gilati Brigade, who has received attention for the heavily religious content of his instructions to his troops. With his brigade poised near the Gaza Strip before the most recent round of destruction there, Winter said in a letter to his troops that he looked forward to a ground invasion so that he could be in the vanguard of a fight against “the terrorist enemy that dares to curse, blaspheme and scorn the God of Israel.” After Winter’s brigade did get to join the fight, he said that a mysterious “cloud” appeared and provided cover for his forces, an event he attributed to divine intervention. Quoting from Deuteronomy, he said, “It really was a fulfillment of the verse ‘For the Lord your God is the one who goes with you to give you victory.’”

Winter’s brigade was involved in what could be described as a culmination of the synthesis of zealotry and bloodshed. When an Israeli soldier was missing and suspected (incorrectly, as it later turned out) to have been captured alive by Hamas in a battle at Rafah, Winter executed the “Hannibal” directive, an Israeli protocol according to which as much violence as necessary is used to avoid having any Israeli become a prisoner, no matter how many civilians or others are killed and no matter that the captured Israeli soldier himself is killed. Over the next several hours a relentless barrage of artillery and airstrikes reduced this area of Rafah to rubble, while Israeli forces surrounded the area so that no one could escape it alive. This one Israeli operation killed 190 Palestinians, including 55 children. There may have been other implementations of the Hannibal directive in the recent Israeli offensive in Gaza; this one is confirmed because Winter himself later spoke openly and proudly about it. Although some secular-minded private citizens in Israel have objected to the heavily religious content of Winter’s leadership, officially there does not appear to be anything but approval for anything he has said or done. He is an exemplar, not a rogue.

In short, an operation officially sanctioned and led in the name of a national god was conducted to slaughter scores of innocents as well as one of the operators’ own countrymen. We ought to think carefully about this incident and about what Colonel Winter represents when we decide how to conceive of fault lines in the Middle East, what it means to insert religion into politics or to be a religious zealot, exactly what it is we fear or ought to fear about religiosity in public affairs, and which players in the Middle East have most in common with, or in conflict with, our own—Enlightment-infused, one hopes—values.

This article was first published by the National Interest and was reprinted here with permission.

A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth has time to get its pants on. –Winston Churchill

Opponents of a nuclear agreement with Iran are mobilising once more. A recent letter to colleagues from the chairman and ranking member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee sponsored by Ed Royce (R-CA) and Eliot Engel (D-NY) contains almost as many distortions of the truth as the annual address to the UN General Assembly of the current Prime Minister of Israel.

Here are some of those distortions.

Iran’s nuclear program poses a severe threat to the national security of the United States and our allies. How can the nuclear program of a state that is not known to possess nuclear weapons and is assessed by US intelligence not to have taken a decision to acquire nuclear weapons pose a severe threat? Do the comparable nuclear programs of Brazil and Japan pose a severe threat to their neighbours? Does Israel’s nuclear program pose a severe threat to its neighbours?

For several years, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has sought Iran’s cooperation regarding evidence that Tehran has conducted extensive research and development on a nuclear weapon. What the IAEA has reported is evidence of research, not of development. And some of that evidence is open to non-nuclear interpretations. The possibility that some of it has been fabricated cannot be excluded.

Last November, Iran agreed to disclose information on such “potential military dimensions” to the IAEA. Last November Iran agreed to “resolve all outstanding issues that have not already been resolved by the IAEA”. In the Nov. 11, 2013 agreement there is no reference to a “possible military dimension”. The relevant part of subsequent IAEA reports is headed “Clarification of Unresolved Issues.”

Iran has failed to fully cooperate with the IAEA and has failed to meet its latest deadline. Iran has failed, partially, to meet a recent deadline but the Director General of the IAEA has not reported any failure to cooperate.

We remain deeply concerned with Iran’s refusal to fully cooperate with the International Atomic Energy Agency. The Director General of the IAEA has not reported any failure to cooperate. In all manner of processes the missing of deadlines is liable to occur.

For several years, the IAEA has attempted to work with Iran to resolve this central issue, but Tehran has refused. In February 2012 Iran agreed with the IAEA a plan of work for resolving outstanding issues. After a change of government in Iran, in November 2013, Iran and the IAEA agreed to a Framework for Cooperation. Since November 2013 Iran has provided the access and information requested by the IAEA on 16 out of 18 occasions.

In its September 5, 2014 report, the IAEA stated that Iran had failed to meet its latest deadline, even as it continued to demolish structures and construct others at the Parchin military base, where clandestine nuclear-related activities have reportedly taken place. The latest IAEA report is devoid of any linkage between the recent missing of a deadline and construction work at the Parchin military site.

If Iran’s nuclear program is truly peaceful, “it’s not a hard proposition to prove.” Actually it’s a very hard proposition to prove. How can a state “prove” that it does not have some small secret fissile material production facility somewhere on its territory? That is why the IAEA is never ready to offer more than “credible assurances” that a given nuclear program is truly peaceful.

The only reasonable conclusion for its stonewalling of international investigators is that Tehran does indeed have much to hide. That Iran may have something to hide is a reasonable conclusion. But it is not the only reasonable conclusion.

We are concerned that an agreement that accepts Iran’s lack of transparency on this key issue would set the dangerous precedent that certain facilities and aspects of Iran’s nuclear program can be declared off limits by Tehran. Iran is under an international legal obligation to submit all nuclear facilities where nuclear material is present to IAEA inspection. There is not the remotest possibility that the current negotiation with the US and others will result in their trying to persuade the IAEA Board of Governors that certain Iranian facilities should be excluded from the scope of Iran’s safeguards agreement with the IAEA.

Both the IAEA Board of Governors and the IAEA secretariat are determined to resolve questions that have arisen in relation to what the IAEA terms “nuclear-related” research in Iran, most of which is thought to have taken place, if at all, more than ten years ago. The IAEA secretariat is highly competent and knows its job. Its task will not be facilitated by the circulation of misleading information about the nature of Iran’s participation in that resolution process.

Photo: The Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu with US Rep. Ed Royce (left) and US Rep. Eliot L. Engel in Jerusalem

With the Nov. 24 deadline looming, Iran and world powers will resume talks toward a final deal over Iran’s nuclear program this week in New York, but the gap between the two sides over the future size and scope of Iran’s uranium enrichment program seems as wide as ever. Fortunately, not every think tank in DC is focused on a military solution to this conflict. Indeed, the non-proliferation-focused Arms Control Association (ACA) has been working on a phased final deal implementation plan.

The three phases, detailed in the ACA policy brief, “A Win-Win Formula for Defining Iran’s Uranium-Enrichment Capacity,” were presented during a Sept. 15 panel discussion in Washington.

The first phase, which would last from 2015 through either 2017 or 2018, requires Iran to reduce its enrichment capacity from its current 9400 Separative Work Units (SWU) down to something in the range of 4500-5400 SWU. This would extend Iran’s “breakout time,” the length of time it would take the Iranians to produce enough highly enriched uranium to fuel one nuclear bomb, from the current (estimated) 2-3 months to 9-12. Iran would agree not to enrich any uranium beyond 5%, and would convert its stockpiles of uranium hexafluoride gas to powdered uranium oxide, which would have to be reconverted to gas (an action that would likely be detected by International Atomic Energy Agency monitors) before it could be enriched. In return, the P5+1 (US, UK, France, Russia, China and Germany) would allow Iran to continue research and development into more advanced centrifuge models than the relatively primitive IR-1 centrifuges it currently operates.

Phase II of the proposal would run from the completion of Phase I through 2021. At this point, Iran would be allowed to gradually bring its enrichment capacity back up to its current level (9400 SWU) while also swapping out its IR-1 centrifuges for more advanced IR-2 models. It could also continue researching more advanced centrifuge models, under an agreed upon capacity limit of 10 SWU per centrifuge. Iran’s stockpile of enriched uranium would still be limited, in order to keep its breakout time in the 5-6 month range. Phase III, which is envisioned to last until sometime between 2026 and 2031, would be triggered when the IAEA is able to reach a “broad certification” that Iran’s nuclear program is entirely peaceful. This phase would keep Iran’s overall capacity at 9400 SWU but would allow Iran to begin producing advanced centrifuges in anticipation of scaling up that capacity upon the completion of that phase.

The ACA’s compromise hinges on both sides coming to some reasonable agreement with respect to Iran’s “practical needs,” a standard that was included but not defined in the text of last year’s interim Joint Plan of Action. But as noted by panelist Paul Pillar, a 28-year veteran of the CIA who has written extensively about the conflict over Iran’s nuclear program, the Iranians and the P5+1 have not been able to reach a mutual definition. Right now, Iran has a deal with Russia to supply fuel for its Bushehr nuclear plant. As far as the P5+1 is concerned, this reduces Iran’s immediate practical enrichment needs to almost nothing, but the Iranians, who have recent history on their side, are unwilling to leave their nuclear program at the mercy of a potentially unreliable foreign fuel supplier. They argue that they have a short-term practical need to fuel their current and planned future reactors with domestically enriched uranium.

Pillar also pointed out that the Iranians believe they have shown far more flexibility and willingness to compromise than the P5+1, which puts the degree to which they will be amenable to further compromise on the issue of their practical needs in question. The Iranians have consistently chafed at what they perceive as a double standard, whereby their nuclear program, which they have always insisted is peaceful, is subject to significantly greater scrutiny and limitations than countries that have actually implemented military nuclear programs, like Pakistan and India. Accordingly, Iran may reject additional compromises that reinforce that double standard.

Despite this structural obstacle, the ACA panel seemed optimistic that the two sides would find enough common ground to reach a final deal. The nuclear security expert Jim Walsh pointed to the considerable progress that has been made so far on other potential complications like Iran’s Arak heavy water reactor and the status of the Fordow enrichment facility. When it comes to enrichment, Walsh argued that the P5+1 need to reduce its “misguided” emphasis on numbers—i.e., overall capacity and breakout time—and instead look at the potential political ramifications of a deal that could reincorporate Iran into the international community and support the political ascendance of Iranian political moderates over hard-liners. Pillar noted that the outcome of these talks will likely determine Rouhani’s political future, but suggested that Iran is not desperate for a final deal. He rightly noted that the Iranian government’s receptiveness will ultimately depend on how the deal balances sanctions relief against Iran’s stated principles and requirements.