Iran Is Already Nuclear — Why Is an Agreement Necessary?

The United States is racing to sign a new nuclear agreement with Iran. Past experience shows that it’s impossible to stop a radical and aggressive power merely with a smile, favors and agreements to buy peace for a while.

Like a marathon with its ups and downs, the international community, led by the United States, is racing to sign a new nuclear agreement with Iran.

Negotiators on both sides are concerned about creating a smokescreen to “confuse the enemy.” Unfortunately, the enemy in our case is not Tehran, but those who oppose an agreement with Iran, notably Israel.

However, the fog of war will dissipate in the end. Therefore, during the final days of negotiations, it is becoming clear that, despite the reports about hardening positions that have led to a dead end and even a crisis in talks with Iran, in fact both sides are advancing to a decision.

From the beginning, the Biden administration has not hidden the fact that it is determined to reach an agreement at almost any cost that will allow the United States “to close the Iranian file,” and even to turn away from the problems of the Middle East, of which Iran is foremost.

Even the Iranians, for their part, are interested in an agreement that will remove economic sanctions. But we have to recognize that Iran is seeking an agreement less enthusiastically than the United States and is demanding an exorbitant price in exchange for an agreement, a price the Americans are apparently ready to pay.

There are those in Iran, particularly among the radical, conservative camp, who see isolation from the world and the closure and siege imposed on it by the West as a blessing. There is nothing like the feeling that “the whole world is against us” to ensure the survival of the ayatollahs’ regime and the population’s support for it. In any case, the West has repeated its past mistakes with the Taliban, Saddam Hussein’s Iraq and Russia, as it assumes economic sanctions have the power to topple a regime or bring a change in policy. From this perspective, one can see that the foot-dragging by the Iranians is not only a strategic kind of haggling, but an expression by the supreme leader and his people that Iran needs an agreement.

However, even for Ali Khamenei, there is no real reason to object to the improved deal being placed on the table. After all, there is no limit on Iran’s ability to advance its influence in the region, undermine Arab regimes and encourage terrorism against Israel. There is no ban on developing advanced combat systems, such as missiles intended to carry nuclear warheads when that day comes. And most importantly, Iran is not required to compromise on the installations, equipment and materials that it has built or purchased.

So why is an agreement necessary?

There is no disagreement that the Iranians have advanced significantly toward nuclear capability in recent years. This, and also the attempts to stop that advance have, in fact, slowed down development and bought precious time to better prepare for a future nuclear Iran. It is also clear that Iran will need more time to produce a living, breathing nuclear weapon and manufacture delivery capability on the back of missiles or from a fighter jet. However, this process is irreversible, and, in any case, it is enough for the Iranians to announce they have achieved nuclear capability even without showing “receipts” in the form of a nuclear test to provoke mayhem in the region.

The proposed agreement is asking Iran to sit quietly and not tell the gang out loud that it has nuclear capability. From the Iranians’ perspective, it doesn’t make any difference. The agreement allows them to retain what they have already achieved so far. And in any case, Iran will make a break for the nuclear bomb when it wants to, and we should assume that, in the meantime, it prefers the fog of war over taking an unnecessary and unwarranted defiant step at this point in its struggle for regional hegemony against Israel.

However, past experience teaches that a radical and aggressive force like Iran cannot be stopped merely with a smile, favors and agreements that only buy peace for a while, but don’t really bring any change in direction or strategy. After all, the forces of darkness always work to gain and ensure power, and, in our case, nuclear capability, because they are guided by the logic that only force will guarantee survival and the future. The Iranian nuclear bomb has not, therefore, been neutralized, and even if negotiations have slowed the stopwatch, there will surely be an explosion.