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Dear Mr. Trump; Last week, you called the nuclear agreement with Iran the worst deal you have "ever, ever" seen. Having made that statement, holding you accountable is fair game. While you could protest the specific questions hurled at you by a conservative radio talk show host in which you confused "Kurds" with "Quds," your assessment of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action demands more than an ad hominem conclusion.
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My sense is that you have neither studied nor have read the hundred-plus page document to understand what it does and does not achieve. My guess is that you cannot tell the difference between a centrifuge and a Cadillac. However, I will give you the benefit of the doubt.
Understanding the context for rejecting your flawed conclusion that this is the worst agreement ever is important. As you may or may not know, nuclear weapons require either Uranium (U-235) or Plutonium (P-239). Weapons grade Uranium can be produced by gaseous diffusion or centrifuge using UF6 (uranium fluoride 6). This is called enrichment. Plutonium is produced as a by-product of reprocessing Uranium in a heavy water reactor.
The nuclear bombs used against Japan in WWII, Fat Boy and Little Man, used P-239 and U-235 respectively as the fissile material that generated the explosions equivalent to about fifteen kilotons (15,000 tons) of TNT, wiping out Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945. Fortunately, despite the tens of thousands of nuclear and thermonuclear weapons that have been produced, none has since been used in anger. One hopes none ever will be.
When George W. Bush took office in 2001, Iran had no centrifuges. Today, Iran has 19,500 centrifuges used to enrich Uranium. Iran has several tons of enriched Uranium. Estimates are that Iran could produce nuclear weapons inside a year and possibly sooner. It also has a heavy water reactor at Arak that is capable of producing Plutonium. Without manufacturing, buying or stealing weapons grade Uranium or Plutonium, Iran cannot ever produce a nuclear weapon.
For those engaging the debate over the JCPOA, three irrefutable facts must be acknowledged before drawing any conclusions on the merits or demerits of the agreement. First, if Iran abides by the agreement, and this is a big "if," Iran will never, repeat never, obtain a nuclear weapon.
Second, this agreement is not a bilateral pact between the United States and Iran. The other four permanent members of the U.N. Security Council -- Britain, China, France and Russia -- plus Germany and the European Union, are co-signatories and the U.N. Security Council voted 15-0 in favor the JCPOA. Hence, the United States is in no position unilaterally to alter that agreement. It is also interesting to ask why support in these other countries is overwhelmingly in favor of the agreement unlike here, and why last Friday the leaders of Britain, France and Germany all co-signed a powerful op-ed in the Washington Post reaffirming that support.
Last, like the United States and 187 other states, Iran is a signatory to the Non-Proliferation Treaty. As you may or may not know, that treaty guarantees the right of each signatory to pursue nuclear energy for peaceful purposes. Treaties are part of the law of the land. Hence, anyone calling for Iran to forgo its nuclear capacity is either naïve or uninformed.
Iran will mothball all but 6500 largely obsolete centrifuges; eliminate 98% of its enriched Uranium; and fill the core of its Arak Plutonium reactor with concrete. These actions block every avenue, called by General Colin Powell "super highways," to produce nuclear weapons material. Are you, Mr. Trump, even aware of these facts?
Responsible critics can make their case based on prior Iranian deceptions and the view that Iran can never be trusted and that it will find a way to circumvent the invasive verification system administered by the International Atomic Energy Agency. And some object to how the administration bypassed Congress. In my view other potential weaknesses lay ahead.
This agreement can be likened to an arranged marriage between two distrusting parties. What is needed is a long-term regional strategy for implementing this agreement that includes a Plan B should the JCPOA fail. And a commission of distinguished Americans of both parties should be established now to oversee the agreement providing its assessment to Congress and the public on a recurring basis.
I would hope -- and hope is not a strategy -- that you, Mr. Trump, re-evaluate your worst-ever condemnation of the JCPOA using your well-earned business sense to take a more measured position. But admitting mistakes does not seem part of your DNA.
___________________________________________________________ Harlan Ullman is UPI's Arnaud de Borchgrave Distinguished Columnist; Chairman of the Killowen Group that advises leaders of government and business; and Senior Advisor at both Washington D.C.'s Atlantic Council and Business Executives for National Security. His latest book is A Handful of Bullets: How the Murder of Archduke Franz Ferdinand Still Menaces the Peace.
