Iran is now dangerously close to acquiring nuclear weapons. We could obtain the materials for a rudimentary nuclear explosive device within months and perhaps achieve a stockpile of deliverable nuclear warheads within a year.
US intelligence community Iranian leaders are losing confidence that they are not ready to cross this Rubicon, even though until recently they assessed that Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei had not yet decided to go nuclear. But Iran on October 2nd missile attack An attack on Israel and its expected retaliation could change this calculus, setting off a chain reaction in the process.
To avoid such an outcome, the United States needs to take the lead in severing ties with Iran and limiting Iran's nuclear activities to just one step short of a bomb. It is possible that Ayatollah Khamenei will try to build on the mandate he gave to newly elected President Massoud Pazeshikian. resume nuclear negotiations with the United States and its Western partners.
What would a nuclear off-ramp require?
The US objective should be both to curb Iran's nuclear ambitions and to prevent the possibility of further escalation of conflict in the region. The complexity of the issue, combined with Iran's negotiating style and the difficulty of the United States in offering durable commitments, means that these negotiations are bound to be long and complex, and will likely involve negotiations between Washington, Paris, London, Berlin, and (possibly) ) is straining the limits of what Beijing's politics can endure. .
To make matters worse, compared to the last attempt at nuclear negotiations, Iran now receives significant support from Moscow, and its regional proxies and allies (Hezbollah, Hamas, Houthis) have been significantly reduced. Nevertheless, the nuclear program is far advanced.
The biggest challenge for negotiators so far will be the inevitable link between nuclear activity, Iran's regional actions, and Russia's support for the war in Ukraine. Failure to satisfactorily address all three is likely to further hamper the West's ability to offer sanctions relief for Iran in exchange for nuclear cowardice.
Adjusting expectations is therefore essential, especially since the United States is currently in a period of election-imposed political paralysis that is likely to last until the spring of 2025 regardless of the election outcome.
Nuclear off-ramp requires a two-step process. It is immediate stop-gap measures to prevent further escalation, followed by more comprehensive and permanent arrangements.
A nuclear stopgap involves a tacit understanding of activities and actions that the Iranian government must stop, including improving and testing weapons designs, enriching uranium to 90 percent U-235, and converting highly enriched uranium into metal. may be included. Enumerating these understandings should strengthen the Iranian leadership's awareness that further steps toward a viable nuclear weapon cannot go undetected.
In exchange for this nuclear tolerance, Washington could promise to deter systematic Israeli attacks on Iranian nuclear facilities.
Similarly, negotiators could come up with modest interim stabilization measures to support Iran's regional activities and Russian aggression in Ukraine. The deal includes a commitment by the US government to refrain from tightening oil sanctions against Iran (and perhaps symbolically ease other sanctions) as long as Iran refrains from increasing its military aid (quantity or quality) to Russia. may be included.
Additionally, if Iran does not extend support to all endangered proxies in the region, the US government promises to deter Israel from expanding its ground offensive objectives in southern Lebanon. There is a possibility.
Behind this short-term deal would be an implicit threat from the West about what would happen if Iran did not comply: increased sanctions enforcement leading to full reinstatement of sanctions, destabilizing the Iranian regime. These included covert actions aimed at blocking the supply of weapons to Iran. Strengthen Israel's offensive capabilities to retaliate against Iran.
Interim de-escalation talks will then take place, setting the stage for formal negotiations to begin next spring for a more permanent agreement. Such exercises would be much easier if progress towards ceasefires in Ukraine and Gaza had been agreed by then.
But even if both prove elusive, the logic of comprehensive, nuclear-specific negotiations would still be persuasive. That's because if Iran were to proceed with its nuclear program, it could set off a proliferation chain reaction that would facilitate bomb programs by Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Turkey.
There is also the urgent issue of the United Nations provisions for a complete lifting of international sanctions against Iran expiring in October 2025, creating something of a deadline for negotiations.
At the heart of nuclear negotiations should be efforts to codify, limit, and introduce additional verification measures to check the status of Iran's weapons standards. Negotiations will focus on Iran's plans, but will also be conducted with an eye toward establishing a template of constraints and transparency that can be applied to any country that accumulates a threshold of advanced nuclear capabilities. Should.
The stakes are high and the time to act is now. Pragmatism requires making realistic policy choices that, in rare cases, have the potential to garner bipartisan support in Washington. Not least because it creates room for the next administration to subsequently chart its own course of action toward Iran.
Ariel E. Levite is a senior fellow in the Nuclear Policy Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Toby Dalton is co-director of the Nuclear Policy Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
