By David
Horovitz 14-7-2015
Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani on Tuesday
unsurprisingly hailed the nuclear agreement struck with US-led world powers,
and derided the “failed” efforts of the “warmongering Zionists.” His delight,
Iran’s delight, is readily understandable.
The agreement legitimizes Iran’s nuclear program, allows it to
retain core nuclear facilities, permits it to continue research in areas that
will dramatically speed its breakout to the bomb should it choose to flout the
deal, but also enables it to wait out those restrictions and proceed to become
a nuclear threshold state with full international legitimacy. Here’s how.
1. Was the Iranian regime required, as a
condition for this deal, to disclose the previous military dimensions of its
nuclear program — to come clean on its violations — in order both to ensure
effective inspections of all relevant facilities and to shatter the
Iranian-dispelled myth that it has never breached its non-proliferation
obligations? No. (This failure, arguably the original sin of the Western
negotiating approach, is expertly detailed here by Emily B.
Landau.) Rather than exposing Iran’s violations, the new deal solemnly
asserts that the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty which Iran has failed to
honor “remains the cornerstone” of ongoing efforts to prevent the spread of
nuclear weapons. The deal provides for a mechanism “to address past and present
issues of concern relating to its nuclear programme,” but Iran has managed to
dodge such efforts for years, and the deal inspires little hope of change in
that area, blithely anticipating “closing the issue” in the next few months.
2. Has the Iranian regime been required to halt all uranium
enrichment, including thousands of centrifuges spinning at its main Natanz
enrichment facility? No. The deal specifically legitimizes enrichment under
certain eroding limitations.
3. Has the Iranian regime been required to shut down and dismantle
its Arak heavy water reactor and plutonium production plant? No. It will
convert, not dismantle the facility, under a highly complex process. Even if it
honors this clause, its commitment to “no additional heavy water reactors or
accumulation of heavy water in Iran” will expire after 15 years.
4. Has the Iranian regime been required to shut down and dismantle
the underground uranium enrichment facility it built secretly at Fordo? No.
(Convert, not dismantle.)
5. Has the Iranian regime been required to halt its ongoing missile
development? No.
6. Has the Iranian regime been required to halt research and
development of the faster centrifuges that will enable it to break out to the
bomb far more rapidly than is currently the case? No. The deal specifically
legitimizes ongoing R&D under certain eroding limitations. It specifically
provides, for instance, that Iran will commence testing of the fast “IR-8 on
single centrifuge machines and its intermediate cascades” as soon as the deal
goes into effect, and will “commence testing of up to 30 IR-6 and IR-8 centrifuges
after eight and a half years.”
7. Has the Iranian regime been required to submit to “anywhere,
anytime” inspections of any and all facilities suspected of engaging in rogue
nuclear-related activity? No. Instead, the deal describes at considerable
length a very protracted process of advance warning and “consultation” to
resolve concerns.
8. Has the international community established procedures setting
out how it will respond to different classes of Iranian violations, to ensure
that the international community can act with sufficient speed and efficiency
to thwart a breakout to the bomb? No.
9. Has the Iranian regime been required to halt its arming,
financing and training of the Hezbollah terrorist army in south Lebanon? No.
(This kind of non-nuclear issue was not discussed at the negotiations.)
10. Has the Iranian regime been required to surrender for trial the
members of its leadership placed on an Interpol watch list for their alleged
involvement in the bombing, by a Hezbollah suicide bomber, of the AMIA Jewish
community center offices in Buenos Aires in 1994 that resulted in the deaths of
85 people? No. (This kind of non-nuclear issue was not discussed at the
negotiations.)
11. Has the Iranian regime undertaken to close its 80 estimated
“cultural centers” in South America from which it allegedly fosters terrorist
networks? No. (This kind of non-nuclear issue was not discussed at the
negotiations.)
12. Has the Iranian leadership agreed to stop inciting hatred among
its people against Israel and the United States and to stop its relentless
calls for the annihilation of Israel? No. (This kind of non-nuclear issue was
not discussed at the negotiations.)
13. Has the Iranian regime agreed to halt executions, currently
running at an average of some three a day, the highest rate for 20 years? No.
(This kind of non-nuclear issue was not discussed at the negotiations.)
14. Does the nuclear deal shatter the painstakingly constructed
sanctions regime that forced Iran to the negotiating table? Yes.
15. Will the deal usher in a new era of global commercial
interaction with Iran, reviving the Iranian economy and releasing financial
resources that Iran will use to bolster its military forces and terrorist
networks? Yes.
16. Does the nuclear deal further cement Iran’s repressive and
ideologically rapacious regime in power? Yes.
No wonder Iran and its allies are celebrating. Nobody else should
be.
Video of the week: ALEH: working with the severely handicapped, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VEJSK3-kCTU
No comments:
Post a Comment