I am well aware that the political history between the United States and the Middle East cannot be reduced to a few paragraphs without misconstruing the matter, but I’m going to do it anyway.
Former President Trump withdrew the United States from the Iran Nuclear Deal back in 2018, reimposing sanctions, and then assassinating General Soleimani despite the reinstated punishment, which was…counterproductive. And the shiny, new Biden Administration has formally offered to restart its talks with Iran on the nuclear deal. But before I get into Biden’s plan for Iran, here is a quick summary of the deal:
The Joint Comprehension Plan of Action (JCPOA), or the Iran Deal, was a 2015 agreement between the P5+1 and Iran to limit their nuclear capabilities by cutting their stockpile of enriched uranium and gas centrifuges. While this didn’t remove Iran’s capability to create a bomb, it stalled it until 2030. Before the agreement, the estimate was that Iran would be able to create a bomb in 2-3 months. Israel and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) were convinced that Iran would nuclearize proxy groups, posing a threat to humanity… as if Saudi and the U.S. haven’t armed proxies before. In return, Iran had sanctions lifted. Iran is oil country and the sanctions did serious damage to their economy, costing the country more than $160 billion in oil revenue from 2010 to 2016. The JCPOA was a strong-arm tactic in which Iran would be able to trade oil again and would be given access to their $100 billion of previously frozen assets. This is a debated topic in the U.S. as both sides of the aisle disagree on whether this deal has any fiscal value to us— letting Iran claim $100B just to have them promise not to build a toy? In truth, the $100B was frozen by the Carter administration in 1979 following the Iranian hostage crisis, and is the result of a 40-year interest payment on a $400M arms contract that was never paid in full. Anyway, foreign inspection and oversight verified that Iran was holding up its end of the bargain, besides the minor infringements of occasionally testing medium-range ballistic missiles. And then came Trump, the most vocal arbiter of the JCPOA. This may be one of the few moments where the stars aligned for both Trump and the far Left. The far Left condemned the lifting of the sanctions as Iran has committed countless war crimes in Yemen and supports the al-Assad Syrian regime. Trump is quoted as wanting to “bring Iran to its knees,” imposing new sanctions with Israel’s blessing.
Biden has toyed with the idea of re-entering the deal and consulting Israel, which doesn’t mean anything. I don’t know what’s in store for Iran but re-entering the JCPOA is a dead idea anyway because in 2019 Iran exceeded the quantity of enriched uranium they were allowed to achieve. Killing the Iranian General and Scientist certainly hasn’t done anything for the US-Iran relationship other than plant a seed of resentment, and historically countries with resource-based economies mature into breeding grounds for terrorism when sanctioned. And the issue isn’t whether or not Iran will use its nuclear weapons (it won’t) but rather who it will enable and sell to, a sanctioned country should be expected to supplement its economy with another source of income, most notably, its allied proxies in Lebanon, Palestine, and Yemen.
It’s crazy that as I write this I think of the rich Persian kids from college who used to fly to Tehran on the weekends to go shopping and don’t have any strong opinions on this issue. Like the American media will blow any international topic out of proportion that a native person to that country would probably not consider a huge problem. The best stance on this issue is no stance because realistically, Biden and the Senate will go back and forth on this issue for months. Each president will spend time undoing everything their predecessor did and Iran will forever be swinging back and forth between being sanctioned and not being sanctioned, and overall nothing will get accomplished. And nothing getting accomplished makes the world go round.
Note: excerpt from my middle school summer camp creative writing class
Recipe for a nuke:
“It’s a tough decision between uranium and plutonium. Iran uses Uranium. Uranium has 3 isotopes: U-234, U-235, and U-238. When enriched to 5%, U-235 can fuel nuclear reactors and at 90%, atomic bombs! Most of Iran’s uranium has been enriched 4-5% which is far below what is needed. It takes a lot energy to get from 0 to 4% and less from 20 to 90%. Enrichment becomes easier at higher levels, making it an exponential process. Uranium enrichment is a difficult process and not many countries have access to efficient centrifuges. The most powerful centrifuges have light but strong, balanced rotors, high-speed bearings that are magnetic to reduce friction.
First, dig uranium ore out of the ground and extract pure uranium from the ore. Once it is processed, you have yourself some uranium oxide. Uranium oxide has two isotopes: U-235 and U-238. A nuclear reactor requires U-235 as it is the only fissionable material, but it’s rare in nature because the uranium oxide from the mine is 99% U-238 and 1% U-235. You must separate the U-235 from the U-238 while still getting a large and enriched amount of U-235. This process is called enrichment. U-238 weighs slightly more than U-235 and by exploiting the weight difference, you can separate the isotopes. Next, react the uranium oxide with hydrofluoric acid to get the gas uranium hexafluoride. Put the gas in a centrifuge. The centrifuge creates a force more powerful than gravity. Since U-238 is slightly heavier than U-235, it moves towards the walls of the centrifuge and the U-235 atoms stay toward the center. Extract the gas from the center of the centrifuge and you’ll notice it has a slightly higher concentration of U-235 than before! Then put this gas in several centrifuges and do the process over several times to enrich the concentration of U-235. At the end of the chain of centrifuges you finally have a high concentration of U-235. But its gaseous and needs to be turned into a solid, by adding calcium. The calcium reacts with the fluoride to create a salt and the rest of the U-235 metal is left behind. This metal can make a powerful nuclear reactor.”
fun fact: Israel’s nuclear policy is known as the Samson Option or a last resort, which is in reference to the story of Samson in the Old Testament. “Samson pushed apart the pillars of a Philistine temple, bringing down the roof and killing himself and thousands of Philistines who had captured him, crying out ‘Let me die with the Philistines!’” (Judges 16:30).