Subject: Re: Vance Failed. No Deal.
They didn't, eh. Okay.

Are you suggesting that they already have a nuclear weapon?

They've had 60% enriched uranium for years. Yet they didn't build a bomb with it. And they didn't enrich it to 80% or 90%. Even though they could have done either of those things. Which is why I noted that they didn't push forward full tilt. Unless, again - do you think they already have a nuke? Or 90% enriched uranium?

We don't want them to have a nuclear weapon. Period. I'm not sure why this is unclear. The administration is offering that in exchange for Iran getting rid of all their nuclear weapons technology that we will give all the enriched uranium for civilian power plants for free.

I fully understand what we want. What I don't understand is why you think that what you describe above would get us there, if the JCPOA didn't work.

You're saying that we'll give them as much civilian power plant level uranium as they need. And all they have to do is promise that they won't then take that uranium and enrich it further to weapons grade.

But....that's exactly what the JCPOA said. They could have uranium up to 3.67%, and weren't allowed to enrich it further.

Your criticism of the JCPOA is based on a belief that we had no way of knowing that they were keeping to their agreement (and a certainty that they would not). But the same is exactly true of what Trump wants. If you believe that even with IAEA monitoring (and all our own monitoring and satellites and intelligence) that Iran could somehow further enrich that 3.67% uranium without us knowing, then the same will continue to be true under anything we negotiate today. If they can do secret enrichment - and thus the JCPOA was stupid - then they'll be able to do that once this war is over as well.

That's why I don't understand what it is that we're holding out for if your criticism of the JCPOA is correct. If there's no way of ever knowing for sure that they're sticking to their promise and don't have secret enrichment facilities, why on earth do we care whether they say they're getting rid of all their nuclear weapons technology? We won't ever be able to know whether it's true - so why bother?

So then Iran won't be blowing up the Red Sea or theoretical Mediterranean pipelines all the live long day and they can be used to reduce the importance of the Straits of Hormuz.

If Iran ever wants/needs to close the strait, they can blow up the pipelines then. They don't need to be constantly blowing up the pipelines for the Straits of Hormuz to be their new "nuclear weapon." Just to be able to close the pipelines and the straits at the same time.