Iran, the IAEA, and the Kingdom

Jeffrey Lewis 0:02

If people made good choices, I wouldn't be able to say I told you so. You are listening to the Arms Control Wonk podcast, a podcast on arms control, disarmament, and nonproliferation. I'm Dr. Jeffrey Lewis, the founding publisher of the Arms Control Wonk blog and a professor at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey.

Aaron Stein 0:27

I'm Dr. Aaron Stein, Chief Content Officer at War on the Rocks. Jeffrey, you were texting me at 3.57 a.m. East Coast time. Why were you texting me at 3.57 East Coast time? Jet lag. Where were you?

Jeffrey 0:42

The struggle is real. Tokyo, which was great. I got to see my friend Nobu Akiyama and give a talk at Hido Tsubashi University. I visited a number of fine Japanese establishments and had one of the best meals of my life. So I would say, all in all, good trip.

Aaron 1:04

Unfortunately, we're not going to be talking about your trip, although I would like to. We're going to be, depending on where you are on the globe, moving east or west or north or south to talk about the Islamic Republic.

Jeffrey 1:14

I like to go right through the middle, Aaron.

Aaron 1:19

Jules Vernet, journey to the center and keep on trucking. We're talking about the Islamic Republic of Iran. Because the DG, the Director General of the IAEA, has been doing a little, he's been racking up those frequent flyer miles between Iran and Ukraine during his tenure.

Jeffrey 1:36

Hey, man, we're all trying in this post-pandemic era to get our status back. I mean, you're the DG, you know, you got to have the lounge access. You can't just be sitting out there in the terminal with you and me.

Aaron 1:51

With us out there in sort of the Starbucks trying to crib the Wi-Fi. No, no, he's definitely got his platinum membership. Because Iran has been, I think deliberately, although some people can say it's accidental, trying to up the pressure on the international community over its nuclear program, which has been relatively unconstrained since the collapse of the JCPOA.

Jeffrey 2:16

Yeah, it's hard because we have been neglecting this problem because we are sort of famously resigned to the death of the JCPOA. And so you and I spent this morning going back over some of the things that have happened because we do want to talk about... What the IAEA is attempting to do in Iran with some fidelity and some degree of factual accuracy.

But, you know, to spoil it for listeners, you know, this is a band-aid on a bleeding artery, I suspect.

Aaron 2:50

Yeah, I mean, I think it's essentially is that Iran, as it was unwinding itself from the JCPOA, was giving the IAEA, who had increased authority stemming from the JCPOA, less access to sites, enriching at the Fordow facility where it's not supposed to be enriching, at least as part of the JCPOA. And enriching to levels of significant purity of uranium, they're being picked up in swipe samples.

And so the DG was trying to solve those issues

Jeffrey 3:26

Which, to be clear, he should be doing. I mean, you and I can sit here and we can do a podcast like we are about to do on what an uphill battle this is and how unlikely it is that this ends differently from North Korea. And we can spar about how differently it could end, although I think we're both pretty down on it.

But fundamentally, Rafael Grossi's job is to show up every day and put in the work and make the situation as stable and effective as he can and put the IAEA in the best position it can to verify or to monitor an agreement if one were to come about. And so... Good on him. He is doing a great job.

But none of this matters if the US doesn't find a way to re-enter the deal.

Aaron 4:23

Also correct. He's not, I mean, perhaps we should just dive into it. That's completely right. It's also two issues that they're dealing with. It's JCPOA stuff, and it's also basic safeguard stuff. In a way, we're like back to the bad old days of Ahmadinejad and sort of escalatory stuff. They're just 20 years down the road in terms of nuclear capabilities that they've developed.

Jeffrey 4:48

Yeah, and I mean, to be clear, they're not in violation at this point of their safeguards agreement, as best I can tell, but they are not complying with the JCPOA because the U.S. is not participating any longer. But they are doing a number of things like, for example, enriching to much higher levels, I think that really make it hard to be confident that bad things aren't happening.

Aaron 5:18

Right. And so should we jump into what it is that Grossi is trying to do?

Jeffrey 5:21

Okay. So, you know, the way that I look at the core problem is the core problem involves monitoring and surveillance equipment, right? The cameras. There was an incident involving cameras at one of the centrifuge production workshops. And there is also the issue of all of the JCPOA related cameras, which have, you know,

Aaron 5:48

Hard drives, SD cards?

Jeffrey 5:49

SD cards in them that are filling up, right? And so for all the JCPOA-related cameras, the IAEA does not have access to that data and, as best I understand, will not have access to that data Until there is a resumption of JCPOA compliance by Iran, which Iran says requires a resumption of JCPOA compliance by the US. And so this is really about, as I understand it, preserving continuity of safeguards.

For a future day. There's already been one really serious blip. Something happened with the cameras at the centrifuge workshop that led to a gap or a break, which if you're me is extremely alarming because the thing I'm always worried about is they're going to produce centrifuges that are outside the count and they're going to put them on a truck and they're going to drive them to another facility and they're going to install them there and...

By the way, Iran's not under any obligation outside of the JCPOA to declare centrifuges sitting in a secret facility until there is a date determined for fissile material or for nuclear material to go into that facility. So there's a gap, and what's happened recently is Grossi went to Tehran and negotiated an agreement, which there's a joint statement which we can read, but it says very little.

It just says that the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran and the IAEA agreed on the following, and then it's three bullet points. The first of which is just, I mean, it's niceties, right? Just that the interactions will be carried out in a spirit of collaboration and in full conformity with the competence of the IAEA and the rights and obligations of the Islamic Republic.

Aaron 7:40

I think I know which side demanded that bullet point.

Jeffrey 7:42

Yeah. You know, based on the comprehensive safeguards agreement, right, which is the only thing that's left in force, not the JCPOA. And then two bullet points that hint at some progress, right? So involving the outstanding safeguards issues relating to the infamous three locations. I added infamous. That's not in the statement. Iran expressed its readiness to continue its cooperation and provide further information and access.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, sure. And then crucially, Iran on a voluntary basis will allow the IAEA to implement further appropriate verification and monitoring activities. Modalities will be agreed between the two sides in the course of a technical meeting, which will take place soon in Tehran. That team is supposed to go there shortly. Maybe we'll have gone by the time this podcast comes out.

Aaron 8:34

Correct, yeah.

Jeffrey 8:34

We don't really know what the privately agreed parameters of that are. Although Grossi, you know, has sort of repeatedly said that he thinks that they have a deal. So... I don't know what that means, but I presume that this is about, you know, making sure that there are enough cameras in place in all of the right locations and that they have enough, you know, they have appropriate levels of access in terms of people and, you know, the ability to service and otherwise maintain those cameras.

But... I don't know, man.

Aaron 9:22

I don't know. And I think it's important to as best as we can tell the cameras. I mean, we know this. They don't like it's not like somebody sitting in Vienna, like like watching security footage. Do you know what I mean? Because I think sometimes people think that this is that they are being stored on these SD cards as best as we can tell.

Right. And those SD cards are under seal. And then somebody has to go pick them up and like review the footage.

Jeffrey 9:46

Right. Which presumably the IAEA will do if the JCPOA gets resurrected. So, you know, one of the big fights seems to be over whether they're going to reinstall the cameras that Iran apparently took apart. So all we have is Grossi got asked if the monitoring equipment would be reinstalled and he said yes. And then the spokesman for the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran gave some answer where he said, no, they haven't agreed to what's been sort of paraphrased as new cameras.

And so there's been sort of this debate about like, well, maybe they mean old cameras are okay, not new cameras. So we don't, I think we fundamentally agree. Like, we don't know what the parameters of that agreement were. We don't know what the technical... Well, actually, the technical team probably doesn't know what it's going to show up and find, because, like, you still have to send the technical team.

And if we did know, we'd probably have to keep our mouths shut. I mean, you know, so it's good that the IAEA hasn't allowed that information out into the press. Because I think when... I think what you saw was a little bit of the dynamic underplay... A little bit of the dynamic... That you saw was when it looked good, which is to say from our perspective that Iran was complying, I think from the Iranian perspective, they looked weak because it looked like they were complying.

And so you get that tension of like the Iranians shoving back a little bit.

Aaron 11:11

Yeah, and I think it's important to also, again, put this into broader context. I think there's the 30,000-foot level, but let's drop to the 10,000-foot level. I believe that there's debates about censoring Iran for some of its activities that are going on, so that this could be seen as a pressure release valve on the Iranian side to try and prevent that.

And this feels so vintage to me. Like, honestly, this feels so vintage.

Jeffrey 11:35

Yeah, well, there was a Board of Governors meeting, and there was a report on Iran, and that's where that kind of activity would take place. And I think if you're the Iranians, the chances of more sanctions now are pretty limited, but they do seem sort of sensitive to how they're perceived, and they seem to not like it when the Board of Governors criticizes them.

And so, yeah, I think... Getting an agreement with Grossy, even if it's a very imperfect one, gets them through this meeting. And there, there's probably a lot to that, you know. Once, once now that they're through the meeting you know, the technical team might find that they're not as forthcoming as they were with Grossy before the meeting. I don't know. I mean, they have to go and we have to find out, right?

Aaron 12:27

Yeah, we'll find out, but now let's like jump up to like 30,000 feet because why I keep saying so much of this stuff feels vintage is because You know, what we're fundamentally negotiating is a far weaker safeguards package that was already in place. You know, and that's, I think, the troubling part. We're trying to, like, inch back and regain access on a quote-unquote voluntary basis.

Jeffrey 12:55

It feels weirdly familiar to me, Aaron.

Aaron 12:58

It's just like we've seen this movie before. Maybe the ending changes a little bit because of political leadership decisions in Tehran, but the plot is like the Marvel movies. They're all vaguely similar, even if the endings are a little different.

Jeffrey 13:17

Yeah, I mean, there is this incredibly frustrating dynamic playing out that has played out over the years in North Korea, which is we get an okay deal with the North Koreans. And people point out all the ways in which it is not perfect. And they are right, it is not perfect. And they point out all the reasons that the North Koreans might cheat on the agreement or, you know, they usually don't cheat.

They normally sort of undermine. Circumvent. Yeah, you know, pick your word that involves, you know, a lawyerly interpretation of whatever it is you think you've agreed to. And they're right about all that, but the fundamental point always remains that it's the best chance you have to manage the situation before it gets worse, because at the end of the day, you're not willing to attack them.

And it's not clear that attacking them would actually solve your problem in any event. And so like we walk away from the deal and then we try to get the deal back, and the deal we get the next time is not as good. So we walk away from that promising we're gonna get a better deal, and they do some more, and then we come back and just lather, rinse, repeat. And throughout this whole thing, the IAEA dutifully shows up, you know, and it's not their job to tell us we're being idiots. It's Grossy's job to be like, well, here's what I can do.

Right. And, you know, they try really hard. And I actually just wrote a paper for the Wilson Center. It's a wonderful institution with a terrible name, named after a terrible human being, who doesn't deserve a national memorial. But that's a whole other point. But I wrote this paper for the Wilson Center where I was asked to look at the evolution of safeguards on the Korean Peninsula.

And I think the original idea was, you know, like, is it possible to come up with a really good IAEA driven monitoring and verification scheme for some future agreement with North Korea? Or is that, you know, too hard? And the answer is, it's always easy. Whatever agreement we agree to, we could implement. Like the IAEA can do it.

They're really good at their job. And I think it's the same thing that we're seeing now, which is, Even though this situation is getting progressively worse because of the broader geopolitical context and the choices that the leaders are making, you know, Grossi is still going to show up and he's going to be like, well, I can verify that, you know, I can monitor that.

Like, I put a camera there, you know, so he's being maximally helpful. But it's important, I think, not to confuse our enthusiasm and admiration for the work that the IAEA is doing with Our enthusiasm and admiration for the general situation, which to me still feels like what happened with North Korea.

Aaron 16:08

Yeah, I mean, it definitely does. And I agree with you on Grossi, like their job is not to I mean, their job is essentially just to verify what the Iranians are saying. That's really it, but through as much as they can, and to try and enforce the safeguards agreement, and they're trying to figure out ways to do that.

The broader political context here is that I feel obligated on this podcast to talk about the breakout time because I think Colin Call, I think third in the Pentagon, I think said 12 days. Other people have said like a month or something like that.

Jeffrey 16:50

Aaron, can you just give me a minute?

Aaron 16:52

Yeah.

Jeffrey 16:54

Okay, I'm back.

Aaron 16:56

I only bring that up because that used to be the end-all, be-all. Six months, we'll attack. Three months, we'll attack. And now it's like, what, 12 days or 24 days? It fundamentally doesn't matter. It's just that the timelines keep getting lower, lower, lower, lower. And that sort of impetus that we can use coercive leverage to get a better deal doesn't go away.

Jeffrey 17:17

That's right. And also, by the way, again, not to just constantly harp on this point, but that's why the issue with the cameras is so important. Because if you can't determine how many centrifuge components they've made and you don't know how many centrifuges there are, Which you can't without the JCPOA, then you have no idea. Well, you might have an idea if they have a covert facility someplace, but you very well might not.

Aaron 17:49

Right. And that's what they're going to do.

Jeffrey 17:51

They're not going to break out. They're going to sneak out.

Aaron 17:53

And that's always been the theme of this podcast, which is it's not breakout, it's sneak out. And it does bring us back to sort of those technicalities, that sort of one foot level technicalities that we were talking about at the beginning. It's the gap in the centrifuge monitoring facility in camera footage. Maybe it was like a normal gap, like my electronics fail all the time, but maybe it wasn't, right?

And like we have fundamentally worse monitoring regime in place than we used to precisely because of where we're at.

Jeffrey 18:21

Which, you know, on the positive side... We both work in the nonproliferation space. And when shit's bad, business is great.

Aaron 18:31

Money flows. We thrive on, we would be putting ourselves out of business if we were to solve all these things. And yet here we are altruistically trying to solve all these things.

Jeffrey 18:43

If people made good choices, I wouldn't be able to say I told you so.

Aaron 18:47

That's right. You'd have to move to Hollywood and write scripts or something. I'd have to get a real job. Like my dad, I'd have to make, you know, engine parts for tractors.

Jeffrey 18:57

I don't want that.

Aaron 18:59

No. I mean, should we put this because you wanted to expand this in our pre-show pod meeting to the Saudis and what's going on with them?

Jeffrey 19:07

Well, because it's so interesting to me that on the one hand, we saw from the Saudi government this visceral hostility to the nuclear deal. And, you know, I think to those of us who supported the deal, that never made an ounce of sense because it's like, well, you don't want them to get a bomb, right? But it seemed to me that, you know, for the Saudis and honestly for a lot of people, the nuclear deal was bad because it was a deal, right?

And what they wanted was confrontation with the Iranians. And so diplomatically solving individual issues wasn't good because all it did was reduce the pressure on Iran. And what they wanted to do was get back to... What the Trump administration annoyingly called maximum pressure, right? It was that stupid thing Mark Dubowitz kept saying where he kept, you know, talking about turning the pressure up to 11 on Iran, you know, having clearly never, ever, ever seen this as spinal tap and not realizing that talking about turning something up to 11 is like a sign you're an idiot.

You know, it's like, it's not clever, man. You're a parody of a parody. And I think that explains a little bit then this like bizarre shift we're seeing where now the Saudis are like making nice with the Iranians.

Aaron 20:34

Right. Well, it certainly seems like. And this has also been a theme of this podcast is the Iranians have, with impunity, been firing missiles into downtown Riyadh for years. I know. Nobody really does anything. Actually, we don't do anything. The Saudis don't do anything. Oh, they intercept, with scare quotes around that word, the missiles. Yeah. Which still seemed to hit things, but it's okay.

Jeffrey 21:08

You intercepted it. Sure.

Aaron 21:09

Okay. And it does seem like as part of the roadmap, and it is a roadmap between the two countries. And again, let's put this in further context. This is to resume diplomatic relations. Yeah, in exchange for the Iranians to stop rocketing the shit out of the kingdom. Yeah. Correct. And there seems to be a third element of this, which is the Saudi leadership want formal security guarantees from the United States.

And as part of that, access to U.S. nuclear technology, which I don't quite understand because the concern is like they want this to build the bomb. Access to U.S. nuclear technology doesn't strike me as the best way to go about building a bomb. I agree completely. I don't quite understand that third component of it, but that seems to be where it's at.

Jeffrey 22:03

I think that's fundamentally what we're dealing with here is you and I and all the people around us, we approach these things from the perspective of nonproliferation experts. But that's not how real policymakers think, right? Real policymakers deal at absurd levels of abstraction where facts no longer have any meaning because you're so high up that you can't reach down and actually touch anything real, which I promise it's another topic and we won't go there, but I think that's AUKUS in a nutshell.

It's one of these things that sounds... It passes the... I call this the bagels and coffee test. It doesn't matter how good of an idea something is. It's how it sounds over bagels and coffee at the Brookings Institution. You're in a boardroom, right? Or you're in a conference room or you're in a meeting and you're at this super high level of abstraction.

And so I think for them, for the Saudis... And honestly, most people in Washington, it's just about do you want to be friends with the Iranians or not? And the answer is no. And so the JCPOA is bad because it means being friends. But if you can't get the U.S. to confront the Iranians, then the answer is, well, I guess we have to be friends with them.

So then you cut your separate deal.

Aaron 23:28

Of course.

Jeffrey 23:29

And so I don't, you know, this idea of arms control or non-proliferation as being something you do with an enemy, like, I think that just is such an unnatural thought to people. Right? And so I think what you're seeing now is I think the Saudis have ultimately concluded that, If there isn't going to be an all-out effort to constrain and ultimately topple the Iranians, then they're better off sort of getting along with the Iranians.

And I do think eventually they want their own nuclear weapon, right? They'd rather be in a situation where they both have nuclear weapons. Than a situation where only the Iranians do. And because no one thinks of nonproliferation agreements the way we do, they think that the Iranians are going to get one. If we're nice to them, they will get one.

And so it's like, well, then we have to get one too.

Aaron 24:23

No, I think that's exactly right. But I slightly disagree. But I agree with you.

Jeffrey 24:29

Our civil nuclear assistance would make it harder for the Saudis, not easier. So, yeah, I would support some kind of peaceful nuclear cooperation with the Saudis. Sorry, my answer was way too long-winded, Aaron. No, no, it wasn't too long.

Aaron 24:42

That's a jet lag talking. I'll only say is that people don't ascribe to arms control until you give in to vulnerability. And I think the challenge, and so that ultimately guided arms control with the Soviet Union, and I think the challenge with Iran is that nobody wants, it's still a regional context.

Jeffrey 25:02

Yeah, although I suspect to you the Saudis wrongly believe that if they get nuclear weapons, that they will have a deterrent against the Iranians. You know, doing nasty things to them, which is false, by the way.

Aaron 25:17

No, completely. That allows for the dichotomy between the two countries. So in the U.S., people don't like the JCPOA because you're negotiating with the Iranian regime, and the Iranian regime needs to be changed. And, like, that's it. It's like we can't have a deal with them because they can't be trusted.

Jeffrey 25:29

And it's the same view that says, and it's good when our allies have nuclear weapons, right?

Aaron 25:33

Right. Whereas the Saudis have been eating missiles for the past three years, and they're saying, well, like, maybe we should try something else because it is existential for them.

Jeffrey 25:41

Although the actual outcome of this is they both end up with nuclear weapons, and then they rocket the shit out of each other conventionally, safely assured this will never escalate until the day it does. But in Iraq, in a third country? Maybe. I mean, I don't know. You know, look at the Indians and the Pakistanis.

Aaron 25:57

You know, every now and again, the Pakistanis decide, you know, we got nuclear weapons, you got nuclear weapons. We can bloody you up some and you'll take it. Right. I mean... And someday they'll go too far.

Jeffrey 26:11

Maybe.

Aaron 26:11

Yeah, maybe. I mean, I... Mumbai was pretty far. I think, and maybe this is the good way to like, like land the podcast and like pivot to the end is the level of abstraction about terror of living under nuclear weapons was abstract for many people. It was an abstract thought and it was romanticized in the cold war because many people didn't fundamentally have to live under it, particularly those who practice policy.

And so we're being confronted again with like, Oh wow. Like the consequences of catastrophe are huge. And so we need to calibrate policy in ways that make a lot of people uncomfortable. But the people haven't quite caught up yet to the sort of consequences of catastrophe. And then when you transpose those under countries that have never dealt with this before, you know, it's very simple and simplistic concepts of deterrence and like what it actually feels like.

Jeffrey 27:06

I love the humans, Aaron. What? I love the humans.

Aaron 27:11

Maybe we should turn it all over to chat GPT. I was at a conference where someone suggested that.

Jeffrey 27:17

It was like, oh yeah, we should totally, we should, for all crisis bargaining, we should turn it over to an algorithm that we've pre-programmed to be in alignment with the preferred outcome we want. And that's going to be the most credible way to go. And then further, he was like, you know, and what you should do is you should make the code open because then it's inherently credible that yes, you know, you're going to follow, your algo is going to follow through on the threats it's making.

Aaron 27:42

In a way, this is what the Rand scientists were wanting to do. I guess economists back in the day were trying to do. They were trying to distill down decision making into simple mathematical formulas.

Jeffrey 27:55

Happily, I think there's zero chance that I will be alive when this happens. It's one of those ideas that sounds really stupid the first time you hear it. Then the more you think about it, it becomes unclear what the hell to make of it. And then you're just sort of like happy that you will be old and dead.

You know, it's like, oh, will I be dead before that future comes? Outstanding, because I have zero interest in writing that academic paper. Talking about the great Iranian-Saudi crisis of 2075 when their AI advisors, you know, were like slightly out of alignment with each side's preferences, leading to, I don't know, leading to a nuclear strike on the...

Aaron 28:42

Neom.

Jeffrey 28:43

Yeah.

Aaron 28:44

The indoor. I don't know.

Jeffrey 28:46

I'm so glad to be opting out of that.

Aaron 28:48

Yeah, seriously. In true arms control fashion, the final back third of this turns into sort of a bit of a free-for-all. We go off the rails. But how do you think it ends up? I guess let's wind it back. How do you think it ends up?

Jeffrey 29:02

I think it ends up like North Korea. I think that we go through this period where the Iranians periodically engage in order to keep pressure off. But at some point, they will, if they have not already, make a decision to at least give themselves a capability that they put in the basement and that they don't disclose. But just like with North Korea, there comes a day where that's unsustainable for whatever international event.

And then the Iranians build a nuclear weapon. I mean, do I hope that doesn't happen? Yes. Do I hope that the U.S. and other governments take vigorous action that does not involve airstrikes to prevent that from happening? Yes. But it's hard for me to see how that doesn't happen. And then it raises this other question of proliferation cascades.

Can we talk the Saudis and the UAE and the Turks out of doing it themselves? I don't fucking know.

Aaron 29:58

God, this was like my graduate existence, like in a nutshell in 2008. And so like, I don't want to go back there. We've written those papers for the new generation can.

Jeffrey 30:09

Yeah. I mean, you know, it's, it's a lifetime employment. Yeah.

Aaron 30:15

Well, it's also a lifetime podcast.

Jeffrey 30:17

Well, actually, proliferation cascades are historically unlikely. There are a number of policy interventions. Oh, yeah, I can I can write this paper right now. I yeah, no problem.

Aaron 30:26

You don't even need chat GPT. You could just write it like verbalize it.

Jeffrey 30:31

Following Blake's taxonomy, where states consider, explore and pursue nuclear weapons. No, sorry. It's what is it? It's explore, pursue and acquire. I couldn't write it right. Philip Blake has a whole taxonomy on this.

Aaron 30:45

Yeah. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Okay.

Jeffrey 30:49

See you at ISA in 2045.

Aaron 30:53

I'm going to land the plane where you can talk about this taxonomy. Play with chat GPT in your free time and post your results is in our Slack channel, which is the Star Wars bar of cool people in the nonproliferation space where they do know the difference between the JCPOA and IAA safeguards. To join that community, it's patreon.com slash ACW podcast.

$3 if you're a student, $5 if you're not. Join the coolest nightclub in town where the line is long and the drinks are free as long as you're paying yourself. Patreon.com slash ACW podcast.

Jeffrey 31:29

Jeffrey, it's good to see you at Jetlagged.

Aaron 31:32

It's good to talk to you too, Harry. Don't text me at 357 again. Okay, I promise. Talk to you later, buddy. You up, girl? Okay. Thanks, everybody, for listening.