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Here's How America Can Really Make the Iran Deal Better

(National Interest) Robert Einhorn - The way to get a better Iran deal is to strengthen the existing deal by supplementing it with U.S. policies designed to promote strict compliance, counter Tehran's destabilizing regional activities, and prevent a nuclear-armed Iran over the long term. First, the administration should actively build international support for rigorous enforcement of compliance, working with key partners to establish contingency plans for the coordinated re-imposition of sanctions in the event of Iranian violations, including appropriate responses to both small and major infractions. The U.S. should make detection of Iranian weaponization activities a top U.S. intelligence priority. It should also press potential supplier governments to comply with renewed Security Council prohibitions on transferring major conventional weapons and ballistic missile technology to Iran, step up efforts to interdict illicit shipments to and from Iran, and strengthen the conventional military and missile defense capabilities of Israel and Gulf Arab partners. To deter Iran from deciding to build nuclear arms once restrictions on its nuclear capabilities expire after 15 years, U.S. presidents, with the formal endorsement of Congress, should publicly commit the U.S. to preventing Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons and to using any means necessary, including military force, to enforce that commitment. Finally, the U.S. and its regional partners should mobilize their collective economic resources and military capabilities - which are far greater than Iran's - in a coordinated strategy to thwart any Iranian efforts to destabilize and dominate the region. The writer is a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and a former member of the U.S.-Iran negotiating team.
2015-09-03 00:00:00
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