Alright, y'all welcome back to the show It's anti-war radio I'm Scott Horton.
I'm happy to welcome Flint Leverett back to the show He's a professor of international affairs at Penn State and senior fellow at the New America Foundation He and his wife Hillary write the blog race for Iran dot-com and he is a former CIA analyst and staffer on the National Security Council and Her qualifications are just like that to State Department and NSC as well.
I believe welcome back to the show Flint How are you doing?
Thank you Scott.
Good to be back with you.
I appreciate you joining us here now One of the things we talked about last week was how the Iranian so-called terror plot here Seemed to definitely deflate the Iranian proposal for renewed nuclear talks and a nuclear swap deal That they have been pushing over the last few weeks a Offer that you said should be taken very seriously and unfortunately now is not being taken seriously, but so that made me Want to try again to get my head around this entire nuclear swap deal controversy Basically from the so-called, you know reset of the Obama years forward because I guess Well, obviously it's a very complicated story I'm good with the broad outlines of it, but I and but I really want to know more I know that the WikiLeaks documents contain some information about Iranian politics at the time and How it all played out so I was hoping that I guess basically if you could give us the broad outline I'll try to work in follow-up questions where I can sure The the notion of a fuel swap relates to the so-called Tehran research reactor And I think it's worth keeping in mind that this is a reactor which was originally provided by the United States to Iran under the Shah during the 1960s and when the United States provided it this Reactor was designed to operate on a fuel that was enriched to More than 90% your uranium, which is very very close to the level that you need to have Weapons grade fissile material to have material with which you could build a nuclear bomb after the Iranian Revolution After the United States had cut off Iran from further nuclear supplies from the United States the Islamic Republic took it upon itself to Reconfigure the TRR to work on fuel that's enriched only to just below 20% Which considerably lowers the proliferation risks involved in in operating it it is used primarily to produce medical isotopes for cancer patients It is thoroughly monitored by the IAEA the International Atomic Energy Agency The agency's never found any diversion of nuclear material or any other suspect activity at the site and so This this reactor is running out of fuel and back in 2009 the Iranians approached the Atomic Energy International Atomic Energy Agency and said Help us go out on the market find provider of fuel and under your supervision You know purchase the fuel bring it to Iran install it and continue operating the reactor under IAEA safeguards That was the original proposal from the Iranians and instead of Going ahead with a kind of normal commercial transaction that sort what happened was they cut back this US authored proposal where Iran was going to be asked to send the bulk of its then Current stockpile of low enriched uranium that is in rainium That's enriched only to three to four percent and which is suitable for making fuel for normal power reactors Iran then had a Stockpile of leu that it had produced and the United States was saying in order to get new fuel for the TRR You have to send you know most of your at that time current stockpile of Leu low-enriched uranium out of Iran and then wait for a year or 18 months and We will provide you with finished fuel Russia will take that leu enrich it to the higher level required to make fuel for the Tehran research reactor And then it will be sent to France to get fabricated into fuel rods for the reactor And that'll take a year 18 months, and you guys just you know wait around To see if we delivered the fuel the Iranian response to this was We will You know we would like to consider this deal in principle That's what they said in Vienna when this deal was first put on the table in October of 2009 And that's what they continued to say afterwards But you know there are some aspects of this arrangement that you know we need to talk about we need to work out So that we have confidence.
We're not going to be Left in the lurch as has happened in previous deals that the Islamic Republic had for nuclear fuel with with Western countries and So they prefer the French specifically I think your wife Hillary man level yes, but the French were were particularly notorious in in this regard So the Iranians came back in the month that followed the tabling of this u.s.
Authored proposal in October 2009 the Iranians came back with several.
You know variations on it Maybe the one thing they proposed was to have the swap actually take place in Iran the IAEA could take charge of the 1,200 kilograms of Low enriched uranium that Iran would ultimately send out of Iran the IAEA could take charge of it Physical possession of it and sit on it in Iran And then when the finished fuel for the TRR was delivered the IAEA would take that 1,200 kilograms Out of Iran that was one option Another option was to have the Iranian low enriched uranium sent out of Iran in installments Okay, they'd put some you know send some out up front But then other installments would wait until you know various commitments by the Western powers to move ahead with fabricating new fuel for the TRR as Those commitments were fulfilled Iran would send more out that was another option the Iranians tabled the Iranians also proposed the idea of having the 1,200 kilograms held in escrow by a third country a country that would Sit on the it would hold it sit on it And then if the West did not come through with the finished fuel in whatever the agreed on length of time was That low enriched uranium would be returned.
Okay now so far this whole debate back and forth The the one proposal the other in the timeline we're talking about the spring in the summer of 2000 Actually, no, we're actually we're actually talking about, you know, the fall of 2009 the the u.s.
Proposal is tabled with the Iranians in Octa as well the Iranians send their letter to the IAEA saying we need to buy any fuel for this reactor in June of 2009 the US proposal this swap deal is tabled with the Iranians in October 2009 and in November December of 2009 in January of 2010 the Iranians Float various the kinds of alternatives that I was described.
They say we are interested in Doing a swap in principle.
We just want it to be done in a way that you know We have confidence that our leu is not just going to be taken and will be left High and dry but then to the Obama administration.
This is simply intransigence This is that it's a table.
Yes.
It is routinely described by u.s.
Officials as The Iranians having completely rejected completely rebuffed The this wonderful offer that the Obama administration has made.
This is the way the French government provides it This is not the way that Muhammad al-baradei Who was director general still of the IAEA?until December of 2009 this is not the way he describes it.
All right.
All right there flim Sorry, we got to go out to this break.
We'll be right back.
I'm ready with Flint Leverett from Penn State and race for iran.com All right, y'all welcome back to the show it's anti-war radio I'm Scott Horton and I'm online with Flint Leverett He's a professor of international relations at Penn State and a senior fellow at the New America Foundation Formerly on the National Security Council worked at the State Department and was a senior analyst at the CIA and we're talking about the Nuclear swap offer because the Americans and the Israelis are paranoid about the Iranians enriching uranium at all and especially up to 20% which is closer to 90% than 3.6 percent And so we got to find a way to convince them to not enrich up to 20% And so they had this great nuclear offer that they Said okay.
Well basically implicitly acknowledge your 3.6 percent enrichment as legitimate just as long as you stop enriching up to 20 And I thought it wasn't enriching it at 20 at that point.
Oh, right, right Right.
Yeah more to the point and then the Iranians as you say, they came up with this counter offer They said well, how about you give us some finished fuel rods at the same time?
We're giving up our 3.6 percent that way you don't just leave us hanging which was a perfectly reasonable place to at least begin a Negotiation and yeah, and yet the Obama administration said no and now the way I remember this was there was a whole manufactured fake controversy over the comm facility that the Obama administration used to kind of pile on the Iranians at the time and and show just how intransigent they were with the upcoming Obama designated December 31st deadline for them to start playing along.
Yeah, that's exactly right Obama had made a commitment to Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu and to the the pro-israel Community here in the United States that if Iran didn't accept this offer by the end of 2009 that he was That it didn't accept that offer Obama had committed that he was going to stop engagement and move on to seeking new sanctions Through through the United Nations Security Council.
And so the Obama administration was never interested in a negotiation over this It was a take it or leave it proposition Bar and I has said publicly since he left the IAEA has said on several occasions That that was a real mistake that there was a deal which could have been had but it would have required Negotiating some of these details with the Iranians, but the Obama administration wasn't interested They defined it as a take it or leave it offer And when the Iranians weren't willing to play on that basis, they worked really hard to create the impression that You know that they had made this great offer and were prepared to deal and it was the Iranians who had Who had rebuffed it when in reality, you know, I think the opposite was was closer to Closer to reality.
Well, but when New Year's came and Brazil and Turkey intervened, that's right both Brazil and Turkey wanted to try and and and prevent Diplomatic breakdown over this.
I mean, I think I mean both had their Their own Interests in this for Brazil.
This is a country that gave up an actual nuclear weapons program Under IAEA supervision to the To the satisfaction of the international community after it made a political transition from military rule to to democracy But Brazil has been very insistent under democratic government since then That it did not forfeit its rights to enrich uranium or to do other peaceful nuclear technologies including the fuel cycle and so Brazil has an interest in not seeing Another non-weapon state like Iran is Seeing in a state singled out and punished by the international community for enriching uranium You know Brazil has an interest in defending that position and didn't want a precedent set in the Iranian case For Turkey.
I think it was more they didn't want to see a Muslim country Singled out as say, okay Everyone has the right to enrich uranium under the NPT Except the Islamic Republic of Iran And I think Turkey had an interest in in trying to forestall that sort of outcome so both Brazil and Turkey put themselves forward as potential mediators and The Iranians were willing to work with with both Brazil and Turkey to try and find some arrangement for refueling the Tehran research reactor in in April of 2010 President Obama sent letters to both Prime Minister Erdogan of Turkey and then President Lula of Brazil outlining the US conditions for an acceptable fuel swap deal and The conditions basically boiled down to this if the United States said it in this letter Obama himself said They were willing to live with a with an escrow arrangement Involving Turkey meaning that the 1200 kilograms of low enriched uranium from Iran Would be taken to Turkey and held there by the Turks in escrow for whatever the negotiated period was and That would be acceptable to Iran.
That would be acceptable to United States, but Obama in this letter said The deal had to meet two conditions in order to be acceptable to to him One of them was that the 1200 kilograms of low enriched uranium had to come out of Iran Up front at the beginning no time delay No waiting for finished fuel it had to come out it could be held in escrow in Turkey But 1200 kilograms had to come out of Iran Upfront from the get-go the other condition Obama specified in these letters Was that um, so the it all had to come out at once there was going to be no Installments no delay it had to come out all at once in one batch not in installments and The what's really so sad about this is that?the Obama administration never really had any intention of Moving ahead with the deal it President Obama basically and I sorry to say this But it has to be said he lied to Lula and Erdogan in these letters The calculation that his advisors had told to him was that if he insisted on these conditions Lula and Erdogan could not possibly get the Iranians to agree and That therefore they would try this effort.
They would fail they'd crash and burn and after they had failed Then the United States could have them because both countries were on the Security Council at the time Could have them voting for new sanctions on Iran Later that later that spring and the United States would have a unanimous Council voting for new sanctions That was the kind of cynical calculation that was made and even worse The President United States in fine letters to other heads of state or heads of government Basically live it is it is a really really damaging episode in American diplomacy for which Obama really bears enormous responsibility, I think so these letters go out and You know Lula and Erdogan and their foreign ministers and their staffs read them and they take them seriously.
They internalize them and when they go to Tehran in May of 2010 to try and broker a deal They tell the Iranians, you know, you have to accept these conditions or there can't be a deal But you know we have been You know given the highest possible assurance I mean fine letters from the President of the United States that if we meet those conditions we can get this deal to work and so the Iranians Accept the conditions and in May of 2010 Lula and Erdogan who are in Tehran are able to announce the so-called Tehran Declaration, which essentially involved a fuel swap 1,200 kilograms of low enriched uranium would go from Iran to Turkey where it would be held in escrow and You know at the end of the negotiated period new fuel would be delivered for For the TRR and the Iranians agreed to this and Brazil and Turkey were I think understandably very proud of their accomplishment in doing this and Then they were immediately rejected by the Obama administration That this was this was a distraction I mean, does that mean that the entire swap deal the the whole offer everything from the beginning?was really just a ruse an excuse to get more sanctions through the Security Council because it seems to me like if What they're really afraid of is the so-called breakout capability and the Iranians having enough uranium enriched up to 3.6 percent that they could Conceivably turn it into a single weapon that this is the silver bullet for that.
This it would be the end of the breakout And I think wouldn't they just take the deal because I think it started out that way When the rain u.s.
First tabled its proposal back in October 2009, but by the spring of 2010 The focus was all on sanctions right now Is there any way I can keep you one more segment here Flint you bet you okay great put down the phone take a break We'll be back at 6 after okay.
Okay much All right, y'all welcome back to the show It's anti-war radio I'm Scott Horton, and I'm talking with Flint Leverett He teaches international relations at Penn State He's a senior fellow at the New America Foundation New America net and he's formerly with the National Security Council the State Department and the CIA and we're talking about the lack of progress in forging a nuclear deal with Iran and now I wanted to ask you Flint about the UN resolutions at play here because of course the the non-proliferation treaty guarantees to all non-nuclear states who sign it the Unalienable right to peaceful or to nuclear technology for peaceful purposes And yet the I guess the assumption is that if the Iranians are enriching uranium Then that means it's at least a proto nuclear weapons program and therefore The UN Security Council has issued a demand Correct that they must cease enriching uranium period that that's right there that is enshrined and now several UN Security Council Resolutions the and they also they say you have to answer every question based on the so-called smoking laptop the alleged studies documents And you have to let us inspect The plants where you manufacture the centrifuges and your missiles and all these things that are completely unrelated to the safeguards agreement Is that right?yes that the resolutions in join Iran to Expand its cooperation with the IAEA to address, you know unresolved questions about some of its past nuclear activities I mean the real point though Is that I can sit here make up questions about it too and accuse them of not answering my questions, but they're not really They're either ridiculous questions in the first place like the alleged studies documents based questions that yeah, you know, it's already we know it's a forgery or It's stuff that is completely unreasonable that it seems like just like Obama's refusal to accept their acceptance of his offer It seems like the whole scam is basically to force them to refuse to to make demands that they won't possibly accede to Well, that's right.
I mean they are a set of demands which I can't imagine the Islamic Republic ever ever exceeding to But the idea is to keep Iran in a box keep Iran under pressure keep Iran subject to escalating sanctions And you know for some I think it also amounts to you know, laying the predicates so that when the time comes the United States could claim some some sort of tortured legal justification for using using force against attacking Iranian nuclear installation Well, you know, there's a great clip.
I don't know how famous it is, but it should be everybody can find it on YouTube It's a John Bolton former unconfirmed ambassador the United Nations and the Bush administration on the phone With the American Israeli Public Affairs Committee in a conference call Explained to them that what he was trying to do was beat the Iranians over the head with the International Inspection Regime in such a way that they would finally throw their hands up and withdraw from the tree That's what he was hoping that they would do.
Yes, and So that to lay the predicate for war that here they will not cooperate That's right, I think there are Certainly there were people in the Bush administration like like ambassador Bolton who who had that agenda I even regret that there are people in the Obama administration Who who have that agenda as well?
Do you think that includes the Secretary of State?
I'm not sure about that It it may well.
I mean certainly her rhetoric on Iran has been Has been incredibly Incredibly hawkish to say the least But I you know, I have no evidence that I would I would say Ties her to this But I think certainly someone like Dennis Ross at the White House.
This is this is absolutely his agenda Well now and here's the same problem.
We've been running up against with this all the Israeli and neoconservative wolf cries about Iran all this time is that no matter what the Accusations or even if they were true that okay They're making nuclear bombs or whatever How in the heck is anyone even the United States of America most powerful military machine ever?
How are we supposed to do a regime change in Iran?
The closest explanation I've ever heard was from Bill Kristol on Fox News saying that well Once we start bombing them, the people will overthrow the government, but since that is not true What could the policy possibly be marching divisions of American Army troops into Tehran?
No way I I can't imagine that that either Or I think a tie either right?
No, I don't think there are any options for that I think that as much as the Iranians don't want to believe it I'm sorry as much as Americans don't want to believe it the Islamic Republic, you know Has a great deal of legitimacy among Iranians Iranians don't want to see another Western imposed regime Even Iranians who want to see the Islamic Republic Evolve in some pretty significant ways from the way it is today You know, there's there's just no support there for externally imposed Regime change.
Okay, so what is Dennis Ross talking about?
I think what then I think what Dennis Ross is talking about is ultimately He wants to see US military strikes against Iranian Iranian nuclear installations.
He wants to knock out their program.
He wants to knock out what he sees is their nascent capability to make Nuclear weapons.
I don't think Dennis is particularly worried or concerned about you know Politically what happens afterwards whether that leads to the collapse of the regime or or what have you?
I think there are others and neoconservative fight like Crystal that you were you were citing who do see this as a kind of a twofer that if you strike Iran Militarily, the regime will crumble people will rise up the regime will be seen as not able to protect Iran and people will rise up and And overthrow it.
I think that is just that is fantasy.
I'm kind of surprised by what you say about Dennis Ross there I've always considered Since everybody knows including the National Intelligence Council and the IAEA and everybody that there is no nuclear weapons program going on there That people like Dennis Ross or Bill Crystal or anybody else who wants any kind of military action against Iran that for them?the nuclear program is simply a pretext for regime change the real goal because Their concern couldn't possibly be this three point six percent uranium enrichment program.
That's not a threat to anyone No, I think I think for some people, you know even even these very very strange scenarios where Iran takes, you know, three and a half percent enriched uranium and And kicks the IAEA out and then cranks it back through the centrifuges and starts making weapons grade Fissile material, you know, I find those just you know, there's no way you can really put put serious Credence to them, but I think for some like Dennis Ross They actually do take them seriously that this is an unacceptable threat to Israel.
This is you know an unacceptable threat to American hegemony in in the Middle East and the United States, you know will ultimately need to use force to Force to preclude that I think for others like crystal some of the other neocons It is as I said, I mean you may want to call it a pretext I I prefer to call it has it that a twofer where they think they can actually strike at Iranian nuclear installations You know stop that, you know Remote fantasyland scenario that that Dennis and others worry about the breakout scenario But they think they can also in the process they can bring down the regime and that what you're going to get in return in Its place is some, you know secular liberal democratic pro-western Government, but so then is it fair to say in other words then that?
No one in touch with reality any better than William crystal is actually Planning for regime change or has an idea about how it could be carried out Oh, I think I think there there are some other scenarios out there.
This is one reason why neoconservatives and others not just neoconservatives But others are pushing to have the MEK taken off the US government's list of foreign terrorist organizations Because they want to use the MEK just like the neocons wanted to use Ahmad Chalabi in the Iraqi National Congress back in the 1990s They want to use the MEK today as the spearhead for regime change Campaign against the Islamic Republic.
Yeah.
Well and just like when they hired Chalabi for the Iran thing This would be exactly what the ayatollah wants really couldn't do anything But oh, I did the MEK has zero I mean worse than zero standing and inside Iran.
All right I'm sorry, we have to leave it there.
I thank you so much for your time today.
I really do Thank you Scott.
Sure glad to do it.
All right, everybody.
That's Flint Leverett He teaches at Penn State International Relations former CIA State Department guy race for ran Calm is his blog that he writes with his wife Hillary.
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