Transcripts For CSPAN2 Discussion Focuses On Future Of Iran

If we really believed and were going to live this record programmed to go live to the Heritage Foundation this afternoon. A quick reminder you can watch the rest of the Program Online on cspan. Org. This type center for strategic and budgetary assessment in the search bar. Live now to the Heritage Foundation for the future of the every Nuclear Agreement. This is cspan2. Will post a program in the heritage homepage following todays presentation as well. Leaving our discussion as jim phillips, Senior Research fellow for middle Eastern Affairs in douglas and Sarah Allison center for Foreign Policy studies. If the veteran foreignpolicy specialists who has written widely on the middle east and issues of International Terrorism since coming to the Heritage Foundation in 1979. He has authored dozens of papers on iran on its Nuclear Program, use of terrorism and testified before congress on Irans Nuclear program and other middle east security issues. Please join me in welcoming jim phillips. Well, thank you, john. The Iran Nuclear Agreement has been in force now for more than a year, but yet it faces a very uncertain future. As a president ial candidate donald trump indicated that he would overturn the deal were also indicated that he may enforce so tightly that the iranians may walk away from it. But as president , hes been in no hurry to rip out the deal and it appears the administration is still reviewing its options. Our critics charge that the nuclear deal only slowed irans uranium Enrichment Program, did not halt it and that the administrations promises that the deal would help to moderate irans behavior have not come to pass. Iran still does provocative missile test, still supports terrorism, and still expanding military intervention in syria and harassing u. S. Navy ships and other International Ships in the persian gulf. Supporters said the deal indicate almost all those things are not not included in the deal and that the deal to reduce irans stockpiles of uranium enrichment for a few years in order to buy time for possibly defusing this crisis. So how well has the gc poa worked . The nuclear deal also is a joint comprehensive plan of action or drama london jcpoa. What position should the Trump Administration take on the deal going forward. To answer these and other questions, we have a very knowledgeable panel of experts and theyll be introducing them as they speak. First speaker is spread flights, Senior Vice President for policy and programs at the center for security policy. Fred served in the u. S. National security position for 25 years at the cia, dia, department of state and the House Intelligence Committee staff. During the administration of president church w. Bush, he was chief of staff to john bolton, then the undersecretary of state for arms control and interNational Security. During his tenure with the House Intelligence Committee, u. S. This affects her down the iranian and north korean Nuclear Programs and briefed key National Intelligence estimates on these issues to committee members. After he left government in 2011, and he founded and served as director of the Langley Intelligence Group network committed news max medias Global Intelligence and forecasting services. Shes published numerous articles in various journals and newspapers and last year published the eyeopening book, obama bomb from a dangerous and growing National Security fraud. Let me turn it over to fred. Thanks, jeff. A pleasure to be back at harwich to discuss the urgent National Security issue. Its humbling to be on a panel of some of americas leading experts on this issue. Youve written extensively on this issue. The former iaea official for a number of years and really knows the exact way whats going on with the program. David albright with his center has produced information that i dont think i would know which end was up and report to his organization producing. Reports he has been producing despite pressure from the foreignpolicy establishment of the Obama Administration to pull punches. I really respect him with a hardhitting report put out and for not pulling his punches. Donald trump said repeatedly during the campaign at the nuclear deal with iran is one of the worst deals the United States has never negotiated. He has implied that he would tear up the deal. He would renegotiate the deal and some other options being discussed right now. Mr. Trump is right. This is a terrible agreement that endangered u. S. And interNational Security. The question is what will mr. Trump do about it . I will discuss three options on the table for mr. Trump. The first i want to talk about why its a bad deal. As to principal reason for this. Worst of all, the jcpoa legitimizes and normalizes Irans Nuclear program. Second, it allows iran to continue to engage in Nuclear Weapons related activities while the agreement is in place. Why is that a problem . Iran to halt its Nuclear Infrastructure in defiance of the treaty obligations under the Nuclear Nonproliferation treaty. It did it in secret. They cheated. Its a statesponsored terror. It had been the position until early in the Obama Administration of certain technologies although peaceful applications, iran should not be allowed to pursue because they are simply too easy to use to make weapons. However, the Obama Administration was desperate for an agreement they made concession after concession to give away these dangerous technologies because they wanted to get a leg of the Nuclear Agreement for president obama. The Main Technology that is of great concern is uranium enrichment. Until 2010 or 2011, the Obama Administration stuck that they cannot be allowed to enrich uranium. Under the agreement, iran can operate 5000 slightly over five dozen uranium centrifuges and develop advanced centrifuges. This is all the agreement is in place. This allows iran to increase expertise and technology that can later use to make Nuclear Weapons. Iran should not be allowed to enrich uranium. The position of the israeli government. It should be our position, too. Iran had a reactor that would be a source of plutonium. Proponents of the deal had praised the fact under the agreement iran so the reactor with cement and it will be rebuilt so will not produce weapons grade plutonium. Thats not exactly the case. The reactor will be rebuilt by the chinese according to the arms control association, it will be the source of a quarter of their weapons for the plutonium per year. Even if plutonium is not usable as weapons, which some experts have said, this agreement will allow iran to acquire expertise in the construction and operation of a heavy water reactor. This is an outrageous concession by the United States and is something i think is going tonight is considerably less safe than the road when the reactor is complete. In addition, the reactor has been exempted from an oversight process to safeguard the technology being provided for construction of the reactor is not being diverted for weapons purposes. This is a real problem. Verification under the agreement is very weak. Supposedly this is the strongest verification measures of any Nuclear Agreement in history. In fact, the verification mostly applies to the declared supply chain and declared nuclear sites. There is a procedure to get access to suspect facilities in nondeclared sites, but there has to be a vote of treaty parties to get that inspection and if iran refused in theory, sanctions would be snapped back at sanctions had been suspended under the agreement. If the Trump Administration attempts to get an authorization from the various parties to get an infection like this, the answer is almost certainly no both because the europeans wont agree to vote for him and because iran has threatened to withdraw from the agreement if theres an attempt to implement more sanctions or snapback sanctions. I dont think thats an option. In addition, iran is refusing to allow inspection of literary facilities. If their weapons related at todays, its happening in weapons facilities. Iran has said they will not allow sanctions. That alone is a big problem. Then there are issues left out here this concern promises by the Obama Administration that not only will the agreement reduce or eliminate the threat from iran Nuclear Program, it will bring a manager between the nations and make iran improve relations with the United States. I think we know the last two conditions have not happened. Iran has hired a dozen missiles is a Nuclear Agreement was announced. Missiles had been fired by the who the rebels, an iranian proxy into the red sea at american uae and saudi ships. Iran has considered to support terrorism, probably financed by the enormous amount of money received in sanctions relief under the agreement. Missiles are something worth talking about a little bit of length. We were told earlier in the Nuclear Talks missiles would be included in the agreement, but iranians refuse to include it, so instead there is a provision in an annex to a Security Council resolution that endorsed the agreement. What really wasnt known at the time was that this language, Iranian Missile test for a tank 80 years weekend previous Security Council resolutions and only applies to missile tests that are designed to carry Nuclear Warheads. Lets be real here. These missiles are in Nuclear Weapons Delivery System. They are not being built to fire monkeys into space or payload full of dynamite. They are Nuclear Weapons Delivery System to carry Nuclear Bombs against israel come United States and europe. Thats the purpose. Iran is the only in history to have a missile at the range of 2000 kilometers or more without having a Nuclear Weapon system. Lets not pretend this is not part of a Nuclear Weapons program. It was another irresponsible confession at the Obama Administration to get the deal that allowed the agreement to go through without part of it. This is why every time i ran test the missile and about a dozen since the agreement was announced, theyve not been in noncompliance with the Nuclear Agreement. The Iranian Foreign are actually has bragged that he worked for over a year to get this language so they can test missiles and pretend they were not part of the Nuclear Program. I think this is a bad deal for many reasons. It makes us less safe. I think i ran is able to cheat on the agreement will not be caught. So what should President Trump do about it . Theres three options i see for him. Carrots the agreement, renegotiate the agreement or pursue a policy of strictly enforcing the agreement. In my view commentary the agreement is the best option. This agreement is a fraud. It was so fraudulent to the American People. There are numerous ideals not disclose to congress when it voted on the agreement september of 2015. It was negotiated not only over the objections of israel, one of our closest allies, but behind his back and behind the backs of allies in the middle east. I think this is a big deal. But we conducted negotiations with north korea, we included regional can state. This agreement was initiated with no input from regional states. They were surprised. Jay sullivan writes in his book of regional states were stunned at what iran was allowed to keep under an agreement to reduce the threat from its Nuclear Program. It was a betrayal and this is the best reason why this program has to be stopped. Also, this agreement undermines important nonproliferation efforts the United States had been pursuing to stop the proliferation of uranium enrichment and fuel reprocessing. This is something the Bush Administration worked hard on and negotiated an agreement to Nuclear Technology with the United Arab Emirates which was called the Gold Standard in which we shared Nuclear Technology he provided they will not enrich and not reprocess to produce the program. The Obama Administration that the way from the standard. This is a serious mistake or the more nations allowed to enrich and reprocess field means the more nations will have covert Nuclear Programs. This was a mistake we have to return to the Gold Standard and the process of not permitting the liberation of reprocessing and uranium enrichment. I think that of the options that the president is looking at, renegotiation is more likely. And i can live with renegotiation because i am confident that a trump team ultimately will push for a deal that actually addresses threats from Irans Nuclear program, brands and other crucial issues such as Ballistic Missiles and sponsorship of terrorism or iran will back out of these things. Theres two objections we hear about. First of all multilateral agreement, u. S. Cant renegotiate on it god and what general mattis said the u. S. Has to keep its commitments. We just cant tear back out of this agreement. These are both false arguments. This is not really a multilateral agreement. This is an agreement negotiated entirely between the United States and iran, mostly in secret, most of the multilateral talks begin. We jay sullivan spoke. He writes about how western states have their arms twisted to go along with all the concessions that john kerry worked out with the iranians. These other nations were just along for the ride. I cant be the reason. Concerned by the u. S. Should keep its commitments, the u. S. Does not have to keep its commitment to an agreement that is a fraud. This agreement was fraudulently push forward, dangerous National Security. The American People throughout the last two years have learned about one unfair concession after another. Can you imagine what the u. S. Congress wouldve done when it voted on this agreement september 2015 if they knew that there was a secret deal to pay rent them to get american hostages out of iran . I know the Obama Administration for the release of the american prisoners was not related to the nuclear deal. Give me a break and of course it was related. Of course an agreement with the iranians that they would not release prison until the cut tensions relief. Its no accident are Prisoners Released on the same day that i ran for tensions relieved in the same day that we flew a plane load of cash secretly to iran. This was not to disclose what the administration was doing celebrations in january of 2015 about the success of the deal. It was revealed on the wall street journal a few months later. Many other concessions like this, which is why i say it really is a fraud. The u. S. Does not have to stand behind fraud. Finally, strictly enforcing seems to be the objective of the day right now. And the reason people push this is because the argument is the multilateral agreement and european allies will be upset with us if we back out. But strictly enforce iran to back out. Theres several problems with this argument. First of all, the approach legitimizes a fraudulent agreement. We know this is a fraudulent agreement and working within the process is a mistake. Second of