Next, a National History center briefing with a political scientist and a historian who have spent their careers studying americaniranian relations. In light of current tensions between the two nations, they traced the history of u. S. Policy towards iran and Irans Nuclear program, which began in 1957 with the assistance of the Eisenhower Administration as part of an atoms for peace initiative. Good morning. This is an amazing crowd. We have already turned away a good 50 people or more. Kennedy, director of the National History center. I want to welcome you to this rethink on the history of u. S. Iranian relations. This is part of an ongoing series at the National History center to bring historical perspectives to Current Issues that are confronting congress and the nation. The purpose of the program is not to provide or advocate for any political position. It isnonpartisan, intended to inform policymakers and the public about the issues they are dealing with. Want to give a few thanks
I want to give a few thanks, first to the Mellon Foundation for providing funding that makes these briefings possible. I also want to thank our assistant, jeffrey, for helping o make the arrangements. I want to thank the office of gerry connolly, which booked the room, and i want to remind or explain why there are index cards on your seats and why i passed index cards around. What we will do after presentations by the speakers is we will get questions, and we would like you to write those questions on the index cards, rather than ask them in front of the audience. So, keep your index cards ready, and jot down questions when they come to mind. So, now, i will turn this over to matthew to offer introductions. Matthew thank you, dane, and jeff, and everybody who helped arrange this event. Everyone out there supports the National History center and all the other professional organizations and networks that help historians thrive. And thank you for coming to the event. We will have to get y
Not to provide or advocate for any particular political position. It is nonpartisan, it is intended to inform policymakers and the public about the issues they are dealing with. I want to give a few thanks, first to the Mellon Foundation for providing funding that makes these briefings possible. I also want to thank our assistant, jeffrey, for helping make the arrangements. I want to thank the office of gerry connolly, which booked the room, and i want to remind or explain why there are index cards on your seat and why i passed index cards around. What we will do after presentations by the speakers is we will get questions, and we would like you to write those questions on the index cards, rather than ask them in front of the audience. So keep your index cards ready, and jot down questions when they come to mind. Now i will turn this over to matthew to offer introductions. Matthew thank you, dane, and jeff, and everybody who helped arrange this event. Everyone out there supports the Na
That they developed more easily to their allies but they will be able to import from russia and china the technology they need for icbms or surface to air weapons and so forth. Ambassador burns. There is no question the iranians were trying to split the p5 in the last week of the negotiations with this proposal. Point one. There is no way we could have accepted this, so i was trying to dive through the details coming over here, if we can maintain the u. N. Weapons and embargoes for five to eight years, thats good for the United States. Hold on, five to eight years they in ten years they are going to have the capability for undetectable breakout, ten years plus under this agreement. Why would we want to agree to five years lifting and eight years for the russian transference of that capability . Why would the United States sign off on such an agreement ambassador . I am not here of course to represent the administration i am just a private citizen. This is a painful tradeoff and i would
You can resite the litany in which they are justified that unfortunate conclusion. The one way to have confidence in the agreement is if the verification inspections provisions of it were air tight anywhere, any time but they are not. They create a whole negotiating process, as we said, 14 days, 21 days, appeal to a board. It is an invitation to the iranians to on advice kate and if they are caught with something wrong to get the time to get it out of the view of the international inspectors. In the area of in spectors whatever you are inspecting giving notice to whoever you are going to inspect always allows them to hide or fix the problem before you get there. It seems to me with 24 days, would you be able to hind the grand canyon or something. I find that as a problem. Big picture is it still the policy of iran today to destroy the United States . Well, until we hear otherwise, i think we have to say it is. And israel as well. And israel. And now you notice that last fridays demonst