The Atlantic
The Case Against the Iran Deal
Reviving the JCPOA will ensure either the emergence of a nuclear Iran or a desperate war to stop it.
January 21, 2021
Mohammad Berno / Iranian Presidency Office / AP
Proponents of the Iran nuclear agreement are sounding the alarm. In 2018, the United States withdrew from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, and since then, Iran has increased the quality and quantity of its uranium enrichment well beyond what the deal allows. Recently, it has even begun enriching uranium to 20 percent, a short distance away from weapons-grade. Iran, JCPOA advocates say, is closer today to producing a bomb than it was in 2015, when the deal was concluded. Only the deal’s renewal, they insist, can prevent the nightmare of a nuclear Iran.