Is the Obama administration preparing the ground for an Iran nuclear deal — one in which both sides can claim victory?
Wendy Sherman, the top U.S. negotiator, in an unusually detailed and optimistic speech on Oct. 23, for the first time suggested that the pieces of a deal were in place and all that was needed was Iranian willingness to wrap it up by the Nov. 24 deadline.
“I can tell you that all the components of a plan that should be acceptable to both sides are on the table,” Sherman, an undersecretary of state, said at a Center for Strategic and International Studies symposium on the talks. “We have made impressive progress on issues that originally seemed intractable. We have cleared up misunderstandings and held exhaustive discussions on every element of a possible text.”
The United States and other major powers have said that a deal would have to include a tough inspection regime, disabling a plutonium reactor at the Arak nuclear facility and a sharp reduction in Iran’s enrichment capability. Sherman named the capability condition as the sticking point of “this painstaking and difficult negotiation.”
Alireza Nader, an Iran analyst at the Rand Corp., a think tank that has advised the Pentagon, said that Sherman was referring to a “red line” laid down over the summer by Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Khameini, when he said Iran would not dismantle any of its more than 19,000 centrifuges. Of those centrifuges, more than 9,000 are believed to be operational.
The United States reportedly wants that reduced to 4,500 centrifuges, which it believes will keep Iran from reaching weapons breakout ability.
“I’m not sure Iran is going to stick with that maximalist position,” said Nader, who said that in the wake of Sherman’s speech, he would not rule out a deal by Nov. 24.
Mark Dubowitz, the director of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies think tank who has helped shape congressional sanctions on Iran and been a skeptic of the talks, said there could be creative workarounds in which both sides could claim victory on the centrifuges issue.
“I think President Obama clearly wants a deal, and has instructed the negotiators to get a deal, and has floated a number of creative proposals to accommodate the supreme leader’s red lines,” Dubowitz said.