Will a desperate Biden make even more concessions?
President Joe Biden is on the verge of making another colossal foreign policy blunder. He wants to restore the disastrous nuclear deal with Iran known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) that the Obama-Biden administration had concluded in 2015, along with Britain, France, Germany, Russia, and China. Some of the same Obama-Biden administration players involved in the original negotiations, who strongly denounced former President Donald Trump’s wise decision to withdraw from their fatally flawed handiwork, are determined to bring it back to life.
President Biden appears ready to make major concessions to Iran. For example, as reported by the Wall Street Journal, “Iran’s 'breakout time'—the duration needed to amass enough nuclear fuel [f]or a bomb—could be as little as six months,” under a restored deal as opposed to the JCPOA’s original twelve-month breakout time. As of mid-February, Iran had already amassed 33.2 kilograms of uranium material enriched to the 60 percent level, nearly double the amount it had in early November of last year.
“Iran would need around 40 kilograms of 60% enriched uranium to produce enough weapons-grade nuclear fuel for a weapon,” the Wall Street Journal reported. This means that Iran already has about three-quarters of what it would require to advance quickly to weapon-grade 90% fuel for a nuclear bomb.
Iran has put itself in the driver’s seat by plowing ahead to reach an incredibly short breakout time, enabling the regime to extort more concessions from the Biden administration. The war in Ukraine, which is destabilizing the global energy market, also provides the Iranian regime with a stronger bargaining position to achieve the maximum lifting of sanctions and unfreezing of Iran’s assets. The regime is counting on the West’s need for Iranian oil to make up for shortfalls from other oil producing countries.
President Biden finally announced the cut-off of U.S. oil and gas imports from Russia on March 8th. But instead of reversing his war on fossil fuels policies that have stymied more drilling and production of oil in the energy-rich United States, the Biden administration already has its hand out to Venezuela and Saudi Arabia for their oil to make up for the resulting shortfall. And the Biden administration has its eyes on Iran.
Out of sheer desperation, the Biden administration appears ready to turn to Iran to add its own oil to the global oil supply. This means agreeing to a nuclear deal on Iran’s terms. It is a quick fix to show the American people that the Biden administration is taking action to reduce the price of gasoline that they are paying at the pump. Anything to avoid offending the climate change activists at home, which would happen if the administration were to do the sensible thing and remove barriers it has imposed against more domestic production of oil and gas.
While trying to isolate Russia economically and diplomatically for its invasion of Ukraine, the Biden administration is negotiating alongside Russia (and China) to restore the JCPOA. Even worse, since Iran has refused to negotiate face-to-face with U.S. representatives, the Biden administration has outsourced the principal intermediary role to Russia.
“Russia has been instrumental in shaping a compromise,” Reuters has reported, based on information from diplomats.
If there is a deal, Iran will most likely ship its excess uranium over the agreed upon cap to none other than Russia as it did the last time around. Only this time, Iran would be doing so in concert with a country that has just brought the world perilously close to...
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