The Iranian nuclear deal for dummies

Reprinted from Digby's blog "Hullabaloo." 

"The Iran Deal for dummies"
 
"From the Atlantic:

To assess the impact of the accord that the United States and its partners reached with Iran on Thursday, it is useful to start with five bottom lines. To what questions are 15,000, 12,000, 10, 5, and 0 the answer?

15,000 is the number of pounds of low-enriched uranium that would be neutralized. 

12,000 is the number of centrifuges that would be decommissioned. 

10 is the number of months by which Iran’s “breakout” timeline to a bomb would be extended. 

5 is the number of bombs’ worth of low-enriched uranium that would be neutralized. 

0 is the number of bombs’ worth of plutonium that Iran would be able to produce.

Of course, the framework accord still has to be translated into a more specific, binding agreement. And even more important, assuming that is done, the agreement has to be implemented. But if this happens, a state that currently has seven bombs’ worth of enriched uranium and 19,000 centrifuges, and is six weeks away from breaking out to produce the core of a bomb, will have been pushed back materially on each of these fronts. Moreover, the route to a bomb using plutonium rather than uranium, which Iran has pursued for over a decade at its Arak facility, will have been abandoned.

". . .  Honestly, I cannot fathom how people can be against even trying this. The only explanation is that they just want war and then occupation. That's unfortunately where imperialist ambitions always lead. And these people have some serious imperialist ambitions."

digby 4/04/2015 02:00:00 PM

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I agree with digby on this.   The opposition hawks in Congress seem to be acting out of (1) blind mistrust of Iran, (2) blind loyalty to Israel, (3) blind hatred of Obama, (4) addiction to money from the Israeli lobby and from Sheldon Adelson, or (5) just the sheer love of war and American imperialism.

The only way you can reach a diplomatic agreement of something like this is by adopting the stance of "trust but verify."    This agreement has the most stringent inspection requirements in history.  We would know immediately if the Iranians are cheating and could take the same action then as they want to do now.

In this context, I'm willing to give the Iranians the opportunity to prove that they want to change how they relate to the world.

Ralph