The Nuclear Deal Gives a Dangerous Amount of Atomic Expertise to Iran

The nuclear deal that the six world powers signed with Iran last week commits the United States to eventually removing a ban on Iranian graduate students applying for advanced degrees in nuclear sciences at American universities.

Other clauses in the agreement establish a framework for nuclear cooperation between the deal's other signatories — which happen to be world leaders in nuclear technology — and Tehran. That the deal would trade economic relief for nuclear concessions was to be expected. Education, however, is a different matter.

A number of little-noticed clauses in the agreement give Iran access to advanced Western nuclear technology, training, knowledge and expertise. By the time the international embargo against Tehran’s missiles is removed on year eight of the deal, and the other nuclear restrictions are lifted between years ten and fifteen, Iran will have reduced its knowledge gap with Western nuclear scientists to such an extent that if its leaders decide to dash to a weapon, their success will owe in no small part to Western assistance.

Even the deal’s proponents in the Obama administration have conceded that Iran can, once the agreement’s limitations begin to expire, quickly assemble a nuclear weapon. In April, soon after the Lausanne framework nuclear agreement was concluded, President Obama stated that “by year 13, 14, 15,” Iran would have “advanced centrifuges that enrich uranium fairly rapidly, and at that point the breakout times would have shrunk almost down to zero.”

The President is confident that the verification regime established under the agreement (coupled with the work of the UN’s International Atomic Energy Agency) will give the world such comprehensive insight into Iran’s past nuclear activities that even if Iran sought a nuclear weapon, its activities would become public knowledge fairly quickly.

Knowledge, however, is a two-way street. It defies reason that the Vienna agreement can impose stringent restrictions and verifications on Iran’s nuclear activities while opening up the inner sanctum of Western science to Iranian nuclear personnel.

The United States has committed itself to end the “Exclusion of Iranian citizens from higher education coursework related to careers in nuclear science, nuclear engineering or the energy sector” by year eight of the agreement. That means that as restrictions on Iran’s nuclear program begin to fade, Iranian graduates will be free to pursue nuclear studies at institutions like CalTech or MIT.

To be fair, Iranian students have long been coming to US campuses, and many opt to stay in America once they complete their studies. But with Iran’s nuclear industry opening up under the terms of the deal, many such students will likely return to the Islamic Republic after earning their degrees. By the time the deal sunsets, a cohort of American-trained Iranian nuclear scientists and engineers will be ready to apply for jobs in Tehran, Fordow, Isfahan and Natanz.

And it’s not just that the West will soon be training their scientists. The agreement allows Iran to continue research and development for next-generation centrifuges. Iranian efforts to improve their performance and design will benefit from Western-educated scientists, and the deal stipulates a variety of mechanisms for civil-nuclear cooperation, including even measures to protect Iranian facilities against nuclear sabotage.

Iranian scientists will now benefit from rubbing shoulders and sharing knowledge with their European, Russian, Chinese, and American counterparts. They will learn from their experience and from being exposed to technology they could not previously acquire, let alone design, on their own.

If Iran’s leaders – by year 13, 14 or 15 – decide to build a nuclear bomb, they will be able to tap into this vast body of knowledge acquired through the Vienna agreement. Their graduates from American universities will be coming home by then, ready to assist.

President Obama is confident that, if that happens, “the option of a future president to take action … is undiminished.” That statement would stand on stronger ground had the Vienna agreement denied Iran access to the nuclear knowledge that it has just gifted.

Emanuele Ottolenghi is a Senior Fellow at Foundation for Defense of Democracies. Follow him on Twitter @eottolenghi