Don't Count on Regime Change to Stop Iran's Nuclear Program
Editor’s Note: This article is part of a debate about whether to stay in the Iran deal. Read the other entries here.
It now looks like President Trump intends to withdraw from the nuclear deal, with the support of critics like Reuel Marc Gerecht, who in what he sees as the deal’s flaws. To sum up, as I understand it, Gerecht would have only accepted, and would now only accept, a fundamentally different nuclear deal—i.e. one that forever prohibited Iran from having an enrichment program, even for energy production and under international monitoring; forever banned any advanced centrifuge research and development; provided for snap, anytime/anywhere inspections (including military bases); required an admission of past deception about its nuclear-weapons development; required changes to Iranian policy in the region; and banned testing or development of long-range ballistic missiles, even if Iran agreed to all the nuclear demands. And if he didn’t get all of that he would have “walked away,” as he writes a “stronger
