The pending nuclear deal is premised on the claim that, were Iran to violate its terms, the U.S. would have the time and ability to detect and punish non-compliance before the Islamic Republic created a working bomb. But critics have pointed out that this claim is, at best, overly optimistic. Armin Rosen writes:

The one-year-breakout timeline is crucial to any future deal’s success. Based on the series of understandings announced in Lausanne, Switzerland, in April, the coming agreement doesn’t address Iran’s ballistic-missile arsenal, which is perhaps the largest and most developed of any state without nuclear weapons. Critics allege that the framework includes insufficient prohibitions on nuclear research and development, and that the anticipated accord may give Iran a pass on disclosing much of its past nuclear-weaponization activities.

[Furthermore, the] deal as currently envisioned wouldn’t require Iran to destroy or permanently close any of its [existing] nuclear infrastructure. Dismantled centrifuges could remain in storage inside of Iran, and all Iranian nuclear facilities—including previously undeclared installations like Fordow, a site built into a mountain inside of an Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps base—would be allowed to remain open. Most of the more onerous uranium-enrichment restrictions would be phased out ten years into a deal. And that’s on top of the lifting of most U.S. and international sanctions against Iran. . . .

Advocates of the deal argue that these trade-offs don’t preclude the accomplishment of its primary objective. Even with these concessions, Iran will supposedly remain far enough away from a nuclear-weapons capability that any movement toward weaponization could be detected and then either deterred, punished, or prevented.

This makes the accuracy of the one-year breakout estimate a crucial underlying assumption of a future deal. There will be troubling implications for the future of both the Middle East and global nuclear proliferation if it turns out to be wrong.

Robert Satloff has some harsh words for the U.S. government in this regard, words I take especially seriously because Satloff is someone inclined to political moderation. Why, he asks, have American diplomats failed to achieve anything in their endless rounds of talks in Doha and Cairo? Because

there is simply not enough pressure on Hamas to change course, accept a deal, and release the remaining October 7 hostages, stuck in nightmarish captivity. . . . In this environment, why should Hamas change course?

Publicly, the U.S. should bite the bullet and urge Israel to complete the main battle operations in Gaza—i.e., the Rafah operation—as swiftly and efficiently as possible. We should be assertively assisting with the humanitarian side of this.

Satloff had more to say about the hostages, especially the five American ones, in a speech he gave recently:

I am ashamed—ashamed of how we have allowed the story of the hostages to get lost in the noise of the war that followed their capture; ashamed of how we have permitted their release to be a bargaining chip in some larger political negotiation; ashamed of how we have failed to give them the respect and dignity and our wholehearted demand for Red Cross access and care and medicine that is our normal, usual demand for hostages.

If they were taken by Boko Haram, everyone would know their name. If they were taken by the Taliban, everyone would tie a yellow ribbon around a tree for them. If they were taken by Islamic State, kids would learn about them in school.

It is repugnant to see their freedom as just one item on the bargaining table with Hamas, as though they were chattel. These are Americans—and they deserve to be backed by the full faith and credit of the United States.