A fifth round of nuclear talks between Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi and U.S. special envoy Steve Witkoff concluded in Rome last week with \u201csome but not conclusive\u201d progress, the talks\u2019 Omani mediator said.<\/p>\n
The primary sticking point remains Iran\u2019s enrichment capacity. Iran has long maintained that it has a legal right to enrich uranium<\/a> under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), a claim that the United States has consistently rejected. According to Washington\u2019s interpretation<\/a>, the NPT does not confer an explicit right to enrichment. The United States is now demanding that Iran completely give up its enrichment program, but this is a maximalist demand that Iran will not accept.<\/p>\n Araghchi, who leads Iran\u2019s talks with the United States, recently reaffirmed his country\u2019s position when he said<\/a> that while a deal to ensure that Iran would not have nuclear weapons was \u201cwithin reach,\u201d enrichment \u201cwill continue with or without a deal.\u201d While speaking about U.S. demands on May 20, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei\u2014Iran\u2019s supreme leader\u2014said<\/a> that \u201cno one in Iran is waiting for their permission. The Islamic Republic has its own policies and direction\u2014and it will stick to them.\u201d<\/p>\n On the American side there are two factions, but both are united in a refusal to allow Iran its domestic enrichment capacity. Witkoff, who had previously hinted<\/a> that Washington could accept a limited enrichment capacity, reversed his position on May 18 when he said<\/a> that the United States \u201ccannot allow even 1 percent of an enrichment capability.\u201d<\/p>\n Trump administration officials have suggested that Washington could accept a civilian nuclear program in Iran\u2014as long as there was no enrichment. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said<\/a> in April that \u201cif Iran wants a civil nuclear program, they can have one just like many other countries in the world\u201d\u2014one in which \u201cthey import enriched material.\u201d<\/p>\n But even though this position marks a clear departure<\/a> from 1990s, when the U.S. officials rejected any nuclear programs in Iran\u2014even for civilian purposes\u2014it still won\u2019t lead to the agreement that both sides want. That\u2019s because Iran\u2019s stance on owning the full nuclear fuel cycle predates the Islamic Republic. In fact, it was this very point that has led to the enduring standoff between Iran and the United States.<\/p>\n In the 1970s, the Shah of Iran\u2014then a close U.S. ally\u2014poured Tehran\u2019s massive oil revenues into an ambitious nuclear program. In June 1974, Iran signed<\/a> a $4 billion deal with France to construct five 1,000-megawatt nuclear reactors, scheduled for completion by 1985. In November of the same year, Iran signed a contract with the West German company Kraftwerk Union, for the construction of two 1,200-megawatt light water reactors (Iran I and Iran II) in Bushehr. The terms of this agreement stipulated that once the reactors were completed, Iran\u2014in consultation with West Germany\u2014would build fuel reprocessing installations.<\/p>\n While Iranians expressed interest in purchasing reactors from the United States as well, negotiations with Washington were far more difficult. After India\u2019s Peaceful Nuclear Explosion\u201d in May 1974, Washington tightened controls on the export of sensitive technologies to developing countries, including Iran. Ironically, India conducted its test while U.S. Atomic Energy Commission Chair Dixy Lee Ray was visiting Tehran to discuss nuclear cooperation and the training of Iranian scientists.<\/p>\n American officials grew increasingly uneasy about what might happen if a hostile regime succeeded the shah. A June 1974 memorandum<\/a> to Defense Secretary James Schlesinger warned that \u201c[i]f Iran were to seek a weapons capability \u2026 the annual plutonium production from the planned 20,000 MW Iranian nuclear power program will be equivalent to 600-700 warheads.\u201d<\/p>\n The Americans were also concerned about the shah\u2019s true intentions. In October 1977, CIA psychiatrist Jerrold Post warned in a top secret memorandum\u2014reviewed by the author\u2014that the agency lacked confidence about the shah\u2019s commitments concerning nuclear weapons. By 1978, the Iranian military, under the supervision of a general, was discreetly pursuing nuclear weapons-related research.<\/p>\n The core dispute between Tehran and Washington centered on plutonium reprocessing\u2014the chemical extraction of plutonium from spent nuclear fuel, which could then be used in developing nuclear weapons. The United States pressed its close ally, the shah, to demonstrate \u201cstatesmanship<\/a>\u201d on the world stage by abandoning plans for national reprocessing and accepting a U.S. veto over how Iran could manage the spent fuel from American-supplied reactors.<\/p>\n This demand posed a significant dilemma for Tehran. As Akbar Etemad\u2014the Shah\u2019s nuclear chief and the father of Iran\u2019s nuclear program\u2014argued in an interview<\/a> years later, \u201cWe could not work with the Americans because they told us that if you buy the fuel from us\u2026 we must consent to what you do with the spent fuel.\u201d Known as the \u201cright of prior consent,\u201d this condition would have restricted Iran from reprocessing even its own spent fuel\u2014regardless of whether it came from a U.S.-made reactor. From the perspective of the Iranians, such constraints violated their country\u2019s national sovereignty and had to be resisted.<\/p>\n Iranian officials, including Etemad and the shah himself, framed the issue of national reprocessing as both a legal entitlement and a matter of national sovereignty. In their negotiations with the United States, Iranian officials asserted that the NPT guaranteed access to the full spectrum of peaceful nuclear technology, \u201cincluding reprocessing<\/a>\u201d\u2014a position that the United States rejected.<\/p>\n Nuclear nationalism also played a role in Tehran\u2019s intransigence in nuclear talks. Etemad succinctly captured this when he asserted<\/a> publicly that \u201cno country should think they have the right to dictate nuclear policy to another.\u201d The shah was equally blunt: \u201cYou are asking us for safeguards that are incompatible with our sovereignty,\u201d he had complained<\/a> to U.S. officials.<\/p>\n Despite the disagreements over the purchase of reactors, which U.S. officials said had become a \u201cserious irritant<\/a>\u201d in bilateral relations, Washington\u2014sensitive to shah\u2019s views\u2014attempted to mitigate his concerns over the perceived discriminatory attitude. In a November 1975 telegram, Secretary of State Henry Kissinger instructed<\/a> Richard Helms, then the U.S. ambassador to Iran, to convey to the Iranians that the United States was \u201cnot in any way singling Iran out for special, disadvantageous treatment.\u201d Even when the Ford administration offered to soften the language\u2014replacing the demand for \u201cveto rights\u201d with a request for a \u201crigorously safeguarded<\/a>\u201d program\u2014Iran still refused.<\/p>\n Tehran also rejected a U.S. proposal to establish a multinational reprocessing center in Iran, citing poor relations with neighboring states. Notably, Kissinger later reversed course on the idea of multinational reprocessing centers, calling it a \u201cfraud<\/a>.\u201d The Ford administration ultimately failed to reach an agreement with Iran because of Tehran\u2019s strong opposition to U.S. demands.<\/p>\n Nonetheless, in February 1977, Iran ultimately agreed to scale back its demands on reprocessing in exchange for the United States granting it \u201cmost favored nation\u201d status\u2014ensuring that Iran received equal treatment in nuclear cooperation as other U.S. partners. Although an agreement was finally signed in July 1978 for the sale of nuclear reactors, it was never implemented due to the political turmoil that culminated in the shah\u2019s overthrow in February 1979.<\/p>\n What followed was not the end of Iran\u2019s nuclear ambitions, but their transformation\u2014recast under a new regime with similar goals and with a touch of anti-imperialism.<\/p>\n When the Islamic Republic inherited the shah\u2019s nuclear program, it initially paused and curtailed its activities. But before long, it resumed the effort in 1982\u2014ultimately pursuing a path that mirrored the ambitions of its predecessor. Against the expectations of many, Iran achieved<\/a> uranium enrichment capacity by the summer of 1999 and has steadily expanded it ever since. It has sought to use its nuclear program as a bargaining chip to get economic and trade concessions from the West.<\/p>\n It took the United States a long time to recognize that what it was asking for from Iran was not feasible. The Clinton administration categorically rejected any nuclear program in Iran, with Secretary of State Warren Christopher asserting<\/a> in May 1995 that \u201cwe think the entire [Iranian] nuclear program should be brought to an end.\u201d<\/p>\n Later, President George W. Bush\u2019s national security advisor, Condoleezza Rice, admitted<\/a> that the United States would have to concede to some nuclear program in the country, albeit one with zero enrichment. It was only when President Barack Obama recognized that the United States could not demand zero enrichment, let alone zero nuclear program, that a diplomatic solution could finally be found.<\/p>\n Yet some hard-line figures in Washington, D.C., including recently ousted National Security Advisor Mike Waltz and Sen. Lindsey Graham, are persisting in calls<\/a> for a full dismantlement of the Iranian nuclear program\u2014the so called Libya model<\/a>\u2014echoing<\/a> Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu\u2019s demands. From Tehran\u2019s perspective, agreeing to such terms would amount to nothing short of unconditional surrender, and almost certainly will be rejected.<\/p>\n