Ernie Moniz: Reflections on the JCPOA

Former U.S. Secretary of Energy Ernest Moniz joins Decouple to examine the history of Iran’s nuclear program and the negotiations that produced the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action. As the agreement’s lead American technical negotiator, Moniz offers a rare inside account of his intensive discussions with Iranian nuclear chief Ali Akbar Salehi, explaining how personal trust helped make an extraordinarily difficult negotiation possible. He details the JCPOA’s restrictions on uranium enrichment and argues that its unprecedented inspection, verification and transparency provisions were even more important than its limits on nuclear technology.

The conversation also explores the origins of Iran’s nuclear ambitions, including the formative impact of the Iran–Iraq War, the country’s former structured weapons program and its subsequent accumulation of uranium enriched to 60 percent. Moniz assesses the consequences of the United States’ 2018 withdrawal from the JCPOA, the limits of military action, the weakening of Iran’s civilian leadership and the increasingly difficult prospects for renewed negotiations. Despite these obstacles, he argues that diplomacy remains the only durable path to resolving Iran’s nuclear program, and potentially the wider challenges posed by its missiles, drones and regional proxies.

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