The last time one-on-one talks of major import between the United States and Iran occurred, baseball legend Willie Stargell led the Pittsburgh Pirates to a World Series championship. In short, U.S. policy towards Iran hasn't changed dramatically since Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi was run out of Tehran in the late 1970s — until last week. In Geneva, senior U.S. and Iranian diplomats met during lunch for the highest-level diplomatic exchange in 30 years between the estranged nations, spurred by recent revelations on Iran's advanced nuclear capabilities. President Barack Obama cheered the developments as his national security adviser, James Jones, indicated that "things are moving in the right direction."
But are they really? If Obama's aim is to simply open a line of dialogue with Iran, then he has certainly succeeded. But if his goal is to make America safer, diplomatic talks with Iran are not really addressing the key issues that put America and its allies at risk. Ultimately, knowledge of Iran's nuclear capabilities should not be a surprise or a new revelation worthy of spurring talks. Furthermore, focusing exclusively on Iran's uranium enrichment program — and whether or not it is yet weapons-grade — ignores a much more immediate threat.
Iran has had, since the mid-1980s, "an organized structure dedicated to acquiring and developing nuclear weapons," according to former Secretary of State Warren Christopher. Furthermore, 30-year Jane's International Defense Review veteran Al J. Venter argues that cooperation between Iran, Russia and China in the 1980s led to construction of several sub-critical Iranian reactors. Additionally, the Chinese engineered heavy-water facilities, while also providing large quantities of enrichment-expedient uranium hexafluoride to Iran. These resources have allowed for the construction of facilities at Natanz, Arak, Ardekan, Bushehr and elsewhere over the past 25 years. In short, Iranian nuclear pursuits didn't start in 2003.
Tehran, however, doesn't need to pursue the costly, lengthy and risky development of a conventional nuclear weapons program to have an immediate, massive impact on regional and international politics – especially when considering the current global supply of easily available, cheap fissile material. The Institute for Science and International Security has concluded that Russia cannot account for the security of its radioactive material stockpiles, particularly within the former USSR satellites in the Caucasus. These stockpiles are not sufficiently secured, making it easy for those in the market like Iran to gain cheap, consistent access to radioactive material.
Furthermore, only a very small amount of radioactive material is required to adequately arm a radiological dispersal device (RDD), or dirty bomb. RDDs should be the pre-eminent concern for the United States, particularly when considering Iran's influence over Hezbollah and Hezbollah's global reach — in 2007 Hezbollah was caught trafficking narcotics in Los Angeles, only one of its many U.S. operations in the very recent past. Iran could easily obtain a small quantity of radioactive material from a poorly-guarded stockpile, smuggle it abroad via Hezbollah and activate the cell — detonating the RDD with minimal effort, overhead cost or risk of detection. The threat of nuclear smuggling is very real; International Atomic Energy Agency-reported smuggling incidents, a very small percentage of all global cases, tally into three figures.
The United States, through diplomacy, is seeking a conventional solution to a very unconventional security threat. Diplomacy is an honorable aspiration, and certainly one of the values upon which U.S. foreign policy was built. The United States should not necessarily discontinue its efforts in engaging Tehran, or in furthering the dialogue that began last week. However, lunch between diplomats in Switzerland will not curb the smuggling of fissile material. Talks with Iran address issues — very large issues, in fact — but not the right ones.
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Teddy Minch is a senior majoring in political science. He hosts "The Rundown," a show that airs from 3 to 5 p.m. every Friday on WMFO. He can be reached at Theodore.Minch@tufts.edu.
