But What About Bushehr?

Even as more Senators and Representatives are coming out either for, or against, the Iran deal, we continue learn more about just what wasn’t covered. First was the revelation of two “secret side deals,” which covered how the Iranian regime would be permitted to literally provide their own samples at the Parchin facility, and regarding how the IAEA would (or wouldn’t) be allowed to address the Possible Military Dimensions (PMDs) of Iran’s nuclear program.

Now there’s concern that there may yet be a third “secret deal”, this one between Russia and Iran. The writers at IranTruth.org note that, like Parchin,  Iran’s pressurized water reactor at Bushehr is also not addressed in the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), a fact noticed early on by a sharp-eyed Bill Gertz in the Washington Free Beacon.

If there is a deal covering Bushehr, then it would likely be a bilateral agreement  through Russia, not the IAEA. That would be logical because Russia is already in an agreement to provide Iran with 8 light water reactors at the Iranian site, and because Russian engineers played the lead role in building the facility, which the two countries own jointly.

The disposition of Bushehr is highly significant because as a pressurized water reactor, it is able to produce Plutonium-239, a key ingredient in the Plutonium path to a nuclear weapon. Stopping the Plutonium pathway to the bomb was one of nine red lines the Center for Security Policy warned any good Iran deal would need to adequately address.

If there is a bilateral deal between Russia and Iran regarding Bushehr, the United States could easily find itself cut off from any method of inspecting how Bushehr is being run, as Russia could invoke its security council vote to prohibit inspections, and the Iranians have already adamantly asserted that no U.S. inspectors will be permitted to visit any nuclear sites.

Are legislators voting for the Iran Deal prepared for the possibility that Vladmir Putin may be the only man standing between Iran and the Plutonium path to a nuclear bomb? Are they willing to trust that if a deal was cut between Russia and Iran it adequately addresses their concerns?