For more than two decades, the Iranian regime has played a dangerous and calculated game of deception with the West by skillfully masking its nuclear ambitions under the pretense of "civilian use." This is not a new tactic — it's a time-tested playbook used by rogue regimes to buy time, mislead international watchdogs, and continue marching in the shadows toward nuclear weapons and the missiles to them.
Tehran has manipulated global diplomacy by leveraging Western naivety and its obsession with appeasement and the search for "peace" to keep all the core elements of its nuclear program intact.
While negotiations and deals were struck in the name of "peace," Iran preserved and advanced the infrastructure necessary to build nuclear bombs. Preserving its nuclear programs by proliferating secret sites under the deceitful banner of civilian energy has allowed the regime to reap the benefits of economic deals while continuing to lie and manipulate.
US President Donald J. Trump recently signaled a willingness to allow Iran a "civilian" nuclear program. This is a mind-bogglingly dangerous compromise that would only serve to catapult Iran's nuclear ambitions into existence. Trump's negotiating team must recognize that this is not diplomacy — it is surrender under the illusion of progress. It is being fooled in order not to return to Washington looking empty-handed.
Let us be honest: Iran does not need nuclear energy. This is a country sitting on some of the largest reserves of oil and natural gas in the entire world. If Iran needs energy for civilian purposes, it has enough oil for its domestic needs to be the cheapest in the world. Instead, Iran is insisting on developing and enriching uranium — a process that is expensive, technologically complex, and totally unnecessary for energy needs in a nation overflowing with oil as its primary natural resource.
The request alone should set off alarm bells. The only purpose for an Iranian nuclear program of any kind is to develop the capability to produce nuclear weapons. The longer the US allows Iran to prolong this charade, the closer the regime gets to its ultimate goal: joining the ranks of nuclear-armed rogue states and using that power to intimidate, attack, and dominate the region.
Even the International Atomic Energy Agency, which has often bent over backwards to give Iran the benefit of the doubt, has confirmed that Iran is enriching uranium to 60% purity—a level absurdly beyond what is needed for civilian energy use and weeks close to the 90% threshold required for nuclear weapons. There is no legitimate, peaceful explanation for this level of enrichment. Iran continues to stonewall inspectors, hide facilities, and test ballistic missiles — all while claiming it has no intention of building a bomb. These are not the actions of a peaceful government. These are the moves of a dictatorship that has gulled many negotiators most of the time while it inched ever closer to its nuclear weapons breakout while laughing behind the scenes at a West too afraid or too foolish to stop them.
Despite mountains of evidence, the international response has been pathetic; Over and over again, the world — especially under weak, liberal leadership — has settled for deals that leave the core infrastructure of Iran's nuclear program untouched. Under the Obama administration's JCPOA, Iran was allowed to keep its centrifuges, its enriched uranium stockpile, and its ballistic missile development programs. The deal was not a victory for peace — it was a time-buying scam that not only enabled but legitimized Iran's nuclear progress.
Now, after President Trump's return, the world is watching to see whether the United States really has the backbone to compel Iran completely to dismantle its nuclear weapons infrastructure – or actually to deliver the alternative.
Any deal that permits Iran to keep centrifuges spinning, continue uranium enrichment, or store nuclear material is a deal that guarantees a future nuclear-armed Iran. We cannot afford a disastrous "JCPOA, the Sequel."
The stakes are not only about the existence of Israel or the United Stares, which for more than 40 years the regime has been threatening to destroy. Iran will unleash the threat of "annihilation or submission" across the Middle East, as well as unlimited nuclear arms races among the countries that feel threatened. Gulf states, sensibly terrified by the prospect of Iranian nuclear dominance, will not wait for America's notoriously vacillating promises of protection. Those nations will seek their own nuclear weapons. The message is simple: if the U.S. cannot stop Iran, countries of the region will arm themselves. That will mean a nuclear arms race across one of the most volatile, conflict-ridden parts of the world. Imagine a Middle East where not only Iran, but multiple countries, possess nuclear weapons. War will be more likely than ever.
If the Trump administration fails either to dismantle or destroy Iran's nuclear infrastructure now — fully, permanently, and without compromise — it will be remembered as the moment America surrendered its status as a global superpower.
The enemies of freedom — Putin, Xi, Khamenei and others — are watching. They are probing for weakness. If they see that Washington under Trump willing to accept another bogus deal or tolerate Iran's lies in the name of diplomacy, they will know that the era of America as the world's leading superpower is over.
If Trump and his team end up talking tough and then signing a weak deal and walking away while Iran continues harboring a nuclear program in secret, Trump's legacy as a tough, America-first leader will effectively be over.
The Iranian regime is not to be trusted. Its so-called "civilian" nuclear program is a Trojan horse, a fraud designed to keep the West paralyzed. There have to be no more talks, no more half-measures, no more inspectors playing cat and mouse with a regime that lies to their faces with impunity. The only acceptable outcome is either full dismantlement -- no centrifuges and enriched uranium for "civilian use", no secret sites -- or unfortunately, the less pretty "Plan B," if Trump and his administration are to have any credibility.
Now is the time for courage. The Trump administration, supported by leaders like Secretary of State Marco Rubio and envoy Steve Witkoff need to act with the resolve of a Ronald Reagan, not the weakness of the presidents who succeeded him. Iran's nuclear program must not be coddled, but crushed.
Dr. Majid Rafizadeh, is a political scientist, Harvard-educated analyst, and board member of Harvard International Review. He has authored several books on the US foreign policy. He can be reached at dr.rafizadeh@post.harvard.edu
