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97–883 PDF 2016

S. HRG. 114–128

THE IMPLICATIONS OF SANCTIONS RELIEF UNDER

THE IRAN AGREEMENT

HEARING

BEFORE THE

COMMITTEE ON 

BANKING, HOUSING, AND URBAN AFFAIRS 

UNITED STATES SENATE

ONE HUNDRED FOURTEENTH CONGRESS

FIRST SESSION

ON

ASSESSING THE NATURE, IMPLICATIONS, AND POTENTIAL CONSEQUENCES OF IRAN SANCTIONS RELIEF THAT ARE PROPOSED TO 

BE PROVIDED TO IRAN IN RETURN FOR THE NUCLEAR-RELATED 

COMMITMENTS SET FORTH IN THE JOINT COMPREHENSIVE PLAN OF 

ACTION

AUGUST 5, 2015

Printed for the use of the Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs

(

Available at: http://www.fdsys.gov/


BANKI-41578DSA with DISTILLER
COMMITTEE ON BANKING, HOUSING, AND URBAN AFFAIRS 

RICHARD C. SHELBY, Alabama, Chairman

MIKE CRAPO, Idaho 

BOB CORKER, Tennessee 

DAVID VITTER, Louisiana 

PATRICK J. TOOMEY, Pennsylvania 

MARK KIRK, Illinois 

DEAN HELLER, Nevada 

TIM SCOTT, South Carolina 

BEN SASSE, Nebraska 

TOM COTTON, Arkansas 

MIKE ROUNDS, South Dakota 

JERRY MORAN, Kansas 

SHERROD BROWN, Ohio 

JACK REED, Rhode Island 

CHARLES E. SCHUMER, New York 

ROBERT MENENDEZ, New Jersey 

JON TESTER, Montana 

MARK R. WARNER, Virginia 

JEFF MERKLEY, Oregon 

ELIZABETH WARREN, Massachusetts 

HEIDI HEITKAMP, North Dakota 

JOE DONNELLY, Indiana

WILLIAM D. DUHNKE III, Staff Director and Counsel 

MARK POWDEN, Democratic Staff Director

DANA WADE, Deputy Staff Director 

JOHN V. O’HARA, Senior Counsel for Illicit Finance and National Security Policy 

JAY DUNN, Professional Staff Member 

SHELBY BEGANY, Professional Staff Member

LAURA SWANSON, Democratic Deputy Staff Director 

COLIN MCGINNIS, Democratic Policy Director

DAWN RATLIFF, Chief Clerk 

TROY CORNELL, Hearing Clerk 

SHELVIN SIMMONS, IT Director 

JIM CROWELL, Editor

(II)


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CONTENTS

WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 5, 2015

Page

Opening statement of Chairman Shelby ................................................................ 1

Opening statements, comments, or prepared statements of: 

Senator Brown .................................................................................................. 2

WITNESSES 

Wendy Sherman, Under Secretary, Department of State .................................... 4

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 72

Responses to written questions of: 

Senator Crapo ............................................................................................ 163

Senator Warner ......................................................................................... 164

Senator Heitkamp ..................................................................................... 166

Adam J. Szubin, Acting Under Secretary of Treasury for Terrorism and 

Financial Crimes, Department of the Treasury ................................................ 6

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 75

Juan C. Zarate, Chairman & Senior Counselor, Center on Sanctions and 

Illicit Finance, Foundation for Defense of Democracies and Senior Adviser, 

Transnational Threats Project, Center for Strategic and International Studies .......................................................................................................................... 52

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 79

Mark Dubowitz, Executive Director, Center on Sanctions and Illicit Finance, 

Foundation for Defense of Democracies ............................................................. 54

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 101

Matthew Levitt, Ph.D., Fromer-Wexler Fellow and Director, Stein Program 

on Counterterrorism and Intelligence, The Washington Institute for Near 

East Policy ............................................................................................................ 56

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 150

Nicholas Burns, Goodman Professor of Diplomacy and International Relations, Harvard Kennedy School .......................................................................... 58

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 158

(III)


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(1)

THE IMPLICATIONS OF SANCTIONS RELIEF 

UNDER THE IRAN AGREEMENT 

WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 5, 2015

U.S. SENATE, 

COMMITTEE ON BANKING, HOUSING, AND URBAN AFFAIRS, 

Washington, DC. 

The Committee met at 10:04 a.m., in room SD–538, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Richard Shelby, Chairman of the Committee, presiding. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF CHAIRMAN RICHARD C. SHELBY 

Chairman SHELBY. The Committee will come to order. We have 

a very important hearing today, and we have a lot of attendants. 

I will start the hearing off by recognizing my colleague and friend 

Senator Corker because he is tied up on similar stuff himself. 

Senator Corker, go ahead. 

Senator CORKER. Well, I just want to ask the first questions. 

Chairman SHELBY. Oh, you want to go ahead and ask it now? 

Senator CORKER. I will wait. 

Chairman SHELBY. You want to wait? 

Senator CORKER. Yeah. 

Chairman SHELBY. OK. If that satisfies you, that satisfies me. 

Much has changed since the Committee held its hearing on Iran 

and marked up an economic sanctions bill drafted by Senators Kirk 

and Menendez. Since then, there has been a nuclear agreement 

with Iran, after numerous delays. 

Many serious concerns have been raised regarding this deal, including, first and foremost, whether it would actually prevent Iran 

from continuing on its dangerous path to a nuclear

weapon. And although a new deal has been reached, fundamental 

problems remain with Iran, the country upon whose assurances the 

deal rests. 

Iran remains the world’s leading state sponsor of terror. It remains a serious risk to the national security interests of the United 

States. It remains a constant threat to the survival of Israel. And 

despite these grave concerns, it will remain a country with the capability to enrich uranium. 

Under these circumstances, I believe it is critical that Congress 

conduct a thorough review of the agreement as required by the 

Iran Nuclear Agreement Review Act. As part of this review, the 

Banking Committee will focus specifically on analyzing the sanctions relief provided in the nuclear agreement and the implications 

of taking such actions. 


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2

There is general agreement that the pressure of sanctions 

brought Iran to the negotiating table. Congress must consider carefully now the repercussions of lifting those sanctions on our national security and our economic interests. 

In recent weeks, many of my colleagues—on both sides of the 

aisle—have expressed skepticism over several aspects of the agreement. For example, the relief provided to Iran under this deal 

would allow it to rejoin the international economic system. Over 

time, this would give Iran the financial means to increase its support of terrorism and regional destabilization. 

In addition, the mechanism for reimposing the harshest sanctions, should Iran not comply with parts of the deal, may prove ineffective except in the most extreme cases of violation. Many view 

it as Iran’s ‘‘license to cheat,’’ as long as such cheating falls just 

short of a significant violation of the agreement. 

Financial sanctions have become a critical tool of U.S. foreign 

policy, and they are an important part of this Committee’s jurisdiction. In fact, over initial Administration objections, this Committee 

was instrumental in imposing the sanctions that brought Iran to 

negotiations in the first place. I believe it is essential for U.S. sanctions law and policy to continue to evolve to meet any new security 

challenges presented by Iran. 

Today the Committee will hear from two panels. On our first 

panel, we will hear from the Administration’s lead negotiator of the 

agreement and its lead sanctions expert. Following this, the Committee will receive testimony from a panel of experts who have 

studied the agreement extensively, including officials from the previous Administration. 

Senator Brown. 

STATEMENT OF SENATOR SHERROD BROWN 

Senator BROWN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Ms. Sherman and Mr. Szubin, thank you for being here and for 

your very important public service. 

We will hear in the second panel from four witnesses who 

worked in the Bush administration and terrorist finance and Middle East policy. In fact, this whole process began in the Bush administration with a Republican President who was, in the wake of 

the Iraq war, willing to engage Iran diplomatically. 

As Secretary Kerry observed in Senator Corker and Senator 

Menendez’s Committee the other day, the Bush administration laid 

the foundation for what became the Iran agreement: sanctions relief in return for strict limits on Iran’s nuclear program. 

In June 2008, President Bush’s National Security Adviser 

Condoleezza Rice signed a memorandum with the P5+1, which said 

that, in return for Iran doing key things to limit its nuclear program, the United States was ready to do a number of things: One, 

to recognize Iran’s right to nuclear energy for peaceful purposes; 

two, to treat Iran’s nuclear program like any other non-nuclear 

weapons state party to the NPT if international confidence in the 

peaceful nature of its program could be restored; three, provide 

technical and financial aid for peaceful nuclear energy; and, four, 

to work with Iran on confidence-building measures to begin to norVerDate 0ct 09 2002 11:24 Dec 22, 2016 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00006 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 S:\DOCS\97883.TXT SHERYL

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malize trade and economic relations and allow for civil aviation cooperation. That was Condoleezza Rice’s agreement at the time. 

This should sound familiar because it was the early outline of the 

Iran agreement just completed. That is partly why I have been so 

disappointed—so disappointed—in the politicized nature of the debate on this agreement so far, including from colleagues coming out 

in opposition to the agreement within hours of its release even 

though it is over 100 pages long and very dense and complicated 

to read. 

This is one of the most significant national security issues Congress will face in a generation. I say that the most important—this 

will be the second or first most important vote I have ever cast on 

foreign policy, second perhaps only or even more important than 

my vote against the Iraq war a decade-plus ago. 

This should not be subject to partisan attacks and political ad 

wars, even though it has been. Congress should give this agreement the serious debate that it deserves. 

We know Iran is a sponsor of terrorism. We know it destabilizes 

the region. We know it violates the human rights of its people. 

That is why Western policymakers agreed to separate out and try 

to secure agreement on this one specific issue. They knew an Iran 

with a nuclear weapon would be especially dangerous to us, to 

Israel, and to the region. That was the singular goal of P5+1 negotiations: to keep Iran from getting a nuclear weapon. 

Since Iran has deceived the West, verification is key. It is not a 

question of trust. Of course, we must understand how verification 

will work. 

There are a number of questions: Will IAEA have sufficient resources to conduct inspections, not just at declared sites but at suspicious covert sites? Will our intelligence capabilities be able to detect cheating? Will Iran’s breakout time, extended from 2 to 3 

months to a year for the next 10 years, will we have time to respond politically, economically, and, if necessary, militarily if Iran 

makes a break for a weapon? 

And, finally, what actually happens if Congress rejects the deal? 

How would we maintain effective enforcement of our sanctions 

without the support of our P5+1 allies whose Ambassadors again 

made clear to a large group of us yesterday that we would be isolated? What happens if a country like China walks away and 

dodges our sanctions by establishing banks with no correspondent 

relationships in the United States and starts buying Iranian oil 

again? What would a rejection in Congress do to the credibility of 

the United States in the eyes of the rest of the world? 

We need answers to these questions and other questions. Some 

we will hear today; others we have been receiving in classified sessions. 

Over the years, I have joined many of my colleagues in supporting round after round of tough unilateral and international 

sanctions which clearly brought Iran to the table and helped secure 

this agreement. Some predicted that JPOA would unravel the sanctions regime. It has not. Others worried Iran would not comply or 

would benefit unduly from sanctions relief. That has not happened. 

We have an unusually grave and historic responsibility to assess 

the consequences, without partisan rancor, without any partisan 


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4

attacks, to assess the consequences of this agreement, then to 

weigh the risks, weigh the benefits of allowing the President and 

our allies to test Iran’s ability to comply with it. Ultimately, while 

some of us might differ on tactics, it is clear we share the same 

goals to assure that Iran does not achieve a nuclear weapon, to do 

that diplomatically if possible, and to recognize that other alternatives remain on the table and are not precluded by this agreement. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman SHELBY. Thank you, Senator Brown. 

On our first panel we will hear first from the Honorable Wendy 

Sherman. She is the Under Secretary for Political Affairs at the 

U.S. Department of State. 

Next we will hear from Mr. Adam Szubin. He is currently the 

Acting Under Secretary of the Treasury for Terrorism and Financial Crimes. 

Both of your written testimonies will be made part of the hearing 

record today. Ambassador Sherman, you proceed as you wish. 

STATEMENT OF WENDY SHERMAN, UNDER SECRETARY, 

DEPARTMENT OF STATE 

Ms. SHERMAN. Good morning, Chairman Shelby, Ranking Member Brown, and Members of the Committee. Thank you very much 

for this opportunity to discuss the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action that the United States and our international partners recently 

concluded with Iran. To reserve as much time as possible for questions, I will only highlight a few key points. 

By blocking each of Iran’s potential pathways to the fissile material required for a bomb, the deal approved in Vienna ensures that 

Iran’s nuclear program will be peaceful over the long term. 

Under the deal’s provisions, Iran must remove two-thirds of its 

installed centrifuges for 10 years, reduce its stockpile of enriched 

uranium by 98 percent for 15 years, and cap uranium enrichment 

at 3.67 percent, far below the danger point, for 15 years. 

The core of Iran’s heavy-water reactor at Arak will be removed 

and rendered unusable and the facility rebuilt so that it cannot 

produce weapons-grade plutonium. Meanwhile, spent fuel from the 

reactor will be shipped out of the country. 

I emphasize, as both the Chairman and the Ranking Member 

did, this deal is based on verification, not trust. Before obtaining 

any relief from economic sanctions, Iran must meet its major nuclear-related commitments. International inspectors will have unprecedented access to Iran’s declared nuclear facilities and its entire nuclear supply chain, from uranium production to centrifuge 

manufacturing and operation; and if there are suspicious 

undeclared sites, no sites—no sites—will be off limits. 

If Iran fails to meet its responsibilities, we can ensure that sanctions snap back into place, and no country can stop that from happening. If Iran tries to break out of the deal altogether, the world 

will have more time—a year—compared to the 2 months prior to 

the negotiation to respond before Iran could possibly have enough 

fissile material for a bomb. At that point, all the potential options 

that we have today would remain on the table, but we would also 


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5

have the moral authority and international support that comes 

from having exhausted all peaceful alternatives. 

This is also a long-term deal. Some provisions will be in effect 

for 10 years, some for 15, some for 25, and some indefinitely. 

Under the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, Iran is permanently 

prohibited from pursuing a nuclear weapon, and the access and 

verification provisions associated with the NPT will remain in place 

forever, enhanced by the Additional Protocol as a result of the Joint 

Comprehensive Plan of Action. 

The bottom line is that this deal does exactly what it was intended to do when we began formal negotiations nearly 2 years 

ago. At that point, we faced an Iran that was enriching uranium 

up to 20 percent at a facility built in secret and buried in a mountain, and was rapidly stockpiling enriched uranium, had installed 

over 19,000 centrifuges, and was building a heavy-water reactor 

that could produce weapons-grade plutonium at a rate of one to two 

bombs per year. 

The plan agreed to in Vienna will shrink those numbers dramatically, ensure that facilities can only be used for peaceful purposes, 

and put the entire program under a microscope. 

Some have expressed concerns about what might happen 15 

years from now, but without this agreement, as Secretary Kerry 

and Secretary Moniz have said, year 15 would begin today. And if 

the United States walks away from the JCPOA, which has been negotiated every step of the way with our international partners, we 

will be left alone. That would be the worst of all worlds. Iran could 

push ahead with its nuclear program in whatever direction it 

chooses. Everything we have tried to prevent could occur. We 

would not have enhanced transparency, required under the 

JCPOA, to scrutinize every element of Iran’s nuclear program, and 

the multilateral sanctions regime, which the President and Congress worked so hard to put in place, led by this Committee, would 

begin rapidly to unravel—along with the Senate Foreign Relations 

Committee, of course. 

As for Iran’s behavior, the United States is under no illusions. 

This agreement was never based on the expectation that it would 

transform the Iranian regime or cause Tehran to cease contributing 

to sectarian violence and terrorism in the Middle East. That is why 

we have made clear that we will continue our unprecedented levels 

of security cooperation with Israel. 

As Secretary Kerry confirmed earlier this week in Qatar, we will 

work closely with the Gulf States to build their capacity to defend 

themselves and to push back against Iranian influence that destabilizes the region. We will continue to take actions to prevent terrorist groups, including Hamas and Hezbollah, from acquiring 

weapons. We will keep in place all of our own sanctions related to 

human rights, terrorism, WMD, and ballistic missiles. And we will 

continue to insist on the release of U.S. citizens unjustly detained 

in Iran and for information about the whereabouts of Robert 

Levinson so everyone comes home. 

I am almost done, Mr. Chairman. 

We all know that the Middle East today is undergoing severe 

stress due to violent extremism, challenged governance, and sectarian and political rivalries. But every one of those problems 


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6

would be even worse if Iran were allowed to have a nuclear weapon. That is why the agreement reached in Vienna is so important. 

None of us can accept a nuclear-armed Iran. 

Some have said if we double down on sanctions, we could force 

Iran to dismantle its nuclear program. But, quite frankly, ladies 

and gentlemen, Members, that is a fantasy. The whole purpose of 

sanctions was to get Iran to the bargaining table and to create incentives for precisely the kind of good agreement that we were able 

to achieve in Vienna. 

Over 90 countries have issued public statements in support of 

the deal. That list includes all of the countries that were involved 

in these negotiations. Every one of these countries has made tough 

choices to keep the international sanctions regime in place. We 

need their support for implementation. 

It is important to remember that we tried for many years to get 

here, as was pointed out. We worked on this on a bipartisan basis. 

President Obama and this Committee pushed for stronger multilateral sanctions and unilateral sanctions to keep the door open to negotiations. Those sanctions forced Iran to pay a high price, but 

were not enough to make them change course. That required this 

diplomatic initiative. 

Congress played a critical role in getting us to this point. Sanctions achieved their goal by bringing about serious, productive negotiations. Now Congress has a chance to affirm a deal that will 

make our country and our allies safer, a deal that will keep Iran’s 

nuclear program under intense scrutiny, a deal that will ensure the 

international community remains united in demanding that Iran’s 

nuclear activities must be wholly peaceful. 

It is a good deal for America, a good deal for Israel, a good deal 

for the world, and I say to you all, respectively, it deserves your 

support. Thank you. 

Chairman SHELBY. Mr. Szubin. 

STATEMENT OF ADAM J. SZUBIN, ACTING UNDER SECRETARY 

OF THE TREASURY FOR TERRORISM AND FINANCIAL 

CRIMES, DEPARTMENT OF THE TREASURY 

Mr. SZUBIN. Thank you, Chairman Shelby, Ranking Member 

Brown, and distinguished Members of the Committee. Thank you 

for inviting me this morning to appear before you to discuss the nuclear deal with Iran, and it is a pleasure to appear alongside Ambassador Sherman. 

The global sanctions coalition built and led by the United States 

across Administrations and with broad bipartisan support in Congress, including from this Committee, gave us the leverage to secure unprecedented nuclear concessions from Iran. 

From the start, our purpose in imposing these sanctions was to 

build the leverage that could be used to obtain concessions on the 

nuclear file. Our secondary sanctions were meant to be the quid for 

the nuclear quo. 

Our three goals were to close off Iran’s paths to a nuclear weapon, ensure we had the access to know if they were cheating, and 

preserve the leverage to hold them to their commitments and to 

punish them if there was a breach. The JCPOA obtains these purposes. 


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On the sanctions side of the deal, I would like to touch briefly 

on four points that have been much debated: the scope of relief; the 

snapback provisions; the campaign that is ongoing to combat Iran’s 

support to terrorism, the Quds Force and other maligned groups; 

and, finally our remaining leverage in the event that the United 

States walks away from this deal. 

First, we should be clear in describing what sanctions relief will 

and will not mean to Iran. If Iran completes the nuclear steps in 

this deal, which will take it at least 6 to 9 months, the United 

States will lift our nuclear-related secondary sanctions. The primary U.S. sanctions—our embargo—will still be in place with respect to Iran and still be enforced aggressively. Iran will be denied 

access to the world’s most important market and unable to deal in 

the world’s most important currency. 

Our sanctions list with respect to Iran will remain very extensive. We are not relieving sanctions against Iran’s Revolutionary 

Guard Corps, the IRGC, or the Quds Force, or any of their subsidiaries or senior officials. In fact, under this deal more than 225 individuals and companies linked to Iran will remain designated, including major Iranian companies and their financial engineering 

and transportation sectors. 

There has been much discussion of the Iranian foreign reserves 

that are to be released from foreign restricted accounts under the 

deal. If Iran fulfills its nuclear commitments, Iran will receive 

about $50 billion, not two or three times that much. The rest of 

what has been inaccessible will remain inaccessible, and with that 

about $50 billion, Iran will need to try to address an economic hole 

that is half a trillion dollars deep. This President Rouhani’s central 

promise to the Iranian people when he ran for office, and he now 

needs to meet that promise. 

Second, on snap back, if Iran does not uphold its side of the bargain once we have suspended sanctions, we can promptly snap 

back U.S. and U.N. sanctions. Our EU colleagues are positioned to 

do the same. For U.S. sanctions, this can be done rapidly in a matter of days, and we have the discretion to impose everything from 

smaller penalties to the powerful oil and financial restrictions. A 

binary on-or-off snapback would not serve us well, and we have retained maximum flexibility and leverage here. If the sanctions snap 

back, I want to emphasize there is no grandfather clause. No provision in the deal gives signed contracts special status. Once snapback occurs, any new, prospective transactions are sanctionable. 

Third, as we neutralize the most acute threat posed by Iran, its 

nuclear program, we need to be aggressive in countering the array 

of Iran’s other malign activities. This deal in no way limits our 

ability to do so. We have made that clear both to Iran and to our 

partners. This means we will sustain and intensify our use of sanctions against Iran’s backing for terror groups like Hezbollah. We 

will be using our authorities to counter Iran’s interventions in 

Yemen and Syria, Iran’s efforts to oppress those who are standing 

up for human rights in Iran. And we will be using our sanctions 

to block Iran’s attempts to develop their missile program. 

Under the interim deal, while negotiations were ongoing, we took 

action against more than 100 Iranian-linked targets, and we will 

be accelerating that work in the days and months ahead, alongside 


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Israel and our regional allies to combat Iran’s proxies, to interdict 

funds moving through its illicit networks. I will personally be focused intensively on these efforts. 

Fourth, and finally, let me provide my perspective as a sanctions 

official on the implications of walking away from this deal. The 

sanctions regime generated much of its force because the world’s 

major powers, including Iran’s closest trading partners and oil customers, agreed on the goal of ending Iran’s nuclear threat through 

diplomacy. It would be a mistake for the United States to back 

away from this international consensus on the notion that we could 

feasibly unilaterally escalate the pressure and obtain a broader capitulation from Iran. 

U.S. sanctions are extremely powerful. I have seen that firsthand 

in my 10 years at the Treasury Department. But they are now allpowerful. If the United States were to walk away and ask our partners to continue locking up Iran’s reserves, limiting their oil purchases, the coalition we assembled would fray, with unpredictable 

and risky results. It is difficult to see how a broken international 

consensus and less leverage would help us to obtain a ‘‘much better 

deal.’’

Instead, enforcing this deal, securing the far-reaching nuclear 

concessions Iran has made will capitalize on our carefully built economic pressure and deny Iran access to a terrifying weapons capability for the foreseeable future. And as we move forward, you have 

my commitment that the dedicated team at Treasury will continue 

to pursue smart and aggressive sanctions to address Iran’s remaining malign activities. 

Thank you very much, and I look forward to answering your 

questions. 

Chairman SHELBY. I will yield to Senator Corker. 

Senator CORKER. Thank you, Chairman. We have Ms. Romano 

coming in. Actually, we have four briefings and/or hearings today, 

counting this one, so thank you very much. 

I want to start by addressing the Ranking Member’s comments. 

I could not agree more that this should not be a partisan effort. I 

could not agree more. I met with Senator Reid on Monday just to 

talk a little bit about how this debate will take place in September, 

and I can say to every one of my colleagues on both sides of the 

aisle, regardless of how people vote on this, you are not going to 

hear me making comments either way. I think this is a very important vote. What we have tried to do in the Foreign Relations Committee is to make sure that people fully understand the ramifications, so I could not agree more. 

I do want to say that one of the details you left out in your letter 

regarding the Bush agreement was they were not going to agree to 

enrichment, and that is a detail that has kind of been left out. And 

I think that is the Rubicon that has been passed here, is that we 

in essence are—we have three state sponsors of terror that we list: 

Sudan, Syria, and Iran. 

And what this agreement in essence does is it codifies with our 

approval the industrialization of their nuclear program. I mean, 

that is a fact. That has not been debated. 

I want to say that I think Senator Donnelly, Senator Heitkamp, 

Senator Warner, Senator Tester, Senator Schumer, and Senator 


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Menendez all know that I have been very open to supporting an 

agreement. I had one of the few conversations that I have ever had 

with Secretary Kerry—I think we all know him well—where I actually thought he was listening to what I was saying on a Saturday. 

It was interesting. I was standing in my driveway. And I emphasized the importance of these last pieces, and I am talking about 

the inspections, I am talking about the previous military dimensions—I know it is possible military dimensions; we all know they 

are involved militarily—and how important that was not just from 

the standpoint of what it said, but the indication to us that we 

were really going to apply these things, that we were really going 

to be tough and make this agreement stand. And when I got the 

documents—and I have been through all of them extensively—I 

have to say my temperature rose very heavily. And then when I 

saw that we were lifting the conventional ban in 5 years, the missile ban in 8 years, and on the front end lifting the missile test 

ban, on top of what this agreement said, I was very troubled. 

Now, I want to just get the sanctions relief, first of all, in perspective. I know you said, Adam, 50—most people have been saying 

56, but overall it is about 100. But some of that money is tied up 

in deposits for activities that are going to be taking place. But, in 

fairness, it is about $100 billion. Just to put that in perspective, 

their economy is $406 billion. So $100 billion would be like us getting in the next 9 months $4 trillion, just relative to our economy. 

They have all said that over the next 10 years they are going to 

get $400 to $600 billion. That would be like us getting $17.5 trillion 

in our coffers over the next 10 years on a relative basis. 

But here is the question I have. I was very discouraged with the 

final round, and I think maybe I showed a little temperature when 

I went through it and understood it, and I apologize for that. But 

I worked with Senator Cardin, my friend, I began with Senator 

Menendez over an excruciating period of time to make sure that 

the way this agreement worked, the Iran Review Act, we got the 

documents, and we got them in a way that was acceptable to you 

all. He spent all weekend with you, the White House, and others 

on this Iran Review Act. And we were to get all agreements, including the side agreements. 

Now, the very entity that we are counting on to do the inspection, we cannot even get a copy of the side agreement that lays out 

how we are going to deal with Parchin, and I would say to everyone here, if you have not been down to the intel area, you ought 

to see what Iran is doing today while we are sitting here in 

Parchin. You should go look at it or get them to bring it to you in 

the pouch. 

We cannot even see the agreement that relates to how we are 

going to deal with PMD. By the way, all sanctions relief occurs regardless of what they do with PMD. All they have to do, the IAEA 

has to write a report, but if they D-minus it, meaning they do not 

tell us much, or if they A-plus it, they tell us everything, sanctions 

relief still occurs. 

So I would just ask Ms. Sherman, after this painstaking effort 

we went through to make sure we did not ask you to give us

documents you could not give us, you knew what the IAEA protocols were, why now will you not give us the documents that exist 


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that are so important to all of us relative to the integrity of this? 

Why not? 

Ms. SHERMAN. Thank you very much, and thank you, Mr. Chairman, for all of your hard work along with first Senator Menendez 

and then Senator Cardin on this deal and all your attention to it. 

Let me answer your question, but then I want to come back to 

one other point that you made. 

You are about to have the Director General come and meet informally with the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. He made this 

decision on his own because the IAEA is an independent agency. 

You made a bipartisan invitation to him, and he agreed to come, 

and I found out about it about the same time you found out about 

it. So he did this on his own, and I think it will be very useful 

and——

Senator CORKER. But why can’t we get the documents? 

Ms. SHERMAN. I am going to explain. We do not have the documents in the first instance. We do not have them, so we do not 

have them to give to you. And the reason we do not have them is 

because they are Safeguards Confidential. And the Director General explained this to you and what that means. 

The IAEA does Safeguards Confidential Protocols with the 

United States, and they do not share them with anyone else, so 

they do not want to share Iran’s with anyone else. You, I am sure, 

will say to me, ‘‘But, Ambassador Sherman, they did tell you about 

them.’’ And, indeed, they did, and the reason they did is it was in 

the middle of the negotiation, and they wanted to go over with 

some of our experts the technical details. 

So I did see the provisional documents. I did not see the final 

documents. I saw the provisional documents, as did my experts. 

And as you know, there will be a classified, all-Senate briefing this 

afternoon, and I will go over in detail in a classified setting everything I know about——

Senator CORKER. That you have been told. 

Ms. SHERMAN.——these arrangements. 

Senator CORKER. So, again, I want to say we spent 4 days going 

over every detail with the Administration to make sure that the 

documents we were asking for were ones that could be delivered. 

Ms. SHERMAN. And you got every single document we have. 

Every single one. 

Senator CORKER. The entity that we are depending upon for the 

integrity of this deal, we do not even have the agreement. 

Let me ask you this: Do you have any understandings as to 

whether there are limitations, whether the IAEA actually is going 

to have physical access inside Parchin to take samples themselves? 

Would you give that——

Ms. SHERMAN. I will be glad to discuss all of this in a classified 

session this afternoon. And I will say this, also, Senator, on two 

other points you made: What Iran must do is give to the IAEA all 

of the actions and all of the access that they believe is required for 

them to write their final report on the possible military dimensions 

of Iran’s program. The United States has already made its own 

judgment about that. We made it in a National Intelligence Estimate that was made public some years ago, and that estimate said 

publicly that we believe they did have military dimensions of their 


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program up until 2003. So the United States has already made its 

judgment, and we stand by that judgment. 

What this deal is most focused on is where the program is and 

where it is headed, and I quite agree, getting access to Parchin is 

important because it says something about access in the future. 

And establishing the credibility of the IAEA is also important to 

this. So I am very glad that the Director General is coming to see 

you. 

I would add one other point, Mr. Chairman, and that is that 

sanctions, as the Acting Under Secretary said, are absolutely crucial to having brought Iran to the table. But sanctions never 

stopped Iran’s program. When the Obama administration began, 

there were about 5,000 centrifuges. Sanctions were the most extensive ever during the Obama administration, and yet Iran went to 

19,200 centrifuges. So sanctions will not stop their program ever. 

It is negotiations or other options that will do that. 

Senator CORKER. I would just say in closing—and I did not want 

to take this much time. I would just say to every Senator here this 

is a big decision. But, Wendy, and Secretary Kerry, every other 

country, including Iran, knew that because we drafted this Iran Review Act, regardless of what is being said, we were going to have 

the opportunity to weigh in. We were going to have the opportunity 

to weigh in. 

So when people say it is this versus that, especially on these 

issues that we have been so concerned about, and when we saw 

that they were just punted on, negotiated away, issues that we 

with great sincerity talked with the Administration about, and yet 

they were just punted on. I think that each of us has to make our 

own decision based on whether we think this is going to keep Iran 

from getting a nuclear weapon, regardless of where we feel with 

the international community. I just want to—I hope at some point 

on this grandfathering issue—and I will stop. We sent out a document to help everybody. It was nine pages long. And we asked the 

Administration for red lines. We were able to go—I have got resources with staff and others to go through this agreement, and it 

is a huge privilege to do that. So I sent out a CliffsNotes to everybody. And there was one question about whether the gold rush that 

we are all concerned about is going to occur, and that is, people 

going into Iran immediately to sign contracts. And we use the 

words ‘‘grandfathered contracts,’’ and you used some interesting 

words. I guess the question I have—and it is still unanswered. 

And, by the way, our friends in Britain and Germany and France 

and the EU have all told me that contracts are grandfathered. 

Now, they backed off a little bit. There is some confusion around 

that. 

And, by the way, I want to say there is confusion. I think Iran 

views it the way we had it in this document. 

But if someone spends $1 billion when these sanctions are lifted, 

let us say BP on an oil facility, and sanctions snap back—by the 

way, you all realize that in 9 months Iran has the nuclear snapback, meaning it shifts to them. All of a sudden, if we put any 

sanctions in place, the agreement clearly states they can walk 

away. They have all their sanctions relieved, but they can walk 


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away. So they have what is called a ‘‘nuclear snapback.’’ We have 

sanction snapback. 

But I guess the question is: If somebody enters into a contract 

over the next year when these sanctions are relieved, everyone expects them all to be relieved in 9 months, again, regardless of what 

the PMD report says, can that contract continue on—in other 

words, it was put in place during the free time. Can it continue on 

if sanctions are put in place afterwards? That is a gray area. I 

think it is a detail, but I think it does—and I realize it is not the 

biggest issue. But it does create concerns about people rushing in 

now to establish contracts, which we see happening right now with 

Europe. 

Mr. SZUBIN. Senator, I do not think that is an unimportant issue. 

I would not describe that as a detail at all. I think that is pretty 

central. If you are talking about snapback and the leverage that we 

have, if companies could enter into contracts and then have them 

be somehow protected against snapback, then we would have a 

very weak snapback indeed. And we were intent that we were not 

going to let that happen. 

So what we have—and it is not gray. It is very clear. Iran might 

want to put some grayness into the issue, but they understand this 

issue as well. Obviously, when sanctions are lifted, the business 

that is allowed by that lifting can occur. If sanctions are snapped 

back, any prospective transactions, on a pre-existing contract or on 

a new contract, are sanctionable. It is that clear. Our friends in the 

U.K. understand that, in France and Germany understand that. 

And if there is any doubt, I want to remove it here today. 

Senator CORKER. Could we get a letter from the other parties 

that agree to that? That would be helpful to us. If you could get 

the other parties, even including China and Russia, to agree that 

that is the case, because we are getting very mixed—I think it 

would just help us to some—at least some people who may still be 

on the bubble about the issue. 

Ms. SHERMAN. If I may just add, I think, Senator Corker, I spoke 

with Sir Peter Westmacott, the U.K. Ambassador to the United 

States, this morning—I know he has talked to many of you—and 

he shared with me an email that I believe he sent to your office 

about this, and he said, ‘‘I want to clarify the E3 position on our 

ability to apply sanctions to Iran for other activities and for snapback,’’ and said that, in fact, he is committed and Europe is committed to snapback, and that the EU retains the freedom and ability to apply sanctions for other forms of unacceptable activity. 

He also said to me on the phone this morning that he absolutely 

understands, all Europeans understand, and Helga Schmid, the 

Deputy of the European Union’s High Representative Office, just 

had a meeting with all the services of the European Union to affirm this very fact that you question, which is that, indeed, companies have no grandfather clause whatsoever. 

Chairman SHELBY. Senator Corker, thank you. 

Senator CORKER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman SHELBY. Senator Brown? 

Senator BROWN. Thanks, Mr. Chairman. It is important, as Senator Corker and I appreciate, the seriousness and gravitas about 

this issue, and thoroughness, that he talks that we have sanctions 


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snapback, the Iranians have, as he said, nuclear snapback, but the 

military option obviously is always on the table. It is a political 

agreement that any party can obviously pull out of, just to make 

that clear. 

Again, I appreciate Senator Corker’s comments. I do not know 

that the analogy of what, first of all, the discussion on 50 versus 

100-plus, and I want to get to that with Mr. Szubin in a moment. 

I do not know that analogizing that to the size of our economy is 

really a very compelling—really gets us anywhere, but that aside, 

I want to talk about sanctions relief, since this is the jurisdiction 

of this Committee, the primary area of jurisdiction. 

I know you imposed, Secretary Sherman, a pay-for-performance 

model on Iran in the agreement, and I would like you to discuss 

generally the steps that Iran will have to go through before receiving any new sanctions relief under the agreement on Implementation Day. If you would walk through that with us. 

Ms. SHERMAN. Sure. Iran has to uninstall two-thirds of its centrifuges. It has to get its stockpile down 98 percent, from 12,000 

tons to—12,000 kilograms to 300. It must take the calandria, which 

is the core of the Arak reactor, out and fill it with concrete so that 

it is rendered unusable. It must set up with the IAEA all of the 

verification processes. The IAEA will have access to the declared 

facilities—Natanz, Fordow, and Arak—on a 24/7 basis. There will 

also be real-time data transmission. There will also be electronic 

seals so that, in fact, if something is tampered with, the IAEA will 

know about it in real time. They will put in place what is called 

a ‘‘surveillance of centrifuge production,’’ which means that rotors 

and bellows, which are the active parts of a centrifuge. The IAEA 

will have eyes on that production. That will be for 20 years. For 

25 years, the IAEA will have eyes on uranium from the time it 

comes out of the ground until it is milled, from its mining until its 

milling, conversion, fed into gas so that they will not be able to divert one ounce of uranium, one portion of uranium. We will always 

know where it goes. So Iran, in essence, would have to create an 

entire new supply chain covertly in order to get to a nuclear weapon. 

In addition to all of these measures which have to be put in 

place, Iran has to have taken all of the steps the IAEA requires on 

PMD. That is supposed to happen, actually, by October 15th, which 

is around Adoption Day, as opposed to Implementation Day, so 

even sooner. 

All of these things have to take place and all of these are detailed in Annex V of the agreement before there is any sanctions 

relief whatsoever. At that point, all sanctions relief is lifted. It is 

not a termination. Termination comes many years later or when 

the IAEA reaches what is called ‘‘the broader conclusions.’’ The 

broader conclusions means that they have no undeclared facilities, 

that, indeed, they can certify that their program is completely 

peaceful. 

Senator BROWN. Mr. Szubin, if you would describe what sanctions remain in place that will help us manage, combat, eliminate 

as much as possible nefarious Iranian activities and terrorism in 

the region, and within that answer, if you would talk about the $50 

billion figure, why it is 50 and not 100 in terms of obligations. And, 


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second, if you would speak to the $500 billion—you said half a trillion—I think you used the term ‘‘hole in the Iranian economy,’’ 

what that means in terms of pressure on their government. I assume you are implying to meet some domestic needs, as some of 

this money is available to the Iranians. 

Mr. SZUBIN. Yes, absolutely, Senator. The sanctions regime that 

remains in place to combat Iran’s malign activities—and I take 

your question to be referring not just to their support for terrorist 

groups like Hezbollah, but their support to the Houthis and the ongoing violence in Yemen, their support to Shia militants in Iraq, 

their support to the Assad regime in Syria. 

That sanctions regime fully remains in place, and it is a very extensive one. So it is not just the front companies and the actors and 

the generals that we have listed so far, but it is an ongoing authority that we have, that the Europeans maintain, and that many of 

our allies maintain to go after these actors. 

Senator BROWN. If I could interrupt, you are confident that our 

allies stay with us on those sanctions, unlike the suggestions we 

hear from Ambassadors and others that particularly China and 

Russia will not be there with the broader, deeper sanctions that 

are in place now overall. 

Mr. SZUBIN. One does need to distinguish. When it comes to 

Iran’s regional activities, there is a coalition of countries that are 

highly concerned, that are working alongside us. Increasingly, we 

are seeing a lot of cooperation from the Gulf countries who, for understandable reasons, are increasingly troubled by Iran’s activities. 

And I would note and I think it deserves highlighting, you saw 

Saudi Arabia sanction a number of Hezbollah leaders just a few 

months back, and in doing so call out Hezbollah as a terrorist organization. The concern is very high. 

But our concerns about Hezbollah, I do not want to mislead the 

Committee, are not shared worldwide. We have not been able to obtain U.N. Security Council resolutions with respect to Iran’s proxies in Lebanon, and I do not think we will see China and Russia 

stepping up in the way that we have seen our allies in Europe, in 

Israel, and the Gulf with respect to a lot of these regional interventions. 

Senator BROWN. Under Secretary Sherman, the singular goal, as 

we have discussed, of P5+1 negotiations, just to make sure that 

Iran did not obtain a nuclear weapon, many of the opponents to 

this agreement have talked about the dollars that will be available 

because of the lifting of sanctions and what discord and terror that 

Iran can sow in the region. 

Speak to the broader strategy outside of nuclear issues in the 

Middle East and sort of where this money goes and what the Administration is doing to combat that. 

Ms. SHERMAN. Thank you very much, Senator. Indeed, we share 

the concerns that this Committee has and the Senate has and our 

country has about Iran’s activities in the region. Not only will we 

have all the sanctions tools that Acting Under Secretary Szubin 

laid out, but as you know, President Obama has provided more security assistance to Israel than any other President. To be fair, 

every President, Democrat or Republican, has built on the efforts 


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of the previous President, so each President has increased that assistance. But this President, most assistance. 

This President has also commissioned technology that allows us 

to take actions if we need to in Iran in a way that no President 

has before and to ensure that we have the options that we need, 

commissioned and deployed those options. 

In addition, as you know, the President had all of the GCC, the 

Gulf Cooperation Council, to a meeting at Camp David to talk 

about how to develop security for the region and a regional strategy. That has been followed up with a meeting that Secretary 

Kerry just had in Doha—in which, by the GCC supported the Joint 

Comprehensive Plan of Action, believing that if it is fully implemented, it indeed will bring security, more security to the region, 

because Iran will not be able to project power, will not be able to 

have a nuclear weapon that acts as a deterrent. But we are focused 

very much on helping the GCC to better improve its capabilities, 

whether that is in special forces training, intelligence sharing, having the right armaments to deal with these regional efforts, and 

really work in coalition. 

So I think we are all in common cause. This is quite critical, and 

we will be following up on a daily basis to make sure that these 

new strategies, these new efforts go forward. 

And, finally, as you know, Secretary of Defense Carter was recently in Israel. We are ready whenever the Prime Minister of 

Israel is ready to discuss further enhancements to security assistance. 

Senator BROWN. My last question, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Szubin? 

Mr. SZUBIN. I am sorry, Senator. I neglected to answer——

Senator BROWN. On the $50 billion. 

Mr. SZUBIN. Yes, on the $50 billion. So the answer is—and we 

have a high degree of confidence in our figures on this—that it is 

about $50 billion. I can get into more detail on itemization in a 

classified setting, and I know we have a classified session with you 

and all Members of the Senate later this afternoon. 

Senator BROWN. I think that is important to do, so thank you. 

Mr. SZUBIN. I would be pleased to. The reason that the $100 billion figure has been out there—and we have been speaking to it for 

several years—is that there is $100 billion of the Central Bank of 

Iran’s foreign reserves that have been inaccessible to it. Some of 

that has been due to the sanctions, the powerful sanctions that 

Congress put in place; some of it because it has already been obligated for other reasons; and some of it because it is gone, it has 

been spent. And so one can list it on the books, but it is just not 

there. 

So, obviously, those latter baskets—the funds that have been 

spent and are not there, the funds that are obligated and are now 

in place as collateral—cannot be recovered, even when sanctions 

are lifted. What remains is this about $50 billion that can come 

back to Iran. And with that, one needs to keep the perspective of 

the about $500 billion or more that Iran needs to be able to meet 

really fundamental needs in terms of unpaid military pensions and 

salaries, in terms of needed infrastructure, in terms of their oil sector, which is crippled. 

A final point that I want to add with respect to——


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Senator BROWN. How much of that one-half-a-trillion hole would 

be required for them to get their oil sector up and producing so 

they can bring the wealth into the country that the Iranians that 

we all think about and worry about and that they obviously aspire 

to? 

Mr. SZUBIN. Their oil minister has publicly estimated that they require $160 to $200 billion just for the oil sector repairs alone. 

That is not to take their oil sector forward into the future. That 

is to get it back to baseline, to undo the damage that was done by 

the sanctions over the last few years. 

And across the Iranian economy, writ large, we see about a 7-

year lag due to the sanctions, meaning upon sanctions relief, let us 

say in the middle of next year, the major economic sanctions 

abroad are relieved, it will be 7 years before Iran comes back to 

where they ought to be today. If that——

Senator BROWN. Even if they invested $160 to $200 billion, it 

would take them that long? 

Mr. SZUBIN. That was not a comment on the oil repairs. 

Senator BROWN. I am sorry. 

Mr. SZUBIN. The oil repairs might happen in a shorter amount 

of time, 2 to 3 years. I am not certain. I would need to get back 

to you on that. What I am saying is if you look at their GDP curve 

and where it ought to have been, it had this radical break obviously due to this international sanctions effort, and it only gets 

back in 7 years to where it ought to have been today. 

So the hole that they are in really cannot be overstated, and $50 

billion coming back to them does not begin to meet the needs. What 

is more, that $50 billion is not spending money. That is all of their 

freed-up foreign reserves. In other words, no country is going to exhaust its foreign reserves down to zero. It is risking huge instability to do so. 

So we estimate that Iran is going to use that money primarily 

for its domestic economy, and it is going to need to leave some in 

reserve in the way any country would with its foreign reserves. 

Senator BROWN. Last question, Mr. Chairman. 

Secretary Sherman, many of us have raised concern about the 

prospects of the U.N. embargoes in Iran on conventional arms 

being lifted in 5 years and on ballistic missiles in 8 years. I know 

all of us would have preferred to retain these embargoes much, 

much longer. We know Russia and China felt differently. Outline, 

if you will, briefly—since my time has gone over—what specific 

U.S., EU, and U.N. legal authorities remain in place to combat 

Iran’s conventional arms and ballistic missile efforts. 

Ms. SHERMAN. Sure. First of all, we will still be able to rely on 

other U.N. Security Council resolutions that levy arms embargoes 

against key areas of concern in Lebanon, Libya, North Korea, 

Houthis and Shia, Shia militants in Iraq, et cetera. So all of those 

remain in place. We will continue to work with over 100 countries 

around the world that have signed the Proliferation Security Initiative to help limit Iranian missile-related imports or exports. The 

missile technology control regime also remains in place and will 

play a critical role in that regard. 

In conjunction, we have a lot of unilateral, bilateral cooperative 

tools. We have ongoing sanctions in place, as Adam has pointed 


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out. We have Executive Orders 12938 and 13382 which authorize 

U.S. sanctions on foreign persons that materially contribute to the 

proliferation of missiles capable of delivering weapons, and we will 

make use of those Executive orders. 

The Iran, North Korea, and Syria Nonproliferation Act, INKSNA, 

levies U.S. sanctions on entities connected to Iranian ballistic and 

cruise missile activities. And the Lethal Military Equipment sanctions of 2006 provision in the Foreign Assistance Act, the Iran 

Sanctions Act, as you all well know, as amended, and the Iran-Iraq 

Arms Proliferation Act all impose U.S. sanctions on individuals and 

entities. 

I would also say that the U.N. Security Council resolution that 

was just recently passed does not let Iran’s ballistic missile program off the hook. The current UNSCR prohibitions on the supply 

of ballistic missile-related items, technology, and assistance will remain in place. Under this prohibition, states are still required to 

prevent transfers to Iran of ballistic missile-related items from 

their territory or by their nationals. They are still required to prevent provision to Iran of technology, technical assistance, and other 

related services. They are still required to prevent transfers of ballistic missile items that might pass through their territory. They 

are still required—and I could go on. There are about 10 things 

that it still continues to require states around the world to do. 

So, quite frankly, yes, would we have liked them to go on forever 

in the U.N. Security Council resolution? Of course. But we have 

kept them on far longer than either Iran, Russia, or China wanted 

them to stay on. We have kept them on under Article 41, Chapter 

7, which means they are enforceable. And, more importantly, we 

have other U.N. Security Council resolutions and other tools unilaterally to make sure that where arms are concerned and where missiles are concerned, we can keep moving forward in every way we 

need to. 

Senator BROWN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman SHELBY. Senator Toomey. 

Senator TOOMEY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I thank the 

witnesses for appearing today. 

I want to go back to the issue that was raised by Senator Corker. 

Ambassador Sherman, the Iran Nuclear Review Act of 2015 is 

abundantly clear, I think, that Congress is supposed to receive all 

the documentation, all the agreement, all the annexes, all the related materials. It says right in the beginning, referring to the 

transmission of agreements, ‘‘The President shall transmit to the 

appropriate congressional committees and leadership the agreement as defined in subsection (h)(1), including all related materials.’’

Subsection (h)(1) specifies that this agreement includes—and I 

quote the last part of this—‘‘any additional materials related thereto, including annexes, appendices, codicils, side agreements, implementing materials, documents and guidance, technical or other understandings, and any related agreements.’’

I think it is clear that is meant to be completely all-encompassing, and yet we discover that there is a secret side agreement 

between the IAEA and Iran, which presumably contemplates the 

previous military dimensions of Iranian activities, which strikes 


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many of us as very, very important information to have to evaluate 

whether or not future activities is in violation of this agreement or 

not. 

Now, Senator Corker asked why you have not given us the document. If I understood correctly, you said, ‘‘It is because we do not 

have the documents.’’ And my question is: Knowing this statute, 

knowing the intent of the statute and the letter of this law, why 

didn’t you insist that this essential-to-enforcement document be 

disclosed? 

Ms. SHERMAN. Senator, thank you very much for your question. 

As you point out, we do not have the document, and the U.S. Senate has every single document that the U.S. Government has. 

Second, the reason we did not insist is because we want to protect U.S. confidentiality. This is a Safeguards Protocol. The IAEA 

protects our confidential understandings and our confidential arrangements between the United States and the IAEA. 

Now, I know you will say this is a different situation, and I grant 

you that this is an international understanding to try to stop Iran 

from having a nuclear weapon, and that is a different circumstance. So in the development of where the IAEA was going. 

They did come to us for technical expertise, as they came to every 

other member of the P5+1, and in a classified briefing this afternoon, I will share with you everything I know about this. 

Senator TOOMEY. So let me——

Ms. SHERMAN. I am also very grateful that the Director General 

on his own cognizance is meeting with the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in an informal setting, which is extremely unusual 

because every other country sort of wonders why he is. 

Senator TOOMEY. OK. Did I understand you to say to Senator 

Corker that you personally did not see the final document? 

Ms. SHERMAN. No. What I said is that I was shown documents 

that I believed to be the final documents. But whether, in fact, 

there are any further discussions—you know, what this is about, 

Senator, are the modalities, the technical modalities that the IAEA 

uses. And I will share with you this afternoon in a classified setting every single thing I know about that, and I think it will give 

you great confidence that the IAEA is doing what it needs to do. 

Senator TOOMEY. Well, I look forward to that, but, frankly, it is 

still extremely disappointing to me. We are being asked to vote to 

affirm an agreement that seems to me the enforcement of which 

depends in no small part on a very important document that not 

only are we not allowed to see, it is not clear to me that you have 

read the final document, or anyone else in our Government has actually read it. 

Ms. SHERMAN. I have seen——

Senator TOOMEY. And you do not have it in your possession. 

Ms. SHERMAN. I have seen the document, as I said, as we were 

going through the technical discussions with the IAEA. But what 

is important here, Senator, ultimately what we are talking about 

here is the credibility of the International Atomic Energy Agency, 

whether, in fact, we believe that they are a credible, independent 

verification organization, which it is. They have done a superb job 

on the Joint Plan of Action, which is the interim step. All of those 

reports, because we have had to report to Congress on the compliVerDate 0ct 09 2002 11:24 Dec 22, 2016 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00022 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 S:\DOCS\97883.TXT SHERYL

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ance under the JPOA, have come up here. They have done a very 

fine job, and I have trust and confidence in their ability to do a fine 

job on the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action. 

Senator TOOMEY. Well, I am glad you do, but I think that is a 

document that we ought to have before us. 

Let me ask a separate question here. Paragraph 36 of the 

JCPOA grants to either party the opportunity to walk away from 

this agreement. Anybody can raise an objection about what the 

other side is doing. And then after an adjudication process that 

seems to me lasts about 35 days, if this objection is not resolved 

to the satisfaction of the complaining participant, then the complaining participant can simply walk away, either side. 

So Iran, for any reason that Iran deems to be sufficient, can walk 

away from this agreement. Of course, that would be after they have 

their $50 or $100 billion, whatever the figure is. 

Here is my concern. I am concerned that this dynamic creates a 

very—this fact creates a very dangerous dynamic, one in which the 

Administration will have a very hard time enforcing anything other 

than a massive violation. 

You know, former Secretaries of State Shultz and Kissinger 

wrote a widely read piece some time ago where they suggested that 

most likely if a violation occurs, it would not be a clear-cut event 

but, rather, the gradual accumulation of ambiguous evasions. 

So let us say we start to discover the gradual accumulation of 

ambiguous evasions, which strikes me as extraordinarily plausible. 

If we were to take any measures at all, any enforcement mechanism of any kind, Iran could invoke Paragraph 36, decide that this 

is unacceptable, and they are walking away. And since this Administration has told us so many times so forcefully that the alternative to this is war and so we have to have this agreement and 

we had to make all of these concessions after concessions after concessions to get this agreement, why should we believe that in the 

face of the accumulation of these small but accumulating evasions 

that the Administration is going to risk Iran walking away from 

the table? Because I suspect that is pretty likely that that would 

be their threat. 

Ms. SHERMAN. So, Senator, I appreciate that you believe that 

Iran will have gotten enormous sanctions relief and they will be 

sitting in the driver’s seat, but you seem to forget the other half 

of the equation. Iran will have reduced their centrifuges by twothirds. They will have eliminated 98 percent of their stockpile. 

They will have made the Arak reactor inoperable. They will have 

allowed inspectors in their country to have 24/7 access to their facilities. They will have——

Senator TOOMEY. 24-day access. 

Ms. SHERMAN. No. For the declared facilities—Arak, Fordow, and 

Natanz—the IAEA has 24/7 access every day of the week, 365 days 

of the year. 

Senator TOOMEY. And the military sites? 

Ms. SHERMAN. The military sites, if the IAEA believes there is 

justification for them going to a site, the Additional Protocol allows 

them to give 24 hours’ notice to get into that site. If the country—

in this case Iran—says, ‘‘Well, actually, we think you should go to 

this site,’’ or ‘‘We think you should have this document,’’ under the 


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Additional Protocol they are allowed to suggest an alternative. 

However, under the Additional Protocol, that debate about what 

the IAEA can do can go on for quite some time. 

So what this agreement did, different than any other arms control agreement ever negotiated, we put a clock on that debate. We 

said that if the IAEA under the Additional Protocol wants to go to 

a site, it has to have access to that site. And so we said you can 

debate with Iran for 2 weeks. At the end of those 2 weeks, the 

Joint Commission, which is made up of all of us, looks at that. If 

we believe on day one of the 7 days we have to consider this situation that they ought to give access, if five out of eight of us believe 

the IAEA should get access—and we believe we will always have 

Europe and European High Representative with us—Iran then has 

3 days to provide access. 

So at the most, it is 24 days, but it could be as short as 18 days. 

And as Secretary Moniz has testified again and again and again, 

nuclear material cannot be cleansed away. It will be found if it is 

there. 

So, quite frankly, Senator, what we have negotiated in this 

agreement is absolutely unprecedented access whenever the IAEA 

believes that it has a suspicious site that it needs access to. 

Mr. SZUBIN. Senator, would it be permissible to address the 

snapback aspect of your question? 

Senator TOOMEY. At the pleasure of the Chairman. 

Chairman SHELBY. Senator Reed, you are next. Do you want 

to——

Senator REED. I will take my time and ask Mr. Szubin to respond quickly to Senator Toomey’s question. Very quickly. 

Mr. SZUBIN. Thank you, Senator. I just wanted to speak to one 

of the premises that I think is behind your question on snapback. 

First, I absolutely agree that the more likely scenario we see is 

small breach, is a testing, is sticking a toe across the line, and 

what we need to do then is obviously hit Iran in a proportionate 

way, show them that those breaches have consequences. Otherwise, 

we are just asking for larger breaches. And we have to be very serious about that. We have been very clear with our partners that we 

are going to be very serious about that. 

But there is a premise that I have heard circulating that after 

the initial sanctions relief, Iran can somehow immunize itself to 

further pressure and, therefore, it will not care about snapback, 

and that is just simply not the case. Iran’s foreign reserves cannot 

be put in a vault or in a mattress in Iran in the form of gold or 

bills. If so, they are not liquid, they are not usable. 

What Iran needs with its foreign reserves is what every country 

needs, which is to have them in major financial centers, usable for 

imports, usable to boost their currency—the whole host of things 

that countries do with their foreign reserves. That means they are 

going to have to keep them in foreign jurisdictions where they are 

subject to snapback. If anything, the more Iran begins to benefit 

from a deal, the more vulnerable they are to this pressure. 

So we need to be very serious, and I agree with your question 

in that respect. But the consequences to Iran will remain very serious, very severe throughout this agreement. 

Chairman SHELBY. Senator Reed, go ahead. 


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Senator REED. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. And within 

my allotted time, Secretary Szubin, you have testified that you do 

not expect Iran to stop funding Hezbollah and other proxies, so 

what will you do to combat this activity? 

Mr. SZUBIN. Unfortunately, I do expect to continue to see Iran 

funding Hezbollah and their other violent proxies, and it is extremely troubling. It is, frankly, what I have devoted the bulk of 

my career to combating. I have been working 13 years on the terrorist financing portfolio because of how serious of a threat I believe that to be. 

We have a lot of tools at our disposal here, and, frankly, one of 

the most powerful is one that the Congress has given us, which is 

that when we sanction Iranian terrorist supporters, our designation is amplified international. What I mean by that is when we 

name a Hezbollah financier, a Hezbollah money launderer, any 

bank worldwide, not just American banks, any bank worldwide 

that facilitates transactions for that designated entity faces very 

severe sanctions from the United States, sanctions that no bank 

wants to face. 

And so what we have seen as a practical matter, thanks to those 

congressional sanctions, is that our sanctions against Iran’s proxies 

carry this international weight, and those designated entities become pariahs worldwide. 

But we need to do more and I think it is incumbent on us to do 

more in terms of additional intelligence targeting, to be able to 

identify the money launderers, the facilitators, and the funders, 

and then to muster the coalition of countries who care about this 

to cut it off, to shut it down. 

Senator REED. Thank you. Let me just go to a very critical point 

here. The sanction regime is in place today. If we reject this arrangement, this deal, some have argued, well, it will not make a 

difference, the sanctions will stay in place, we can keep it in place. 

You have been working on these things for 10 years. How would 

our partners react if we walked away from the deal? 

Mr. SZUBIN. From my perspective—and I would certainly defer to 

Ambassador Sherman on the diplomatic perspective. But from a 

sanctions perspective, we have tremendous clout, tremendous influence as the United States, as the world’s most powerful economy, 

when it comes to our moral sway, when it comes to our sanctions 

and economic sway. 

I do not underestimate that. I have had the privilege to be a part 

of exercising that clout for the last 10 years, and I have seen firsthand how effective it can be. 

But as I mentioned in my opening statement, it is not all-powerful. We do not simply get to dictate to other countries, especially 

major economies, what their foreign policy will be. We need to harness shared concerns. When it comes to Iran, we have a shared 

concern. Four U.N. Security Council resolutions have called out 

Iran’s nuclear program as being a threat, and so when we went to 

China, when we went to India, South Korea, Japan, to say, ‘‘You 

need to work with us. We have these very powerful sanctions in 

place. We do not want to use them, but you agree with us that 

Iran’s nuclear program is a threat,’’ they said, ‘‘Yes, we do agree 

with you it is a threat.’’ And we said, ‘‘Well, here is the way to


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address it. We have got a diplomatic path forward. Join us and let 

us test it. Let us see if we can use our sanctions leverage to obtain 

the nuclear concessions we all need from Iran.’’

They worked with us, and it succeeded. It succeeded, I think, to 

a remarkable extent. 

In the event that we walk away, it is a very different and much 

bleaker scenario. The international consensus, as Ambassador 

Sherman described, is behind this deal; 90 countries have come out 

and endorsed this deal. We would be alone walking away from it. 

And in that event, going and asking them to take very costly economic sacrifices in the hope of a future, much better, much tougher 

deal that I think they would doubt the feasibility of, I think we 

would have very weak prospects for that. 

Senator REED. Thank you. 

Mr. Chairman, I think I will stop. 

Chairman SHELBY. Senator Scott. 

Senator SCOTT. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and good morning to 

the witnesses. Thank you all for being here. 

I, like so many of us, am very concerned about this deal, not supportive of it whatsoever, and the more I read of the deal, the less 

I like it, and that does not include the parts that I do not know 

about, the IAEA side agreements. 

Ambassador, you have said a couple of conflicting things this 

morning from my perspective. Sitting here, I can see your notebooks. I cannot read what is in it. In the final deal from the IAEA, 

have you seen it and read it? 

Ms. SHERMAN. Let me be very clear. I have seen the documents 

that the IAEA and Iran discussed to create the final arrangements 

for the modalities that underpin the road map—the road map document being a public document that Congress has a copy of. I was 

not allowed to keep any of the documents about the arrangements 

on the modalities that underpin the public road map that you have 

a copy of. 

However, I told the IAEA that, given our Constitution, if Congress asked me to brief on the details that I understood, I would 

do so in a classified session. And I will do so this afternoon in the 

all-Senate classified session. I will give you all of the details of 

which I am aware. 

Senator SCOTT. So have you read the final agreement? 

Ms. SHERMAN. It is not an agreement. It is a set of arrangements 

that are made——

Senator SCOTT. Have you read it? 

Ms. SHERMAN. I have. 

Senator SCOTT. OK. A question for you, Secretary. You stated 

earlier that the Iranian regime continues to fund terrorism and bad 

behavior. And at the same time, we are concerned, at least those 

of us who have commented on the fact that we are concerned, that 

the more money the Iranian regime has, the more they will fund 

terrorist activity. In spite of the fact that they have a crumbling 

economy, they have infrastructure needs, they have needs to repair 

their ability to sell more oil, yet in spite of all of that, they are still 

funding terrorism. 

And so it seems like to me that you would agree with National 

Security Adviser Susan Rice when she said that we should expect 


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that some portion of the money from the sanctions relief will go to 

the Iranian military and could potentially be used, as you said, will 

be used to fund more bad behavior and terrorist behavior in the region in spite of the state of their economy. 

Mr. SZUBIN. Thank you, Senator. I do agree with the premises 

of your question. I agree with the statement that you quote from 

former National Security Adviser Rice. We have seen Iran fund terrorism before the sanctions, through the period, the toughest period 

of the sanctions. We saw them fund these groups during the IranIraq war when their economy was in shambles. 

Senator SCOTT. Yes. 

Mr. SZUBIN. And I expect we will continue to see that. The question is: What do we do about it? And it is my office’s responsibility, 

along with our colleagues in the interagency, in the intelligence 

community, to ramp up our efforts to be able to go after those funding streams. 

The alternative, though, that I think is put out there does not 

make sense to me strategically, which is that we do not enter into 

a nuclear agreement, we do not give them back their money—in 

other words, we do not do this exchange of securing a nuclear commitment in exchange for sanctions relief, and then, what? So we 

will continue to combat Iran’s support for terrorism, as we have 

been doing, but we will have the prospect of Iran 2 to 3 months 

away from breakout. To me, when you are talking about a state 

sponsor of terrorism, that is a terrifying prospect. And so we have 

decided we need to address the nuclear threat and then turn to the 

terrorism. And I think that is the strategic way to do this. 

Senator SCOTT. So, strategically speaking, according to the agreement, 5 years from the start of the agreement they will have more 

access to weapons, 8 years they will have access to ballistic missiles, and they will be able to move forward in advanced research 

on nuclear technology, and then we know for certain at the end of 

the 10th year we are looking at a breakout phase. So the reality 

of the agreement is that we will with certainty be able to mark on 

a calendar when the Iranians will have an opportunity for a nuclear weapon. 

Mr. SZUBIN. No. As Ambassador Sherman has said repeatedly, at 

no point, at no future date, not 25 years, not 50 years, does Iran 

have the ability to pursue a nuclear weapon. In fact, the agreement 

locks in the contrary. The agreement has varying durations with 

respect to Iran’s enrichment limits, and those are strictest in the 

first 10 and 15 years and then are reduced. But at no point does 

Iran have the right to pursue or obtain a nuclear weapon. 

Senator SCOTT. We will have to just respectfully disagree. Let me 

ask one final question. My time is up as well. 

In Paragraph 25 of the agreement, it seems to suggest that there 

will be an effort made to preempt State laws and States who have 

otherwise passed laws that prohibit companies from investing in 

Iran. How is this not a violation of States rights? And how do you 

read Paragraph 25 of the agreement? 

Mr. SZUBIN. Thank you, Senator. There is nothing, to my knowledge, about preemption in the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action. 

All that the JCPOA says is that we will make sure that State authorities who have enacted legislation, divestment legislation with 


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respect to Iran are informed of the developments, which I think are 

pretty key to be aware of, when it comes to the Iran nuclear deal, 

and that we will encourage them to take those into account as they 

consider their divestment laws. 

Senator SCOTT. And how will you encourage them? 

Mr. SZUBIN. Simply by setting forth what this deal is, what it is 

not. In some cases, those divestment laws were predicated on the 

nuclear case, and I think for any State authority who is looking at 

divestment laws based on Iran’s nuclear program, you would have 

to take into account the developments, the historic developments 

that we are talking about today. 

Senator SCOTT. Thank you. 

Chairman SHELBY. Senator Schumer. 

Senator SCHUMER. I want to thank you, Chairman Shelby and 

Ranking Member Brown, and I want to thank Under Secretary 

Sherman and Acting Under Secretary Szubin. 

Under Secretary Sherman, I have appreciated through this process your thoughtfulness, intelligence, your candor, your availability 

in our past meetings. I thank you for many years of service, laudable service to our country. 

And Acting Under Secretary Szubin, thank you for being here as 

well. I look forward to helping remove ‘‘Acting’’ from your title so 

that we can have you officially at the helm for the daunting challenges our country faces, not only in Iran but around the world. 

Now, I have read and reread the agreement. I have had many 

meetings with people on both sides of the issue, several classified 

briefings, more meetings to come this week. I am carefully analyzing the proposed deal because its implications are profound and 

far-reaching. I have had many questions answered. I have not yet 

reached a conclusion. 

This is one of the most important votes I have had to take, any 

of us will have to take in our legislative career, as Senator Brown 

mentioned. I owe it to my constituents to make an informed decision. I will not let party, pressure, politics interfere with doing 

what I think is right. I want to judge the deal on the merits and 

the merits alone, and in that spirit, I want to ask you questions 

today. 

So one of the questions I have is this, to both of you: Where will 

Iran be 10 years from now? Now, I know you will say no matter 

what they are, you have a very good agreement. But I am interested in where Iran will be. Some say, well, look at the people of 

Iran, they tend to be secular, they have economic needs, they will 

push Iran in a direction that is more moderate, more welcoming to 

the world, et cetera.

Some say we have had that population for a long time, and this 

dictatorship, a very totalitarian, evil dictatorship of mullahs, has 

barely shuddered, even with one transition of power. 

So let me ask you how you see these two elements competing. I 

want your judgment, because this is only a judgment question, but 

I think a very important one as to where Iran will be 10 years from 

now. And I would ask you each to answer that question in your respective spheres. 

Ms. SHERMAN. Thank you, Senator Schumer, and I thank all 

Members for the enormous diligence of looking at this deal and tryVerDate 0ct 09 2002 11:24 Dec 22, 2016 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00028 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 S:\DOCS\97883.TXT SHERYL

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ing to ask and answer incredibly difficult questions. The U.S. Senate has been united behind Democratic and Republican Presidents 

for war, and I appreciate that perhaps we can come united together 

behind peace. 

Where Iran will be in the future, I do not know, Senator. I really 

do not. I do not think anyone does. Our intelligence community can 

give and I think probably has given you an assessment of what 

they believe, but, quite frankly, it is a very complicated situation. 

The people who turn out on the streets tend to be the young people 

who are desperate not only for a better life and a stronger rial and 

a job, but they want to end their isolation. We live in a technologically connected world. No matter what the Iranian regime does, 

indeed they get on the Internet. They see Twitter. They use all of 

the devices all of our kids use, and they know what is going on in 

the world, and they want to be part of it. And I thank the U.S. 

Senate for their support for programs that have helped break 

through the Internet so they can get on. 

And at the same time, we have a regime led by clerics who have 

been around for a very long time, have very conservative views—

more than conservative; radical—are part of the revolution of 1979, 

have not let go of that history. The depth of mistrust between us 

is profound. I do not believe there will be some magic transformation as a result of this deal. For me, this deal is about one 

thing and one thing only, and that is, making sure that this regime, which does do a lot of terrible things in the region and to its 

own people, will not have a nuclear weapon that could further terrorize the world and terrorize the region. 

I am hopeful, because I am a hopeful person, that a transformation will take place in 10 years. But it may not. So we have 

to use every tool we have on all of the activities of concern that we 

have and work with Israel, work with the region to stop those activities, to make sure that those young people have a future at all. 

Senator SCHUMER. Do you have anything to add, Mr. Szubin? 

Mr. SZUBIN. I do not. 

Senator SCHUMER. OK. She is a very hard act to follow. 

Mr. SZUBIN. That is right. 

Senator SCHUMER. OK. Let me ask you a question. It relates to 

what Senator Corker talked about, and that is, the retroactivity or 

the grandfathering of contracts. I want to give you a hypothetical. 

A country, not the United States, its major oil company, maybe 

government owned, maybe not, signs a 10-year contract with Iran 

immediately after sanctions are lifted because Iran has complied 

with the long list in the agreement. OK? 

And then we go—snap back. We find a major violation. We go 

forward on snapback. It is now year 4 of that contract. I understand that grandfathering will not affect years 1, 2, and 3. The 

profit that, say, Total, just to use an example, has made in those 

first 3 years they keep. 

Is the contract terminated in year 4 for the next 6 years? Or does 

the contract continue? And, I mean, this is an important question. 

As Senator Corker said, it is not the most important question. But 

we need a yes or no answer. 

There was a New York Times article where people had different 

views, and they asked a U.S. Government spokesman, and they


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refused to give an answer. So that made me worried. So that is 

why I am glad you are here to clarify. What happens in years 4, 

5, 6, and 7? Is that contract terminated? 

Mr. SZUBIN. So I want to be very clear, and I also want to be 

very careful with my words to make sure I am exactly answering 

the question. 

Sanctions do not terminate a contract. They do not have the authority to annul a contract between parties. What sanctions do, 

what U.S. sanctions do in that circumstance that you are describing, is they say any future transactions, whether it is future investment by the foreign oil company, future derivation of profits, future 

expansion, or future just work under the contract——

Senator SCHUMER. Purchase. It could be purchase of oil. 

Mr. SZUBIN.——is sanctionable. That is what the sanctions do 

right now. That is what they have been doing over the last——

Senator SCHUMER. So you have to explain what that means to 

me in layman’s terms. So I am Total, and it is my fourth year, and 

I am due to send Iran $1 billion for oil which I want. I still send 

that oil. That is allowed. 

Mr. SZUBIN. No. What it means——

Senator SCHUMER. What does it mean it is ‘‘sanctionable’’? What 

happens? Is it your view the sanctions are severe enough that Total 

will terminate the contract and risk being sued by Iran? I mean, 

give me the—what does ‘‘sanctionable’’ mean in that situation? 

Mr. SZUBIN. Let me spell it out, and it is exactly what the circumstances are right now and what the circumstances have been 

when we put these tough sanctions into place. There were a lot of 

pre-existing contracts that were 10-year, 20-year contracts when 

we put NDAA and CISADA into place. 

Senator SCHUMER. That is a good—yes. 

Mr. SZUBIN. What companies saw is that they faced the threat 

of these powerful U.S. sanctions and made the next purchase. 

Senator SCHUMER. So, in other words, Total would not be able to 

do business in the United States if it continued in year 4, for instance? Is that right? 

Mr. SZUBIN. There are all sorts of consequences, including——

Senator SCHUMER. Well, answer me that question. Would Total 

be able to do business in the United States in year 4 if they continue the contract? 

Mr. SZUBIN. Total could face a menu of choices under the Iran 

Sanctions—a menu of penalties under the Iran Sanctions Act, 

which could include being cut off from the U.S. market. So there 

is this menu of tough——

Senator SCHUMER. What does ‘‘could include’’ mean? I am sorry. 

I just want to nail this down. 

Mr. SZUBIN. The Iran Sanctions Act has a menu of——

Senator SCHUMER. OK, could. And who has the ability to determine which on the menu is chosen? Is that the U.S. Government 

unilaterally? 

Ms. SHERMAN. If I may, I was in the private sector for a decade, 

and at the time when these sanctions came into place and Total 

had to make a decision at that point about whether to leave, the 

risks were too high for them. Same for Siemens, who actually, to 

be perfectly frank, was a client of mine at the time, and they had 


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to leave. They had to unwind those investments. They had to see 

if there was a force majeure that would allow them to come out. 

But the risks were too high because, yes——

Senator SCHUMER. And what were those—that is what I am trying to——

Ms. SHERMAN. The risks are they do not have access to U.S. secondary markets. They do not have corresponding banking relationships. Their shipping is at risk. 

Senator SCHUMER. And who determines—Mr. Szubin, you said 

‘‘could.’’ You did not say ‘‘will.’’ Who determines——

Mr. SZUBIN. The selection——

Senator SCHUMER.——the ‘‘could’’? 

Mr. SZUBIN. So the selection of the penalties with respect to 

Total in your hypothetical is done at the State Department. The 

penalties imposed on the bank——

Senator SCHUMER. But solely unilaterally——

Mr. SZUBIN.——would be the Treasury——

Senator SCHUMER.——by the U.S. Government? 

Ms. SHERMAN. Yes. 

Mr. SZUBIN. That is right. 

Senator SCHUMER. OK. That is good. OK. Now——

Mr. SZUBIN. And the only——

Senator SCHUMER.——next—you——

Mr. SZUBIN.——reason I was putting in the caveat at the top 

about the contract is that, of course, if a contract is signed between 

a European company and Iran, the contract is not invalidated by 

U.S. sanctions. What our sanctions do is deter——

Senator SCHUMER. Right, and then Total——

Mr. SZUBIN.——performance under that——

Senator SCHUMER.——just to use an example, would have to 

make a decision. Does it risk the suit——

Ms. SHERMAN. Correct. 

Senator SCHUMER.——by the Iranians because they are violating 

their contract, given the heaviness of our sanctions? 

Mr. SZUBIN. That is exactly right. But we saw how that played 

out——

Senator SCHUMER. I appreciate the answer——

Mr. SZUBIN.——in 2012. 

Senator SCHUMER.——and I think you have answered. 

Now, next question. So that is our interpretation, what you just 

gave, of what grandfathering means. I think Secretary Sherman—

what is your title? 

Ms. SHERMAN. Yes. 

Senator SCHUMER. Secretary. Under Secretary——

Ms. SHERMAN. Whatever. 

Senator SCHUMER. Ambassador Sherman. Excuse me. 

Ms. SHERMAN. ‘‘Wendy.’’ Whatever. 

Senator SCHUMER. OK. You are good by me, whatever your name 

is, title is. 

Ms. SHERMAN. Likewise, Senator. 

Senator SCHUMER.——said that a British Ambassador said Britain agreed with that interpretation. OK? Do we have that in writing somewhere that Britain, France, Germany, and the European 


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Union agree with that interpretation since they are members of the 

Group of Eight? 

Ms. SHERMAN. We do not have a letter to that effect. I will talk 

with them about that possibility. I want to tell this Committee, 

though, I had extensive discussions the 27 days I was in Vienna 

toward the end of this with every single one of our partners, quite 

extensive, because they all had these concerns, and we were extremely explicit. And the explicitness is the following, which Adam 

said and I will repeat. We said there is no validity to a snapback 

provision if there is any form of grandfathering. Then it renders 

snapback meaningless, and we will not agree to a deal—the United 

States of America will not agree to a deal where there is not a real 

snapback provision. That is what we insisted upon, and that is 

what we got. 

Senator SCHUMER. But the snapback has lots of other aspects to 

it, I understand. I just want to ask you, do Russia and China, do 

we have any indication that they agree with this interpretation of 

grandfathering? 

Ms. SHERMAN. Yes. We had very, very explicit discussions with 

them. There is language in the document that talks about prior 

contracts. But if you read that language very carefully, you will see 

there is no grandfathering whatsoever. 

Senator SCHUMER. OK. And just one other point to make. I suppose if it is a major contract to them, they could just ask that snapback not be put in effect, or they could pull out of the deal. But 

who knows what——

Ms. SHERMAN. But snapback——

Senator SCHUMER. That is just speculation. 

Ms. SHERMAN.——cannot be stopped by any one country. It cannot. 

Senator SCHUMER. Yes. No. But they can—let us say it is a huge 

contract of real importance to the Soviet—to Russia. They could 

say, ‘‘You go forward with snapback, which you have the unilateral 

power to do; we are pulling out.’’ They could. 

Ms. SHERMAN. They could. 

Senator SCHUMER. Who knows if they would, but they could. 

Ms. SHERMAN. They could. 

Senator SCHUMER. Yes. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. SZUBIN. Senator Crapo. 

Senator CRAPO. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I would like to address my first questions to you, Mr. Szubin, 

with regard to sanctions. At this point, the JCPOA has been approved and—submitted to the Security Council and approved by 

the Security Council of the United Nations, correct? 

[Mr. Szubin nods head.] 

Senator CRAPO. What impact does that approval have on the 

sanctions regimes, both the U.N. sanctions regimes and the sanctions of the United States? 

Mr. SZUBIN. So it has no impact on the sanctions of the United 

States whatsoever. With respect to the U.N. sanctions regimes, as 

I understand it, the endorsement by the U.N. Security Council sets 

out a timetable right in line with what Ambassador Sherman was 

describing where Iranian performance, when verified, will lead to 

the lifting of U.N. sanctions. 


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Senator CRAPO. And that would be all of the U.N. sanctions on 

Iran? 

Mr. SZUBIN. No. What it would mean—at Implementation Day, 

when Iran is taking its initial steps and all those key nuclear steps 

that Ambassador Sherman described would mean that the economic sanctions in the United Nations Security Council would be 

relieved. The sanctions on their arms trade, the sanctions on their 

acquisition of ballistic missile technology remain in place for many 

years to come under the U.N. 

Senator CRAPO. And in your opening statement, you made some 

point about the fact that it would be very hard right now for the 

United States to back out of the agreement that it has reached and 

then reimpose a sanctions regime, correct? 

Mr. SZUBIN. Senator, what I was referring to is if Congress were 

to strike down the deal, would we as the United States be able to 

unilaterally coerce international pressure to be able to secure a 

much better agreement. I was not talking there about snapback. 

And the key distinction between those two is obviously Iran is in 

breach in the second. Iran is defying the international community 

in the second, and I think we have very good leverage in that case. 

Senator CRAPO. Well, that is the question I wanted to ask, because if it is not possible for us to go back and reimplement an effective sanctions regime now, what about snapback? And I understand that snapback is based on an Iranian violation of the agreement. But what about that makes you think that now that the 

sanctions have been essentially put into the process of being removed, what makes you think that the snapback will work? 

Mr. SZUBIN. And that is a question I have spent the better part 

of 2 years working on. I appreciate it very much, Senator. One of 

the reasons that you hear us talking about lifting, viz., terminating 

sanctions is for that exact reason: to ensure that these authorities 

remain in place, that the structure of the U.N. sanctions resolutions is still on the books, that the EU sanctions are still on the 

books, and that the U.S. sanctions are still on the books so that 

they are hovering in suspense and we make very clearly, not just 

symbolically but legally, that we are in a position very quickly to 

restore that pressure. 

Senator CRAPO. So you believe the fact that we have five other 

nations agreeing that a violation of the agreement would require 

a snapback of sanctions means that they would immediately join 

us if we said that there is a violation of the agreement? 

Mr. SZUBIN. Obviously, if we are talking about a scenario in the 

future of a violation, the key question would be: What is the violation? How material is it? But in the event where we, the United 

States, view it as a significant breach, we have retained the authority to do so unilaterally, including at the United Nations, even 

if the other members of the Security Council are not with us. 

Senator CRAPO. And you believe that in that case, we could effectively cause the other nations to reimplement sanctions? 

Mr. SZUBIN. In the event of a serious breach, I do. What you are 

talking about then is the scenario we were facing in 2012, where 

Iran seemed to be on the path toward a nuclear weapons capability, and we won international agreement to impose very tough 

sanctions to cut off contracts, to pull out of investments. All of 


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those costly steps were taken because the world, frankly, does not 

want Iran to have that capability. That is not a U.S.-only priority. 

Senator CRAPO. So what I am getting here, though, is that you 

are talking about an extremely serious violation that would cause 

the other nations of the world to believe that Iran was, in fact, developing or had developed a nuclear weapon. 

Mr. SZUBIN. Yes, Senator. 

Senator CRAPO. So we have to get to that level of proof of a violation before we can see an effective reimplementation of sanctions? 

Mr. SZUBIN. No. I think what I am saying is that we will obviously want to respond in a proportional way. It is not in our strategic interests to respond to a small breach with scrapping the 

agreement and trying to put all of the sanctions back into place. 

I do not think that would have the success that we had over the 

last few years, and I do not think it would be in our interest to see 

this agreement scrapped. If we see a small breach, it is in our interest to see Iran cure and to come back into full compliance in a 

way that we can verify. 

Senator CRAPO. All right. Thank you. 

Mr. Chairman, I see my time is up. Thank you. 

Chairman SHELBY. Thank you. 

Senator Menendez. 

Senator MENENDEZ. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Let me thank you both for your service. Regardless of my questions, I certainly appreciate your service. 

Madam Secretary, is this agreement or war—is that the choice? 

A simple yes or no. 

Ms. SHERMAN. I do not think it is a simple yes or no. Do I——

Senator MENENDEZ. So if you had not—if you cannot give me a 

simple yes or no as to whether it is either this agreement or war, 

and since I do not have the unlimited time—so if you had not 

struck agreement with Iran, would we be at war with Iran? 

Ms. SHERMAN. I believe that the chances that we would be down 

the road to war would go up exponentially. 

Senator MENENDEZ. So you are saying compared to other witnesses who have served in the Administration in the past, who 

support the agreement before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and have been asked the same question, they have unequivocally, easily said no, it is not this or war. So you have a view 

that it is this or——

Ms. SHERMAN. As I just said to you, it is not binary, Senator. 

Senator MENENDEZ. Further down the path——

Ms. SHERMAN. It is not binary——

Senator MENENDEZ.——a year from now, 2 years from now, 3 

years——

Ms. SHERMAN. I do not—you know, I do not think any of us can 

predict the future in that way. What I will say——

Senator MENENDEZ. Well, that is the problem. 

Ms. SHERMAN. What I will say——

Senator MENENDEZ. The Secretary of State has come before various Members of the Senate——

Ms. SHERMAN. Yes. 

Senator MENENDEZ.——and said it is either this or war. I think 

that is——


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Ms. SHERMAN. Yes, because——

Senator MENENDEZ.——a binary statement. 

Ms. SHERMAN. And the reason, Senator, is because sanctions 

have never gotten rid of their nuclear program. It has only brought 

them to the table. And so——

Senator MENENDEZ. But that has not——

Ms. SHERMAN.——if we——

Senator MENENDEZ.——created war either. 

Ms. SHERMAN. If we walk away from this deal, Iran will begin 

marching forward with their program further, as they have done 

over the years, and the President of the United States has said he 

will not allow them to obtain a nuclear weapon——

Senator MENENDEZ. Well, I think there is real doubt——

Ms. SHERMAN.——and that leaves you with only one option. 

Senator MENENDEZ. I think there is real doubt, including——

Ms. SHERMAN. That only leaves you with one——

Senator MENENDEZ.——if you were to get an intelligence briefing, I think there is real doubt that Iran believes that a credible 

military threat of force is on the table. 

Let me ask you——

Ms. SHERMAN. I do not agree with that at all. 

Senator MENENDEZ.——this: On page 26 of the agreement, it 

says:

The United States will make its best efforts in good faith to sustain the 

agreement and to prevent interference with the realization of the full benefit by Iran of the sanctions lifting specified in Annex II.

Which is basically, for the most part, the U.S. sanctions.

The U.S. administration, acting consistent with the respective roles of the 

President and the Congress, will refrain from reintroducing or reimposing 

the sanctions specified in Annex II that has ceased applying under the 

[Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action].

Now, I tried to get this from the Treasury Secretary, and he did 

not give me an answer. The Iran Sanctions Act that I was one of 

the authors of expires next year. Do we have the right to reauthorize those sanctions now or at any given time? Yes or no. 

Ms. SHERMAN. I believe, Senator, that it does not expire until the 

end of next year, and it is premature to have that discussion. 

Senator MENENDEZ. OK. So here we go again. We either have the 

right or we do not have the right. Having a question of prematurely discussing something does not answer the question of do 

you understand the agreement is that we have the right or we do 

not have the right? 

Ms. SHERMAN. We said in this document that it recognizes the 

Constitution of the United States. The U.S. Congress has the right 

to do whatever it wants to do within its authority. So in that case, 

you do have the right. What we are saying is it is premature—we 

would urge that it is premature to make that decision——

Senator MENENDEZ. Well, if you are going to snap back, you got 

to snap back to something. And if the Iran Sanctions Act, which 

this Administration on various occasions has credited as one of the 

significant elements of getting Iran to the negotiating table, if they 

do not exist after next year, there is nothing to snap back to in that 

context. So——

Ms. SHERMAN. We believe there is a way forward in that regard. 


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Senator MENENDEZ. Well, let me then just read to you what your 

partner in this deal said in a letter to the Security Council dated 

July 20, 2015. The Iranians said:

It is clearly spelled out in the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action that both 

the European Union and the United States will refrain from reintroducing 

or reimposing the sanctions and restrictive measures lifted under the Joint 

Comprehensive Plan of Action. It is understood that reintroduction or reimposition, including through extension of the sanctions and restrictive measures, will constitute significant nonperformance which would relieve Iran 

from its commitments, in part or in whole.

So your partner in this regard believes that, in fact, if we were to—

if Congress were to go ahead and reauthorize, which I think most 

members believe that it is still going to exist, I think most members considering this agreement, Mr. Chairman, believe that the 

Iran Sanctions Act is still going to exist, as something, with all the 

waivers the President has, as something that, in fact, will be reverted back to if the Iranians violate, and it is a form of deterrence. 

And so either sanctions work or they do not. Either they are a 

deterrent or they are not. And if they are not, then the agreement 

is really based on the hope over the course of 10 years, or 13 as 

the President said in his NPR interview, that, in fact, there will 

be performance by the Iranians, that they will not violate, and then 

with no sanctions in place, that, in fact, the only choice you have 

is a very limited window in which you will have to act possibly 

militarily for the next President of the United States. 

So, Mr. Szubin, let me ask you this: Isn’t it true that whenever 

we have imposed sanctions, we have given countries and companies 

and individuals sufficient notice for them to divest themselves of 

the sanctionable activity? 

Mr. SZUBIN. No. What I would say, Senator, is when we have imposed major sanctions that affect sectoral behavior or major investments, we have typically built in a wind-down period, a short winddown period—so that could be 60 days, 90 days—in order to——

Senator MENENDEZ. It has often been 6 months, has it not? 

Mr. SZUBIN. In some cases it has been 6 months. 

Senator MENENDEZ. OK. 

Mr. SZUBIN. But typically that is longer. We want——

Senator MENENDEZ. So if it is 6 months and you have a 1-year 

breakout time, although David Albright, in testimony before the 

Senate Foreign Relations Committee, a physicist, a former weapons 

inspector, and the head of the Institute for Science, said that they 

believe their calculation of potential breakout time under one scenario is 6 to 7 months. That is a heck of a lot less than 1 year. 

So the time period of potential re-enactment of sanctions, which 

the Administration argues both ways—it will not get Iran to do 

what we want it to do; at the same time you say this is our defense, it is snapback. It is either one or the other. 

I just do not see how, in fact, we have the wherewithal under 

this agreement. Your partner says that, in fact, there is no way 

that they will respect that in terms of they will be able to get out 

of the agreement, and we will be back to point zero. When they 

choose to do that, which is why you are all reluctant to go ahead 

and acknowledge that there should be a reauthorization of the Iran 

Sanctions Act because then they may very well walk away, and if, 

in fact, they are going to walk away simply by the existence of 


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sanctions that do not go into effect unless there is a violation in 

the future, you have to worry that what they are doing is buying 

for time. 

And the last point I want to make, you know, sometimes what 

is past is prologue. And I just want to read some excerpts from a 

hearing when I was pursuing the Iran Sanctions Act when the 

then-Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, now 

the Secretary of State, was actually arguing against the sanctions. 

So I guess, you know, in this respect, things have not changed. He 

went on to say that:

Rather than motivating these countries to join us in increasing pressure on 

Iran, they are most likely to resent our actions and resist following our 

lead, a consequence that would serve the Iranians more than it harms 

them. And it could have the opposite effect than was intended and increase 

the Iranian regime’s revenue.

And then you were quoted, Secretary Sherman, as, in fact, also 

buying into that point of view, and if you look at the transcript of 

the hearing, basically what it talks about is everything we have 

heard here, that we will break the coalition, that, in fact, we will 

be isolated, that, in fact, we will be alone, and that, therefore, we 

will not have the consequences against Iran. And the problem is 

when you cry wolf one too many times, it really is problematic. 

And so based upon a history here which says, no, those sanctions 

should not be imposed because if they do, we will lose the coalition, 

now listening to if this agreement is not accepted we will lose the 

coalition, saying—unwilling to say that the Iran Sanctions Act 

should be reauthorized, which I think every member believes is 

going to exist as a deterrent, and then saying there is a deterrence 

or no deterrence, that is hard to understand. 

And the final point I would make, Mr. Chairman, this Iranian regime cares about two things: preserving the regime and the revolution. They are not going to enter into any agreement that does not 

preserve the regime and the revolution. And so they must think 

this is a good agreement for them ultimately to accomplish that 

goal. And that is worrisome. That is worrisome. 

So I understand the hope that the agreement implies and that 

they will perform. But when they do not perform, I do not think 

we are going to be in a better position at that time, and that is my 

concern. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman SHELBY. Senator Sasse. 

Senator SASSE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you both for 

being here. 

Ambassador Sherman, I wonder if you can help me understand 

what you think the Congress is actually voting on. Whether or not 

Congress would kill the deal, does that matter in any way to the 

Iranians? Or are they already guaranteed all the benefits of what 

has been negotiated today? 

Ms. SHERMAN. Well, of course, they are not, Senator. 

The U.S. Congress has the authority and the right under our 

Constitution and under the Corker-Cardin legislation to, in fact, review this and to vote a resolution of disapproval. The President of 

the United States then has the right and the authority to exercise 

his veto if he wants, and I would expect that he would. And then 


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the U.S. Congress has the right to try to override that veto. That 

is how our system works. 

I would hope that the U.S. Congress would not override that veto 

because I believe that the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action is 

the most profound, the most far-reaching arms control agreement 

ever negotiated and that indeed it will keep this country, Israel, 

and our allies safer. 

Senator SASSE. Thank you. But what I am asking is: If the Congress did override that veto, why would it matter to the Iranians? 

What would they lose? 

Ms. SHERMAN. They would lose an opportunity to have sanctions 

relief. They would lose the opportunity to end their isolation from 

the rest of the world. They would lose their opportunity to come 

into the community of nations. 

Now, they may not care about that, and what I would expect if 

the U.S. Congress overrides a Presidential veto, which I would not 

expect to have happen because I believe that this Congress has 

united behind Democratic and Republican Presidents for war, and 

I would expect in the end they would unite behind a Democratic 

President or a Republican President for peace, and that is what 

this deal is about, not having to go to war, but ensuring that Iran 

does not get a nuclear weapon. 

Senator SASSE. I agree with you that this should not be a partisan issue. But isn’t it the case that the Administration is arguing 

to undecided members that we have already lost the international 

community, and so if the United States does not act, if we do not 

go forward with your deal, the Iranians are going to get this relief 

anyway? If not, isn’t that an answer to Senator Menendez’s question, and, frankly, it is what the President and Secretary Kerry 

were saying 3 or 4 weeks before July 1st, that it is not a choice 

between this deal and war, but that there are other scenarios 

where sanctions could have an effect? I think you cannot have it 

both ways. 

Ms. SHERMAN. Yes, I understand that. The issue is what kind of 

effect, how far-reaching an effect, and whether that will stop their 

nuclear program. So is it true that our unilateral sanctions could 

be put back in place and continue on? Is it possible that the rest 

of the world—maybe not Europe; Europe may follow through because they are allies and partners of ours—but other parts of the 

world that have taken huge economic costs by stopping their importation of Iranian oil or taken huge costs by other ending of trade 

with Iran would not pay attention to our unilateral, bilateral sanctions? Yes, that is indeed the case. 

So our sanctions regime would not be as effective as it would be. 

There would not be—the international community has come together behind this deal. They will not stay together behind our 

alone rejecting this deal if the U.S. Congress overrides the veto. 

The United States will be in a weaker position not only on this, 

Senator, but on many other things that we are trying to do internationally in the world. 

Senator SASSE. But just to be clear, it is your position that if the 

Congress would kill this deal, the U.S. sanctions regime could still 

have some significant effect? 


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Ms. SHERMAN. It would have some effect. I would suspect so, yes. 

But it will not have the effect that it does today, and everyone has 

to remember that Iran will then move forward with its program, 

that sanctions, as devastating as they have been and, as I would 

say to Senator Menendez, and hope it shows in the record, that indeed this Administration has enforced both unilateral and multilateral sanctions even more profoundly that every previous Administration, each of which has tried to do a very good and credible job, 

but we have intensified that. That is what President Obama set out 

to do, was to intensify that sanctions pressure so that Iran would 

come to the negotiating table in a serious way to get the most profound and far-reaching arms control agreement that has ever been 

negotiated. 

Senator SASSE. Thank you, and I do appreciate your advocacy for 

the agreement. But I think this was the yes-or-no answer that you 

just gave to the question that Senator Menendez asked. You do not 

believe that it is war or this deal. You just outlined a third scenario. You——

Ms. SHERMAN. Yes, but——

Senator SASSE.——would not answer yes or no for him, but I 

think you just——

Ms. SHERMAN. No, but——

Senator SASSE.——said yes, it is not. 

Ms. SHERMAN. I did not, Senator, because a third scenario is 

even though our sanctions would have some bite, Iran would move 

forward with its nuclear program, because why wouldn’t they? 

They would not be getting the relief, all the relief they wanted. 

They would keep marching forward with their program. And it 

would force us into a choice: Were we going to allow them to have 

a nuclear weapon? And President Obama is resolute. He will not 

allow that to happen. And that leaves you heading down a road to 

war. 

Senator SASSE. Thanks. Almost at time, but, Secretary Szubin, I 

want to ask you one question. You and I have had previous discussions, and you know that I appreciate the work that you do, and 

I know that we have mutual affection for one of your predecessors, 

Secretary Zarate. I do not know if you have read his testimony 

today. I will not quote the whole length of it, but you said in your 

opening statement that the IRGC receives no sanctions relief under 

this deal. Is that correct? 

Mr. SZUBIN. Yes. 

Senator SASSE. The Secretary in his testimony in the second 

panel is going to outline much of what he calls their ‘‘business empire’’ that is driven by the IRGC. Most of those entities do receive 

sanctions relief under this deal. So isn’t your point really fairly 

meaningless that they do not receive sanctions relief since all the 

entities that they get their money from do? 

Mr. SZUBIN. No, Senator. On this point—and maybe it is the only 

one—I would respectfully beg to differ with former Assistant Secretary Zarate. The business empire of the IRGC will remain under 

sanctions. That means the companies that it controls, that it is deriving revenue from, will remain under sanctions, and certainly, obviously, its senior officers will remain under sanctions as well. And 

thanks to Congress, that will have international effect, meaning 


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any international bank that does business with that—and let me 

give a very specific example here. 

Khatam al-Anbia, the largest construction engineering firm in 

Iran, we have designated for being owned or controlled by the 

IRGC. It is a revenue source for the IRGC. It is not coming off, not 

at 5 years, 8 years, 15 years under this deal. Any international 

bank that hosts accounts for it will face cutoff from the U.S. financial system. So those are very tough, aggressive sanctions, and 

those all remain in place. 

Now, there are companies who have done what I would call 

‘‘arm’s-length transactions’’ with the IRGC over time that we have 

designated for conducting business for the IRGC. We have companies like that that are due to receive relief at various phases under 

the deal, but the business empire, as you described it, remains intact. 

Ms. SHERMAN. And if I might add, the IRGC does not support 

this deal. That should tell you something. 

Senator SASSE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman SHELBY. Thank you. 

Senator Merkley. 

Senator MERKLEY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

In regard to that, my understanding is the IRGC controls a lot 

of smuggling and benefits very handsomely, if you will, from the 

sanctions in that regard, and that that is one of the reasons they 

are opposed to that. Is that a correct impression? 

Mr. SZUBIN. The IRGC is engaged in a lot of nefarious activity 

within Iran’s economy as well, as you point out, and we have seen 

allegations, I think credible allegations, that they have engaged in 

profiteering, black market profiteering, off of sanctioned goods, including, very cynically, off of goods that are going to the health of 

the Iranian people. 

Senator MERKLEY. Ms. Sherman, I want to turn to you. I submitted a series of questions to the Administration, and in response 

to one of the questions, the Administration has responded, ‘‘Iran 

has committed indefinitely to not engage in specific activities that 

could contribute to the design and development of a nuclear weapon.’’

In this context, does ‘‘indefinitely’’ mean the time period has not 

been established? Or does it mean ‘‘perpetually’’? 

Ms. SHERMAN. It means that under this agreement and under 

the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, Iran is prohibited from pursuing a nuclear weapon, obtaining, acquiring, or developing one. 

Ever. Ever. 

Senator MERKLEY. So it really means perpetually. 

Ms. SHERMAN. Perpetually, yes. 

Senator MERKLEY. So under the NPT, the Additional Protocol 

and modified Code 3.1, does Iran have the right to enrich up to 

weapons-grade uranium after the expiration of the Iranian enrichment cap? 

Ms. SHERMAN. No, because if they indeed move to enriching to 

what we would consider weapons-grade, it will raise a red flag to 

the entire international community, to the IAEA. There are very 

few circumstances where Iran needs to, for peaceful nuclear purposes, enrich above 5 percent. One could argue for submarine fuel, 


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perhaps, but indeed, if they went to weapons-grade, it would raise 

instantaneous red flags, and we would see it as a major noncompliance. 

Senator MERKLEY. So enrichment over 5 percent starts to essentially raise this red flag with the exception of submarine fuel? And 

what percentage——

Ms. SHERMAN. Submarine fuel, and there may be one other or 

two things. I am not an expert. I could ask my physicist, who is 

sitting behind me, if there are other instances, but there are very 

few. 

Senator MERKLEY. Well, what enrichment would the submarine 

fuel be? 

Ms. SHERMAN. I think it is 20? 

It could be 20, some are higher, Dr. Timby says. 

Senator MERKLEY. So that is a big distinction between 5 and 20. 

But are you basically saying that if the amount of fuel enriched did 

not specifically meet the quantity profile of the nuclear submarines, 

that that would be a red flag? So, essentially, for most purposes, 

it is 5 percent? 

Ms. SHERMAN. It is 5 percent or less. 

Senator MERKLEY. OK. And in terms of after the——

Ms. SHERMAN. The one other distinction I should make is for the 

Tehran Research Reactor, which helps to make medical isotopes for 

cancer research, cancer treatment in Iran—it uses 20 percent. But 

this agreement says that we will provide fabricated fuel for that 

Tehran Research Reactor over time, and we have put controls on 

that so that it cannot be used for other purposes. 

Senator MERKLEY. So how much enriched uranium above 5 percent could Iran store without creating a red flag? 

Ms. SHERMAN. So two points. Acting Under Secretary helpfully 

reminds me that for 15 years Iran is not allowed under this agreement to enrich beyond 3.67 percent. So the concern you have raised 

only begins to raise those red flags after those 15 years. They are 

allowed for those 15 years to only have a stockpile of 300 kilograms. That 300 kilograms is not enough to provide enough fissile 

material for a nuclear weapon. 

Senator MERKLEY. Right. But after those 15 years, they can have 

more than the 300 kilograms, so there is no particular limit at that 

point? 

Ms. SHERMAN. There is not a limit, but, of course, again, we 

would look at an ever increasing stockpile and want to understand 

the reasons and uses of it. And one of the things that is very clear 

here, because we have uranium accountancy for 25 years, centrifuge production for 20 years, they have to make a declaration to 

the IAEA of their Additional Protocol research and development 

over the long term, that there will be many, many metrics for 

measuring what they are doing with their program for a very, very 

long time. 

Senator MERKLEY. Because my time is expiring, my last question 

is: When you look at snapback, that is kind of a sledgehammer approach. Given the scale of violations, is there a scalable response? 

Mr. SZUBIN. Yes, Senator. We have reserved the right to snap 

back ‘‘in whole or in part,’’ and that is a quote from the agreement, 

and we can do that with our unilateral sanctions or we can do that 


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with the U.N. sanctions. And the EU has reserved a similar right, 

whether it is putting back in place on a sector, on a category of 

transactions, all the way through to full snapback. 

Senator MERKLEY. Thank you. 

Chairman SHELBY. Senator Cotton. 

Senator COTTON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I have to note with some astonishment that there was an 8-

minute exchange between Senator Schumer and the witnesses 

about the meaning of the grandfather clause. I think we got some 

kind of answer out of it, but I also know that Administration officials have said repeatedly that Iran will exploit every ambiguity in 

the text of this agreement to that advantage, so I can only imagine 

what they will say about that clause, should it come to pass. 

But moving on, Secretary Sherman, there is a lot of commentary 

about access—access to Iran’s necessary sites, their military sites. 

It is throughout the JCPOA. Secretary Kerry and Secretary Moniz 

have frequently talked about ‘‘managed access.’’ Can you assure us 

that this access will actually be physical access, IAEA inspectors 

will be physically walking into these sites and taking samples or 

installing equipment? 

Ms. SHERMAN. I think that every situation is different, Senator, 

and that the IAEA has the capability, the expert knowledge to 

make sure that whatever they do can be technically authenticated. 

So I cannot go through every hypothetical situation. I know that 

Director General Amano I am sure will get asked these questions 

by your colleagues in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in 

this informal meeting, so I would rely on his answers more than 

on my answers. But what I am assured of is that whatever they 

do in every circumstances where they believe they need to have access, it will be technically authenticated, and it will be meet the 

standards that they must have and that they require for ensuring 

verification and monitoring. 

Senator COTTON. The answer then, it sounds like, is no, we cannot be assured that IAEA——

Ms. SHERMAN. No. 

Senator COTTON.——inspectors will physically and personally be 

present on every single site. 

Ms. SHERMAN. You know, you do not have to be physically 

present on every site in this technological world to get done what 

is necessary. Our labs can you walk you through those parameters 

as well. 

Senator COTTON. Who will decide what is and is not a military 

site? 

Ms. SHERMAN. Well, I think the better way to respond to your 

question is to say if the IAEA believes that it has justification to 

have access to a site, we have a process to ensure they get that access, whatever that site is, military or nonmilitary. 

Senator COTTON. Can Iran deem its research universities to be 

a military site? 

Ms. SHERMAN. As I said, if they have justification to enter any 

site, regardless of what it is, and the access agreement provides a 

process to ensure they will get access. The United States of America would not have agreed to an agreement where access was not 


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assured if the IAEA believed it had to have it. That is what we 

have in this agreement. 

Senator COTTON. Are you aware of any actions that the Government of Iran has taken to sanitize any sensitive or suspected sites 

since the date of the JCPOA? 

Ms. SHERMAN. I am not going to discuss anything that would be 

considered classified, but there is an all-Senate briefing this afternoon. The National Intelligence Manager will be there, and we will 

be prepared to answer these questions. 

Senator COTTON. Let us move to the side deals between the 

IAEA and Iran. You acknowledged to Senator Scott that you read 

the side agreements between the IAEA and Iran. Did anyone else 

in the U.S. Government read these side agreements? 

Ms. SHERMAN. Yes. Some of our experts did as well, as did all 

of the P5+1. 

Senator COTTON. Can you give me an estimate of how many officials read the side agreements? 

Ms. SHERMAN. A handful. I would have to stop and think. 

Senator COTTON. So you said earlier to Senator Corker that we 

have to honor the confidentiality of these agreements between the 

IAEA and Iran, but if you have read them——

Ms. SHERMAN. Well, actually, it is the IAEA and every country 

with which it does Safeguards——

Senator COTTON. I will come to that——

Ms. SHERMAN.——Confidential Protocols. 

Senator COTTON.——in a moment. But the fact that you have 

read them and other U.S. Government officials have read them, 

doesn’t that undermine the claims of supposed confidentiality in 

these agreements? 

Ms. SHERMAN. Well, we were shown them in a confidential setting, and I will share with the U.S. Senate, as I have done with 

House leadership, Chairs, and Rankings, my confidential understanding, and we will hopefully keep them in a classified setting. 

Senator COTTON. How long are these documents? 

Ms. SHERMAN. Very short. 

Senator COTTON. Like the road map itself? 

Ms. SHERMAN. I would have to stop and think back, but it is very 

short. 

Senator COTTON. Why are these documents classified? This is not 

a U.S. Government document. It is not a covert action. It is not 

subject to sensitive collection and methods of our intelligence community. Iran——

Ms. SHERMAN. Because it is——

Senator COTTON. Iran knows what they agreed to. You know 

what is in it. Why are these classified? 

Ms. SHERMAN. So the reason is they are what are called ‘‘Safeguards Confidential.’’ Under——

Senator COTTON. Yes——

Ms. SHERMAN.——the Comprehensive Safeguards Agreement 

(CSA), to which we are also a party, we have confidential Safeguards documents and protocols with the IAEA, between the 

United States and the IAEA, as do all of the countries that are 

under the CSA. The IAEA has committed to keeping them


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confidential, and so, therefore, they are committed to keeping these 

protocols under CSA confidential as well. 

Senator COTTON. Yes, I am aware that that is the statement you 

also gave Senator Corker. I assume that you are not implying any 

kind of moral equivalence between the United States——

Ms. SHERMAN. Absolutely not——

Senator COTTON.——and Iran. 

Ms. SHERMAN.——and I indeed said to a Senator—you were not 

here yet, Senator Cotton, that I understood that this was a very 

different circumstance in the sense that we were trying to keep 

Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon, and that this was an international understanding that had been negotiated among six parties 

and Iran. So, yes, I understand this is a different circumstance, 

which is why I believe the IAEA at an expert level shared the protocol arrangements, understanding they would be classified. And I 

made clear to the IAEA under our system I would be required to 

share in a classified, confidential setting with members of the U.S. 

Congress what I had seen, and I will do so this afternoon. 

Senator COTTON. Did you make clear to Iran and the other parties that U.S. law, U.S. law that was, in fact, signed in the middle 

of these negotiations, required Congress to receive the text of all 

agreements, to include agreements to which the United States was 

not a party? 

Ms. SHERMAN. Indeed, our understanding of the Corker-Cardin 

legislation that was passed by the House and the Senate is that we 

must give you every document that we have, and we have given 

you every document that we have. 

Senator COTTON. The legislation says ‘‘all agreements.’’ It does 

not actually matter whether the U.S. Government has it in its possession or not. 

Ms. SHERMAN. Well, it is very difficult—it is very difficult to give 

you something that we do not have. 

Senator COTTON. Did you make that clear to Iran and IAEA at 

the time, however? 

Ms. SHERMAN. Iran and the IAEA are quite well aware of our 

legislation. I can assure you they follow what you do every single 

day. 

Senator COTTON. And one final question. A fascinating new interview today from Secretary Kerry and Jeffrey Goldberg says that if 

Congress were to vote no on this, it would be screwing the Ayatollah. And then Secretary Kerry says that if Congress rejects the 

deal, it would show Iran ‘‘America is not going to negotiate in good 

faith. It did not negotiate in good faith now, and that would be the 

Ayatollah’s point.’’

Surely you made clear to Iran that Congress had to vote on this 

deal before it could go forward and, therefore, they should not be 

operating under such a misperception? 

Ms. SHERMAN. Of course they knew that Congress was going to 

vote on this. Everything was very public. Everything that happens 

here in our country is transparent, democratic, and public, and we 

are very proud of that fact. 

Senator COTTON. Are you concerned about Congress screwing the 

Ayatollah? 


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Ms. SHERMAN. I have not seen this interview. I am not going to 

comment on it, Senator. What I will comment on is that Secretary 

Kerry, Secretary Moniz, myself, the negotiating team who have 

been working diligently on this for over 2 years, having briefed the 

U.S. Senate and the Congress countless times—hundreds of times, 

quite frankly—did everything they could to ensure the safety and 

security of the United States. That is our solemn obligation, and 

that is what we did. 

Senator COTTON. Thank you. 

Chairman SHELBY. Senator Warner. 

Senator WARNER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I am going to start by simply saying, one, I appreciate what you 

have been doing. I think many of us have concerns about components of the deal. Many of us would like to Monday morning quarterback, but I find it remarkable that some members seem to impugn that you were not there trying to do the best deal possible 

for the United States of America and for long-term prospects of stability in the region. 

I may agree or not agree with what you negotiated, and I have 

got more due diligence to do. But I would never question the approach you took or the dedication that you have taken in this process. 

Mr. Szubin, clearly your actions through both Administrations 

working on this bring a lot of history and commitment, and I absolutely believe that you want to make sure that we follow up in particular on Iranian actions, destabilizing actions in the region. 

I do want to continue, I think, something that Senator Sasse 

asked about, what would happen if we do not act. There are some 

who have put forward a theory that have said that if the U.S. Congress turns this agreement down, Iran would still—it would still be 

in Iran’s best interest to go through to Implementation Day so that 

take down their nuclear stockpiles, dissemble parts of their reactors, so that they could still obtain the $50-plus billion, in effect 

isolate America since the rest of the world would be otherwise 

aligned. 

Do you want to comment on that theory? Because it is being 

speculated on a lot. 

Mr. SZUBIN. So, Senator, obviously it is always dangerous to 

speculate about how scenarios play out, especially highly compromise international scenarios like the one you are describing. But 

I think the point Ambassador Sherman made earlier is really important in this respect, which is it is not a black or white answer. 

If the United States were to retain our sanctions because Congress 

rejects the deal, and certainly for our part we would then implement the sanctions, as it is our obligation to do, we would still see 

some international enforcement, whether it is on the oil side, 

whether it is on the reserve side. That enforcement would begin to 

erode, especially in a scenario that you are describing, where Iran 

actually goes through with its commitments in order to isolate us 

and to show they are now the good actor, they are complying with 

all their commitments, and the United States is the one who 

walked away. 

That is a scenario I very much hope does not occur. It would be 

terrible for us in terms of our sanctions, in terms of our credibility. 


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When we exercise these authorities, these extraordinary authorities, we need to be able to do so in a way that is meaningful and 

where people know we are ready to act. 

So I very much hope it does not come to that, but it certainly 

would be a situation of weakened leverage. It is not going to be 

zero. It is not going to be 100 percent. But it will be weakened leverage. And the question then is: Could we turn weakened leverage 

into a much stronger deal? And my assessment is no. 

Senator WARNER. Ambassador Sherman, do you have any other 

comment on that? 

Ms. SHERMAN. I could not agree more. My assessment would also 

be, no, that, in fact, if we walk away, even if we retain some sanctions capability—and we would, of course, enforce our laws—the 

rest of the world will go in another direction and, more importantly, Iran will go in another direction, and the President of the 

United States, whether it is President Obama or the next President 

of the United States, will face a very difficult choice——

Senator WARNER. But there is one—you know, there is a separate premise. Would they walk away immediately or would they actually go through to implementation? We do not know, but it is——

Ms. SHERMAN. I doubt very seriously—if the United States sanctions remain in place, Iran will perceive that we have walked away 

from the deal and they no longer have to stick with it. 

Senator WARNER. Two questions. One, two more questions, and 

I will try to stay within my time. One is that, you know, one of the 

concerns we have had is the Administration did say when Congress 

put tougher sanctions in, moved forward particularly on the SWIFT 

notions, using the SWIFT system, there was great reluctance from 

the Administration about us taking that step. I think in retrospect 

taking that step was important and effective and helped tighten 

down the sanctions. 

I do wonder if we do not move forward, though, you know, will 

we be prepared to move forward with the severity of those same 

sanctions, particularly as we look at sanctioning Bank of India, 

Bank of Korea, Bank of Japan. Comments on that? And I would 

like to get one last question in, recognizing everybody has gone a 

little over time. 

Mr. SZUBIN. It is a very stark scenario that you are depicting because the institutions you are talking about are some of the most 

significant and fundamental institutions in the international financial sector, whether it is SWIFT, who is the leading messaging 

company, secure messaging company for banks worldwide, whether 

it is the largest commercial banks in Korea, India, the Central 

Bank of Japan. The prospect of us having to use our sanctions authorities against those entities is frightening. 

Senator WARNER. But if we chose to reject this, that would be 

our policy. 

Mr. SZUBIN. It would then be threatening those institutions unless they come along with the U.S. approach on this. 

Senator WARNER. Let me just get my last question in. One of the 

statements you made earlier, as we kind of—and I think further 

explanation on them, how you got to the 24 days, I was surprised 

at first about that time. I still have some concerns, but at least I 

have a little more clarification now. You know, one of the things 


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that you have said—and I think it is an artful process you created 

with, in effect, not allowing other members of the Permanent Council of the U.N. to have a veto, that we, in effect, have a default 

veto. But what kind of assurance can we really have that our current EU partners and friends in the U.K., for example, if they 

have—and in Germany, if they have engaged in a major way with 

Iran on a business basis going forward, that they will stick with 

us? How do we get more comfort around that? 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for giving me the extra minute. 

Ms. SHERMAN. I think the best comfort is the one that Acting 

Under Secretary Szubin gave, which is, in 2012, we were in the 

same circumstance where, in fact, Europe had lot of business with 

Iran. They had a lot of businesses in Iran, and they were very concerned about Iran having a nuclear weapon and moving down that 

pathway. And so they joined us in enforcement of not only our unilateral sanctions, but put on their own sanctions and multilateral 

sanctions, and, in fact, enforced them, and companies like Total 

and Siemens, Peugeot and Renault all had to leave. 

Senator WARNER. I would like to hear more particularly from our 

European allies on that matter. 

Ms. SHERMAN. I would urge you to speak with them directly. I 

think you will get the right answer you are looking for. 

Chairman SHELBY. Senator Warren. 

Senator WARREN. Mr. Chairman, if I could, I would like to yield 

to Senator Donnelly and then come back when it is my turn. 

Chairman SHELBY. Senator Donnelly is recognized. 

Senator DONNELLY. Thank you. I want to thank Senator Warren 

for her kindness on that, and thank you both for your hard work. 

In regards to Parchin and the IAEA agreement and moving forward—and this has been asked by others, but I want to try to clarify. Moving ahead in Parchin and every other facility, is it your understanding that the IAEA can get into every facility that, if they 

choose to, they can go in there physically themselves as opposed to 

having Iran turn over materials, that they have physical access? 

Ms. SHERMAN. I would be happy to get into this in greater detail 

in a classified session, Senator. What I can tell you is that whatever the IAEA believes that it needs to do to have a technical authenticated result for whatever access they believe they need to 

have, they will get it. 

Senator DONNELLY. So if they believe they need to have physical 

access to a place, that will not be denied? 

Ms. SHERMAN. As I said, whatever they believe they need for a 

technically authenticated process, they will get under the agreements that we have negotiated here, and I will be glad to discuss 

this in greater and more explicit detail in a classified setting. 

Senator DONNELLY. That would be fine. We can talk this afternoon, but that sounds like a yes to me. 

Is there reason to believe there are any other documents out 

there? 

Ms. SHERMAN. No. If there are, I do not know about them. 

Senator DONNELLY. OK. Have you asked the IAEA if there are 

any other documents out there? 

Ms. SHERMAN. I have not asked them explicitly, but I did see the 

Director General when he arrived here yesterday. We talked. I 


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asked him questions about where we were with various things, and 

I have no reason to believe there is any other document. 

Senator DONNELLY. Have you asked the Iranians whom you have 

had these discussions with, ‘‘Do you have any other agreements 

with anybody else at this time that we do not know about?’’

Ms. SHERMAN. I have not asked that question explicitly, but 

given the hours and hours we have spent together, I do not believe 

there are any other documents. 

Senator DONNELLY. I think that is a question well worth asking 

as we move forward. 

Mr. Szubin, the alternative theory that has been put out there 

or one of the alternative scenarios is that the United States walks 

away and then we, in effect, go country by country saying, ‘‘Make 

a choice economically. Do not deal with Iran or else we will sanction your’’—in effect, ‘‘We will not deal with your economy.’’ What 

is the likeliness of that kind of scenario having success? 

Mr. SZUBIN. In the event of us walking away from this deal, I 

think we would be very much swimming against the tide, because 

the cooperation we have obtained to date in going around the 

world, just as you describe, and saying, ‘‘We need to pressure Iran,’’ 

was predicated on a diplomatic path. And so China, India, South 

Korea could see here is a roadway to test Iran to see if they are 

ready to make a deal. In this context, we would be walking away 

from that. 

Senator DONNELLY. And I apologize because time is limited, but 

if we walk away, what is left in terms of strength of sanctions? Because some folks have said we still have significant impact on Iran 

at that time. What is left as—we obviously know we will still have 

sanctions in place. So what other global effects will take place? 

Mr. SZUBIN. The United States, as you note, Senator, would retain our unilateral sanctions. 

Senator DONNELLY. Right. 

Mr. SZUBIN. Basically our primary embargo on Iran remains in 

place, and that is, frankly, true, notwithstanding the deal either 

way. Our embargo is going to remain in place. 

The EU has sanctions with respect to Iran’s bad activity outside 

the nuclear file. Terrorism, human rights, those sanctions would 

remain in place. But the most severe economic sanctions that we 

have spent time talking about today and that Congress helped to 

put in place affect things like Iran’s sales of crude oil, petrochemicals, and the assets of the Central Bank of Iran, the access to the 

banking system internationally. Those are all built on the threat 

of U.S. sanction with international acquiescence. And it is that acquiescence that I fear we would be risking. 

Senator DONNELLY. And the alternative suggestion is that for 

countries who are not willing to also continue their sanctions if we 

walk away, that we go to them and say, ‘‘Make a choice.’’ How realistic is that? 

Mr. SZUBIN. I think it would be a very tough conversation, and 

I think when you are going to a country like China or India and 

telling them, ‘‘We are going to dictate where you buy your oil 

from,’’ which is what, frankly, we have been doing for the last few 

years, they are going to say, ‘‘With an eye on what?’’ What is your 

prospect for getting a nuclear deal so that we can lift these


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sanctions? And if they think that our bar, having moved the goalposts—sorry to mix sports metaphors, but that our bar is unrealistically high, then I think we will have a very hard time securing 

that cooperation, and that means our sanctions leverage will erode 

considerably. 

Senator DONNELLY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman SHELBY. Senator Warren. 

Senator WARREN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you, 

Ambassador Sherman and Under Secretary Szubin, for your work. 

And I think everyone here understands that a nuclear-armed Iran 

threatens the United States, threatens Israel, threatens the entire 

world. 

The question now before Congress and the only question before 

Congress is whether the nuclear agreement negotiated alongside 

other countries represents our best available option for preventing 

Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon. So I want to see if we can 

just pull some of these pieces together and evaluate the options. 

What happens if we go forward with this deal versus what happens 

if we back out? 

Let us start with the tough sanctions imposed by the United 

States with the cooperation of other countries around the world, 

such as the U.K., France, China, Russia, Germany, the EU. If we 

reject this deal, we need our international partners to continue the 

tough sanctions, refuse to trade with Iran, block Iran’s access to 

the frozen assets in order to be effective. 

So, Ambassador Sherman, if we walk away, do you believe that 

all the other nations that have endorsed this deal are likely to continue working with us to impose strong sanctions against Iran? 

Ms. SHERMAN. No, because as Acting Under Secretary Szubin 

said, the reason they cooperated was because we were pursuing a 

diplomatic solution and they thought that was worth trying to accomplish. That has now been accomplished, so they believe it was 

worth taking the economic hits they all did to do that. But if we 

walk away from what they consider to be a good deal—90 countries 

have spoken out in support of that deal—they will believe that we 

have changed the equation, we have not operated in good faith, and 

we are on our own. 

Senator WARREN. All right. So let us look at what happens if we 

are on our own. If the United States attempts to continue sanctions 

on our own while other nations resume trade with Iran, how effective will our sanctions likely be? 

Mr. SZUBIN. They will be less effective than they are today and 

than they were when we negotiated this agreement. 

Senator WARREN. All right. Thank you. 

Let us now consider the roughly $50 billion of Iran’s money that 

is frozen and could be granted to Iran as part of sanctions relief 

if Iran complies with the deal. 

Under Secretary Szubin, let me ask, is most or even a very significant part of this $50 billion held in the United States? 

Mr. SZUBIN. No. 

Senator WARREN. So if we walk away, do you believe that the 

other countries that hold this money will continue to keep it out 

of Iran’s hands? 


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Mr. SZUBIN. I think we will begin to see those funds be released 

if Iran starts meeting its commitments under the deal. 

Senator WARREN. All right. But the question I ask is: If we walk 

away from the deal, are you convinced that other countries that 

hold these funds are going to continue to withhold those funds from 

Iran? 

Mr. SZUBIN. I cannot guarantee you that they will. 

Senator WARREN. All right. So let us talk next about Iran’s nuclear weapons ambitions. Ambassador Sherman, if we reject this 

deal and Iran decides to build nuclear weapons, what would be 

Iran’s breakout time—that is, how long do you estimate it would 

take Iran to produce enough material for a nuclear weapon? 

Ms. SHERMAN. The assessment today is 2 to 3 months. 

Senator WARREN. OK, 2 to 3 months. And if we accept this deal 

and if Iran complies with it, what would be Iran’s breakout time? 

Ms. SHERMAN. At least for 10 years, 1 year. 

Senator WARREN. OK. Now, let us next think about cheating. 

Iran may sign the deal and then try to develop a nuclear bomb 

anyway. So, Ambassador Sherman, will it be easier for us or harder for us to detect a secret Iranian nuclear weapons program if we 

accept the deal or if we reject the deal? 

Ms. SHERMAN. Clearly, if we accept the deal, we will have many 

more eyes on; the IAEA not only will have access to the declared 

sites—Natanz, Fordow, Arak—but they will also have surveillance 

over uranium, the entire supply chain through the procurement 

channel. They will have eyes on centrifuge production. They will 

have access to undeclared sites, that is, suspicious sites; if they believe there is a justification, get in. Much of that, most of that, 

nearly all of that will disappear if there is no deal. 

Senator WARREN. All right. And then I just have one more question on this. Let us talk about war. I do not think Americans want 

to be dragged into another war in the Middle East, but let us face 

hard facts. If we reject this deal, Iran’s breakout time will go down, 

and that will increase the pressure to take military action very 

soon. So what I want to compare here is the effectiveness of these 

two options, a negotiated option versus a military option. 

In the long term, which action is likely to be more effective at 

preventing Iran from developing a nuclear bomb: accept the agreement and closely monitor Iran’s nuclear program, or reject the 

agreement and, if there is escalation, bomb Iran? Which one is 

more likely to be effective? 

Ms. SHERMAN. Clearly, a long-term negotiated solution, which is 

what we have in the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, is more 

effective because if we take military action, which the President of 

the United States will do if he has absolutely no choice, indeed we 

will only set back their program, it is estimated by the intelligence 

community, 2 to 3 years because Iran has the know-how. They 

have mastered the entire fuel cycle to create fissile material for a 

nuclear weapon, and so, therefore, although we could bomb away 

their facilities, they could reconstruct them. You cannot bomb away 

knowledge, you cannot sanction away knowledge. The only way to 

control it is a negotiated solution that is intrusively and highly 

monitored and verified. That is what we have negotiated. 


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Senator WARREN. Thank you. You know, some have said that 

they want a better deal, but that is not the choice that Congress 

faces. The deal is the deal, and Congress has two choices: accept 

it or reject it. 

No one can say for certain that this deal will prevent a nucleararmed Iran, and I will not say it. But no one has put a better, more 

realistic alternative on the table, and until I hear a better option, 

I intend to support this deal. Thank you. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman SHELBY. Senator Heitkamp. 

Senator HEITKAMP. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you, 

Mr. Chairman, for your patience today. I think this is such an important issue and this Committee has unique jurisdiction, and I 

have watched as you have let Members really get to the heart of 

what they need to examine, and I want to personally thank you for 

that. 

There is a lot of attempt here to unbake the cake. Right? And 

I think I have been product and I have been somebody who has 

been engaged in multi-party negotiations, including some of the 

large civil settlements that this country has seen, and I know how 

difficult it is to unbake a cake and to start saying, well, this could 

be better or that could be better. And I think Elizabeth—Senator 

Warren—just took us through the paces in terms of what the real 

options are. 

But I will tell you that one thing that I do not believe has been 

talked a lot about is that the fact of lifting the sanctions regime 

will, in fact, build a bigger, better, more economically stable Iran 

into the future. And as long as Iran is on the terrorism list, that 

creates incredible opportunity, as I think, Mr. Secretary, you have 

so appropriately talked about the challenges that they have economically today. If, in fact, the sanctions regime is lifted and we 

look 10 years into the future, Iran is going to be a much more stable economic power. I do not think there is any doubt about it. 

And so this might seem off topic for some people, but it is certainly on topic for me, which is the one thing that we could do that 

would provide competition against an Iran that has the ability to 

market their oil into the market and have the resulting economic 

growth as a result of marketing that oil is actually exporting American oil to compete with that Iranian oil. And it is very difficult in 

my State to explain why we should lift sanctions on Iran when we 

are sanctioned in the United States of America in terms of our oil 

exports. 

And so I would like to hear from both the State Department and 

Department of Treasury your response to that statement, especially 

looking into the future in 10 years when we know that that competition could, in fact, curtail that economic might of an enemy 

that is pretty powerful. 

Mr. SZUBIN. Senator, thank you for the question. Unfortunately, 

I am not the right Treasury official to speak to the restrictions on 

sales of American oil overseas. 

Senator HEITKAMP. But you do manage the sanctions. 

Mr. SZUBIN. Yes. 

Senator HEITKAMP. And that is a big part of it. And when you 

look—as part of your job of managing the sanctions, it is to look 


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at how those sanctions have an impact on the viability economically of Iran. So you kind of are for me the right guy to ask. 

Mr. SZUBIN. Well, what I——

Senator HEITKAMP. No dodging. 

Mr. SZUBIN. What I can say with respect to the sanctions is you 

are right, what is envisioned under this deal is to relieve some of 

the secondary pressure, not the U.S. sanctions against Iran that 

are bilateral sanctions, but the secondary pressure internationally 

on Iran’s economy, and if Iran adheres to all of its commitments, 

Iran can expect some economic recovery. I think it is going to be 

many, many years in the making before Iran gets back to where 

it ought to have otherwise been today. But——

Senator HEITKAMP. But you do understand there is a lot of concern about an economically empowered Iran and what that means 

for stability in the region. 

Mr. SZUBIN. I understand it to my very core, and——

Senator HEITKAMP. I do not have a lot of time, and I think the 

Chairman has been extraordinarily generous with all of us, so I 

would turn to you, Ambassador Sherman. 

Ms. SHERMAN. So, Senator, I think neither Adam nor myself can 

comment on U.S. domestic policy, though we do well understand 

how U.S. domestic policy has a profound impact on international 

relations and international markets. And so I am sure that the particular interests that you have, that we all have, in American economic security and independence when it comes to oil and gas is 

something that has to be resolved here. 

Senator HEITKAMP. But there has been a lot written about the 

ability to provide some kind of energy security into Europe that 

could, in fact, be one of those soft power measures, Ambassador. 

Ms. SHERMAN. Absolutely. 

Senator HEITKAMP. And so I understand that this might be above 

your pay grade or whatever it is, but I just want to acknowledgment that American oil moving into international markets has the 

effect of curtailing the economic power of Iran, the economic power 

of Russia, and a whole lot of people that are nation states that 

really are not friends of this country. And this is an opportunity 

to give our allies a step forward in the energy security that may, 

in fact, strengthen the sanctions regime in the event that we ever 

snap back. 

Ms. SHERMAN. I think no one would disagree that energy security 

for our country, for the world, and, for that matter, dealing with 

issues of climate and how we manage that will have a profound impact on the development of countries and America’s continuing to 

be the preeminent economy in the world. No question. 

Senator HEITKAMP. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman SHELBY. Senator Vitter. 

Senator VITTER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thanks to both of 

you for being here and for your service. 

Ms. Sherman, I wanted to follow up on a really important issue 

that I think my colleague Senator Scott got into, and that is, these 

two significant secret IAEA agreements. They are certainly significant in terms of enforcing this agreement, are they not? 

Ms. SHERMAN. I would say they are important arrangements on 

the modalities that the IAEA will use, but I believe that the public 


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road map, which you all have access to, lays out what the IAEA 

is requiring of Iran in broad terms as one of the steps it must take 

in order to get any sanctions relief along with all the other nuclear 

steps. And although I agree that possible military dimensions are 

important—they are—the United States has already made its judgment about it, so we are much more focused on where the program 

is today and where it is headed in the future, which is what the 

bulk of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action is about. 

Senator VITTER. Well, you just said what is available to Members 

of the Senate and the public is laying things out in broad terms. 

Aren’t the real specifics of verification very significant in judging 

this agreement? Would you agree with that or not? 

Ms. SHERMAN. Of course they are, and that is why, Senator, at 

the all-Senate briefing this afternoon I will share in a classified 

session the details that I am aware of the arrangements that have 

been made under Safeguards Confidential Protocols between Iran 

and the IAEA. 

Senator VITTER. And you have read those two secret agreements? 

Ms. SHERMAN. I have read those two Safeguards Confidential arrangements, yes. 

Senator VITTER. OK. When do I get to read them? 

Ms. SHERMAN. Well, you will not, sir, any more than any other 

country will get to read the Safeguards Confidential Protocols between the United States and the IAEA. 

Senator VITTER. Do you have a vote on this agreement? 

Ms. SHERMAN. I do not, obviously. 

Senator VITTER. I have a vote on this agreement. 

Ms. SHERMAN. Yes, sir. 

Senator VITTER. You do not think it is appropriate that I would 

get to read—you have read these agreements, and I think that is 

appropriate. I am not arguing with that. I have to vote on this 

agreement. You do not think it is appropriate that I would get to 

read it? 

Ms. SHERMAN. As I said to the IAEA and to all of my colleagues 

that I would have to share the arrangements in a classified session 

with the U.S. Congress——

Senator VITTER. That is not my question. 

Ms. SHERMAN.——because of the responsibility in our Constitution——

Senator VITTER. Do you think it is appropriate that I do not get 

to read it when I have to vote on the matter? 

Ms. SHERMAN. Senator, you will have to make your own judgment about it. I do——

Senator VITTER. I am asking your opinion. Do you think that is 

appropriate? 

Ms. SHERMAN. My opinion is that it is in the U.S. national security interest for there to be a Comprehensive Safeguards Protocol 

and that those protocols remain confidential. That is in our national security interest. 

Senator VITTER. Do you think it is appropriate that I, as a sitting 

U.S. Senator, representing a significant number of Americans, who 

has to vote on this do not get to read those agreements? I am not 

talking about putting them on the Internet. I am not talking about 

handing out copies. 


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Ms. SHERMAN. I do not have those agreements to give to you, sir. 

I do not have them in——

Senator VITTER. That was not my question. 

Ms. SHERMAN.——my possession. 

Senator VITTER. That was not my question. Please answer my 

question. Do you think it is appropriate that I do not get to read 

them? 

Ms. SHERMAN. I think that the system that has been put in place 

that maintains these as confidential documents between the IAEA 

and the countries with which it operates under the Comprehensive 

Safeguards Agreement is appropriate. 

Senator VITTER. And under that appropriate system, you get to 

read it, although you do not have a vote. I do not get to read it, 

although I do have to vote. OK. Let me move on. 

President Obama earlier said that, ‘‘In year 13, 14, and 15, 

they’’—meaning Iran—‘‘have advanced centrifuges that enrich uranium fairly rapidly, and at that point the breakout times would 

have shrunk almost down to zero.’’ Is that accurate? 

Ms. SHERMAN. Indeed, what is accurate is that——

Senator VITTER. Is that quote accurate? 

Ms. SHERMAN. In those years it will not come down to zero, no. 

Senator VITTER. OK. What will it come down to? 

Ms. SHERMAN. We can discuss that in a classified session. 

Senator VITTER. Well, his quote was ‘‘almost down to zero.’’

Ms. SHERMAN. I know. It is not almost down to zero. 

Senator VITTER. OK. So he was wrong. 

Ms. SHERMAN. For those years, it is not almost down to zero. It 

is literally technically impossible for enrichment to go down to literally zero. It is just not possible. That is why even today it is 2 

to 3 months. 

Senator VITTER. 2 to 3 months, OK. So maybe it is something 

comparable to that. In that context, do you think that other Middle 

Eastern countries will strongly consider developing nuclear weapons? 

Ms. SHERMAN. I do not, and it is the intelligence community’s assessment that they will not. 

Senator VITTER. And to a lay person, that makes no sense. To a 

lay person, when you have a radical, dangerous regime which has 

the capability within months of having nuclear weapons, it is not 

credible that everybody is just going to sit on their hands. So explain to me——

Ms. SHERMAN. Sure. 

Senator VITTER.——why that judgment would be credible. 

Ms. SHERMAN. So, first of all, to build a nuclear weapon, you not 

only need fissile material—which today the breakout time is 2 to 

3 months; under this agreement it will be a year for at least 10 

years, which gives us plenty of time to understand what is going 

on and to act if we need to take action—but you also have to 

weaponize that material, and then you have to have a delivery system. And it is the assessment of our community that even if Iran 

were able to enrich to highly enriched uranium to have fissile material for a bomb, which it does not have today and would take 

some time for them to get, that they would indeed still be some—

maybe as much as a year or two away from getting a nuclear


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weapon, if, in fact, they had a program to weaponize and the delivery system to carry it. 

Senator VITTER. Well, again, as I tried to lay out my question, 

I am not talking about today. I am talking about assuming they 

live under the agreement——

Ms. SHERMAN. So why——

Senator VITTER.——in the later years, those timeframes considerably shorten. 

Ms. SHERMAN. Well, the fissile material timeframes shorten. We 

would have to ask the intelligence community. I am not aware of 

a current weaponization program. I am not aware of a current program that marries a bomb with a delivery system in Iran. I expect 

that, in fact, they could do that should they make the decision to 

do that. 

But your question was about other countries, and I did not get 

to that, and I apologize. I believe other countries will not go there 

because it is expensive, very expensive. Second, we would know 

about it. They would find themselves under the intense sanctions 

that Iran has been under because some of the countries that you 

are talking about are partners or allies of ours and are trying to 

deal with aspects of state sponsorship of terrorism of Iran, and 

they want to work with us to do that, and we are working with 

them to do that. 

So I believe there are any number of both incentives and disincentives for those countries to choose not to move in the direction 

that Iran has moved in. 

Senator VITTER. OK. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman SHELBY. This has been a long hearing, an interesting 

hearing. I just have a few short observations. I will forgo the question. 

It has been brought up here. What is and what is not in an 

agreement is very important, is it not, Mr. Szubin? But if you do 

not have all of the information, it is hard to discern what is in an 

agreement. 

My question to both of you, we know the history of Iran. We 

know what is at stake here. Ambassador Sherman, do you trust 

Iran? 

Ms. SHERMAN. Of course not. 

Chairman SHELBY. OK. Mr. Szubin? 

Mr. SZUBIN. No, Senator. 

Chairman SHELBY. So we are entering into an agreement here of 

great importance with a country that we do not trust, that we have 

reason to believe is going to cheat or do whatever they have to because they are determined—they are in pursuit of nuclear weapons, and as you have said, they are close to it right now. Is that 

correct? 

Ms. SHERMAN. Well, actually, they are not close to it right now. 

They are at least a year or 2 years away from a nuclear weapon, 

should they decide to pursue one, and it is not apparent that the 

Supreme Leader has made a decision to actually pursue a nuclear 

weapon. It is 2 to 3 months right now breakout for fissile material. 

Chairman SHELBY. Fissile material. 

Ms. SHERMAN. Yes, and under this agreement that would change 

to a year. 


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Chairman SHELBY. Which is a big step in——

Ms. SHERMAN. Huge step. 

Chairman SHELBY. Big step. 

Ms. SHERMAN. Huge step. 

Chairman SHELBY. Mr. Szubin, do you trust Iran to forgo their 

terrorist activity and not spend any of this money that they would 

get, if we say $50 billion, on promoting terrorism and unrest all 

over the world? 

Mr. SZUBIN. Mr. Chairman, I do not trust Iran, and I think we 

can be nearly certain that Iran is going to continue to sponsor terrorism and groups like the Quds Force. And that is why it is incumbent on us to intensify our campaign against that. 

Chairman SHELBY. Strange agreement. Thank you both for your 

patience and for your appearance before the Committee. 

We have another panel. I know it is a long day. Very important 

issues. I will call them up. 

Our witnesses for the second panel today include: The Honorable 

Juan Zarate, Senior Adviser for the Transnational Threats Project 

at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. 

Mr. Mark Dubowitz, Executive Director of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. 

Dr. Matthew Levitt, Director of the Stein Program on 

Counterterrorism and Intelligence at the Washington Institute for 

Near East Policy. 

And Ambassador Nicholas Burns, the Roy and Barbara Goodman 

Family Professor of Diplomacy and International Relations at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government. 

We welcome all of you here to the Banking Committee, and all 

of your written testimony will be made part of the hearing record 

in its entirety. And when we get seated, we will proceed. 

Mr. Zarate—is that it? 

Mr. ZARATE. Zarate, Mr. Chairman. Like ‘‘karate,’’ but with a ‘‘Z.’’

Chairman SHELBY. Yes, sir. I will not forget that. We will start 

with you, sir, when you are ready. 

STATEMENT OF JUAN C. ZARATE, CHAIRMAN & SENIOR COUNSELOR, CENTER ON SANCTIONS AND ILLICIT FINANCE, 

FOUNDATION FOR DEFENSE OF DEMOCRACIES AND SENIOR 

ADVISER, TRANSNATIONAL THREATS PROJECT, CENTER 

FOR STRATEGIC AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES 

Mr. ZARATE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member Brown, 

distinguished Members of the Committee. I am honored to testify 

before you to discuss the sanctions implications of the Iran nuclear 

agreement. I am privileged to be testifying with my fellow panelists 

whose work I have admired for years. 

I take this responsibility seriously, given the gravity and implications of this agreement. I come to this issue with views born from 

relevant experience dealing with Iran from the Treasury Department and the National Security Council. 

I know that all involved, including my good friend and former 

colleague, Adam Szubin, who just testified, have been working incredibly hard toward a peaceful solution to the Iranian nuclear 

problem. 


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Mr. Chairman, the financial and economic constriction campaign, 

which you know well and this Committee has been a part of, built 

methodically over the course of a decade thanks to the innovative 

work of patriots like Ambassador Burns, helped bring Iran to the 

table. In the words of President Rouhani, the sanctions threatened 

to drive Iran back into ‘‘the Stone Age.’’

These efforts, it is important to remember, have also been designed to constrain and isolate rogue Iranian behavior—it supports 

terrorism, the Assad regime, proliferation, human rights abuses—

as well as to protect the integrity of the U.S. and international financial systems. 

Unfortunately, the sanctions relief framework is flawed. The relief is too front-loaded. It does not account for the increased risks 

stemming from Iranian commercial and financial activity, and it ultimately constrains the U.S. Government’s ability to use effective 

financial power against Iranian non-nuclear national security risks. 

There are structural problems in the agreement. The snapback 

is a blunt instrument. The Iranians maintain a heckler’s veto on 

any reimposition of nuclear sanctions. The agreement unwinds 

sanctions too broadly. It may put the United States in the position 

of rehabilitating Iran’s economy. 

Mr. Chairman, significantly, the agreement creates an international process that now subjects U.S. sanctions to review. Based 

on the appellate processes, any U.S. sanction or related action to 

which Iran objects would be subject to review by the other parties, 

including Iran, China, and Russia. 

We have potentially converted the Iranian sanctions program 

into one in which the target has an immediate right to challenge 

and an international venue in which to do it. This will be done 

with the support of parties that do not like or want to see the use 

of U.S. financial power and influence. It may even drive a wedge 

between the United States and Europe moving forward. And at a 

minimum, all this will temper our aggressive use of financial tools 

against Iran. 

Mr. Chairman, the spirit and letter of the agreement may neuter 

U.S. ability to leverage our financial power in the future. From the 

start of negotiations, what the Iranians wanted most was the ability to do business again, unfettered and plugged back into the global system. The regime has needed access to banking, shipping, insurance, new technologies, and connectivity to global markets. That 

is what they lost over the past decade. That appears to be what 

they have gained and guaranteed in this deal. 

The United States will need to amplify its use of financial measures aggressively against key elements of the Iranian economy to 

deal with increases risks. It is not at all clear that this is well understood by all parties or even part of our strategy. And we have 

the ability to do so, unilaterally if needed. 

The United States has been shaping and leading the efforts to 

isolate Iran and enforce sanctions since 2005. The sanctions regime 

has not been faltering. On the contrary, Iran’s isolation by virtue 

of its own actions and market reaction has increased over time, and 

there has been increasing risk aversion to doing business with Iran 

because of the underlying conduct it engages in, as well as the deep 


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role of the Revolutionary Guard, the mullahs, and the regime in 

controlling strategic elements of the economy. 

The responsible private sector actors will not rush in immediately, waiting to understand how the sanctions will unwind, 

whether Iran will adhere to the deal, and their own risk. And the 

risks from Iran are real and will increase, from terrorist financing 

and proliferation to corruption and illicit financing. These risks will 

help keep legitimate actors away from the economy for some time. 

The private sector as well, Mr. Chairman, will be watching and listening to you and to Congress which can affect the global environment and the reach of our financial power in the future. 

I think there are three critical principles for Congress to demand 

related to this deal and to sanctions. Congress should ensure that 

there is clarity in implementation of the deal and, in particular, the 

execution of any sanctions unwinding plans. It should ensure the 

United States maintains as much financial and economic power as 

possible. Congress should mitigate the risks attendant to an enriched and emboldened regime in Tehran. These principles then 

could help inform a new strategy to address the dangerous risks 

stemming from Iran. 

The United States could and should adopt an aggressive financial constriction campaign focusing on the Revolutionary Guard 

and the core elements of the regime that engage in terrorist financing, proliferation, human rights abuses. This could include the use 

of secondary sanctions. There should be a recommitment to the elements of a nonproliferation regime focused on Iran. We can reinforce our financial measures against Iranian banks, for example, 

using Section 311 of the PATRIOT Act. The Global Magnitsky Act 

could be used expansively to target the finances and holdings of the 

Iranian regime and those involved in gross human rights violations 

on its behalf. 

Mr. Chairman, these are just some of the measures that could 

be taken to confront the risks from Iran and shape a new sanctions 

framework. 

Mr. Chairman, just very quickly, when President Rouhani came 

back to the negotiating table, a Western diplomat based in Tehran 

shared with me that he thought we had won the war, using economic sanctions and financial pressure. But then he asked, ‘‘Can 

you win the peace?’’ I think and certainly hope we can still win the 

peace, but it will require using and leveraging the very same powers and authorities that helped bring the regime to the table. We 

must ensure that this agreement has not inadvertently empowered 

the regime in Tehran and taken one of America’s most potent powers off the table. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman SHELBY. Mr. Dubowitz. 

STATEMENT OF MARK DUBOWITZ, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, 

CENTER ON SANCTIONS AND ILLICIT FINANCE, FOUNDATION FOR DEFENSE OF DEMOCRACIES 

Mr. DUBOWITZ. Chairman Shelby, Ranking Member Brown, 

Members of the Committee, on behalf of the FDD and its Center 

on Sanctions and Illicit Finance, thank you for inviting me to testify, particularly with these three great experts. 


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The Iran nuclear deal is deeply flawed. I will address two of its 

most serious design defects: the Sunset Clause and the nuclear 

snapback. 

The Sunset Clause permits critical nuclear arms and ballistic 

missile restrictions to disappear over a 5- to 15-year period. Tehran 

has to simply abide by the agreement to emerge as a threshold nuclear power, with an industrial-size enrichment program, near-zero 

breakout time, an easier clandestine sneak-out pathway, ICBMs, 

access to heavy weaponry, and an economy increasingly immunized 

against future economic pressure. And we learned today it sounds 

like from Under Secretary Sherman the IAEA weapons inspectors 

will not get physical access to all military sites. 

Now, as Iran grows more powerful, America’s ability to use 

peaceful economic leverage diminishes. This is a result of an additional fatal flaw in the agreement that provides Iran with what I 

have called a ‘‘nuclear snapback.’’ The agreement repeatedly notes 

that if sanctions are reimposed, in whole or in part, in response to 

Iranian nuclear noncompliance, Iran will view that as grounds to 

void the deal. It also contains an explicit requirement for the 

United States and European Union to do nothing to interfere with 

the normalization of trade and economic relations with Iran. I call 

this the ‘‘nuclear snapback’’ because Iran will use these provisions 

to threaten to walk away from the deal and engage in nuclear escalation. 

Iran will likely target the Europeans to intimidate them not to 

support the reimposition of any sanctions on any grounds or risk 

provoking nuclear escalation and potentially war. This is likely to 

provoke disagreements between Washington and its European allies on the credibility of the evidence, the seriousness of infractions, 

the appropriate level of response, and likely Iranian retaliation. 

It will also stymie the dispute resolution process governed by a 

joint commission in the agreement. The Administration assumes 

that even if Russia and China were to take Iran’s side in a dispute, 

Washington could always count on the votes of Germany, France, 

and Britain, as well as the EU representative. This 5–3 vote majority assumes that one European vote will not change in the face of 

Iranian nuclear intimidation. While the United States can move 

unilaterally to impose U.N. Security Council sanctions over the objections of China and Russia, Mr. Chairman, would it do so without 

European support? 

Europe will also have a strong economic incentive not to join the 

United States in snapping back sanctions. As European companies 

invest billions in the Iranian market, pressure not to reimpose 

sanctions will grow. 

The same dynamics apply to the reimposition of non-nuclear 

sanctions, including terrorism. On July 20th, Iran released a statement to the U.N. Security Council that it ‘‘may reconsider its commitments under the agreement if new sanctions are imposed, irrespective of whether such new sanctions are introduced on nuclearrelated or other grounds.’’ Iran may be able to use this nuclear 

snapback threat to prevent Washington from combating Iran’s support for terrorism or human rights abuses. 

Now, in the face of Iranian threats, for example, would Europe 

agree to a U.S. plan to reimpose terrorism sanctions on the Central 


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Bank of Iran if it was found to be financing terrorism? I am very 

doubtful given the deterrence power of the Iranian nuclear snapback. If the United States cannot use economic pressure to stop 

Iran, military force may become the only option. As a result, I fear 

that this agreement may make war with Iran more likely, not less 

likely. And when that war comes, Iran will be stronger, and the 

consequences will be much more severe. 

But there is an alternative, and it is not war, and it is not about 

killing the deal. It is about a better deal. Congress should require 

the Administration to amend the agreement’s fatal flaws, especially 

the Sunset Clause. One key amendment. Restrictions on Iran’s nuclear program, access to heavy weaponry and ballistic missiles 

should remain until the U.N. Security Council, where America retains its veto, determines that Iran’s nuclear program is not a 

threat. One key amendment. The United States and Europe should 

also keep in place some key parts of the economic sanctions architecture so that we do not need to snap back anything. That leverage will still be in place. 

Now, there is ample precedent to amend this deal. Congress has 

rejected or required amendments to about 200 bilateral and multilateral international agreements, including significant cold war 

arms control agreements with the Soviets at a time when Moscow 

had thousands of nuclear-tipped missiles aimed at our cities. If 

Congress rejects this deal, China and Russia might return to some 

Iranian business, but they are likely to stay at the table to keep 

Iran from getting nuclear weapons. 

Europe, however, is Tehran’s big economic prize. The key will be 

to use diplomatic persuasion and U.S. financial sanctions to keep 

the Europeans out of Iran. Few European banks are going to risk 

penalties or their ability to transact in dollars. European energy 

companies will find their financial pathways into Iran stymied. We 

will never again have the kind of powerful U.S. secondary sanctions leverage as we do today. We should use it to get key amendments to this deal. Those amendments will lower the risk of a future war against a much more powerful and dangerous Iran. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman SHELBY. Dr. Levitt. 

STATEMENT OF MATTHEW LEVITT, PH.D., FROMER-WEXLER 

FELLOW AND DIRECTOR, STEIN PROGRAM ON 

COUNTERTERRORISM AND INTELLIGENCE, THE WASHINGTON INSTITUTE FOR NEAR EAST POLICY 

Mr. LEVITT. Chairman Shelby, Ranking Member Brown, and 

Members of the Committee, thank you for this opportunity to appear before you today to discuss the nuclear agreement with Iran 

and the challenges it poses to the future viability of the U.S. sanctions architecture. 

The Administration is telling people privately that it interprets 

the deal’s sanctions provisions in a very aggressive way, but it is 

not making that clear to the public, to Congress, our allies, the 

business and finance communities in particular, or Iran. 

Unfortunately, if we do not articulate the position that doing 

business with Iran still comes with real business and reputational 


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risks, others will not perceive there being much risk at all and will 

rush head first into the lucrative Iranian market. 

U.S. officials say the Administration’s interpretation of the deal 

enables it to do several unilateral things that will hinder Iran’s 

economic development, including denying Iran access to the U.S. financial system and the U.S. dollar, denying Iran access to the

U-Turn transaction mechanism, through which Iran dollarized

international oil transactions in the past, and aggressively enforcing CISADA’s secondary sanctions on foreign entities doing business with entities that remain listed for terrorism or human rights 

issues. 

The problem is that these laudable positions have not been made 

public in any meaningful way, and they are only effective if they 

are aggressively publicized and then equally aggressive enforced. 

The fact is, as U.S. officials will concede in private conversations, 

that the Administration suffers from a trust deficit. Whether one 

believes that this is deserved or not, it is there. And the fact is that 

not only are none of the positions I just listed clear within the deal, 

the deal could easily be read as prohibiting each and every one of 

them. Failing to make these positions public not only undermines 

their utility, it makes people question whether the Administration’s 

intention is to act on these positions moving forward. These are 

critical issues, which should not be open to interpretation under 

the Iran deal. 

Just a few weeks ago, the Financial Action Task Force issued its 

latest public statement identifying Iran as a jurisdiction with strategic deficiencies which poses risks to the international financial 

system. FATF found that Iran presents such ongoing and substantial money-laundering and terrorist financing risks that the international community must apply active, what they call ‘‘counter 

measures’’ to protect themselves and the larger international financial system from Iran’s illicit financial conduct. But now, under the 

Iran deal, much of the world will be looking to expand business relationships with Iran. A respected European journal already contacted me asking me to write an article on what more Europe can 

do to proactively reintegrate Iran into the international financial 

system. And one could forgive the editors for thinking this should 

be our collective policy, since the JCPOA specifically talks about 

parties refraining from actions that could undermine normalization 

of trade and economic relations with Iran. 

For years now, U.S. officials have pointed to the conduct-based 

nature of Iran sanctions. Illicit conduct brought upon Iran sanctions aimed at countering said conduct. Today Iran’s illicit conduct 

continues, and if the conduct-based consequences do not kick in, 

this could be the death knell of this toolkit. Designating a person 

here or there or a company here or there is not enough. What 

worked was making Iran as a jurisdiction an unattractive market 

due to the massive business and reputational risks inherent to 

doing business in or with Iran. But at the very time we most need 

to be able to highlight the fact that Iran is a tremendously risky 

jurisdiction, where the IRGC controls much of the economy, human 

rights abuses are on the rise, and support for militancy and terrorism continue unabated, we are denied under the Iran deal the 

ability to discourage business with Iran. 


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The best we can do is to delineate Iran’s ongoing illicit conduct, 

remind that there are still some U.S. secondary sanctions, and 

maybe some reputational risk. The former—secondary sanctions—

depends on U.S. follow-through, while the latter—reputational 

risk—depends on how the rest of the international community perceived risk in the wake of an Iran deal that does not discourage, 

but actively encourages business with Iran. How effective will it be 

to highlight the role of the IRGC in Iran’s economy once the IRGC 

has been removed from the EU sanctions list? 

Major international banks will be slow to move back into the Iranian markets, but major non-U.S. companies are likely to trip over 

one another in a rush to re-enter the potential market—which is 

already being described in Europe as an ‘‘El Dorado’’ and a potential ‘‘bonanza.’’

Finally, under the Iran deal, we lose the current balance of U.S. 

unilateral and regional and global multilateral sanctions. Under 

the deal, U.N. and EU sanctions largely disappear, and what remains are only U.S. sanctions. To be sure, U.S. secondary sanctions 

on non-WMD proliferation illicit conduct remain in place and would 

impact the behavior of European and other foreign banks and businesses, but this puts the onus solely on the United States. The deal 

is not a bilateral U.S.-Iran deal but a multilateral one, in fact, and 

our partners should be expected to do their part holding Iran accountable for its illicit conduct. 

Thank you very much. 

Chairman SHELBY. Ambassador Burns. 

STATEMENT OF NICHOLAS BURNS, GOODMAN PROFESSOR OF 

DIPLOMACY AND INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS, HARVARD 

KENNEDY SCHOOL 

Mr. BURNS. Mr. Chairman, thank you, Ranking Member Brown, 

Senator Kirk, thank you for the opportunity to testify. Mr. Chairman, you have my testimony. I will just make four quick points. 

I served in the Bush administration as Under Secretary of State 

and had the pleasure to appear before your Committee before, had 

lead responsibility on Iran, and I come to you as a supporter of this 

agreement. I think it has many benefits for our country, and this 

is my first point. I will effectively arrest the forward movement in 

Iran’s nuclear program that began with Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s 

election 10 years ago this summer. And it is good morning make 

sure that Iran does not have the potential to produce fissile material for their nuclear weapons program for the next 10 to 15 years. 

It is going to narrow that breakout time, as the last panel discussed, from 2 to 3 months now to about a year. There will be significantly strengthened inspections of Iran’s nuclear supply chain 

for 25 years. And sanctions will not be lifted—and this is important; this could take months—until Iran complies with the letter of 

the agreement. 

The Administration is rightly going to maintain sanctions on 

Iran for terrorism and human rights violations, and a final advantage—and it has not been discussed this morning—is that we have 

an opportunity to stop Iran from becoming a nuclear weapons 

power through diplomacy and negotiation without having to resort 

to war. I certainly believe any American President should use force 


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should they get close to a nuclear weapon. That is not the case 

now. And I think both President Obama and President Bush before 

him thought that diplomacy should be tried first. I congratulate the 

Administration on this accomplishment. 

Second point: But there are risks here. I have outlined some of 

the benefits, but there are substantial risks, and I am mindful of 

them. The most important is that the super structure of Iran’s program, both uranium and plutonium, is going to remain in mothballs. It will be intact. It can be rebuilt and revived 10 to 15 years 

from now when the restrictions begin to lapse. I fully expect the 

Iranians two decades from now will want to reconstitute a civil nuclear program. The problem for us then will be that they could perhaps build a covert program on that facility or behind that facility, 

and that is going to be a problem for the United States at that 

time. We will have to reconstitute a sanctions regime. That will not 

be impossible, but I do not minimize the difficulty of doing that. I 

worked with Juan Zarate in trying to establish that regime 10 

years ago. 

And, finally, I would just like to say that the global embargo is 

on Iran conventional arms and Iran’s ballistic missile programs 

that will end in 5 and 8 years, respectively. I wish they had not 

been agreed to, the end of the embargoes. I wish the Administration had held the line. I wish we would not be in a position 5 and 

8 years from now of having to reconstitute sanctions programs, and 

I think that was a compromise that should not have been made. 

The third point, Mr. Chairman, if you weigh the benefits and the 

risks, I think that the benefits outweigh the risks, because we are 

going to freeze this program for 10 to 15 years. And without the 

agreement, and if we get into a scenario of no deal, where Congress 

disapproves and defeats the President, I think three things will 

happen: The global coalition that we have built for 10 years across 

two Administrations I think inevitably is going to weaken. The 

sanctions regime will not end immediately. Certainly, the United 

States would not end its sanctions. But it is going to atrophy. And, 

most importantly, the Iranians will not feel constrained to abide by 

the restrictions that Under Secretary Sherman and Secretary 

Kerry negotiated. They will be unfettered and unshackled. They 

will be able to move forward to become a nuclear threshold state 

again, and I think that would be a weakening of American strategic interest. 

I do think that sometimes we are too caught up in the conventional wisdom in this debate, and just two quick examples that I 

think are relevant, Mr. Chairman. I do not believe the congressional defeat of this nuclear deal with lead inevitably to war. I do 

not think that is right. I think Iran would be careful perhaps to 

become a threshold state but not to cross the line. But neither do 

I believe that implementing the deal leads inevitably to an Iranian 

nuclear weapon. A lot will depend on what we do—not so much 

perhaps President Obama, but the next President and the President after that. And I think that is what Congress should be thinking about. How do we strengthen American strategic policy in the 

Middle East to effectively deter the Iranians as we implement the 

nuclear deal? 


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The President is giving a speech at this hour at the American 

University. I hope what he is saying there is that we are going to 

close the big gap right now between the United States and Israel 

and ensure Israel’s qualitative military edge. I assume he is saying 

that, that we should continue with the effort to strengthen the Gulf 

countries militarily, as Secretary Kerry did, I think successfully, 

this week. But we should also say, the American President should 

say that he would use force against Iran should it get close to a 

nuclear weapon, should it violate this deal. There are things, I 

think, that both Democrats and Republicans here on Capitol Hill 

can agree to perhaps in an accompanying statement to the nuclear 

deal to strength on a bipartisan basis America’s policy in the Middle East. 

So, Mr. Chairman, I support this agreement. I would hope that 

Congress would approve this agreement and strengthen the ability 

of our country to move ahead, both to pursue the nuclear deal but 

to contain Iranian power in the Middle East in the process. 

Thank you. 

Chairman SHELBY. Thank you. 

I have a few questions of Mr. Zarate. Secondary sanctions or 

sanctions, as I understand it, place restrictions not directly on Iran 

but on those who would deal with Iranian entities. I will pose this 

question to you and to Mr. Dubowitz. Even if the Europeans and 

others were to completely lift restrictions on dealings with Iran, 

would U.S. secondary sanctions still keep major global companies 

from doing business in and with Iran? 

Mr. ZARATE. U.S. secondary sanctions, which would apply to 

third-country nationals and companies, have enormous impact and 

reach and do affect what countries do and what these companies 

decide to invest in. So I think the general answer is yes. It depends 

on the environment. It depends on the nature of the secondary 

sanctions, whether or not they are deemed to be legitimate, whether or not they are conduct-based, which is how these efforts have 

really worked and pinched the Iranians. And it would depend on 

the sense of enforcement of those sanctions. If there is a sense that 

these are sanctions on the books only and are not going to be expanded, are not going to be enforced, then they will not work. 

Part of the effectiveness over the past 10 years has not only been 

that the sanctions regime has been put in place, but that they have 

been enforced. And they have been enforced and led by the United 

States and the United States alone. 

Chairman SHELBY. They have to be meaningful, in other words. 

Mr. ZARATE. Exactly right. 

Chairman SHELBY. Mr. Dubowitz? 

Mr. DUBOWITZ. Chairman Shelby, I agree. I think if Congress 

overwhelmingly approved this deal, I do not think major financial 

institutions and energy companies are rushing back in, anyway. I 

think they have deep concerns over counterparty risk, over doing 

business with the Revolutionary Guards. And, most importantly, 

they have very deep concerns over political risks with respect to 

who the next President is, who the next Under Secretary of the 

Treasury is, and how vigorously will we enforce our—I think if 

Congress were to disapprove the deal, even more reason why they 

would not be rushing in. I think that actually would extend the 


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amount of time it takes for them to actually reenter the Iranian 

market. So a result of the congressional disapproval I do not believe is going to lead to the collapse of the sanctions regime. If anything, as Mr. Zarate has said, the power of U.S. secondary sanctions, conduct-based sanctions, are going to make major financial 

institutions and energy companies very reticent about reentering 

the market, whether you approve or disapprove of this deal. 

Chairman SHELBY. Dr. Levitt, risks to the financial system generally. The integrity of the U.S. financial system is a major concern 

of this Committee. The Financial Action Task Force found Iran to 

present great risk to the financial system due to its lack of moneylaundering safeguards and the involvement of Iranian banks in 

supporting terrorism. Is there reason to believe that the problems 

that gave rise to this task force designation will go away anytime 

soon? And is it safe for non-U.S. persons and entities to do business 

with Iranian banks? Would you explain? 

Mr. LEVITT. Thank you for the question, Chairman. It is a very 

simple answer to the FATF question. No, those risks are not going 

away. And let us be clear. FATF is talking specifically about terrorism and money laundering, illicit financial risks. It has nothing 

to do with proliferation. Take proliferation activities off the table. 

All of the FATF warnings remain in full force. This was just from 

the end of June. Their next report will be issued in October. And 

it is very important, and the Administration claims that it will, and 

it should be held to, going around explaining to people these risks 

exist. 

The problem is that how the world interprets risk is going to 

change when it is just the United States. In the first instance, secondary sanctions apply only if you want to have business here. If 

you are a small company that does not want to, if you combined 

an Iranian company that is doing this arm’s-length business with 

the IRGC that Adam Szubin talked about, they might be able to 

do business. But foreigners, especially Europeans and others, when 

these entities come off the EU list and there now is a fissure, the 

kind of fissure Iran has been trying to create between the international community for some time now, well, the European Union 

does not seem to think that these are listable entities anymore. 

The United States does. There is some risk. It is less risk. How 

long? Will it be 2 years? Will it be 5 years? Will it be 8 years? The 

full 20 years? No one can fully answer that question because it is 

changing the nature of risk. It is no longer a consensus. 

Chairman SHELBY. Mr. Dubowitz, pathway to a bomb, that is 

what we all underline and are thinking here, I believe. In your testimony, you describe how the agreement is fundamentally flawed 

because even if Iran abides by the deal, which none of us believe 

it will, it can reopen and expand each pathway to a bomb that the 

agreement seeks to shut down. Could you describe briefly here 

today how this would work and what sanction tools a future U.S. 

President would have to stop Iran from achieving a pathway to a 

bomb? 

Mr. DUBOWITZ. Thank you, Chairman Shelby. So under the 

agreement, because of the Sunset Clauses, the restrictions on 

Iran’s nuclear program, ballistic missile program, access to heavy 

weaponry are going to go away. They start going away year 5 and 


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then 8. At year 8 1⁄2 Iran can start to do advanced centrifuge R&D. 

At year 10 it can start installing an unlimited number of centrifuges in the Natanz facility. It can shorten the breakout time between 10 and 15 years. By the way, after 15 years, Iran can enrich 

uranium to 60 percent, we heard from Under Secretary Sherman 

today. I mean, 60 percent is about as close to weapons grade as you 

can get. Iran will be able to legally do that under the

agreement. They will legally be able to build multiple Natanzes, 

multiple Fordows, multiple heavy-water reactors. They will be able 

to accumulate an unlimited amount of enriched uranium all over 

the country. So what that implies is a patient, multi-pathway to a 

bomb, both a Natanz pathway, a Fordow pathway, and an Arak 

pathway. 

Now, the second part of your question is: What do you do about 

that? When Iran has an industrial-size nuclear program with nearzero breakout and an easier clandestine sneak-out and an ICBM 

program, my concern is in terms of sanctions there is nothing you 

can do about it. The sanctions tool is gone. And at that point you 

have to face a binary choice, which is you either accept that you 

now have a nuclear threshold Iran with unlimited enrichment capacity and multiple heavy-water reactors and an ICBM program 

and the capability to build a bomb very, very quickly, or you use 

military force to forestall that kind of breakout or sneak-out. We 

will not have a peaceful option left, and when that military force 

is used, Iran will be a much stronger country, much more powerful, 

and I think the consequences to American security will be much 

more grave. 

Chairman SHELBY. I will pose this question for all of you. As I 

mentioned in my opening statement, sanctions are a crucial tool of 

U.S. policy. I am concerned that the U.S. Government is not taking 

maximum advantage of this tool. Is any part of the U.S. Government tasked with long-range strategic sanctions planning? And is 

anyone within the U.S. Government tasked with doing contingency 

planning for sanctions equivalent to what the Pentagon does with 

operational plans? And what improvements could we make in those 

kind of matters? We will start with you, Mr. Zarate. 

Mr. ZARATE. Mr. Chairman, we established, when I was at the 

Treasury, the Office of Terrorism and Financial Intelligence, now 

led by Adam Szubin, and that is putatively the war command for 

financial power and tools. There is a question, though as to whether or not we are doing enough to think about the preservation of 

those tools, the use of them aggressively in other contexts, and, 

frankly, the use of these tools by other nation states like the Chinese and Russians to not only extend their reach but to also exploit 

our vulnerabilities. 

And so I would say that that responsibility lies largely with the 

Office of Terrorism and Financial Intelligence at the Treasury Department, in concert with the intelligence community, in concert 

with others, but that perhaps we need to be more aggressive and 

more forward-leaning in terms of the use of this power. 

And one of my concerns with this deal is it is not clear that we 

have considered fully the long-term implications for the use of our 

power in this regard. 

Chairman SHELBY. Mr. Dubowitz? 


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Mr. DUBOWITZ. Chairman Shelby, a simple answer. I would ask 

Under Secretary Szubin, who is an incredibly talented professional, 

to provide you the 10- to 15-year contingency plan for the use of 

economic sanctions against Iran when it has near-zero breakout, 

easier clandestine sneak-out, and unlimited enrichment capacity. 

That plan should be in place today because that fundamentally is 

something that I think everybody is concerned about, that because 

of the sunset provisions we are going to use our economic power 

over time, and we should have that plan in place today, and that 

plan should be disclosed to your Committee. 

Chairman SHELBY. Dr. Levitt? 

Mr. LEVITT. I will just echo what Juan said in particular. I used 

to be the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Intelligence at Treasury 

with NTFI. It is the only finance ministry in the world that had 

its own intelligence component. The ability to interact with the intelligence community is quite vigorous. We were both there when 

with NTFI we would have these types of strategic planning meetings at the time for the things we were dealing with then, and I 

believe and certainly hope that they are having these types of 

meetings now. 

What is unclear is just how far over the horizon the strategic 

conversations are going and whether or not we are taking into consideration the immediate impact of this deal on the long-term efficacy of our U.S. sanctions architecture. 

Sanctions are a tool to be used to reach goals. We should not be 

doing this to say we want to use sanctions forever. But we are always going to have goals that we want to reach for which sanctions 

could be a useful tool, and, therefore, it is critically important to 

maintain that tool as viable and effective. 

Chairman SHELBY. I will ask all of you this simple question, and 

I think it goes—Ambassador Burns first, go ahead. 

Mr. BURNS. Mr. Chairman, if you would not mind, I just wanted 

to answer your question if that is OK. 

Chairman SHELBY. You go ahead. I should have. 

Mr. BURNS. Thank you so much. 

I would say that the most important thing for us, the United 

States, is to have effective Treasury, State, and White House cooperation on what we are trying to do with sanctions and to persist 

over the long term, first. 

Second, we have got to marry what we do with our allies around 

the world, and I think that is the problem if Congress disapproves 

the deal and we walk away. We lose that potency of the sanctions. 

And, third, I say objectively—I cannot speak objectively about 

the Bush administration because I was part of it. But I think that 

both President Bush and President Obama have effectively pursued 

a sanctions regime against the Iranians, which is one of the reasons why we are here today. They, you know, submitted to negotiations, and the deal has been made. 

Thank you. 

Chairman SHELBY. I will ask that question to you. I asked it earlier to each one of you. Do you believe that any agreement with 

Iran—can you trust Iran? Do you trust Iran not to cheat if they get 

a chance? 


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Mr. ZARATE. Mr. Chairman, I served in the White House as the 

Deputy National Security Adviser for Combating Terrorism, so I 

got to watch Iranian nefarious activity, lethal activity against our 

own troops and against civilians around the world. So do I trust 

Iran? Absolutely not. And this is precisely why any deal of any 

sort, whether it is this JCPOA or any other, has to have effective 

monitoring, effective enforcement, and we have to have tools that 

deal with all of the other risks, which will go up because of an enriched regime in Tehran. 

And so I do not think we have done that. I do not think the deal 

has that in mind, and certainly, I have not heard from the Administration a plan to deal with those increased risks, and that is a 

real challenge with the regime in Tehran. 

Chairman SHELBY. Mr. Dubowitz? 

Mr. DUBOWITZ. Mr. Chairman, I do not trust Iran, and I was 

struck today—my jaw dropped—when Under Secretary Sherman 

effectively admitted that we will not have physical access to all 

military sites, because this deal is a bet on the IAEA. This deal is 

a bet on verification and inspection. This deal is a fundamental, existential bet that we will be able to go anywhere anytime into military sites. The Iranians have been saying for years now, ‘‘We will 

not allow the United States or the IAEA into our military sites.’’ 

And if we cannot get physical access, boots-on-the-ground access 

into all military sites, then I am deeply concerned about the efficacy of the verification and inspection regime. And, therefore, we 

all agree we do not trust Iran, but if we do not trust our own 

verification and inspection regime, I think we have a serious problem. 

Chairman SHELBY. Dr. Levitt? 

Mr. LEVITT. We can all trust Iran to engage in even more nefarious activity tomorrow than it did today. Beyond that, we cannot 

trust Iran for those of us who have worked on the issue in and out 

of Government. The verification regime, therefore, is critically important, and as Mark laid out, there are some holes big enough to 

drive a truck through. 

The question is not even so much is it fair that the people who 

have a vote do not get to read these IAEA agreements and others 

did. The question is: Why was that agreed to? It is absolutely true 

that we in the United States want those provisions to be kept a secret so that our information is not made public either. But why was 

that agreed to in the deal? That is what I do not understand. And 

the question is how strong these verification tools are going to be, 

not the 24/7 verifications of declared sites but the ones where the 

real work is happening. 

Chairman SHELBY. Ambassador Burns? 

Mr. BURNS. Mr. Chairman, you will remember President Reagan 

said of the Soviets, ‘‘Trust, but verify.’’ I think we have to say of 

the Iranians, ‘‘Do not trust, and we must verify.’’ And I think everyone agrees on that. 

But I would say on military sites, if this agreement is implemented, and if, you know, 2 or 3 years down the road we suspect 

there are covert facilities, and if the Iranians deny—ultimately 

after this managed inspection process deny access, they will be in 

violation of the deal. And so in that eventuality—it may not be 


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what Mr. Dubowitz was talking about directly—we will have a way 

forward to press the Iranians. 

Chairman SHELBY. Thank you. 

Senator Brown. 

Senator BROWN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Especially to Mr. Zarate and to Ambassador Burns, thank you 

for the work you did. I think that neither you two nor Secretary 

Clinton nor Secretary Kerry nor President Obama nor President 

Bush get the credit for weaving together these six countries, the 

P5+1, against all odds and holding them together in these sanctions, and I think the historical context and the very difficult diplomatic maneuvers and accomplishments that you made we should 

all thank you for, and that should be the historical context of all 

of that, so thank you. 

Ambassador Burns, you said a number of things that were interesting. You said you do not see a more effective, credible, or realistic alternative that would give the United States a greater probability at this point of preventing an Iranian nuclear weapon. You 

then said that if Congress rejects this agreement, you mentioned 

the global coalition would weaken, sanctions would atrophy, and 

shackles on Iran—I cannot remember if you said ‘‘undone’’ or ‘‘loosen.’’

Talk to us, if you would, what would happen if we reject this, 

and especially in light of what our P5+1 allies would do, what their 

reaction would be; and what about other countries in Europe and 

Asia, notably Japan and India and Italy, what their reactions 

might be. 

Mr. BURNS. Thank you, Senator. I do think that the framework 

for members—I mean, one of the questions that members have to 

ask, and we all do, too, is: Is there a credible alternative? I wish 

there were because I do think this is a combination of benefit and 

risk. It is not a perfect deal. But I do not see one right now, because if you work through the logic train, if Congress defeats the 

President, if the United States cannot implement the deal, if we 

cannot remove the sanctions and get the benefit of Iran complying, 

then I think a couple things happen. 

Number one, part of the value of the sanctions regime has been 

the countries that you mentioned, not just the EU but India finally, 

after a lot of work, complying; and Japan and South Korea and the 

other major trading partners. Some of the banks, obviously, are not 

going to go back and do business, but some of the corporations in 

those countries will. And so I think we will begin—the regime will 

begin to believe that political unity we have had—and it is very 

powerful when you have well over 170 countries sanctioning Iran 

politically. So that is the first thing that will go. 

Second, I think the Europeans will be in an extraordinarily difficult place. You know, all their prime ministers and parliaments 

support this deal. They all support the deal, the governments do. 

And so they will not want to hurt the United States if we cannot 

implement the deal, if we ask them not to move forward. But I 

think there will not be unity in the European Union. 

For instance, the European Union will have to reauthorize EU 

sanctions at some point. I can think of three or four European 

Union members who might not want to reauthorize—the weaker 


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countries, the ones that are closer to Russia, for instance, and the 

Russians would love to embarrass the United States. So I think 

that is a problem. 

The biggest problem that I see in Congress defeating the President is that ultimately then this deal will not go into effect. Iran 

will be unfettered and unshackled. It will not have the restrictions 

that the deal promises the next 10 or 15 years. It will not be a

frozen country in terms of its nuclear capacity. It will be a nuclear 

threshold state again. So if I weigh the—it is hard to say exactly 

what would happen because we are talking about hypotheticals. I 

do not want to be too doctrinaire. I think this would be a messy 

situation. But I think ultimately two things would happen: the Iranians would be strengthened and we would be weakened in the 

long-range struggle that we are in with them. We are competing 

for power in the Middle East. We need to win over the next 20 to 

25 years. And despite my misgivings about part of the deal—and 

I enumerated them—I think what we get is we stop them for the 

next 10 or 15 years, and for me that means a lot, and that is why 

I support the deal. 

Senator BROWN. Thank you. I think people supporting this agreement and people on the other side and people that are undecided, 

like a number of us on this Committee, all believe that the President—that the military option should be available. You mentioned 

that in your testimony. When you said that we should provide a 

more concrete assurance that the United States would take military action, what did you mean by that? Should the President say 

that again? Should the Presidential candidates, people who want to 

be the next President, make that clear? Is it something we do now? 

Is it something we reiterate in the next 18 months? What do you 

mean by that? 

Mr. BURNS. What I mean, Senator, is that the United States 

needs to have strategic intimidation of Iran, and it needs to be 

credible. It cannot be credible if they do not think we mean what 

we say. And this is going to have to be, I think, for President 

Obama and his successor and the successor’s successor over the 

next 25 years. 

So I would hope that every Presidential candidate of both parties, but also most pertinently President Obama, would say unequivocally, unambiguously, if Iran bolts from the agreement, violates it in a fundamental way, and if we see Iran racing toward a 

nuclear weapon—we would have a little bit of time to react—that 

the United States President would use force to prevent that from 

happening. It would not resolve the entire problem. It would knock 

them back for a couple of years if we bombed Natanz, Fordow, and 

the Arak heavy-water reactor. But that would be substantial. It 

would mean that at some point we would probably have to have 

another negotiation down the line. But I cannot see the United 

States succeeding in containing Iran if we are not willing to use 

force and be credible about it. And I say this with the greatest respect, because I respect President Obama, of course—I think he 

needs to say that in the middle of this debate to reassure the Congress and reassure the American people and reassure people like 

me that that is a credible threat of force. And I have not seen the 

speech that he just gave, and perhaps he said it in that speech. 


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Senator BROWN. OK. Thank you. 

One last question, Mr. Chairman, for Mr. Levitt. You describe in 

your testimony that major secondary bank sanctions will be retained under the agreement. You note that is a good thing. If Congress does not reject the deal, are there ways that Treasury should 

be using these bank sanctions in a more robust way to mitigate the 

problems you have identified with the deal? 

Mr. LEVITT. Thank you for the question. The secondary sanctions, as we have all said, are very, very powerful. The secondary 

sanctions would remain on the non-WMD proliferation activities. 

The kicker then is that they are not there for everything, and it 

has never been the case that a particular bank was only involved 

in proliferation or terrorism. 

So it is going to be difficult to get the intelligence sometimes to 

be able to show that an entity is engaged in activities relating just 

to terrorism, and then it is going to be a question of political will. 

As Mark said, if you have something like the Central bank of Iran, 

will there be the will to put forth sanctions on those types of major 

entities, or even smaller ones if we think that that might annoy the 

Iranians? 

It will deter the major financial institutions and some major corporations from doing business in Iran, at least for a period of time, 

the banks probably for a long period of time. That is for sure. But 

by virtue of it being limited to certain types of illicit activity, we 

are no longer talking about Iran as a risky jurisdiction when it is 

becoming an even more risky jurisdiction. And that toolkit, which 

was in some ways the most effective—not the formal sanctions of 

any kind, but the informal sanctions that brought to bear the 

reputational and business risks, those are going to begin to fade 

very, very quickly. 

Senator BROWN. Thank you. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman SHELBY. Senator Kirk. 

Senator KIRK. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. Dubowitz, let me show you a list that I got, 290 American 

citizens who we think have been killed through Iranian terror. This 

list covers 40 States, including 24 people from New York, 22 people 

from Florida, 14 people from Ohio, and 13 from my home State of 

Illinois. If we deliver over $100 billion to Iran, what do you suspect 

will happen with regard to this death toll of Americans against Iranian terror? 

Senator BROWN. Mr. Chairman, if I could interrupt, we have a 

habit in this Committee of doing this. Could you give us the source 

of this list? 

Senator KIRK. This is mainly the U.S. Marines that were killed 

in 1983. 

Senator BROWN. U.S. Marines who were killed in 1983. 

Senator KIRK. This is the 241 Marines that were killed there. 

Senator BROWN. At the Lebanese——

Senator KIRK. This was in Lebanon. 

Senator BROWN. OK. Thank you. 

Mr. DUBOWITZ. So, Senator Kirk, I mean, it is well known who 

the victims of Iranian terrorism are. There have been multiple lawsuits. There is over $20 billion in outstanding judgments. 


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I would note, by the way, that a group representing U.S. victims 

of terrorism just filed an injunction in a U.S. court to block the Administration from giving $100 billion back to Iran. And so I think 

that the purpose of that injunction, Senator Kirk, is to actually prevent future victims of Iranian terrorism. I actually find it quite surprising that we have not required the Iranians to satisfy the judgments for past victims of Iranian terrorism, and yet we are willing 

to give them billions of dollars to fund what everybody agrees 

would be future acts of terrorism against Americans and others. 

Senator KIRK. Thank you. 

Mr. DUBOWITZ. I would also note one of thing, Senator, Kirk. I 

did some research into this, because we talk a lot about where this 

money is going to be spent in terms of Syria and Hezbollah and 

Hamas, and people have said that it is not a lot of money, it is lowcost and low-tech. But I looked into actually the Iranian budget for 

2015. The IRGC and the Quds Force are going to get $6.4 billion 

in that budget. President Rouhani is anticipating the sanctions relief in his 2015 budget. That represents 65 percent of the total defense budget of Iran. It represents actually almost 10 percent of the 

total public budget. So the Iranians will spend almost 10 percent 

of their total public budget supporting the Revolutionary Guards 

and the Quds Force, who are the entities primarily responsible for 

acts of terrorism. It gives you a sense of where the Iranian regime 

is actually highlighting its own priorities. 

Senator KIRK. If I could follow up, I have got a second——

Chairman SHELBY. Senator Kirk, he wants to answer. 

Senator KIRK. OK. 

Mr. ZARATE. Senator, I just wanted to add to that, if I could for 

just a moment. It does strike me as odd that we have assumed as 

a country that the cost of the deal is simply that the money will 

flow back to Iran in an unfettered, uncontrolled way, and that we 

are doing nothing, at least in the immediate term, to deal with the 

very real risk that terrorist financing will flow in the international 

system through the Revolutionary Guard Corps, the MOIS, or the 

Quds Force. So it just strikes me as odd that we have accepted almost as a principle of shrugging our shoulders that this is a cost 

of the deal when I do not think it should be. And I also think it 

is remarkable that the Administration has described the walkaway plan here as if we will be the isolated party internationally, 

when, in fact, the Iranians continue to engage in a whole range of 

illicit conduct. 

When we entered into the negotiations with Iran completely isolated, with the onus on Iran to prove its bona fides, to prove the 

peaceful nature of its regime, and suddenly we are being told at 

the moment of fruition that if we do not accept a deal, we are going 

to be the isolated party internationally, that is a remarkable turn 

of the tables. And I just do not think the cost of the deal as described is acceptable, and we should be mitigating against that. 

And there are ways of doing that, and I just have not heard that 

from the Administration. 

Chairman SHELBY. Ambassador Burns, do you have a comment? 

Mr. BURNS. Senator Kirk, I just want to thank you for your first 

chart. In my written testimony, I also said that one of the issues 

we have to press the Iranians on now is the Marines that they 


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killed in 1983; the American Embassy personnel who died in 1983; 

Malcolm Kerr, president of the American University of Beirut, 

gunned down in Beirut in 1984 at the instigation of Iran. It is one 

of the issues that we have to pursue. Some of these issues are in 

Federal court where American citizens have sued the Iranian Government, and they deserve justice. 

I would not advise making this conditional on the nuclear deal, 

but I would advise making it conditional on any resumption of relations with Iran in the future. And I think on balance we will be 

able to contain better this problem of Iran if they are non-nuclear 

than if they are a nuclear weapons power. It is another reason why 

I support the agreement. 

Chairman SHELBY. Dr. Levitt, do you have another——

Mr. LEVITT. If I may, I would just point out to follow up on the 

last question and partially answer this one, breaking apart proliferation and terrorism sanctions does not exactly work, and the 

Administration has conceded this. Last year, David Cohen, then 

Under Secretary of the Treasury, now Deputy Director of the CIA, 

specifically touted the collateral counterterrorism benefit of 

counterproliferation sanctions targeting Iran’s banking and oil sectors, and I quote, he said:

In fact, the success of our unprecedented Iran sanctions regime, including 

sanctions on Iranian financial institutions and Iran’s ability to sell its oil, 

has had the collateral benefit of squeezing Tehran’s ability to fund terrorist 

groups such as Hezbollah.’’ That will no longer be the case.

Chairman SHELBY. Senator Kirk? 

Senator KIRK. Mr. Chairman, I wanted to go through this chart 

here to show you the estimates of the Congressional Research Service on what Iran’s notional terror budget is. According to CRS, their support for Hezbollah is about $100 to $200 million per year, and support for Hamas is tens of millions 

of dollars per year. Support for the Assad regime in Syria is $16 

to $15 million per year. Support for the rebels in Yemen, tens of 

millions of dollars per year. 

The key question, when you add it all, it is between $6 to $16 

billion per year as a state sponsor of terror. The key question to 

follow up from all this information is: Should they get $100 billion 

in sanctions relief, what will become of the situation on the international terror front? 

Chairman SHELBY. Go ahead. 

Mr. ZARATE. They would be enriched. They would be emboldened. 

They would add to the budget that they have already allocated for 

these groups. These groups, hearing from them directly, Secretary 

General Nasrallah from Hezbollah has said he expects more support from the Iranians. So I think we should take the Iranians and 

their proxies at their word. They are going to profit from this deal, 

and we have got to do things to mitigate the risk of that if this deal 

moves forward. There is no question. And I think shrugging our 

shoulders, assuming that it is a cost of the deal, is not good 

enough. 

Mr. DUBOWITZ. Senator Kirk, what has not been discussed as 

well is that in 6 to 12 months the U.S. Treasury Department will 

be lifting sanctions on an entity called the ‘‘Execution of Imam 

Khomeini’s Order,’’ or EIKO, otherwise known as Setad in its IraVerDate 0ct 09 2002 11:24 Dec 22, 2016 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00073 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6604 S:\DOCS\97883.TXT SHERYL

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nian acronym. This is the holding company of the Supreme Leader 

of Iran. It is a $95 billion holding company that would be de-designated by OFAC in 6 to 12 months, allowing the Supreme Leader 

freely to move $95 billion through the formal financial system 

around the world. 

So this is not just the $100 billion in oil escrow funds. It is $95 

billion in a HoldCo that the Supreme Leader actually has. That is 

$200 billion. 

Just one point of clarification here. Under Secretary Szubin was talking about these accounts, and it is now down to $56 billion. The 

Administration is trying to have an argument both ways. If that 

money is only going to be spent on the economy and not on terrorism, then that $56 billion also includes about $25 billion that 

the Chinese are going to spend on upstream energy investments. 

It is going to include another $20 billion that is being secured 

against nonperforming loans. That is money that will be spent on 

Iran’s economy. So if it is Iran’s economy, it is $100 billion. If, on 

the other hand, the argument is from the Administration that the 

Iranians will spend that money on terrorism, then the Administration is right, $100 billion is not available for terrorism, only $56 

billion is available for terrorism. But let us get our arguments 

straight: $100 billion is available for Iran’s economy. That is what 

is in those escrow funds. And as I said, $95 billion is sitting in 

Khameini’s holding company available to fund exactly what you are 

talking about. And the Revolutionary Guards are going to be getting $6.5 billion, representing almost 10 percent of their public 

budget, and they are the entity in control of Iran’s overseas expansionism and its terrorist activities. 

Chairman SHELBY. Dr. Levitt, do you have a comment? 

Mr. LEVITT. You know, let us listen to what Hezbollah, Secretary 

General Hassan Nasrallah said about it. He is not only quite close 

to the regime, but his treasury recently exposed, has been holding 

weekly meetings with Bashar al-Assad to see about furthering 

their cooperation there. 

Nasrallah noted that even under sanctions, Iran funded its allies 

and anticipated that now ‘‘a rich and powerful Iran, which will be 

open to the world,’’ would be able to do even more. And his quote 

continued:

I say that in the next phase Iran will be able to stand by its allies, friends, 

the people in the region, and especially the resistance in Palestine and the 

Palestinian people more than at any time in the past, and this is what the 

others are afraid of.

Chairman SHELBY. Ambassador Burns, do you have a comment? 

Mr. BURNS. Senator, I assume that whether it is $100 billion or 

56—and I am not competent to answer that question—some of this 

is going to have to go to contracts, as was explained in the last 

panel; some will inevitably go to revive the Iranian economy given 

the population’s frustration with sanctions; and some is going to go 

to the IRGC. And you are right about that. 

I do think that if there is congressional disapproval and we cannot fulfill the agreement and they become a threshold state, they 

are a more powerful force to exert mayhem in the Middle East 

than if we can freeze them and weaken them over the next 10 

years. 


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So just thinking strategically, I think we have to combat this 

force and set up a containment regime. But if they are weakened 

by the nuclear agreement, we will have greater success, I would 

think, in doing that. 

Chairman SHELBY. Thank you, Senator Kirk. 

I thank all of you for appearing and your patience here today. 

A very important hearing, very important issue. 

The Committee is adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 1:41 p.m., the hearing was adjourned.] 

[Prepared statements and responses to written questions supplied for the record follow:] 


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PREPARED STATEMENT OF WENDY SHERMAN

UNDER SECRETARY, DEPARTMENT OF STATE

AUGUST 5, 2015

Good morning, Chairman Shelby, Ranking Member Brown and Members of the 

Committee. Thank you for this opportunity to discuss the Joint Comprehensive Plan 

of Action that the United States and our international partners recently concluded 

with Iran. The testimony from my colleague from Treasury, Acting Under Secretary 

Szubin, discusses how our work in crafting an international consensus around tough 

sanctions brought about the conditions that made negotiations possible. As Adam 

notes, JCPOA sanctions relief is tied to specific steps that Iran must take to demonstrate the peaceful nature of its nuclear program and verification of these steps, 

and we will absolutely retain the ability to snap back both our own national sanctions and U.N. sanctions. 

The JCPOA is the end result of not 1 year or 2 years’ effort, but a decade working 

to find the right approach to address the international community’s concerns over 

Iran’s nuclear program. The approach that finally succeeded in getting us to where 

we are today, with a clear plan for ensuring that Iran’s nuclear program will be exclusively peaceful, combined the toughest sanctions ever put in place with the willingness to negotiate to find a diplomatic solution. Congress played a critical role in 

fashioning and supporting those sanctions that brought Iran to the negotiating 

table, and now Congress has an opportunity to further support this approach by 

backing its outcome, the JCPOA. 

I will focus in my testimony on the specific ways in which the deal that we 

reached meets the President’s stated goal of ensuring that Iran will not acquire a 

nuclear weapon and that Iran’s nuclear program will be exclusively peaceful. I will 

outline how the JCPOA cuts off all of Iran’s pathways to enough fissile material for 

a nuclear weapon, and will discuss the comprehensive verification and transparency 

mechanisms built into the deal. Finally, I will review the timeline that we have 

achieved in the JCPOA, which puts significant restraints on Iran’s nuclear program 

for 10, 15, 20, and 25 years, and other restraints that last forever. 

The JCPOA Cuts Off All of Iran’s Pathways to Fissile Material for a Weapon 

On July 14, the United States along with our partners in the P5+1 and the EU 

concluded a historic deal that, when fully implemented, will peacefully and 

verifiably prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon. This deal is the result of 

nearly 20 months of intensive negotiations since the P5+1 and Iran concluded the 

Joint Plan of Action in November 2013. 

From the day that those talks began, we were crystal clear that we would not 

accept anything less than a good deal. A good deal would effectively close off all four 

pathways to enough fissile material for a nuclear weapon. That includes the two 

possible pathways via uranium enrichment at Natanz and Fordow, the plutonium 

pathway at the Arak heavy water reactor, and any possible covert pathway. This 

was our standard, and the JCPOA meets that standard. 

The uranium enrichment pathways are addressed by substantially reducing the 

number of centrifuges enriching uranium at Natanz, ending enrichment at the underground Fordow facility, and reducing Iran’s stockpile of enriched uranium. 

Iran must remove two-thirds of its installed centrifuges for 10 years, reduce its 

stockpile of enriched uranium by 98 percent to 300 kilograms for 15 years, and cap 

uranium enrichment at 3.67 percent—far below the danger point—for 15 years. This 

combination will ensure a breakout time, the time required to produce enough fissile 

material for a weapon, to a year or more for at least 10 years. 

The plutonium pathway is closed off by redesigning and rebuilding the Arak 

heavy water reactor so that it will be smaller and no longer produce weapons-grade 

plutonium. This is not a temporary conversion that could be easily reversed should 

Iran ever make a decision to try to break out to pursue enough plutonium material 

for a weapon. The core of the reactor will be removed and rendered unusable and 

the facility will rebuilt to a different design. In addition, all the plutonium-bearing 

spent fuel will be shipped out of the country for the life for the reactor. And Iran 

has committed to light-water reactors in the future. 

The covert pathway is cut off in multiple ways, because Iran would need multiple 

facilities to covertly produce enough fissile material for a weapon. The normal IAEA 

safeguards will be substantially expanded to cover the entire uranium supply chain, 

from the mines and mills, to conversion and enrichment, to assure uranium cannot 

be diverted to a covert facility. A dedicated procurement channel will be established 

to oversee the acquisition of sensitive nuclear technologies needed for Iran’s nuclear 

program, with the United States having the ability to approve or disapprove of any 

equipment. All centrifuge production will be continuously monitored, and the IAEA 


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will be able to track centrifuges from the time they are produced to ensure they are 

not diverted to a covert enrichment facility. In no other country does the IAEA have 

continuous monitoring of uranium production and centrifuge production, and these 

provisions will be in place for 25 and 20 years, respectively. 

If we should suspect Iran is engaged in activities inconsistent with the JCPOA 

at any undeclared location in Iran, the IAEA can request access to that location and 

if we and our European colleagues agree that access is necessary, Iran must grant 

that access to the IAEA. The entire process cannot take more than 24 days. In no 

other country does the IAEA have assured access to undeclared locations. This provision gives us the assurance for the first time that Iran cannot delay access indefinitely to suspect locations. 

Verification and Transparency 

You have heard us say often that this deal is based on verification, not trust. Let 

me be clear here that we are not talking about the normal verification procedures 

that apply to all non-nuclear weapon state parties to the Non-Proliferation Treaty. 

We are talking about provisions that go far beyond that. As was just noted, international inspectors will have unprecedented continuous monitoring at Iran’s declared nuclear facilities that will allow it to monitor the entire nuclear supply chain, 

from uranium production and centrifuge manufacturing to conversion and enrichment. The IAEA will also have access to undeclared locations if it has concerns 

about activities inconsistent with the JCPOA. 

The IAEA will be permitted to use advanced technologies such as online enrichment monitoring, and electronic seals which report their status to inspectors, technologies developed in the United States. 

The Timeline 

One of the President’s stated goals in these negotiations, and a guiding principle 

for those of us at the negotiating table, was that any comprehensive solution must 

ensure a breakout time of at least 1 year for 10 years, and then a gradual decrease 

of possible breakout time after that. This is what we have achieved with the 

JCPOA. 

For a minimum of 10 years, Iran will be subject to strict limits on its facilities, 

domestic enrichment capacity, and research and development. Other provisions extend for 15 years, 20 years, and 25 years. 

And under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, Iran is permanently prohibited 

from pursuing a nuclear weapon—and the verification provisions of the safeguards 

associated with the NPT will remain in place forever, enhanced by the Additional 

Protocol as a result of the JCPOA. 

The bottom line is that this deal does exactly what it was intended to do when 

we began formal negotiations 2 years ago. Remember that, 2 years ago, when our 

negotiations began, we faced an Iran that was enriching uranium up to 20 percent 

at a facility built in secret and buried in a mountain, was rapidly stockpiling enriched uranium, had installed over 19,000 centrifuges, and was building a heavy 

water reactor that could produce weapons-grade plutonium at a rate of one to two 

bombs per year. Experts estimated Iran’s so-called breakout time—the interval required for it to have enough fissile material for a bomb—at 2 to 3 months. 

This is the reality we would return to if this deal is rejected—except that the diplomatic support we have been steadily building in recent years would disappear because the rest of the world believes that we have achieved a deal that credibly resolves this problem. 

The plan agreed to in Vienna will shrink the number of centrifuges, expand the 

breakout timeline, and ensure that facilities can only be used for peaceful purposes, 

and put the whole program under a microscope. 

If Iran fails to meet its responsibilities, we can ensure that U.N. Security Council 

sanctions snap back into place, and no country can stop that from happening. If 

Iran tries to break out of the deal altogether, the world will have more time—a year 

compared to the 2 months prior to the negotiation—to respond before Iran could 

possibly have enough fissile material for a bomb. At that point, all the potential options that we have today would remain on the table, and we would also have the 

moral authority and international support that comes from having exhausted all 

peaceful alternatives. 

As for Iran’s other behavior, including its ongoing support for terrorism, its destabilizing activities in the region, its anti-Israel and anti-Semitic rhetoric and actions, 

and its dismal human rights record, the United States is under no illusions. These 

nuclear negotiations were never based on the expectation that a deal would transform the Iranian regime or cause Tehran to cease contributing to sectarian violence 

and terrorism in the Middle East. That is why we have made clear that we will


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continue to enhance our unprecedented levels of security cooperation with Israel. 

And as Secretary Kerry confirmed earlier this week in Qatar, we will work closely 

with the Gulf States to build their capacity to defend themselves and to push back 

against malign Iranian influence. We will continue to take actions to prevent terrorist groups—including Hamas and Hezbollah—from acquiring weapons. We will 

maintain and enforce our own sanctions related to human rights, terrorism, WMD, 

and ballistic missiles. And we will continue to insist on the release of the U.S. citizens unjustly detained in Iran—Saeed Abedini, Amir Hekmati and Jason Rezaian—

and for information about the whereabouts of Robert Levinson so he too comes 

home. 

We all know that the Middle East today is undergoing severe stress due to violent 

extremism, challenged governance, and sectarian and political rivalries. But every 

one of those problems would be even worse if Iran were allowed to have a nuclear 

weapon. That’s why the plan reached in Vienna is so important. We cannot accept 

a nuclear-armed Iran. 

Now, some have said that if we only doubled down on sanctions we could force 

Iran to agree to dismantle its nuclear program. But that is a fantasy, as my colleague Acting Under Secretary Szubin from the Treasury Department will attest. 

The whole purpose of sanctions was to get Iran to the bargaining table and to create 

incentives for precisely the kind of good deal we were able to achieve in Vienna. 

Over 90 countries have issued public statements in support of the deal. That list 

includes all of the countries that participated in the negotiation as well as the six 

economies that steadily reduced their purchases of oil in furtherance of our sanctions. It includes the countries that stopped their imports of Iranian oil altogether, 

and the countries that could potentially be major trading partners of Iran but have 

sacrificed economically because we showed good faith in reaching a negotiated diplomatic solution. Each of these countries has stood with us and made tough choices 

to keep the international sanctions regime intact so that we could achieve a deal 

like the JCPOA. We need their support now as we move toward its implementation. 

It is important to remember that the United States has had unilateral sanctions 

on Iran for many years, and yet its nuclear program continued to advance. President Obama’s strategy was to push for stronger multilateral sanctions while keeping 

the door open to negotiations. Those sanctions forced Iran to pay a high price, but 

sanctions alone were not enough to make Iran change course. That required a diplomatic initiative that included strong support from our international partners. 

If we walk away from what was agreed in Vienna, we will be walking away from 

every one of the restrictions we have negotiated, and giving Iran the green light to 

double the pace of its uranium enrichment, proceed full speed ahead with a heavy 

water reactor, install new and more efficient centrifuges, and do it all without the 

unprecedented inspection and transparency measures we’ve secured. 

If we walk away, our partners will not walk away with us. Instead, they’ll walk 

away from the tough multilateral sanctions regime they helped us to put in place. 

We will be left to go it alone and whatever limited economic pressure we could apply 

would be unlikely to compel Tehran to negotiate or to make any deeper concessions. 

They would instead push the program ahead, potentially forcing military conflict. 

And we will have squandered the best chance we have to solve this problem through 

peaceful means. 

Make no mistake: we will never accept a nuclear-armed Iran. But the fact is that 

Iran has extensive experience with nuclear fuel cycle technology. We can’t bomb 

that knowledge away. Nor can we sanction that knowledge away. Remember that 

sanctions did not stop Iran’s nuclear program from growing steadily, to the point 

that it had accumulated enough low enriched uranium that, if further enriched, 

could be used to produce about 10 nuclear bombs. 

The United States will always retain the right to take whatever steps necessary 

to protect our security and prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon. But we 

also have not been afraid to pursue the diplomatic approach. We negotiated arms 

control agreements with the Soviet Union when that nation was committed to our 

destruction, and those agreements ultimately made us safer. Likewise, the truth is 

that the Vienna plan will provide a stronger, more comprehensive, and more lasting 

means of limiting Iran’s nuclear program than any realistic alternative. 

Congress played a critical role in getting us to this point. Sanctions achieved their 

goal by bringing about serious, productive negotiations with Iran. Now Congress has 

a chance to approve a deal that will make our country and our allies safer; a deal 

that will keep Iran’s nuclear program under intense scrutiny; a deal that will ensure 

that the international community remains united in demanding that Iran’s nuclear 

activities must be wholly peaceful. It is a good deal for America—a good deal for 

the world—and it deserves your support. Thank you. 


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PREPARED STATEMENT OF ADAM J. SZUBIN

ACTING UNDER SECRETARY OF TREASURY FOR TERRORISM

AND FINANCIAL INTELLIGENCE, DEPARTMENT OF THE TREASURY

AUGUST 5, 2015

Chairman Shelby, Ranking Member Brown, and Members of the Committee: 

Thank you for inviting me to appear before you today to discuss the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) that the United States and our negotiating partners concluded with Iran on July 14. It is an honor to appear alongside Ambassador 

Sherman. A foreign policy matter of such importance deserves a careful analysis. 

I am confident that an open and honest debate based on the facts will make evident 

that this deal will strengthen America’s security and that of our allies. 

Having spent more than a decade at the Treasury Department working to 

strengthen our diplomatic efforts by imposing sanctions pressure on Iran, I will 

focus on the global sanctions coalition built and led by the United States that gave 

us the leverage necessary to secure unprecedented nuclear concessions from Iran. 

I will then discuss the nature of the sanctions relief in this deal, and how the 

JCPOA is designed to keep pressure on Iran to fulfill its nuclear commitments. Last, 

I will explain the tough sanctions that will remain in place to combat a range of 

malign Iranian activity outside the nuclear sphere—including its support for terrorism and militant proxies in the Middle East, its missile program, and its human 

rights abuses. 

The Impact of Our Sanctions: Bringing Iran to the Table 

The powerful set of U.S. and international sanctions on Iran, and especially those 

imposed over the last 5 years, effectively isolated Iran from the world economy. The 

U.S. Government led this effort across two Administrations and with bipartisan 

backing in Congress. Together we obtained four tough U.N. Security Council resolutions, and built upon our longstanding primary embargo by enlisting the support of 

foreign partners from Europe to Asia to impose further pressure on Iran. This campaign yielded results. After years of intransigence, Iran came to the table prepared 

to negotiate seriously over its nuclear program. 

To see the impact of the sanctions campaign, consider the following metrics. 

Today, the Iranian economy is estimated to be only 80 percent the size that it would 

have been, had it continued on its pre-2012 growth path. Consequently, it will take 

until at least 2022—even with sanctions relief—for Iran to get back to where it 

would have been absent our sanctions. Iran has foregone approximately $160 billion 

in oil revenue alone since 2012, after our sanctions reduced Iran’s oil exports by 60 

percent. This money is lost and cannot be recovered. 

Iran’s designated banks, as well as its Central Bank, have been cut off from the 

world. The Iranian currency has declined by more than 50 percent. We maintained 

strong economic pressure throughout the 2-year negotiating period. Indeed, during 

that time, our sanctions deprived Iran of an additional $70 billion in oil revenue, 

and Iran’s total trade with the rest of the world remained virtually flat. 

To achieve this pressure, international consensus and cooperation were vital. 

Around the world, views on Iran’s sponsorship of groups like Hizballah and its regional interventions differ. But the world’s major powers have been united in preventing a nuclear-armed Iran. Iran’s major trading partners and oil customers 

joined us in imposing pressure on Iran, and paid a significant economic price to do 

so, based on U.S. sanctions and a clear path forward. The point of these efforts was 

clear: to change Iran’s nuclear behavior, while holding out the prospect of relief if 

Iran addressed the world’s concerns about its nuclear program. 

The Nature and Scope of JCPOA Relief 

As Ambassador Sherman has described, the JCPOA addresses these nuclear concerns by closing off Iran’s pathways to a nuclear weapon and providing access to 

ensure compliance, while preserving leverage if Iran breaches the deal. If Iran fully 

complies with the terms of the JCPOA, and if the IAEA verifies their compliance, 

phased sanctions relief will come into effect. 

To be clear: when the JCPOA goes into effect, there will be no immediate relief 

from United Nations, EU, or U.S. sanctions. There is no ‘‘signing bonus.’’ Only if 

Iran fulfills the necessary nuclear conditions—which will roll back its nuclear program and extend its breakout time fivefold to at least 1 year—will the United States 

lift sanctions. We expect that to take at least 6 to 9 months. Until Iran completes 

those steps, we are simply extending the limited relief that has been in place for 

the last year and a half under the Joint Plan of Action. There will not be a cent 

of new sanctions relief. 


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Upon ‘‘Implementation Day,’’ when phased relief would begin, the United States 

will lift nuclear-related secondary sanctions targeting third-country parties conducting business with Iran, including in the oil, banking, and shipping sectors. 

These measures were imposed in response to the security threat from Iran’s nuclear 

program; accordingly, they will be suspended in exchange for verifiable actions to 

alleviate that threat. 

As we phase in nuclear-related sanctions relief, we will maintain and enforce significant sanctions that fall outside the scope of this deal, including our primary U.S. 

trade embargo. Our embargo will continue to prohibit U.S. persons from investing 

in Iran, importing or exporting to Iran most goods and services, or otherwise dealing 

with most Iranian persons and companies. Iranian banks will not be able to clear 

U.S. dollars through New York, hold correspondent account relationships with U.S. 

financial institutions, or enter into financing arrangements with U.S. banks. Nor 

will Iran be able to import controlled U.S.-origin technology or goods, from anywhere in the world. In short, Iran will continue to be denied access to the world’s 

principal financial and commercial market. The JCPOA provides for only minor exceptions to this broad prohibition. 

Countering Malign Iranian Conduct 

As we address the most acute threat posed by Iran, its nuclear program, we will 

be aggressively countering the array of Iran’s other malign activities. The JCPOA 

in no way limits our ability to do so, and we have made our posture clear to both 

Iran and to our partners. This means that the United States will maintain and continue to vigorously enforce our powerful sanctions targeting Iran’s backing for terrorist groups such as Hizballah. In the last 2 months alone, for example, we designated eleven Hizballah military officials and affiliated companies and businessmen. We will also continue our campaign against Hizballah’s sponsors in Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-Quds Force; Iran’s support to the Houthis in 

Yemen; its backing of Assad’s regime in Syria; and its domestic human rights 

abuses. We will also maintain the U.S. sanctions against Iran’s missile program and 

the IRGC writ large. 

Let there be no doubt about our willingness to continue enforcing these sanctions. 

During the JPOA period, when we were intensely negotiating with Iran, we took 

action against more than 100 Iranian-linked targets for their WMD, terrorism, 

human rights abuses, evasion and other illicit activities. 

Nor are we relieving sanctions on Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps, its Quds 

Force, any of their subsidiaries or senior officials. The U.S. designation of Quds 

Force commander Qassem Suleimani will not be removed, nor will he be removed 

from EU lists related to terrorism and Syria sanctions. 

Sanctions will also remain in place on key Iranian defense entities, including 

Iran’s Ministry of Defense and Armed Forces Logistics (MODAFL), Defense Industries Organization, Aerospace Industries Organization and other key missile entities, including Shahid Hemat Industrial Group (SHIG) and Shahid Bagheri Industrial Group (SBIG). We will also retain sanctions on Iranian firms such as the Tiva 

Sanat Group, which has worked to develop a weapons-capable fast boat to be used 

by the IRGC-Navy, and Iran Aircraft Manufacturing Industrial Company (HESA), 

which manufactures unmanned aerial vehicles used by the IRGC, as well as third 

country firms that have assisted Iran’s missile and defense programs. Under the 

JCPOA, more than 225 Iran-linked persons will remain designated and subject to 

our sanctions, including major Iranian companies and military and defense entities 

and firms. 

It is worth emphasizing that our sanctions authorities will continue to affect foreign financial institutions that transact with these more than 200 Iranian persons 

on our Specially Designated Nationals List, as well as persons who provide material 

or other types of support to Iranian SDNs. These measures provide additional deterrence internationally. For example, a foreign bank that conducts or facilitates a significant financial transaction with Iran’s Mahan Air, the IRGC-controlled construction firm Khatam al Anbiya, or Bank Saderat will risk losing its access to the U.S. 

financial system, and this is not affected by the nuclear deal. 

Sanctions Snap Back 

Of course, we must guard against the possibility that Iran does not uphold its side 

of the bargain. That is why, should Iran violate its commitments once we have suspended sanctions, we will be able to promptly snap back both U.S. and U.N. sanctions, and our EU colleagues have reserved the ability to do so with respect to their 

sanctions as well. 

For U.S. sanctions, this can be achieved rapidly—in a matter of days—from smaller penalties up to and including the powerful oil and financial measures that were 


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so effective against Iran’s economy. New measures could also be imposed if Iran 

were to violate its commitments and renege on the deal. 

Multilateral sanctions at the U.N. also can be reimposed quickly, and the United 

States has the ability to reimpose those sanctions unilaterally, even over the objections of other P5 members. 

To those with concerns that Iran can accumulate minor violations over time, it 

is important to clarify that if there are small violations, we can address them 

through a variety of measures—snapback does not have to be all or nothing. This 

approach gives us maximum flexibility and maximum leverage. 

If sanctions snap back, there is no ‘‘grandfather clause.’’ While we have committed 

not to retroactively impose sanctions for legitimate activity undertaken during the 

period of relief, any transactions conducted after the snapback occurs are 

sanctionable. To be clear, there is no provision in the deal that protects contracts 

signed prior to snapback once snapback occurs, any prospective transaction is 

sanctionable. 

JCPOA Relief in Perspective 

Some have argued that sanctions relief is premature until Iran pursues less destructive policies at home and abroad, and that funds Iran recovers could be diverted for destructive purposes. But Iran’s ties to terrorist groups are exactly why 

we must keep it from ever obtaining a nuclear weapon. The JCPOA will address 

this nuclear danger, freeing us and our allies to check Iran’s regional activities more 

aggressively. By contrast, walking away from this deal would leave the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism with a short and decreasing nuclear breakout time. 

We are far better positioned to combat Iran’s proxies with the nuclear threat off the 

table. 

We must also be measured and realistic in understanding what sanctions relief 

will really mean to Iran. Estimates of total Central Bank of Iran (CBI) foreign exchange assets worldwide are in the range of $100 to $125 billion. Our assessment 

is that Iran’s usable liquid assets after sanctions relief will be much lower, at a little 

more than $50 billion. The other $50–70 billion of total CBI foreign exchange assets 

are either obligated in illiquid projects (such as over 50 projects with China) that 

cannot be monetized quickly, if at all, or are composed of outstanding loans to Iranian entities that cannot repay them. These assets would not become accessible following sanctions relief. 

Because Iran’s freely accessible assets constitute the country’s reserves, not its annual budgetary allowance, Iran will need to retain a portion of these assets to defend its currency and stability. Of the portion that Iran spends, we assess that the 

vast majority will be used to tackle a mountain of debts and domestic needs that 

at over a half trillion dollars are more than 10 times as large as the funds it can 

freely use. Iran will also likely need a meaningful portion of its liquid foreign exchange reserve assets to finance pent-up import demand, unify official and unofficial 

exchange rates, and maintain an adequate foreign exchange buffer against future 

external shocks. For reference, $50 billion is roughly in line with the 5–10 months 

of imports foreign exchange buffer that comparable emerging markets countries and 

the IMF consider prudent. All the while, Iran’s economy continues to suffer from 

immense challenges—due to factors including budget deficits, endemic corruption, 

dilapidated energy infrastructure, a poor business environment, and the 

reputational concerns of foreign companies. Let us also recall that President 

Rouhani, who rose to the presidency on a platform of economic revival, faces a political imperative to show meaningful economic gains to the Iranian population. The 

Supreme Leader’s approval of the negotiations suggests his understanding of this 

need as well. 

We are mindful that at least some of the funds Iran receives from relief could find 

their way to malign purposes. This prospect is inherent in any realistic nuclear deal, 

no matter its duration or terms. But therefore it is incumbent on us to intensify 

our work, alongside Israel and our regional allies, to combat these malicious proxies. 

Alternative Approaches 

Sanctions were a means to an end, and relief was a necessary part of any deal. 

The deal we have achieved in the JCPOA is a strong one. It phases in relief in exchange for verified Iranian compliance with nuclear-related steps, and has a strong 

snap-back built in. It would be a mistake for the United States to back away based 

on the misconception that it would be feasible to escalate the economic pressure in 

order to obtain a broader Iranian capitulation. 

It is unrealistic to think that, with a broken international consensus and less leverage, we could somehow secure a ‘‘much better’’ deal involving Iran’s capitulation 


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and the eradication of its peaceful nuclear infrastructure or the cessation of its support for longtime proxies such as Hizballah. 

Our partners agreed to impose costly sanctions on Iran for one reason—to negotiate an end to the threat of a nuclear weapon-capable Iran. If we change our terms 

now, and insist that these countries now escalate sanctions when we have jointly 

addressed this threat through the JCPOA, then our ability to impose additional 

pressure will be severely diminished. 

Iran’s escrowed reserves are not in our hands, and much of the world is prepared 

to do business in Iran. If the United States were to walk away from this deal, and 

ask our partners to continue locking up Iran’s reserves and maintaining sanctions, 

the consensus likely would fray, with unpredictable results. Rejecting the deal in 

pursuit of objectives over which there is far less international consensus and unity 

would allow the sanctions regime to unravel and our leverage to dissipate. And we 

would risk losing both a nuclear deal and the sanctions leverage. 

Conclusion 

Enforcing this deal, and securing the nuclear concessions Iran has made, will capitalize on our carefully built economic pressure strategy. The deal’s terms accomplish our overarching goal. Blocking all of Iran’s paths to a nuclear bomb makes us 

and our allies safer. 


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PREPARED STATEMENT OF NICHOLAS BURNS

GOODMAN PROFESSOR OF DIPLOMACY AND INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS

HARVARD KENNEDY SCHOOL

AUGUST 5, 2015

Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member Brown and Members of the Committee, thank 

you for this opportunity to testify on the international agreement to prevent Iran 

from becoming a nuclear weapons power and the implications for sanctions relief. 

This is one of the most urgent and important challenges for our country, for our 

European allies as well as for Israel and our Arab partners in the Middle East. The 

United States must thwart Iran’s nuclear weapons ambitions and its determination 

to become the dominant military power in the region. 

This will be a long-term struggle requiring the focus and determination of the 

next two American Presidents after President Obama to ensure Iran complies with 

the agreement. We should thus marshal our diplomatic, economic and military 

strength to block Iran now and to contain its power in the region in the years 

ahead. 

With this in mind, I support the Iran nuclear agreement and urge the Congress 

to vote in favor of it in September. 

This is, understandably, a difficult decision for many Members of Congress. It is 

an agreement that includes clear benefits for our national security but risks, as 

well. It is also a painful agreement, involving tradeoffs and compromises with a bitter adversary of our country—the government of Iran. 

I believe, however, that if it is implemented effectively, the agreement will restrict 

and weaken Iran’s nuclear program for more than a decade and help to deny it a 

nuclear weapons capacity over the long term. That crucial advantage has convinced 

me that the Obama administration is right to seek Congressional approval for this 

agreement. 

I have followed the Iran nuclear issue closely for the last decade. From 2005 until 

2008, I had lead responsibility in the State Department on Iran policy. During the 

second term of the George W. Bush administration, we worked hard to blunt Iran’s 

nuclear efforts. We created in 2005 the group that has since led the global effort 

against Iran—the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Russia, China and 

Germany (the P–5 plus One). This group offered to negotiate with Iran in 2006 and 

again in 2007. We were rebuffed on both occasions by the Iranian regime. 

When Iran accelerated its nuclear research program, we turned to sanctions. I 

helped to negotiate for the United States the first three United Nations Security 

Council Chapter VII sanctions resolutions to punish Iran for its actions. Led by the 

Treasury Department, we initiated U.S. financial sanctions and encouraged the European Union to do the same. We built a global coalition against Iran. While Iran 

became increasingly isolated, however, it chose to accelerate its nuclear research efforts in defiance of international law. 

When President Obama came into office in 2009, Iran had made considerable 

progress in advancing its uranium and plutonium programs. It made further 

progress in his first years in office and was on its way to become, in effect, a nuclear 

threshold state. In response, President Obama expanded the sanctions and coordinated an aggressive international campaign to punish and isolate the Iranian regime. 

Congress made a vital contribution by strengthening American sanctions even further. This increasingly global and comprehensive sanctions campaign weakened the 

Iranian economy and ultimately convinced the Iranian government to agree to negotiate during the past eighteen months. 

The Obama and Bush Administrations and the Congress acted over 10 years to 

expand American leverage against Iran and to coerce it to accept negotiations. Despite these efforts, Iran was far along the nuclear continuum when negotiations 

began in earnest in 2013. 

It made sense for the United States to commit to negotiations with Iran in 2013. 

We retained then, as we do now, the capacity and right to use military force to prevent Iran from achieving a nuclear weapon should that be necessary. It is important 

to note that there were alternative negotiating frameworks available to the Obama 

administration in 2013 that might have served our interest in containing Iran’s nuclear program more effectively. But, the issue before the Congress now is the specific agreement that has been negotiated by the Obama team. That is thus the focus 

of my own testimony today. 

In my judgment, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) negotiated by 

Secretaries Kerry and Moniz is a solid and sensible agreement. It has many concrete advantages for the United States. 


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First, the agreement will arrest Iran’s rapid forward movement on its nuclear research programs over the past decade since the inauguration of former President 

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. It will essentially freeze that program. The restrictions the 

United States negotiated will effectively prevent Iran from producing fissile material 

for a nuclear weapon (either through uranium enrichment or the plutonium process) 

at its nuclear facilities for at least 10 to 15 years. 

The number of centrifuges at the Natanz plant will be reduced by two-thirds. Use 

of advanced centrifuges will not be permitted for a decade. Iran’s store of enriched 

uranium will be restricted to levels below those needed for a nuclear device. In addition, there will be no enrichment at all at the Fordow plant for 15 years. 

The Administration also succeeded in blocking Iran’s plutonium program. The 

core of the Arak Heavy Water Reactor will be dismantled. The reactor will be transformed to make it impossible to produce sufficient quantities of plutonium for a nuclear device. Spent fuel will be transported out of Iran. There will be no reprocessing 

of fuel for at least 15 years. 

The most important advantage for the United States is that Iran’s current breakout time to a nuclear weapon will be lengthened from 2 to 3 months now to roughly 

1 year once the agreement is implemented. This is a substantial benefit for our security and those of our friends in the Middle East. It sets back the Iranian nuclear 

program by a significant margin and was a major concession by the Iranian government in this negotiation. 

Significantly strengthened inspections of Iran’s nuclear supply chain for the next 

25 years is a second advantage of the nuclear agreement. Iran has also agreed to 

be subjected to permanent and enhanced IAEA verification and monitoring under 

the Additional Protocol. This will give the IAEA much greater insights into Iran’s 

nuclear program and will increase substantially the probability of the United States 

detecting any Iranian deviations from the agreement. 

Third, sanctions will not be lifted until Iran implements the agreement in every 

respect. This could take up to 3 to 6 months. The United States and other countries 

should demand full and unambiguous Iranian implementation to deconstruct and 

modify its nuclear program according to the letter of the agreement. And, after sanctions are lifted, we must be ready and willing to re-impose them should Iran seek 

to cut corners, cheat or test the integrity of the agreement in any way. In addition, 

the United States will continue to maintain sanctions on Iran for terrorism and 

human rights violations. 

A final advantage, Mr. Chairman, is that this agreement gives us a chance to prevent an Iranian nuclear weapon through diplomacy and negotiations, rather than 

through war. While the United States should be ready to use force against Iran if 

it approaches our red line of acquisition of a nuclear weapon, the more effective 

strategy at this point is to coerce them through negotiations. And, it will be more 

advantageous for the United States to contain a non-nuclear Iran in the Middle 

East for the next decade than to contend with a country on the threshold of a nuclear weapon. In this respect, I admire the commitment, energy and the achievements of Secretary Kerry, Secretary Moniz and their team. 

While the benefits of this agreement for the United States are substantial, there 

are also risks in moving ahead. The most significant, in my judgment, is that while 

Iran’s program will be frozen for a decade, the superstructure of its nuclear apparatus will remain intact, much of it in mothballs. Iran could choose to rebuild a civil 

nuclear program after the restrictions begin to end 10 to 15 years from now. This 

could give Tehran a base from which to attempt to build a covert nuclear weapons 

program at some point in the future. 

Here is where considerable challenges may arise for the United States and its allies. While we can be confident Iran’s program will be effectively stymied for the 

first 10 to 15 years of the agreement, many of those restrictions will loosen and disappear altogether in the decade after. We will need to put in place a series of mitigating measures to deter Iran from diverting any part of its revived civil nuclear 

program to military activities. 

President Obama and his team will need to reassure Congress about the effectiveness and credibility of these initiatives to keep Iran away from a nuclear weapon 

after the first decade of this agreement. This should include a direct, public and unambiguous American commitment to use military force to deter Iran should it ever 

get close to construction of a nuclear weapon. In addition, the United States should 

assemble a coalition of strong partners willing to re-impose sanctions should Iran 

deviate from the agreement. The United States and its partners should also bolster 

the capacity of the IAEA and our own governments to be fully capable of detecting 

Iranian cheating. In sum, we will have to construct a long-term strategic deterrent 

to convince the Iranian government that it is not in its interest to pursue a nuclear 

weapons program a decade from now. 


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Containing Iran will be a difficult challenge for American diplomacy. I differ with 

those critics, however, who believe that the expiration of the agreement will make 

Iranian acquisition of a nuclear weapon all but certain a decade or two from now. 

Much will depend on the Iranian leadership at that time. Will they want to risk 

another generation of international isolation and sanctions if they drive toward a 

nuclear weapon? Will they risk the possibility of an American or Israeli use of military force in response? A decision by Iran to turn back to a nuclear weapons ambition is a possibility, but by no means a certainty. The actions and resolve of the 

United States will have a major impact on Iran’s calculations. It will be up to the 

President and Congress at that time to make clear to Iran that we will be ready 

to use any option available to us, including the use of military force, to prevent Iran 

from becoming a nuclear weapons power. 

The overall effectiveness of the agreement will thus require the Obama administration and its successors to maintain a very tough inspections regime and to be 

ready to re-impose sanctions if Iran seeks an illicit nuclear weapons program in the 

future. 

Congress is right to focus on these concerns and to require concrete assurances 

from the Administration that they can be overcome. Specifically, the Administration 

will need to focus hard on the possibility that Iran will cheat, as it has done so often 

in the past and attempt to construct covert facilities. Should this occur, the United 

States would need to ensure that the ‘‘managed inspections’’ set out in the agreement would work effectively. If Iran were to violate the agreement, American sanctions should be re-imposed. Gaining broader international agreement for sanctions 

would be a more effective way to intimidate the Iranian authorities. This would be 

a priority, but also a challenging hurdle, for American diplomacy. 

A final risk is the agreement that the prohibitions on Iran’s conventional arms 

sales and purchases and ballistic missiles will end in 5 and 8 years, respectively, 

after the agreement is in force. I remain opposed to this compromise. In my view, 

it could embolden Iran and strengthen its conventional capacity in ways detrimental 

to our own interest. The next U.S. administration will need to construct a new coalition to attempt to restrict and sanction Iran in these two areas. 

On balance, however, I believe the nuclear deal will deliver more advantages than 

disadvantages to the United States. There are greater risks, in my judgment, in 

turning down the agreement and freeing Iran from the considerable set of restrictions it has now accepted for the next decade and beyond. 

Most importantly, I do not see a more effective, credible or realistic alternative 

that would give the United States a greater probability at this point of preventing 

an Iranian nuclear weapon. That is the key question Members of Congress should 

ask before you vote. Is there a more effective way forward than the one negotiated 

by the Obama administration? 

The most common criticism of the nuclear deal is that the United States should 

have walked away from the talks during the last year, sanctioned Iran further and 

attempted to negotiate a better and stronger agreement. Some experts have recommended that Congress vote to disapprove the President’s policies or to pass a bill 

that would alter the deal in such a way that a fundamental renegotiation of the 

agreement would be necessary. 

If I thought it was realistic to renegotiate the agreement to make it stronger, I 

would support that option. But, I don’t believe it would be possible to do so and, 

at the same time, to maintain the integrity of our coalition against Iran. 

While this ‘‘No Deal’’ scenario could play out in many, different ways, I think it 

is probable that it would leave the United States weaker, rather than stronger, in 

confronting Iran’s nuclear program. If the United States left the negotiations unilaterally, I don’t believe it is likely that Russia and China and even possibly the European allies and other key international economic powers would follow us out the 

door. These countries are all strong supporters of the nuclear deal before the Congress today. The global coalition and the sanctions regime we spent the last 10 

years building would likely fray and weaken over time. We would lose the strong 

leverage that brought Iran to the negotiating table. While American sanctions were 

very important in convincing Iran to negotiate, it was the global nature of the sanctions with buy-in from nearly every major economy in the world, that also made a 

critical difference in cutting off Iran from the international banking and financial 

system during the past few years. All of these benefits would be at risk after a U.S. 

walkout. 

Most importantly, the strong restrictions that have effectively frozen Iran’s nuclear program since January 2014 would all be lifted if the negotiations are ended. 

The negotiated agreement would cease to be in force. Iran would be free to resume 

its advanced uranium enrichment and plutonium programs. We would lose the 

IAEA’s insights into Iran’s program as the inspections regime would weaken. Iran 


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would not be 1 year away from a bomb under the Obama agreement but on the 

threshold of a nuclear weapons capability. 

While I don’t agree that this ‘‘No Deal’’ scenario would lead inevitably to war, it 

would leave the United States worse off. On balance, this alternative is not preferable to the concrete restrictions on Iran’s program ensured by the nuclear deal. 

If it seeks to disapprove the President’s policy, Congress should offer a realistic 

and effective alternative. But, I am unaware of any credible alternative that would 

serve our interests more effectively at this point than the agreement proposed by 

the Obama administration and the other major countries of the world. 

Rather than vote to disapprove the President’s policy, I hope members of both parties will work with the Administration to strengthen the ability of the United States 

to implement the agreement successfully and to contain simultaneously Iranian 

power in the Middle East. 

We should create, in effect, a two-track American policy toward Iran in the future. 

On the one hand, we should work to ensure Iran implements the nuclear deal. On 

the other hand, we will need to construct a renewed effort with Israel, Turkey and 

our friends in the Arab world to contain Iran’s growing power in the region. 

Now that we are talking to Iran again after 35 years of minimal contact, there 

may be issues on which contact with Tehran will be in our interest. Protecting the 

Afghan government from Taliban assaults is one such possibility. Convincing Iran 

to withdraw its support for President Assad in Syria is another. 

But, I do not believe we will experience anything approaching a normal relationship with the Iranian government as some in our own country have suggested. This 

is not the time to restore full diplomatic relations with its government. There is too 

much that still separates us to justify such a decision. In fact, our larger interests 

in the Middle East require the creation of a coalition of countries to oppose Iran 

as it makes an assertive push for power into the heart of the Sunni world in Iraq, 

Syria, Lebanon and Yemen. The United States will have greater success, however, 

in confronting a non-nuclear Iran over the next decade rather than an Iran with 

nuclear weapons. This is another advantage of the nuclear deal. 

With this in mind, there is more the Obama administration can do to ensure effective implementation of the nuclear deal and to push back against a more assertive 

Iranian policy in the region. Here are some concrete suggestions toward that end.

• A first-order diplomatic priority should be for the United States to do everything in its power to maintain the ability to re-impose sanctions on Iran, if necessary. Russia and, especially, China will likely be weak and undependable 

partners in this regard. The United States should thus focus on securing commitments from the European allies that they will work with us to re-impose 

sanctions in the future, if necessary. The Administration should also convince 

Japan, South Korea, India and other major economies to be ready to curtail 

commercial links to Iran and return to sanctions should Iran violate the nuclear 

agreement.

• The United States should maintain a prohibition on trade with Iran for American business.

• In addition, we should maintain terrorism sanctions on General Qassem 

Suleimani, the Commander of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps. His actions continue to be a threat to America’s national security interests in the Middle East.

• The United States should also remind its allies and partners around the world 

that, if Iran violates the nuclear deal, foreign companies that decided to do business with Iran might subsequently lose their investment when sanctions are reimposed.

• The United States should set a very high bar for Iran on implementation of the 

agreement. Specifically, the United States should call attention to even the 

most minor Iranian transgressions from the start of the implementation process. If we don’t set an exacting standard, Iran may well diminish the integrity 

of the inspections regime by cutting corners and testing its limits. Establishing 

a tough-minded policy now is the right way to convince Iran there will be immediate penalties—a return to sanctions—should it not implement the deal fully 

and completely;

• The United States should reaffirm publicly that we have vital national interests 

in the Persian Gulf and that we will use military force, if necessary, to defend 

them. That was the essence of the Carter Doctrine of the late 1970s and has 

been the policy of Republican and Democratic Administrations since. President 

Obama should continue the campaign he has already begun to assemble a 

strong coalition of Gulf States to contain Iranian power in the region. This will 


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require accelerated military assistance to our Arab partners and a strong, visible and continuous American military presence in the region.

• The United States should try to close ranks with Israel and to strengthen even 

further our long-standing military partnership. The United States-Israel 10-

year military assistance agreement that I led in negotiating in 2007 expires in 

2 years. The Obama administration could reaffirm our ongoing commitment to 

Israel’s Qualitative Military Edge (QME) over any potential aggressor in the 

Middle East region. The Administration should accelerate military technology 

transfers to Israel to head off any potential challenge to Israel from Iran or, as 

is more likely, from its proxies, Hezbollah and Hamas.

• The United States and Israel should also make a renewed effort to diminish 

their public divisions. President Obama should take steps to work more effectively with Prime Minister Netanyahu. But, repairing such a wide public dispute requires both leaders to make it work. Prime Minister Netanyahu would 

be well advised to diminish his excessive public criticism of the U.S. Government. I found in my diplomatic career that allies work best when they work out 

their differences privately rather than publicly.

• President Obama should reaffirm publicly and in the most unmistakable terms, 

his readiness to deploy military force to strike Iran should it violate the agreement and seek to race toward a nuclear weapon. This would help to create a 

more durable American strategic deterrence to convince Iran that abiding by 

the nuclear agreement is in its best interest.

• Finally, the United States should also press Iran to meet the grievances of 

American families who lost their loved ones in Iranian-inspired attacks on 

American citizens in past decades. This includes, of course, the bombings of the 

U.S. Embassy in Beirut and the U.S. Marine Barracks in 1983. It also includes 

the assassination of Dr. Malcolm Kerr, President of the American University of 

Beirut, in January 1984. His family has brought suit against Iran in U.S. Federal Court as they believe Iran authorized his murder through its proxies in 

Lebanon. There are many other such civilian cases against Iran. Implementation of the nuclear deal should not be made conditional on resolution of these 

cases, in my judgment. But, we should not agree to resume full diplomatic relations until Iran has agreed to settle them. By raising them now, we would send 

Iran an unmistakable signal that we expect these cases to be adjudicated fairly 

and with justice for the American families in the future.

• At the same time, the Administration must continue to press as an urgent priority for the release of those Americans imprisoned or missing in Iran.

These steps would help to strengthen our ability to implement the Iran nuclear 

agreement and to put Iran on notice that it has a long way to go before it can resume a normal relationship with the United States. 

Successful implementation of the nuclear deal will require strong, self confident 

and determined American leadership. We are the indispensable center of the P5+1 

group that negotiated the agreement. We have to insist on full Iranian implementation of the agreement. We must assemble an Arab coalition to contain Iran in the 

region. And we have to remain Israel’s strong and faithful partner in a violent, turbulent, revolutionary era in Middle East history. 

Mr. Chairman, I urge members of Congress to support this agreement. A vote of 

disapproval in the absence of a credible alternative, would, after 10 years of effort, 

be self-defeating for our country. 

If Congress votes to disapprove and manages to override the President’s veto, it 

would very likely dismantle the agreement, lead to the gradual disintegration of the 

global sanctions regime and remove all current restrictions on Iran’s nuclear efforts. 

Such a result would leave Iran closer to a nuclear weapon. That is not a sensible 

course for our country. 

I also fear a vote of disapproval would weaken the effectiveness and credibility 

of the United States in the Middle East and around the world. 

There is another path open to Congress. Work with the President to strengthen 

America’s position in the Middle East. Move forward with the nuclear deal. Push 

back against Iranian power in the region. A Congress that sought greater unity with 

President Obama would help to strengthen our country for the struggles that are 

inevitably ahead with Iran in the years to come. 


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RESPONSES TO WRITTEN QUESTIONS OF SENATOR CRAPO 

FROM WENDY SHERMAN 

Q.1. If Congress imposed economic sanctions on Iran, even those 

suspended under the JCPOA, for the continued detention of Americans, such as Pastor Saeed Abedini, would that be a violation of 

the agreement?

A.1. Under the JCPOA, we have only committed to relieve nuclearrelated sanctions. We have not made any commitments that prevent us from using sanctions to address other non-nuclear issues. 

What we have committed to do is quite specific: not to re-impose 

those nuclear-related sanctions specified in Annex II of the JCPOA 

and not to impose new nuclear-related sanctions, contingent on 

Iran abiding by its JCPOA commitments. We would also not be 

precluded from sanctioning specific Iranian actors or sectors, if the 

circumstances warranted. Our human rights sanctions authorities 

remain in place and are unaffected by the JCPOA. Moreover, we 

have made it clear to Iran that we would continue to use and enforce sanctions to address its destabilizing activities in the region. 

That said, the United States would not be acting in good faith 

if we simply re-imposed all of our nuclear-related sanctions the day 

after they were relieved using some other justification. In the end, 

if we decide to re-impose sanctions for any reason, it will be important that we have a credible rationale. That has always been the 

case and will remain the case in the future.

Q.2. The Administration has continuously maintained that discussion of the situation involving Pastor Abedini and the other Americans to be a ‘‘side issue’’ for the JCPOA talks. Since the international conventional arms embargo was not a part of the sanctions regime relating to Iran’s illicit nuclear enrichment activities, 

why was that ‘‘side issue’’ taken up in the talks and the final agreement?

A.2. The U.N. arms embargo is, in fact, directly associated with 

Iran’s nuclear program. The arms embargo and missile-related restrictions on Iran under U.N. Security Council Resolution (UNSCR) 

1929 were specifically designed to pressure Iran to address the 

international community’s concerns with its nuclear program. The 

other members of the Security Council agreed to them on that 

basis. UNSCR 1929 anticipated that these restrictions would be 

lifted when the international concerns regarding Iran’s nuclear program had been addressed. This is why relief from those sanctions 

was part of the U.N. Security Council sanctions relief contemplated 

in the JCPOA. During negotiations, Iran pushed for a lifting of the 

arms embargo and missile restrictions on Implementation Day, 

which is the day that the IAEA certifies that Iran has taken all the 

key nuclear steps provided for in the JCPOA. Through hard bargaining, we were able to ensure that UNSCR 2231 endorsing the 


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JCPOA extends arms- and missile-related restrictions for a significant period of time after the JCPOA takes effect. 

Independent of the nuclear talks or any other issue, we have repeatedly called for U.S. citizens Saeed Abedini, Jason Rezaian, and 

Amir Hekmati to be returned to their families, and for Iran to work 

with us to locate U.S. citizen Robert Levinson. We will continue to 

raise these cases with Iranian officials. While the nuclear talks created the first opportunity we had to discuss these cases bilaterally, 

we have been clear that we have never and would never link these 

cases to the nuclear talks, not because these cases would complicate the negotiations, but because the fate of our detained and 

missing citizens should not depend on unrelated negotiations that 

may or may not have reached a successful conclusion. 

RESPONSES TO WRITTEN QUESTIONS OF SENATOR WARNER 

FROM WENDY SHERMAN 

Q.1. Secretary Sherman, you have been involved in negotiating this 

deal, and can provide valuable insight into our partners’ thinking 

and some of the discussions that took place, including about items 

that did not make it into the agreement. The JCPOA restricts uranium enrichment until year 15. After year 15, even though inspectors still have access to uranium production sites and centrifuge 

manufacturing, other than Iran’s obligations under NPT—which 

they have violated repeatedly in the past—there is nothing that 

would constrain their enrichment. 

Have there been discussions among negotiating partners about 

what steps might be necessary to keep Iran’s enrichment contained 

after 15 years? If so, what might we see? If not, what provides the 

Administration the confidence to assess that no further action 

would be required?

A.1. Under the JCPOA, Iran has committed to never pursue a nuclear weapon. Under the agreement, Iran is constrained to using 

only its first generation IR–1 centrifuges to enrich uranium for the 

first 10 years. Iran will have the option after Year 10 to undertake 

a gradual development of its enrichment program, but it will be 

limited to enriching only up to 3.67 percent and constrained to a 

minimal 300 kg stockpile for another 5 years. These limitations are 

important to ensure that Iran’s breakout timeline does not drop 

dramatically after Year 10. Importantly, the transparency measures under the JCPOA will ensure unparalleled insight into Iran’s 

program. Certain transparency and monitoring measures will last 

for 15 years, others for 20–25 years, and some will last indefinitely, 

such as Iran’s adherence to the Additional Protocol. After 15 years, 

should we suspect Iran is pursuing nuclear weapons, we would 

have the same options available to us then as we do today to prevent such an effort from coming to fruition. 

Similarly, although the JCPOA does not limit enrichment after 

15 years, U.S. nonproliferation policy has been and will continue to 

be to limit the spread of enrichment capabilities, and we would 

apply this standard to Iran’s enrichment program. Similarly, the 

Nuclear Suppliers Group has a policy of strictly limiting enrichment-related transfers. While we would not want to speculate 

about the specific policies we would pursue after 15 years, we are 


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cognizant of the importance of addressing any Iranian enrichment 

at that time that is not consistent with a peaceful nuclear program. 

Non-nuclear weapon states generally have no need for uranium enriched above 5 percent, and they should be able to rely on the 

international market for nuclear fuel and enrichment, and on other 

nuclear supply mechanisms such as the IAEA Fuel Bank recently 

established in Kazakhstan. Enrichment above that level by Iran 

would raise concerns given Iran’s past activities and would require 

a clear civilian justification.

Q.2. After Year 8 or when the IAEA reaches its Broader Conclusion 

that Iran’s nuclear activity is exclusively for peaceful purposes, 

Iran’s enrichment program is codified internationally. This would 

significantly increase the difficulty of making claims that Iran is 

enriching for the purposes of weaponization. 

If Iran is given IAEA’s Broader Conclusion, based on your experience raising issues on Iran’s activities in the international community, what type of proof would be needed to support a claim that 

they are in pursuit of a nuclear weapon?

A.2. Based on the IAEA’s past practice in other countries and the 

extent of Iran’s nuclear program, we expect it will take a substantial number of years of applying the Additional Protocol and evaluating the full range of Iranian nuclear activities for the IAEA to 

reach the Broader Conclusion that all nuclear material in Iran is 

in peaceful activities. After this point, Iran’s commitments not to 

seek, develop, or acquire nuclear weapons under the JCPOA, as 

well as under the NPT, will remain in place indefinitely, and are 

not affected by the IAEA’s Broader Conclusion. 

After the Broader Conclusion is drawn, or after Year 8, Iran’s 

Additional Protocol (AP) implementation will continue. It will give 

the IAEA the tools it needs to investigate indications of undeclared 

nuclear material and activities in Iran, including any activities of 

a potential military nature. For example, under the AP, the IAEA 

must only provide 24 hours’ notice prior to seeking access to a location, whether declared or undeclared, and the IAEA can seek access in as little as 2 hours or less in certain circumstances. Implementation of the AP will deter Iran from cheating by creating a 

high likelihood that such cheating would be caught early. Finally, 

the IAEA reviews the Broader Conclusion on an annual basis, such 

that it could be withdrawn if the IAEA is subsequently unable to 

verify that all nuclear material in Iran is in peaceful purposes. If 

any state is in possession of information regarding undeclared nuclear activities in Iran, that state can approach the IAEA at any 

point to share that information. 

Finally, under the IAEA Statute the Director General must report to the Board of Governors if IAEA inspectors find that Iran 

has not complied with its safeguards obligations. The Statute provides for the Board to report to the U.N. Security Council any noncompliance that it finds to have occurred and call on Iran to remedy such noncompliance forthwith. 

While we cannot specify all of the activities by Iran that would 

raise compliance concerns, we will continue to look for undeclared 

nuclear activities and other activities that would not be commensurate with a peaceful nuclear program, including enrichment not 


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supported by the needs of Iran’s nuclear power and research reactors. 

RESPONSES TO WRITTEN QUESTIONS OF SENATOR HEITKAMP 

FROM WENDY SHERMAN 

Q.1. Please provide more information on how the United States 

could calibrate the re-imposition of sanctions on a sector or a category of transactions if Iran violates the terms of the JCPOA and 

the United States chooses not to seek the full re-imposition of sanctions. Is there flexibility to re-impose some sanctions but not others 

in the case of incremental violations by Iran?

A.1. Yes. Under the JCPOA, we will retain a wide range of options 

to deal with significant nonperformance by Iran under the deal or 

more minor instances of noncompliance, and our ability to calibrate 

our response will deter Iran from violating the deal. 

The United States has the ability to re-impose both national and 

multilateral nuclear-related sanctions in the event of nonperformance by Iran. In the case of U.N. sanctions, under U.N. Security 

Council resolution 2231, we could do so even over the objections of 

any member of the Security Council, including China or Russia. 

Additionally, we have a range of other options for addressing minor 

noncompliance. These include snapping back certain domestic sanctions to respond to minor but persistent violations of the JCPOA, 

and using our leverage in the Joint Commission on procurement requests. If we were to snap back domestic sanctions, the United 

States would have maximum flexibility to determine which sanctions to re-impose, taking into account relevant considerations including the circumstances surrounding Iran’s noncompliance. 

That said, this does not give us free rein to simply re-impose tomorrow our nuclear-related sanctions under some other pretext. 

Iran, as well as our international partners, would see this as an 

act of bad faith. In the end, if we decide to impose new sanctions, 

it will be important that we have a credible rationale for doing so. 

This has always been the case and will be no different in the future.

Q.2. The agreement says that ‘‘Iran has stated that if sanctions are 

reinstated in whole or in part, Iran will treat that as grounds to 

cease performing its commitments under this JCPOA in whole or 

in part.’’ In other words, if the United States chooses to re-impose 

limited sanctions as part of a calibrated response to Iranian violations, Iran could choose to renege on some of its obligations or pull 

out of the deal. How does the Administration think about this dynamic and gauging the Iranian response to calibrated sanctions?

A.2. We have been clear with Iran that the sanctions relief in the 

JCPOA is contingent on Iran’s fulfillment of its nuclear-related 

commitments. Moreover, we would not violate the JCPOA if we imposed sanctions on Iran for terrorism, human rights, missiles, or 

any other non-nuclear reason. We have been clear about this fact 

with Iran and the other P5+1 countries. 

What we have committed to do in the JCPOA is quite specific: 

not to re-impose those nuclear-related sanctions provisions specified in Annex II to the JCPOA, contingent on Iran abiding by its 


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JCPOA commitments. All of our other sanctions authorities remain 

in place and are unaffected by the JCPOA. We have made it clear 

to Iran that we would continue to use and enforce sanctions to address its other troubling activities, including its destabilizing activities in the region. 

With respect to the sanctions relieved pursuant to the JCPOA, 

we have made clear to Iran that should Iran violate its commitments under the JCPOA once we have suspended sanctions, we 

will be able to promptly snap back both U.S. and U.N. sanctions. 

Our EU colleagues have made clear their intention to do the same. 

In the event that there is an Iranian violation, we expect to have 

strong international support for sanctions, as evidenced by the 

broad international coalition that we have built in recent years in 

response to the Iranian nuclear threat. In the case of a violation 

on behalf of Iran, we are not precluded from sanctioning specific 

Iranian actors or sectors if circumstances are warranted.


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