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95–693PDF 2015

IRAN NUCLEAR AGREEMENT:

THE ADMINISTRATION’S CASE

HEARING

BEFORE THE

COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED FOURTEENTH CONGRESS

FIRST SESSION

JULY 28, 2015

Serial No. 114–93

Printed for the use of the Committee on Foreign Affairs

(

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.foreignaffairs.house.gov/ or

http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/

(II)

COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS 

EDWARD R. ROYCE, California, Chairman 

CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH, New Jersey 

ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida 

DANA ROHRABACHER, California 

STEVE CHABOT, Ohio 

JOE WILSON, South Carolina 

MICHAEL T. MCCAUL, Texas 

TED POE, Texas 

MATT SALMON, Arizona 

DARRELL E. ISSA, California 

TOM MARINO, Pennsylvania 

JEFF DUNCAN, South Carolina 

MO BROOKS, Alabama 

PAUL COOK, California 

RANDY K. WEBER SR., Texas 

SCOTT PERRY, Pennsylvania 

RON DESANTIS, Florida 

MARK MEADOWS, North Carolina 

TED S. YOHO, Florida 

CURT CLAWSON, Florida 

SCOTT DESJARLAIS, Tennessee 

REID J. RIBBLE, Wisconsin 

DAVID A. TROTT, Michigan 

LEE M. ZELDIN, New York 

DANIEL DONOVAN, New York 

ELIOT L. ENGEL, New York 

BRAD SHERMAN, California 

GREGORY W. MEEKS, New York 

ALBIO SIRES, New Jersey 

GERALD E. CONNOLLY, Virginia 

THEODORE E. DEUTCH, Florida 

BRIAN HIGGINS, New York 

KAREN BASS, California 

WILLIAM KEATING, Massachusetts 

DAVID CICILLINE, Rhode Island 

ALAN GRAYSON, Florida 

AMI BERA, California 

ALAN S. LOWENTHAL, California 

GRACE MENG, New York 

LOIS FRANKEL, Florida 

TULSI GABBARD, Hawaii 

JOAQUIN CASTRO, Texas 

ROBIN L. KELLY, Illinois 

BRENDAN F. BOYLE, Pennsylvania

AMY PORTER, Chief of Staff THOMAS SHEEHY, Staff Director

JASON STEINBAUM, Democratic Staff Director 

(III)

C O N T E N T S 

Page

WITNESSES 

The Honorable John Kerry, Secretary of State, U.S. Department of State ........ 4

The Honorable Ernest Moniz, Secretary of Energy, U.S. Department of Energy ........................................................................................................................ 12

The Honorable Jacob Lew, Secretary of the Treasury, U.S. Department of 

the Treasury ......................................................................................................... 18

LETTERS, STATEMENTS, ETC., SUBMITTED FOR THE HEARING 

The Honorable John Kerry: Prepared statement .................................................. 9

The Honorable Ernest Moniz: Prepared statement .............................................. 14

The Honorable Jacob Lew: Prepared statement ................................................... 21

APPENDIX 

Hearing notice .......................................................................................................... 90

Hearing minutes ...................................................................................................... 91

The Honorable Gerald E. Connolly, a Representative in Congress from the 

Commonwealth of Virginia: Prepared statement .............................................. 93

Written responses from the Honorable John Kerry to questions submitted 

for the record by: 

The Honorable Edward R. Royce, a Representative in Congress from the 

State of California, and chairman, Committee on Foreign Affairs .............. 95

The Honorable Eliot L. Engel, a Representative in Congress from the State 

of New York ...................................................................................................... 102

The Honorable Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, a Representative in Congress from 

the State of Florida .......................................................................................... 104

The Honorable Ted Poe, a Representative in Congress from the State of 

Texas .................................................................................................................. 109

Questions submitted for the record to the Honorable Ernest Moniz by: 

The Honorable Ileana Ros-Lehtinen ................................................................... 111

The Honorable Joe Wilson ................................................................................... 112

(1)

IRAN NUCLEAR AGREEMENT:

THE ADMINISTRATION’S CASE 

TUESDAY, JULY 28, 2015

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES,

COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS,

Washington, DC. 

The committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:08 a.m., in room 

2172, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Ed Royce (chairman of 

the committee) presiding. 

Chairman ROYCE. This hearing will come to order. 

Today, we continue our review of the nuclear agreement the 

Obama administration reached with Iran. This is a critical hearing 

on one of the most sweeping diplomatic initiatives in years, some 

say decades, demanding the committee’s thorough review. 

The global threat from Iran has been a focus of this committee 

for as long as I can remember. Last Congress, we passed comprehensive sanctions legislation by a vote of 400 to 20. It would 

have given Iran’s Supreme Leader a choice between its nuclear program or economic collapse, but the administration was successful 

in blocking that legislation. 

So, instead of us considering a verifiable, enforceable, and accountable agreement, we are being asked to consider an agreement 

that gives Iran permanent sanctions relief for temporary nuclear 

restrictions. Should Iran be given this special deal? 

In September, committee members will face the important decision of approving or disapproving this agreement. We will have 

that vote only because of the Iran Nuclear Agreement Review Act, 

passed in May, which the administration did not want. To be frank, 

the administration’s preference has been to sideline America’s representatives. So I was not entirely surprised when the administration went against bipartisan calls and gave Russia and China and 

others at the U.N. Security Council a vote on this agreement before 

the American public. That is backwards—and wrong. 

We have heard serious concerns from experts about the substance of this agreement. First, Iran is not required to dismantle 

key bomb-making technology. Does that make the world safer? Second, it is permitted a vast enrichment capacity, reversing decades 

of bipartisan nonproliferation policy. Does that make the region 

more stable? And, third, Iran is allowed to continue its research 

and development to gain an industrial-scale nuclear program once 

this agreement begins to expire in as little as 10 years. Ten years. 

That is a flash in time, and then Iranian obligations start 

unwinding. Does that make the world more secure? 

2

We appreciate President Obama’s efforts to secure the most intrusive inspections in history, but it came up short. Instead, there 

is ‘‘managed access,’’ with Iran, Russia, and China having a say in 

where international inspectors can and can’t go. The deal’s 24-day 

process is a far cry from ‘‘anywhere, anytime’’—and this provision 

expires too. While the administration has professed absolute knowledge about Iran’s program, it is a fact that we have been surprised 

by most every major nuclear development in Iran’s history. And 

Iran has cheated on every agreement they have signed. So I ask, 

Mr. Secretary, has Iran earned the right to be trusted? 

This deal guts the sanctions web that is putting intense pressure 

on Iran. Virtually all economic, financial, and energy sanctions disappear. And where does all that money go? To the largest terror 

network on Earth. Gone are the sanctions on Iran’s nuclear program, but also on the bad banks that have supported Iran’s terrorism and ballistic missile development. And, to our dismay, Iran 

won a late concession to remove international restrictions on its 

ballistic missile program and conventional arms, imperiling the security of the region and our homeland. 

If this agreement goes through, Iran gets a cash bonanza, a boost 

to its international standing, and a lighted path toward nuclear 

weapons. With sweeping sanctions relief, we have lessened our 

ability to challenge Iran’s conduct across the board. As Iran grows 

stronger, we will be weaker to respond. 

Yes, the U.S. would roil the diplomatic waters if Congress rejects 

this deal, but the U.S. still wields the most powerful economic 

sanctions in the world—sanctions Iran desperately needs relief 

from—sanctions that would continue to deter countries and companies from investing in Iran. I understand the effort the administration has put into this agreement, but these are about as high 

stakes as it gets. So the committee must ask if we made the most 

of our pretty strong hand, or are we willing to bet, as the administration has, that this is the beginning of a changed Iran? 

These are complex issues, and I look forward to what should be 

an extremely informative hearing. 

And I now turn to the ranking member. 

Mr. ENGEL. Mr. Chairman, thank you for convening this hearing. 

Secretary Kerry, Secretary Lew, Secretary Moniz, welcome to the 

Foreign Affairs Committee. Thank you all for your dedicated service. No matter what side of the issue anybody is on, I don’t think 

anyone here doubts your commitment to the United States and 

your good intentions on this deal. Thank you for the time you have 

taken over the last week to engage with Members of Congress on 

the proposed deal, and thank you for your testimony today. 

Congress gave itself 60 days to renew this deal, and I sincerely 

hope my colleagues take full advantage of this time to study this 

agreement, to ask questions, and to make an informed decision 

when the time comes. We have had many months and many hearings to discuss the different aspects of a nuclear agreement with 

Iran, but, at this point, we no longer are dealing with 

hypotheticals. We have a specific deal on the table, and we have 

to decide if that deal advances the national security interests of the 

United States and our allies. 

3

To answer that question, to be fair, we also need to ask ourselves 

what is the alternative. Absent this deal, would the international 

sanctions regime and the P5+1 coalition hold together? If this deal 

fails, how would we get the Iranians back to the table? Would new 

sanctions have to be coupled with military action? 

As I continue to review the deal, though, there are a number of 

issues that I find troublesome. I hope the three of you will address 

them in your testimony and as you answer the committee’s questions. 

First, I continue to have concerns that international inspectors 

will not have immediate access to undeclared sites. Under the 

agreement, Iran has 14 days to grant access. If Iran refuses access 

after that time, then members of the Joint Commission could take 

another week to resolve the IAEA’s concerns. After that, Iran has 

3 more days to provide access. 

So we are already nearly a month after inspectors first wanted 

access, but if Iran continues to say no, another month could go by 

while this dispute is resolved. That potential length of time gives 

me pause. I would like to know how we can be sure Iran cannot 

use these delays to sanitize sites and get away with breaking the 

rules. 

Already, we are seeing Iran’s leadership declare that military 

sites will be off limits to inspectors. If this is Iran’s version of 

transparency during the implementation of the agreement, we are 

getting off to a bad start. 

I am also troubled by reports about how the arrangement 

reached between Iran and the IAEA on how Parchin will be inspected. 

Secondly, I have concerns about the sunset of the international 

sanctions on ballistic missiles and advanced conventional weapons. 

Now, my understanding was these weren’t on the table during the 

talks. So I was disappointed to learn that after a maximum of 5 

and 8 years, respectively, they will be terminated. I would like to 

understand why we allowed this to happen and what we can do to 

ensure that this doesn’t make a terrible situation in the region get 

even worse. 

I am also concerned about what Iran’s leaders will do when sanctions are phased out and new resources come flowing in. We are 

talking about tens of billions of dollars. Of course, I would like to 

see Iran’s leaders use this money to help the Iranian people, but, 

even with tough international sanctions in place, Iran has bolstered Hezbollah, Shia militias, Hamas, and the Assad regime. If 

this deal goes through, how would you propose to keep this newfound wealth out of the hands of terrorists and tyrants? 

Next, while I am glad that Iran will be limited in its development of advanced centrifuges for 8 years, I worry what happens 

down the road. After the research and development ban expires, 

Iran could quickly move toward the next stage of its enrichment activities. I would like to know what other provisions in the deal, if 

any, will mitigate this risk. 

Finally, I have a fundamental concern that 15 years from now 

Iran will essentially be off the hook. If they choose, Iran’s leaders 

could produce weapons-grade highly enriched uranium without any 

limitation. They could use advanced centrifuges to speed this 

4

progress even further. This amounts to Iran being a legitimized nuclear threshold state in the year 2030. My big question is this: 

What happens then? Are we back to square one? Is this deal just 

pushing the pause button for 15 years? 

I must also say that I have trepidation; barely a week after the 

Iranians sign the deal with us, there was the Supreme Leader, the 

Ayatollah, chanting, ‘‘Death to America, death to Israel.’’ You 

would think that after the agreement was signed with us there 

might be a modicum of goodwill, that perhaps they would keep 

quiet for a week or 2 or a month, but it went back to business as 

usual. How can we trust Iran when this type of thing happens? It 

is very disconcerting. 

So I am looking forward to hearing from our distinguished witnesses on these issues. Again, I thank you for your service and 

hard work. 

And I yield back to the chairman. 

Chairman ROYCE. Thank you, Mr. Engel. 

This morning, we are pleased to be joined by John Kerry, the 

Secretary of State; Ernie Moniz, the Secretary of Energy; and Jack 

Lew, the Secretary of the Treasury. 

Prior to his appointment, Secretary Kerry served as a United 

States Senator from Massachusetts for 28 years. Before being appointed Secretary of Energy, Dr. Moniz was professor of physics 

and engineering at MIT, where he was a faculty member since 

1973. From Director of the Office of Management and Budget to 

White House Chief of Staff, Secretary Lew now serves as the 76th 

Secretary of the Treasury. 

Gentlemen, welcome. 

And, without objection, the witnesses’ full prepared statements 

will be made part of the record. 

Members here will have 5 days to submit statements and questions and extraneous materials for the record. 

And, before turning to the testimony, we have most of the members present here. I know we all recognize the gravity of this issue. 

We want everyone to have a chance to question the Secretaries. To 

accomplish that, I would ask everyone, members and witnesses, respect the time limit. And that means leaving an adequate amount 

of time for witnesses to answer your questions. And nothing requires full use of your time. 

So we will begin with a summary of Secretary Kerry’s testimony. 

Mr. Secretary? 

STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE JOHN KERRY, SECRETARY 

OF STATE, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE 

Secretary KERRY. Well, Chairman Royce, Ranking Member 

Engel, and all the members of the committee, thank you very, very 

much. 

We genuinely appreciate the opportunity to be here to, frankly, 

clear up a lot of misinterpretation, some element of public distortion that exists out there. I know there is one ad I have seen on 

TV, has at least three or four major absolutely, totally incorrect 

facts on which it bases the ad. And, with all respect to both the 

chairman and the ranking member, there are conclusions that have 

been drawn that just don’t, in fact, match with the reality of what 

5

this deal sets forth. And we happily—happily—look forward to 

clarifying that during the course of this hearing. That is what it 

is all about. And we welcome the opportunity. 

We are convinced that the plan that we have developed with five 

other nations accomplishes the task that President Obama set out, 

which is to close off the four pathways to a bomb. And I think, as 

you listen to Ernie Moniz, particularly on the technical components, and see the whole deal, I really believe that that is a conclusion that everybody can come to. I am not saying they will, but can. 

I am joined by, obviously, two Cabinet Secretaries. Both Ernie 

and Jack were absolutely critical to our ability to do this. The 

Treasury Department’s knowledge of the sanctions and application 

of the sanctions has been exemplary, and they helped us understand the implications of all of these sanctions. 

And, as Jack will let you know, we are not talking about $150 

billion. We are not talking about $100 billion. We are actually talking about $55 billion that will go to Iran. And we will go into that 

later. 

But from the day that our negotiations began, Mr. Chairman, we 

were crystal-clear that we would not accept anything less than a 

good deal, one that would shut off all of those pathways toward 

fissile material for a nuclear weapon. And after 18 months of very 

intensive talks, the facts are pretty clear that the plan announced 

this month by six nations, in fact, accomplishes that. 

I might remind everybody, all of those other nations have nuclear 

power or nuclear weapons, and all of them are extremely knowledgeable in this challenge of proliferation. 

So, under the terms of this agreement, Iran has agreed to remove 

98 percent of its stockpile of enriched uranium; dismantle twothirds of its installed centrifuges; and destroy, by filling it with 

concrete, the existing core of its heavy-water plutonium reactor. 

Iran has agreed to refrain from producing or acquiring highly enriched uranium and weapons-grade plutonium for nuclear weapons 

forever. 

Now, how do we enforce or verify so that that is more than 

words? And, particularly, to speak to the ranking member’s question, what happens after 15 years, what happens is: Forever, we 

have an extremely rigorous inspection/verification regime, because 

Iran has agreed to accept and will ratify prior to the conclusion of 

the agreement—and, if they don’t, it is a material breach of the 

agreement—to ratify the additional protocol, which requires extensive access as well as significant additional transparency measures, 

including cradle-to-grave accountability for the country’s uranium, 

from mining to milling, through the centrifuge production, to the 

waste, for 25 years. 

Bottom line, if Iran fails to comply with the terms of our agreement, our intel community, our Energy Department, which is responsible for nuclear weaponry, are absolutely clear that we will 

quickly know it, and we will be able to respond accordingly with 

every option available to us today. 

And when it comes to verification and monitoring, there is absolutely no sunset in this agreement—not in 10 years, not in 15 

years, not in 20 years, not in 25 years. No sunset ever. 

6

Now, remember, 2 years ago, when we began these negotiations—and a lot of people are kind of forgetting conveniently, sort 

of, where we are today. People are sitting there saying, oh, my 

gosh, in 15 years, this is going to happen, or whatever; Iran is 

going to have the ability to be, you know, a capable nuclear power. 

Folks, when we began our negotiations, we faced an Iran that 

was already enriching uranium up to 20 percent. They already had 

a facility, built in secret, underground in a mountain, that was rapidly stockpiling enriched uranium. When we began negotiations, 

they had enough enriched uranium for 10 to 12 bombs already. Already, they had installed as many as 19,000 nuclear centrifuges. 

And they had nearly finished building a heavy-water reactor that 

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

bombs per year. 

Experts put Iran’s breakout time, when we began—which, remember, is not the old breakout time that we used to refer to in 

the context of arms control, which is the time to go have a weapon 

and be able to deploy it. Breakout time, as we have applied it, is 

extraordinarily conservative. It is the time it takes to have enough 

fissile material for one bomb, but for one potential bomb. It is not 

the amount of time to the bomb. 

So, when we say they will have 1 year to a certain amount of 

fissile material, they still have to go design the bomb, test, do a 

whole bunch of other things. And I think you would agree, no nation is going to consider itself nuclear-capable with one bomb. 

So, if this deal is rejected, folks—by the way, when we started 

negotiations, the existing breakout time was about 2 months. We 

are going to take it to 1 year, and then it tails down slowly. And 

I will explain how that provides us with guarantees. 

But if this deal is rejected, we immediately go back to the reality 

I just described without any viable alternative, except that the unified diplomatic support that produced this agreement will disappear overnight. 

Let me underscore: The alternative to the deal that we have 

reached is not some kind of unicorn fantasy that contemplate’s 

Iran’s complete capitulation. I have heard people talk about dismantling their program. That didn’t happen under President Bush, 

when they had a policy of no enrichment and they had 163 centrifuges. They went up to the 19,000. Our intelligence community 

confirms—and I ask you all to sit with them. They will tell you 

that is not going to happen. 

So, in the real world, we have two options. Either we move ahead 

with this agreement to ensure that Iran’s nuclear program is limited, rigorously scrutinized, and wholly peaceful; or we have no 

agreement at all—no inspections, no restraints, no sanctions, no 

knowledge of what they are doing—and they start to enrich. 

Now, to be clear, if Congress rejects what was agreed to in Vienna, you will not only be rejecting every one of the restrictions 

that we put in place—and, by the way, nobody is counting the 2 

years that Iran has already complied with the Interim Agreement—and, by the way, complied completely and totally, so that we 

have already rolled their program back. We have reduced their 20-

percent enriched uranium to zero. That has already been accomplished. 

7

But if this is rejected, we go back to their ability to move down 

that road. You will not only be giving Iran a free pass to double 

the pace of its uranium enrichment, to build a heavy-water reactor, 

to install new and more efficient centrifuges, but they will do it all 

without the unprecedented inspection and transparency measures 

that we have secured. Everything that we have tried to prevent 

will now happen. 

Now, what is worse? If we walk away, we walk away alone. Our 

partners are not going to be with us. Instead, they will walk away 

from the tough multilateral sanctions that brought Iran to the negotiating table in the first place, and we will have squandered the 

best chance that we have to solve this problem through peaceful 

means. 

Now, make no mistake: From the very first day in office, President Obama has made it clear that he will never accept a nucleararmed Iran. And he is the only President who has asked for and 

commissioned the design of a weapon that has the ability to take 

out the facilities and who has actually deployed that weapon. 

But the fact is, Iran has already mastered the fuel cycle. They 

have mastered the ability to produce significant stockpiles of fissile 

material. And you have to have that to make a nuclear weapon. 

You can’t bomb away that knowledge any more than you can sanction it away. 

Now, I was chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee 

when a lot of us joined together and put most of the Iran sanctions 

in place. And I know well, as you do, that the whole point was to 

bring Iran to the negotiating table. Even the toughest sanctions, 

previously, did not stop Iran’s program from growing from, what, 

163 to 300 to 5,000 to more than 19,000 now, and it didn’t stop 

Iran from accumulating a stockpile of enriched uranium. 

Now, sanctions are not an end to themselves. They are a diplomatic tool that has enabled us to actually do what sanctions could 

not without the negotiation; and that is to rein in a nuclear program that was headed in a very dangerous direction and to put 

limits on it, to shine a spotlight on it, to watch it like no other nuclear program has ever been watched before. We have secured the 

ability to do things that exist in no other agreement. 

Now, to those who are thinking about opposing this deal because 

of what might happen in year 15 or year 20, I ask you to simply 

focus on this: If you walk away, year 15 or 20 starts tomorrow and 

without any of the long-term access and verification safeguards 

that we have put in place. 

What is the alternative? What are you going to do when Iran 

does start to enrich, which they will feel they have a right to if we 

walk away from the deal? What are you going to do when the sanctions aren’t in place and can’t be reconstituted because we walked 

away from a deal that our five fellow nations accepted? 

Now, I have heard critics suggest that the Vienna agreement 

would somehow legitimize Iran’s nuclear program. That is nonsense. Under the agreement, Iran’s leaders are permanently barred 

from pursuing a nuclear weapon, and there are permanent restraints and access provisions and inspection provisions to guarantee that. 

8

And I underscore: If they try to evade that obligation, we will 

know it, because a civil nuclear program requires full access 24/7, 

requires full documentation, and we will have the ability to track 

that as no other program before. The IAEA will be continuously 

monitoring their centrifuge production, so those centrifuges cannot 

be diverted to a covert facility. For the next 25 years, the IAEA will 

be continuously monitoring uranium from the point that it is produced all the way through production so that it cannot be diverted 

to another facility. 

For the life of this agreement, however long Iran stays in the 

NPT and is living up to its obligations, they must live up to the 

Additional Protocol. And that Additional Protocol, as we can get 

into today, greatly expands the IAEA’s capacity to have accountability. 

So this agreement—and I will close by saying this agreement 

gives us a far stronger detection capability, more time to respond 

to any attempt to break out toward a bomb, and much more international support in stopping it than we would have without the 

deal. 

If we walk away from this deal and then we decide to use military force, we are not going to have the United Nations or the 

other five nations that negotiated with us, because they will feel 

we walked away. And make no mistake, President Obama is committed to staying with the policy of stopping this bomb. 

So, in the 28 years, a little more, that I was privileged to represent Massachusetts, I had a 100-percent voting record on every 

issue for Israel. I first traveled there in 1986; I have great friends 

there, members of my family, others who care enormously about 

Israel. I understand the fear. I understand the concerns that our 

friends in Israel have. But we believe that what we have laid out 

here is a way of making Israel and the region, in fact, safer. 

And I emphasize, we do not lose any option in 15 years, 10 years, 

20 years, 5 years that we have available to us today. 

We will push back against Iran’s other activities. We have laid 

out a very detailed policy for working with the Gulf states and others, and we look forward to working with Israel in the effort to do 

that. Our current security cooperation with Israel is at an unprecedented level, and it is why we have a robust military presence in 

the region, and it is why we are working so closely with the Gulf 

states. 

So, Mr. Chairman, we will continue to push back against Iran on 

every front available, but the fact is, it is a lot easier to push back 

against an Iran that doesn’t have a nuclear weapon rather than 

one that does. That has been our principal strategic objective: Deal 

with a nuclear weapon, and then you have an easier time dealing 

with the other issues too. 

The outcome here is critical. We believe this deal makes our 

country and our allies safer. It will guarantee that Iran’s program 

is under intense scrutiny. It will ensure that the world community 

is unified in backing this up. And, in the end, it will guarantee 

Iran’s program has to be peaceful and, therefore, is a good deal for 

the world, a good deal for America, a good deal for our allies and 

our friends, and we believe it richly deserves your support. 

[The prepared statement of Secretary Kerry follows:]

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Chairman ROYCE. Dr. Moniz? 

Thank you, Secretary Kerry. 

Secretary Kerry has been very thorough. Dr. Moniz, if you could 

be brief, and we will get back on time. And we will recognize you 

at this point. 

STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE ERNEST MONIZ, 

SECRETARY OF ENERGY, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY 

Secretary MONIZ. Thank you, Chairman Royce, Ranking Member 

Engel, and members of the committee. Thanks for the opportunity 

to discuss the nuclear dimensions of the Iran agreement, JCPOA, 

reached between the E3/EU+3. 

The JCPOA prevents Iran from getting a nuclear weapon, provides strong verification measures to give us time to respond if 

they violate its terms, and takes none of our options off the table. 

I want to stress that I was backed up in the negotiations by the 

nuclear competency built up over decades at DOE and supported 

by this Congress. America’s leading nuclear experts at DOE labs 

and sites were engaged throughout the negotiations. Nine labs and 

sites in seven States took part in supporting our negotiating position. These experts, again, were essential, and, as a result of their 

work, I am very confident that the technical underpinnings of this 

deal are solid and that the Department of Energy stands ready to 

assist in its implementation. 

The JCPOA will extend, for at least 10 years, the time it would 

take for Iran to produce enough fissile material for a first explosive 

device to at least 1 year. That is the fissile material being reduced 

from 12,000 to 300 kilograms; stringent constraints on Iran’s enriched uranium stockpile, as I said, for 15 years; strong containment and surveillance measures on all centrifuge manufacturing 

and the uranium supply chain for 20 and 25 years. 

Verification that Iran is following the agreement is forever 

stronger than it would be without the agreement. The Arak reactor 

will be redesigned so it is not a plutonium factory; and, furthermore, its plutonium-bearing irradiated fuel sent out of the country 

for the entire life of the reactor. 

Thus, the Lausanne parameters are maintained, and all paths to 

a bomb’s worth of nuclear weapons material are addressed. In fact, 

Lausanne is materially strengthened in the P5+1 Vienna agreement. 

One important area, and only one, of that strengthening is that 

Iran will not engage in several activities that could contribute to 

the development of a nuclear explosive device, including explosively 

driven neutron sources and multiple-point detonation systems. 

These commitments are indefinite. In addition, Iran will not pursue 

plutonium or uranium or uranium alloy metallurgy for 15 years. 

Weaponization requirements, especially for missile launch, add to 

the breakout timeline. 

Mr. Chairman, I cannot agree that the agreement does not dismantle Iran’s technology efforts of relevance to nuclear weapons. In 

fact, every aspect is rolled back. 

Returning to verification, the IAEA will be permitted to use advanced technologies such as enrichment monitoring and electronic 

13

seals—technologies that DOE National Laboratories have, in fact, 

developed. 

Much has been made about a 24-day process for ensuring IAEA 

inspectors getting access to undeclared sites. In fact, the IAEA can 

request access to any suspicious location with 24 hours’ notice 

under the Additional Protocol, which Iran will implement under 

this deal. The deal does not change that baseline. 

The JCPOA goes beyond that baseline, recognizing that disputes 

could arise regarding IAEA access, and provides a crucial new tool 

for resolving such disputes within a reasonably short period of 

time. So the IAEA gets the access it needs within 24 days. Again, 

this is the first time that there actually is a cutoff in time. 

But, of course, most importantly, to complement that, environmental sampling provides extremely sensitive measurements of microscopic traces of nuclear materials even after attempts are made 

to remove the material. And the 2003 example found undeclared 

nuclear material even after Iran delayed access for 6 months. 

The combination of the agreements, technical measures, and the 

coherence of the P5+1 dramatically increase the risk to Iran for 

any attempt to move to nuclear weapons capability. For example, 

any attempt to enrich to HEU, to high-enriched uranium, at any 

time must earn a sharp response by all necessary means. In fact, 

a steep response must be clear from the start for any violation of 

the agreement. 

Blocking the covert path, I should emphasize, will always rely, 

of course, on the work of the American intelligence community and 

those of our friends and allies. 

The deal is based on science and analysis because of its deep 

grounding in exhaustive technical analysis, carried out largely, 

again, by our highly capable DOE scientists and engineers. 

I am confident that this is a good deal for America, for our allies, 

and for our global security. This is nicely summarized in the recent 

letter to congressional leadership by seven former U.S. Ambassadors to Israel and Under Secretaries of State—individuals dedicated to strengthening the bonds between Israel and the United 

States. 

And I quote, briefly,

‘‘This landmark agreement removed a threat that a nucleararmed Iran would pose to the region and to Israel specifically. 

We see no fatal flaws that should call for the rejection of this 

agreement and have not heard any viable alternatives from 

those who oppose the implementation of the JCPOA.’’

As has been stated by many thoughtful analysts, the big gamble 

would come in turning away from the agreement rather than in implementing the agreement. 

So thank you for this opportunity to be here. I look forward to 

our discussion. 

[The prepared statement of Secretary Moniz follows:]

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Chairman ROYCE. Thank you. 

We go to Secretary of the Treasury, Secretary Lew. 

STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE JACOB LEW, SECRETARY OF 

THE TREASURY, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF THE TREASURY 

Secretary LEW. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member 

Engel, members of the committee, for the opportunity to be here. 

This is an important issue, one where I think the full discussion 

that we are having will make it clear that this will strengthen our 

national security and that of our allies. 

The powerful array of U.S. and international sanctions on Iran 

constitutes the most effective sanctions regime in history. These 

measures have clearly demonstrated to Iran’s leaders the costs of 

flouting international law, cutting them off from world markets 

and crippling their economy. Today, Iran’s economy is about 20 

percent smaller than it would have been had it remained on its 

pre-2012 growth path. 

The United States Government stood at the forefront of this effort across two administrations and with the bipartisan support of 

Congress. Together, we established a web of far-reaching U.S. and 

international sanctions that ultimately persuaded Iran’s leadership, after years of intransigence, to come to the table prepared to 

roll back its international program. 

International consensus and cooperation to achieve this pressure 

was vital. The world’s major powers have been and remain united 

in preventing a nuclear-armed Iran. That unity of purpose produced four tough U.N. Security Council resolutions and nationallevel sanctions in many countries and secured adherence to U.S. 

sanctions by countries around the world. 

The point of these sanctions was always to change Iran’s nuclear 

behavior, while holding out the prospect of relief if the world’s concerns were addressed. Accordingly, once the IAEA verifies that Iran 

has completed key steps to roll back its nuclear program and extend its breakout time to at least 1 year, phased sanctions relief 

will come into effect. 

There is no signing bonus in this agreement. To be clear, there 

will be no immediate changes to U.N., EU, or U.S. sanctions. Only 

if Iran fulfills the necessary nuclear conditions will the U.S. begin 

suspending nuclear-related secondary sanctions on a phased-in 

basis—sanctions that target third-country parties doing business 

with Iran. 

Of course, we must guard against the possibility that Iran does 

not uphold its side of the deal. That is why, if Iran violates its commitments once we have suspended sanctions, we will be able to 

promptly snap back both U.S. and U.N. sanctions. And since preventing the U.N. snapback requires an affirmative vote from the 

U.N. Security Council, the United States has the ability to effectively force the reimposition of those sanctions. 

Even as we phase in nuclear-related sanctions relief, we will 

maintain significant sanctions that fall outside the scope of the 

deal, including our primary U.S. trade embargo and other measures. With very little exception, Iran will continue to be denied access to the world’s largest market, and we will maintain powerful 

sanctions targeting Iran’s support for terrorist groups such as 

19

Hezbollah, its destabilizing role in Yemen, its backing of the Assad 

regime, its missile program, and its human rights abuses at home. 

Just this week, Treasury sanctioned several Hezbollah leaders, 

building on designations last month targeting the group’s front 

companies and facilitators. And we will not be relieving sanctions 

on Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps, its Quds Force, any of their 

subsidiaries, or their senior officials. 

Some argue the sanctions relief is premature until Iran ceases 

these activities and that funds Iran recovers could be diverted for 

malign purposes, and I understand that concern. But Iran’s ties to 

terrorist groups are exactly why we must keep it from ever obtaining a nuclear weapon. The combination of those two threats would 

raise a nightmare scenario. A nuclear-armed Iran would be far 

more menacing. 

If we cannot solve both concerns at once, we need to address 

them in turn. JCPOA will address the 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 sponsor of terrorism with a short and decreasing nuclear 

breakout time. 

We must also be measured and realistic in understanding what sanctions relief will really mean to Iran. Iran’s $100 billion in restricted reserves, which many fear will be directed for nefarious 

purposes, constitute the country’s long-term savings, not its annual 

budget. We estimate that after sanctions relief Iran will only be 

able to freely access around half of these resources, or just over $50 

billion. That is because over $20 billion is committed to projects 

with China, where it cannot be spent. And tens of billions in additional funds are in nonperforming loans to Iran’s energy and banking sector. 

As a matter of financial reality, Iran can’t simply spend the usable resources, as they will likely be needed to meet international 

payment obligations such as financing for imports and external 

debt. Moreover, President Rouhani was elected on a platform of 

economic revitalization and faces a political imperative to start 

meeting those unfulfilled promises. He faces over $1⁄2 trillion in 

pressing investment requirements and government obligations. 

Iran is in a massive economic hole from which it will take years 

to climb out. 

Meanwhile, we will aggressively target any attempts by Iran to 

finance Hezbollah or use funds gained from sanctions relief to support militant proxies, including by enhancing our cooperation with 

Israel and our partners in the Gulf. 

Backing away from this deal to escalate the economic pressure 

and try to obtain a broader capitulation from Iran would be a mistake. Even if one believed that extending sanctions pressure was 

a better course than resolving the threat of Iran’s nuclear program, 

that choice is simply not available. Our partners agreed to impose 

costly sanctions on Iran for one reason: To put a stop on its illicit 

nuclear program. If we change our terms now and insist that these 

countries now escalate those sanctions and apply them to all of 

Iran’s objectionable activities, they just wouldn’t do it. They would 

balk, and we would be left with neither a nuclear deal nor effective 

sanctions. 

20

So it is unrealistic to think that additional sanctions pressure 

would force Iran to totally capitulate and impractical to believe we 

could marshal a global coalition of partners to impose such pressure after turning down a deal our partners believe is a good one. 

The Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action is a strong deal. With 

phased relief after Iran fulfills its commitments to roll back its nuclear program and a powerful snapback built in if later on they 

break the deal, its terms achieve the objective they were meant to 

achieve: Blocking Iran’s paths to a nuclear bomb. That is the overriding national security priority, and it should not be put at risk, 

not when the prospect of an unconstrained Iranian nuclear program presents such a threat to America and the world. 

Thank you again, and we look forward to answering your questions. 

[The prepared statement of Secretary Lew follows:]

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Chairman ROYCE. Thank you, Secretary Lew. 

To get back to a point that was made, as I read it, the 24-day 

suspect site process does expire in 15 years. The IAEA Additional 

Protocol alone wouldn’t deter Iran, based on our past experience 

with their noncompliance with the IAEA. So I think that point 

stands. 

The other question I just would like to ask Secretary Kerry relates to what the Secretary of Defense said. In his testimony about 

the ‘‘I’’ in ‘‘ICBM,’’ he said it stands for ‘‘intercontinental,’’ which 

means going from Iran to the United States. Simply, countries develop ICBMs to deliver a nuclear warhead. And these will be aimed 

at us, not at Moscow. 

And at the same time that these missile restrictions are coming 

off, sanctions on the Iranian scientists involved in their bomb work 

are also coming off. 

So how is that making us safer? It seems to me the winner here 

is Russia, which demanded and won on the lifting, on Iran’s behalf, 

of these ICBM sanctions. Why did we concede on that? 

Secretary KERRY. Well, we didn’t concede on that, Mr. Chairman. 

In fact, we won a victory because the—we have seven nations negotiating. Three of the seven thought that the sanctions ought to 

be lifted immediately—Iran, Russia, and China. Four of them—

Germany, France, Britain, the United States—thought they 

shouldn’t. 

And what we succeeded in doing was keeping both the arms embargo and the missile component—the missiles for 8 years, the 

arms for 5 years—notwithstanding the fact that Iran has a very legitimate argument, which they were making, that the U.N. Resolution 1929, which is what created the sanctions and the structure 

we were negotiating under, said that if Iran comes to the table and 

negotiates all the sanctions would be lifted. 

Now, they didn’t just come to the table to negotiate; they made 

a deal. They signed an agreement. They came to an overall agreement. So they felt that they were in compliance with the U.N. resolution. And we felt, on the other hand, that their behavior in the 

region was such that it would be unconscionable, notwithstanding, 

to lift. So the compromise was the 5 and 8. 

But we don’t feel we lost anything whatsoever in that, Mr. Chairman, for the following reasons: The UNSCR, U.N. Resolution 1929, 

is a nuclear resolution. Susan Rice put the—she was then at the 

U.N.—she put the arms piece in at the last minute. It was a sort 

of throw-in at the last moment into this nuclear resolution. 

And the nuclear resolution always contemplated that if the IAEA 

came to what is known as its broad conclusion that Iran was not 

engaged in any illicit activities in its declared or undeclared activities, then all the sanctions are lifted. 

So, no matter what was going to happen here, we were going to 

lose both the missile and the arms under the U.N. component. But 

here is what we have done in the meantime that we believe actually takes care of this issue: 

First of all——

Chairman ROYCE. Mr. Secretary, I have followed the arguments 

that you have made about the laws that we have to defend against 

26

Iran’s missile program, and I understand the steps that you took 

here. 

I am just saying, big picture, big picture, when we end up with 

a bottom line where in 8 years they get the missile, it doesn’t look 

like a victory to me. It looks like——

Secretary KERRY. But they don’t. 

Chairman ROYCE. They may not get the missile at the time, but 

they can buy the technology at that time. The embargo is lifted at 

that time. 

Secretary KERRY. No. Actually, they can’t, Mr. Chairman, because we have, happily—we have several other protocols which prevent that from happening. Specifically, the missile control technology regime prevents that from taking place. We have an Executive order by the President of the United States that, in fact, prevents the transfer of——

Chairman ROYCE. I would just point out there is a reason why 

Russia pushed it. There is a reason we did not want——

Secretary KERRY. Because Russia they didn’t want the U.N. component of this. But they know that we have separate capacities and 

we will apply them. 

Chairman ROYCE. I would hope that we could strengthen our 

hand in this as we go along, but the bottom line is Iran is getting 

a financial windfall. It increases its support for terrorist proxies. 

They have announced that recently. It reintegrates into the global 

economy. It upgrades its conventional weapons. I think it upgrades 

its ballistic missile program in this, over the time of this agreement. It has an industrial-size nuclear program in 10 years. And 

that is the timeframe only if they don’t cheat. 

So, when I look at this and I see that Iran’s neighbors, who know 

it the best, trust it the least, I just ask—we are presuming Iran 

is going to change its behavior——

Secretary KERRY. No, we are not. 

Chairman ROYCE [continuing]. And that behavior did not change 

last weekend, when they were chanting, again, ‘‘Death to America.’’

Secretary KERRY. Mr. Chairman, please, with all due respect, we 

are not presuming any such thing. There is no presumption in here 

about what Iran will or will not do. There is one objective: Make 

sure they can’t get a nuclear weapon. And on the back side of that, 

we have a very robust initiative that will push back against Iran’s 

other activities. 

But let me be very specific. Executive——

Chairman ROYCE. Well, my time has expired. 

Secretary KERRY [continuing]. Order 12938 authorizes U.S. Sanctions on foreign persons that materially contribute to the proliferation of missiles, including efforts to manufacture, acquire, develop, 

and transfer them, by any person or foreign country of proliferation 

concern. 

That is just one——

Chairman ROYCE. Okay. 

Secretary KERRY [continuing]. Of about four or five——

Chairman ROYCE. My time has expired, Mr. Secretary. I am 

going to go to Mr. Engel, but thank you very much. 

Mr. ENGEL. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

And thank all of you for testifying. 

27

I still want to get back to 15 years, because, frankly, it is the 

thing that disturbs me the most. The truth is that after 15 years 

Iran is a nuclear threshold state. They are legitimized in this 

agreement as being a nuclear threshold state, which means they 

can produce weapons-grade highly enriched uranium without limitation. 

I know you can make the argument and say, well, they are already at that point now. But why would we not try to negotiate a 

deal where they couldn’t have those things in 15 years? 

I also want to mention that a nuclear agreement doesn’t whitewash the fact that Iran continues to remain a destabilizing actor 

in the region and continues to fuel terrorism around the globe. 

Our friends in Israel, rightfully, are concerned that Iranian funding of terrorism would continue to affect them in an existential 

way. One of the issues I have had with this agreement is that from 

day one it only focused on—it limits to Iran’s nuclear program. 

With this agreement, the way I look at it, Iran’s financing of terrorism will continue and could become much worse. The Iranian 

Revolutionary Guard Corps would take advantage of any sanctions 

relief that results from an agreement between P5+1 and Iran because, simply put, money is fungible. 

So I would like to know how, specifically, will we work with our 

allies to minimize the potential windfall to terrorist organizations 

and protect our allies like Israel. 

And the other issue I want to raise is that the lifting of the arms 

embargo and the sanctions—the chairman mentioned some of 

this—and the sanctions around Iran’s ballistic missile program further destabilizes the region. 

I was very disappointed that these sanctions will eventually be 

lifted. We had been told that Iranian weapons transfers and their 

ballistic missile program were outside of the scope of the negotiation. So, in my opinion, the changes to these sanctions should have 

been outside the scope, as well. 

So that means, when the arms embargo expires, Iran will be able 

to legally ship weapons to President Assad so he can continue to 

torture and kill his own people. 

So how will U.S. sanctions work to address this issue? Would the 

administration be open to further congressional consideration of 

new sanctions on Iran’s arms activity and ballistic missile program? 

And, finally, because the arms embargo and ballistic missile 

sanctions are not specifically mentioned in the JCPOA, only the 

U.N. Security Council resolution governing the JCPOA, would violations of the arms embargo be considered violations of the 

JCPOA? Does the snapback of sanctions apply to violations of the 

arms and missile embargoes? If Iran were to continue to ship 

weapons to Hezbollah before the arms embargo expires, would they 

be in violation of the JCPOA? 

Secretary KERRY. Well, Congressman, there are so many questions in there. Obviously, we are very happy to come back to you 

on the record. I want to answer every single one of them. But let 

me try to take on the biggest ones first of all. 

Let me just call to everybody’s attention here, the IRGC opposes 

this agreement. So they are not sitting there thinking they are 

28

going to get the whole world and be able to go and do what they 

want to do. And one of the reasons they oppose this agreement—

and I invite you to talk to the intel community about that, they will 

document it—is that they see themselves losing the cover of the nuclear umbrella that they had hoped to have for their nefarious activities. 

Now, there is nothing here to prevent us from pushing back 

against the IRGC and others going forward, Congressman. Congress and others, we are all free to work together to build the 

pushback against the destabilizing activities. 

But let me ask you a simple question: Is Iran empowered more 

destabilizing the region with a nuclear weapon or stripped of that 

ability with an international agreement it has to live up to and 

then us coming in underneath with a whole set of other security 

arrangements and pushback? I think the answer to that is crystal 

clear. 

Now, you asked the question of what happens with respect to 

year 15. Folks, under the additional protocol and the Modified 3.1 

Code, please focus on what happens. There is not some sudden 

break-off at the end of 15 years. They are under remarkable restraint. 

Specifically, the comprehensive safeguards agreement that they 

have to negotiate with the IAEA, which goes on forever, provides 

the IAEA with the right and obligation to provide safeguards on all 

source and special fissionable material in Iran to ensure the material is not diverted to nuclear weapons. All non-nuclear-weapon 

states parties under the Nonproliferation Treaty have to bring this 

into agreement. 

The comprehensive safeguard agreement requires Iran to maintain detailed accounting records on all material that is subject to 

the safeguards, operating records on all facilities subject to the 

safeguards. All public facilities in their program are subject to the 

safeguards. 

It provides for a range of IAEA inspections, including verifying 

the location, the identity, the quantity, the composition of all nuclear materials subject to the safeguards, the design of nuclear facilities. It requires the Board of Governors to ‘‘take action without 

delay’’—that is a quote—in a situation where it is essential and urgent and provides consequences for a finding of noncompliance. 

That is just on the side of the declared facilities. There are a 

whole set of requirements for access and inspection and accountability on the undeclared facilities. 

So, Congressman, they are forever under enormous constraints 

here with respect to inspections and accountability. They have to 

provide accountability for all the nuclear research and development 

activities not involving nuclear material, manufacturing and production of sensitive technology, centrifuge rotor components, construction of hot cells usable for plutonium separation, uranium 

mines, concentration plants, nuclear waste, all kinds of things. 

Now, let me let Ernie——

Chairman ROYCE. Well, may I suggest this, Mr. Secretary? We 

can respond for the record, Mr. Secretary, to the ranking member’s 

questions. But if we could go now to Ileana Ros-Lehtinen. The time 

has expired here. And we will just get that for the record later. 

29

Ms. ROS-LEHTINEN. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 

Last week, the LA Times reported that Iran’s Foreign Minister 

told the Iranian Parliament that under the deal Iran can deny inspectors access to military sites. Iran’s Defense Minister has also 

stated that he would not allow international inspectors to enter 

Iran’s military sites. Yet President Obama stated:

‘‘Inspectors will also be able to access any suspicious location. 

Put simply, the organization responsible for the inspection, the 

IAEA, will have access where necessary, when necessary.’’

Can the IAEA really have access to any and all military sites 

suspected of housing nuclear activity? Does the agency need 

preapproval from Iran to access these sites? 

And the whole point of sanctions, Mr. Secretary, was not to bring 

Iran to the negotiation table, and dismantling Iran’s nuclear infrastructure used to be the administration’s goal. The administration 

repeatedly told us that it would focus sanctions only on its nuclear 

portfolio. Yet, in the deal we have over 60 pages of individuals, 

companies, vessels that will be delisted, specifically mentioned. 

Many of these sanctions are not nuclear-related. 

The administration has always stated that all provisions within 

this agreement have to be agreed upon by all parties, which includes allowing the EU to list sanctions on the Quds Force, including its leader Soleimani. What do you say, Mr. Secretary, to the 

families of Americans who were killed or wounded as a result of 

Soleimani’s actions in Iraq? And please explain to them why as 

part of the nuclear negotiations the U.S. agreed that the IRGC 

Quds Force that is responsible for countless deaths around the 

globe are going to get their designations lifted and will be getting 

billions of dollars to support their acts of terror throughout Europe. 

And I am glad that it is only $50 billion. I feel better already. 

Secretary Kerry, you will be in Cuba soon. I remain extremely 

worried about allowing Cuba to open an Embassy here in DC, giving the regime a license to spy against our Nation. Will U.S. law 

enforcement vet every Cuban official, so-called diplomat, who 

wants to come to Washington, and will we reject any Cuban official 

who wishes to be posted in DC if our law enforcement officials have 

information related to their espionage apparatus? 

And finally, Secretary Kerry, when announcing the deal, President Obama said—the Iranian deal: ‘‘We will continue our unprecedented efforts to strengthen Israel’s security.’’ Will you guarantee 

that the U.S. will veto any measure at the U.N. Security Council 

on Palestinian statehood that calls for anything but a two-state solution through direct bilateral negotiations between Israel and the 

Palestinians and nothing else? 

Secretary KERRY. So, Madam Chair, let me come back to you on 

the record on a bunch of those, because, again, they are more than 

we can answer in the time we have. And I appreciate your effort 

to get a lot of questions, and we will answer them all. 

Let me just clarify a couple of important things. I want Ernie 

and Jack to get in here on two things, one on the money and the 

other on the highly enriched uranium. 

But just very quickly, there is a confusion here between the dismantling of the nuclear weapons program versus the nuclear proVerDate 0ct 09 2002 11:56 Oct 20, 2015 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00033 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 F:\WORK\_FULL\072815\95693 SHIRL
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gram. It was never the goal of this administration—and by the 

way, not even the Bush administration. The Bush administration 

in 2008 offered——

Ms. ROS-LEHTINEN. Mr. Secretary, with all due respect, perhaps 

if you could answer about the Soleimani, the lifting of sanctions of 

the EU, which we agreed to. 

Secretary KERRY. Well, I just want to be very clear, though, I 

want to be very clear that we are achieving what we set out to do, 

which is dismantling their capacity to make a nuclear weapon. 

With respect to the military sites, yes, they will have, providing 

that is part of the inspection of an undeclared suspicious facility. 

And if it is, we will have access. 

Ms. ROS-LEHTINEN. We will have access to the military sites? 

Secretary KERRY. If they don’t provide it, they will be in material 

breach of this agreement and the sanctions will snap back. 

Ms. ROS-LEHTINEN. And we consult with Iran before we get access? 

Secretary KERRY. Well, there is a process, there is a procedure 

in place, but it doesn’t rely on Iran or Russia or China saying yes. 

Ms. ROS-LEHTINEN. So Iran is wrong when they say that we 

won’t have access to military sites? 

Secretary KERRY. No. They are taking care of a domestic constituency in the way that they feel they need to. They understand 

that under this agreement——

Ms. ROS-LEHTINEN. Thank you. 

Secretary KERRY [continuing]. What they say is not as important 

as what they do. 

Ms. ROS-LEHTINEN. Thank you. My time is up. 

Chairman ROYCE. I am going to remind the members we have 5 

minutes. So ask the question. Give enough time for response. Then 

with a second question. And what we are going to do is we are 

going to have the response for the record. But I am going to encourage the members. 

We are going to go now to Mr. Brad Sherman of California. 

Mr. SHERMAN. We have got to remember that this is not a binding deal. This is not a treaty. This is not binding on Iran. This is 

not binding on the United States. It is not even an Executive legislative agreement. And these gentlemen here aren’t even asking for 

Congress to approve the deal. I think they would appreciate it if 

we didn’t pass a formal resolution of disapproval. It might be at 

most morally binding on this administration. 

So what may be important for us is to look to see whether it is 

a good deal in the next couple of years, because I think the administration has plans to follow it, unless we prohibit that, and also 

try to see whether we will have Congresses and administrations in 

the future that will take the actions in the future necessitated by 

our national interest. 

One quick observation. The IRGC may publicly oppose this deal 

because that is the best thing the Iranian Government can do to 

persuade us here in Congress to support the deal, or maybe they 

genuinely oppose it. 

But I want to focus, Secretary Kerry, on your remarks about 

dealing with Iran’s non-nuclear behavior. And you say we will be 

in a stronger position to deal with that, and we have to deal with 

31

it. They are holding four American hostages. Assad is killing 5,000 

people a month at least, and the blood is on the hands of men in 

Tehran. And they are supporting Hamas, Hezbollah, and the 

Houthi, and those are just the organizations that begin with the 

letter H. 

You are not going to be able to persuade them to change just by 

charm, although you bring a considerable amount of that. You are 

going to need to threaten them with new sanctions, unless they 

change their behavior. And we have seen, sanctions cause Iran to 

change its behavior even on things very important to Iran. 

Now, I am not asking you whether you think new sanctions are 

a good idea, bad idea, whether Europe will follow, whether they 

won’t follow. I am only going to focus on what is legal under this 

agreement. 

You were asked about this in the Senate, and you said, ‘‘We will 

not violate the agreement if we use our authorities to impose sanctions on Iran for terrorism, human rights, missiles, or other nonnuclear reasons.’’ But you then also noted that there is this provision in paragraph 26 that commits the United States to refrain 

from reintroducing or reimposing the sanctions specified in annex 

2, which of course are the very best sanctions we have got, although we can probably come up with new ones if you tell us that 

the old ones are forbidden. 

So you were also asked: If we reimpose sanctions on the Central 

Bank of Iran to deter terrorism, would that violate the agreement? 

And you said no. But I would like you to clarify, is Congress and 

the United States free under this agreement to adopt new sanctions legislation that will remain in force as long as Iran holds our 

hostages and supports Assad? 

Secretary KERRY. We are free to adopt additional sanctions as 

long as they are not a phony excuse for just taking the whole pot 

of the past ones and putting them back. We can put them in place. 

Let me let Jack——

Mr. SHERMAN. Secretary Kerry, it is my time, and I have got a 

lot of other questions. 

Now, we have got a number of entities listed for their nuclear activities that deserve to be listed for their terrorist activities. It is 

just you haven’t had time to put them on that second list. Will you 

be putting entities who are on the list of sanctions for their nuclear 

activity on the terrorist list if they deserve it, and can you get that 

job done before this agreement becomes effective? 

Secretary KERRY. Well, we have terrorism sanctions in place 

right now. 

Mr. SHERMAN. But we have got to list additional entities. 

Secretary KERRY. We are free to add, and we have added. 

Mr. SHERMAN. And we are free to add those who——

Secretary KERRY. By the way, we added some 60 entities during 

the course of these negotiations. 

Mr. SHERMAN. Let me get to one other question. You strongly do 

not want us to override a Presidential veto, but if we do, that triggers certain American laws. I would like to give you an opportunity. You don’t want us to do it. You think it is terrible policy. 

You think the rest of the world would be against us. 

32

But let’s say Congress doesn’t take your advice. We override a 

veto. And the law that is triggered then imposes certain sanctions. 

Will you follow the law even though you think it violates this 

agreement clearly and even if you think it is absolutely terrible policy? 

Secretary KERRY. I can’t begin to answer that at this point without consulting with the President and determining what the circumstances are——

Mr. SHERMAN. So you are not committed to following the law if 

you think it is a bad law? 

Secretary KERRY. No, I said I am not going to deal with a hypothetical, that is all. I would like the Secretary of the Treasury to 

respond on the sanctions. 

Chairman ROYCE. We are out of time. We are going to have to 

go to Mr. Chris Smith of New Jersey. But for the record, Mr. Secretary, please put it in the record and we will have it. 

Secretary LEW. Mr. Chairman, on the financial issues and on the 

sanctions issues, there is a lot of responses to the questions that 

are being asked, and if we got a minute or 2 to respond, it might 

actually be helpful to those who want to understand the agreement. 

Chairman ROYCE. Mr. Smith. 

Mr. SMITH. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Welcome to the committee, gentleman. 

Numerous reports of Iranian collaboration with North Korea, including articles written by Assistant Secretary of State Douglas 

Frantz way back in 2003, make it clear that North Korea is collaborating with Iran. One first question, what happens under the 

agreement if North Korea conveys nuclear weapons to Iran and 

other capabilities that they certainly have at their disposal? 

The issue of the arms race is real. I think this incentivizes Saudi 

Arabia and others, Egypt, to acquire a bomb. That means the Middle East becomes even more of a powder keg. 

Saeed Abedini, Hekmati, Rezaian, Levinson, when are they going 

to be free, if you can speak to that, Mr. Secretary? 

In your opening you said even if they break out, they still have 

to go design the bomb. But that is the problem with this agreement. It once again kicks the issue of the past military dimensions 

of Iran’s program down the road. 

Iran has been stonewalling the IAEA on this point for years. Inspectors have long been denied access to the Parchin military site, 

where it is believed that Iran tested detonators for nuclear warheads. Iran has refused inspectors access to the Parchin site for 

years. In 2013, there were even images showing bulldozing of 

buildings and removing of roads. 

Is the IAEA being pressured to accept terms that fail to provide 

inspectors full access and disclosure? 

And the last point, Mr. Secretary, yesterday at the TIP Report 

release you spoke eloquently and boldly about combating modern 

day slavery. I deeply respect your personal commitment to ending 

sex and labor trafficking. But while the report is accurate, I am 

concerned that the designations for several countries miss the 

mark, and a number of countries got absolutely unmerited upgrades, including Malaysia, Cuba and Uzbekistan. 

33

I went back and read the reports from last year and the year before. In China, there were 35 convictions of trafficking, and that is 

now a Watch List country. Cuba, 13 convictions for sex trafficking. 

The narrative gets it right. None for labor trafficking. They say 

there is no labor trafficking, it doesn’t exist, which is nuts. A year 

ago there were 10 convictions. So we are talking about absolutely 

minimal. 

Thailand, by contrast, had 151 convictions. They are still Tier 3. 

And Malaysia had three convictions for sex and labor trafficking, 

a decrease from nine from last year, and they were Tier 3. 

The narratives get it right. The designations miss it by a mile. 

Secretary KERRY. Well, I am going to deal with the TIP. I would 

be happy to sit down with you and talk that through. Since time 

is so precious here, I want to stay on Iran, and I want my colleague 

to be able to address a couple key issues. 

Secretary LEW. Mr. Chairman, if I could just respond to a couple 

of the issues that have been raised. Congressman Engel asked 

about the money——

Mr. SMITH. If the gentleman would yield. This is my time. I 

would really like to know about the questions. 

Chairman ROYCE. Mr. Smith, we will get answers here to everything. Let’s let the witness. 

Secretary LEW. On the question of the flow of money to Iran, 

there have been a range of estimates as to how much money Iran 

has locked up. Let’s remember why the money is locked up. It is 

locked up because our international partners worked with us to 

take Iran’s money and not let Iran get it. At the highest number that we see, there is $115 billion that is theoretically available. In reality, $58 billion to $59 billion of that 

is unavailable, roughly $20 billion is tied up in contracts like 

China, and the balance is things like nonperforming loans. Now, I am not going to say that $56 billion is not a lot of money, but it is not $150 billion, and it cannot all be used because they 

need to keep some foreign reserves just to run their economy. If 

you look at the demands in Iran’s economy for the use of that 

money, we see at least $500 billion of competing demands for that 

$50 billion. 

So in any kind of an allocation of that resource, you look at what 

they have done under sanctions, they have managed with sanctions 

in place to put several million dollars a year toward malign purposes. We can’t say that there won’t be any more money going to 

malign purposes. 

But I think the order of magnitude is way, way smaller, and it 

is in line with the kinds of spending they have been doing anyway. 

You compare that to an Iran with a nuclear weapon, the bigger 

threat to us and our friends in the region is Iran with a nuclear 

weapon having the same kinds of objectives. 

On Congresswoman Ros-Lehtinen’s questions about the IRGC 

and Soleimani, Soleimani is not delisted. We have not delisted the 

major entities of the IRGC. There are a few entities whose identity 

has changed over time, whose leadership has changed over time. 

Privately, we are happy to go through the individual cases. But we 

have kept in place our sanctions regime on terrorism. 

Chairman ROYCE. Thank you, Mr. Secretary. 

34

Now, we have got three questions that were asked by the gentleman from New Jersey. If we can just have a succinct answer to 

those. 

Secretary KERRY. Congressman, the greatest incentive for an 

arms race in the region, for Egypt or Saudi Arabia or one of the 

other countries to try to get a bomb, will be if this agreement is 

rejected. And the reason will be that Iran will go back to enriching, 

we will not have inspection, we will not have insight, and they will 

say: Oh, my God, now they are going for a bomb, now we have a 

reason to have to get one. They have, in fact, told us, these countries, that they are not going to chase a bomb providing the implementation of this agreement continues and providing that we are 

working with them on the other pushback issues for the region. 

With respect to the issue of Parchin, yes, there will be access as 

appropriate under the agreement between the IAEA and Iran, and 

that is an agreement which is normally entered into confidentially 

between those countries. 

Mr. SMITH. Again, that is the problem. 

Americans held captive and North Korea gets the bomb, or conveys a bomb to Iran, what happens there? 

Secretary MONIZ. May I comment? I believe I heard you say, 

Congressman, that Iran set off a nuclear explosive at Parchin. That 

is incorrect. 

Mr. SMITH. I didn’t say that. I didn’t say that at all. 

Chairman ROYCE. Those weren’t his remarks, if I could just 

interject. 

Mr. SMITH. Really, at least get that right. 

Secretary KERRY. But there will be appropriate access. 

Mr. SMITH. But appropriate, how is that defined? 

But, again, on the Americans held captive and on the issue of 

North Korea conveying bombs to Iran, what happens under the 

agreement? 

Secretary KERRY. My last conversation with Foreign Minister 

Zarif and with the brother of the President was regarding the four 

people being held, the four American citizens. And we have followed up on that conversation since then. We are in direct conversations. That is all I am going to say here today. But I hope that 

they will be returned to be with their families. 

Mr. SMITH. North Korea and a bomb, they convey bombs to Iran, 

what happens under the agreement, anything? 

Secretary KERRY. If North Korea what? 

Mr. SMITH. If North Korea were to provide weapons, nuclear 

weapons to Iran, what happens? 

Secretary KERRY. Well, they can’t do that, and both Iran and 

North Korea would be in gross violation of the Nonproliferation 

Treaty, and we would take action. 

Mr. SMITH. North Korea seems not to care. 

Secretary KERRY. And Iran would be in violation of this agreement. 

Chairman ROYCE. All right. So we have Albio Sires from New 

Jersey. 

Mr. SIRES. Thank you Mr. Chairman. 

Thank you for being here. 

35

There are deep divisions in Iran, evidenced by the comments 

made by the hardliners and the Prime Minister and the Foreign 

Minister and the Supreme Leader. Are these divisions likely to resurface during the implementation of this agreement? And what 

are the consequences of these divisions for the implementation? Because I keep reading that they are constantly going back and forth. 

And I am concerned that we get an agreement and the 

hardliners——

Secretary KERRY. So, Congressman, it is a very, very good question and appropriate to understanding the dynamic here. 

We saw the exact same divisions of things that were being said 

regarding the interim agreement, if you recall. And what we have 

learned is it is not as important what they say, it is important 

what they do, and make sure that their actions are held accountable. Every aspect of the interim agreement has been lived up to, 

notwithstanding denials that came out publicly from certain politicians or from certain leaders. 

We have seen the same thing here. We heard that X or Y or Z 

was a red line, it wouldn’t be able to do it, et cetera. But the agreement is the agreement. That is why we have been so clear, Mr. 

Chairman, that nothing in this agreement is based on trust. Nothing is based on an expectation of some change of behavior. This 

agreement is 100 and whatever pages, 9 pages, because it is specific with its annexes in declaring what is expected of whom and 

when. And that precision is what gives us confidence we will be 

able to hold them accountable. 

Mr. SIRES. Thank you. And, Secretary, you said there is only $56 

billion for them to really——

Secretary LEW. That is accessible. 

Mr. SIRES. Accessible. But really, they do not need a lot of money 

for some of these groups to start up again. I mean, they don’t need 

billions, they can’t absorb billions, some of these groups. So, I 

mean, there is enough money there to stir a lot of problems. 

Secretary LEW. I mean, the problem is that even with all of the 

sanctions in place, they are finding the relatively small sums of 

money that it takes to do terrible acts of regional destabilization 

and support of terrorism. So they are doing that now with the sanctions in place. And what I am saying is I don’t think you are going 

to see the shape of that support change. Though there will be some 

more resources available, it will on the margin, and it will be along 

the lines of what they are already doing, which puts the burden on 

us and our allies in the region to shut down the flow of money and 

the flow of materiel to malign forces. 

Frankly, one of the issues we discussed with our Gulf allies when 

we met with them at Camp David was how to work more effectively together to shut down some of those flows of money, things 

that are happening today, with the sanctions in place. So I think 

the problem exists today, with or without an agreement. 

And the challenge on this money that is Iran’s money locked up 

overseas is it is not in the United States. A lot of the money is in 

China. A lot of the money is in India. It is in other places. If the 

P5+1 agreement is rejected by the United States, I don’t think we 

can rely on those other countries keeping that money locked up. So 

36

you could end up with Iran getting access to that money without 

the benefit of an agreement, which would be a very bad outcome. 

So I think that we have to keep it in perspective. It is a serious 

issue. We have made the commitment to continue designating, like 

we did last week, additional Hezbollah actors. We will continue to 

do that. We have sanctions and secondary sanctions in place. We 

will double and redouble our efforts on that. We need to get our 

allies to be part of it. But that is not a reason not to have an agreement to make sure that Iran doesn’t get a nuclear weapon. 

Secretary KERRY. Also, Congressman, I would just underscore, if 

you look at their activities, they are not capital intensive, what 

they have been doing with the Houthi, what they have done over 

the years. 

So I think that our objective here was to make sure they can’t 

have a nuclear weapon, and, secondly, to work with our allies and 

friends in the region in order to do a greater job, a much better job 

of pushing back against those activities. And I am going, at the end 

of this week, I will be meeting in Doha with the Gulf states. We 

are laying out with them the very specific steps with respect to 

that pushback and what we will be engaged in, in order to increase 

the security and push back against these activities you are talking 

about. 

But it is impossible to do them all in one pot at one time. First 

step nuclear weapon. Now we have the opportunity to press for the 

changes that we want. 

Mr. SIRES. Thank you. 

Chairman ROYCE. Thank you. 

We go to Mr. Dana Rohrabacher of California. 

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. And, 

again, thank you and Ranking Member Engel for providing such 

leadership on this issue. We have had many hearings about it. 

And, Mr. Secretary, let me note that while you are receiving 

quite a grueling today, let us note that we appreciate the hard 

work that you and others in the administration are making. We 

know that you sincerely are looking to make this a more peaceful 

world. But some of us realize that in the past we have seen people 

who are very sincere in seeking peace creating a—unfortunately, 

setting things off in a direction that led to war and led to more repression and didn’t create a more peaceful world. 

One of the efforts that I noted when I was part of this is how 

Ronald Reagan succeeded in ending the Cold War, and during that 

time period we reached weapons agreements with the Soviet 

Union. 

But let me note, while we were making those agreements with 

the Soviet Union to put a lid on nuclear weapons in Europe, et 

cetera, we ratcheted up our support for the democratic elements 

who were struggling against Soviet domination in various parts of 

the world. Whether it was in the Soviet Union or in Nicaragua or 

Afghanistan, we were actually increasing our efforts to support 

those people. We also denied them hard currency, much less had 

any agreement that would have bolstered the Soviet economy. And 

because we had that approach, the Soviet Union fell apart, and in 

the long run that is what made a more peaceful world, the elimination of that regime. 

37

And I am afraid that—without fighting, by the way, we eliminated it—I am afraid that this treaty that you are talking about 

today and you are promoting will do just the opposite then what 

we saw succeeded, and that it is it will actually empower the 

mullahs. Rather than making it a more peaceful regime and make 

peace more likely, empowering the mullahs in the long run will create more chaos, more likelihood of war, because they are the main 

proponents and supporters of terrorism and, of course, hatred toward the West that we have seen coming from their regime. 

Now, what I would like to ask you is that we all know in this 

body, we have been aware, for example, of the repression and the 

brutal treatment of people within Iran, like the MEK, who are suffering, and you have noted this in the past yourself, the brutality 

that these people who oppose the regime have had to face. 

Did you confer in any way with the people, the democratic elements in Iran, or these other people who are struggling for a free 

Iran and how this agreement will affect their long-term goal for a 

democratic Iran and thus a more peaceful world? 

Secretary KERRY. Well, as you know, this was a nuclear negotiation. But I have on many occasions met with and had discussions 

with folks representing different interests and aspirations within 

Iran. 

What I would say to you, Congressman, and you have to make 

sort of a hard judgment here about where Iran is, President 

Rouhani and Foreign Minister Zarif are both individuals who have 

expressed a very different point of view from the past leadership 

of Iran. 

Mr. ROHRABACHER. I have a limited amount of time. So your answer is, no, that you did not confer with the democratic elements——

Secretary KERRY. No, that is not what I said. I said I have had 

plenty——

Mr. ROHRABACHER [continuing]. But you have been conferring—

but you are conferring with their oppressors instead. The fact is 

that——

Secretary KERRY. No, I didn’t say that. I don’t think I said that 

at all, Congressman. 

Mr. ROHRABACHER. And during the Reagan years, Mr. Secretary, during the Reagan years—we talk about only $55 billion. Well, 

okay, we will figure out whether it is $150 billion that the mullahs 

are going to have or whether it is $50 billion. But the fact is, part 

of the effort that worked under Reagan was supporting the democratic element and undermining the economy of the Soviet Union. 

In the long run what will bring peace to this part of the world 

is not for us to have short-term arms deals with the mullah regimes and the other people who hate the West and are supporting 

terrorism, but to try to support those elements in those societies 

that want peace with the West and aren’t preparing some sort of 

holy war against us. 

I am sorry, Mr. Secretary, I appreciate your sincerity and what 

you guys are trying to do, but I believe this treaty will empower 

the mullahs and make conflict more likely. 

Chairman ROYCE. Mr. Gerry Connolly of Virginia. 

Mr. CONNOLLY. I thank the chairman. 

38

And I find, my friend from California, I find his words ironic, because Ronald Reagan was nothing if not a pragmatist and was 

quite capable of compartmentalizing relationships for the sake of a 

greater good. His relations with the Soviet Union were the quintessence of that kind of pragmatism, exactly what is in front of us 

today. Something is overriding: Nuclear capability in the region. 

Shall we deal with it or not? 

Samuel Taylor Coleridge described fiction as the willing suspension of disbelief. I must say I find a lot of fiction involved, the willing suspension of disbelief, in some of the criticism of this agreement. It is not perfect. It will hurt Israel. It will give them a nuclear capability some day. It doesn’t do enough. It doesn’t deal with 

ancillary and horrendous behavior. Well, who said it would? 

And here is the bottom line. Valid though many of those criticisms may be, imperfections we can find by the score, what is your 

program? And you know what I have heard in a series of hearings 

here? Let’s just go back to the P5+1 and Iran and say we just 

couldn’t sell it, let’s start over. That is one of the most monumentally naive statements I have ever heard, and it came from a 

former Member of Congress who knows better. It is not true. It 

won’t happen. 

At least let’s stick to the facts. But, no, the willing suspension 

of disbelief is at work, it is alive and well here, including the issue 

of the existential threat to Israel. Walking away from this agreement, you need to take responsibility for the consequences to 

Israel, whether you are Bibi Netanyahu or you are a Member of 

Congress, and you have got to weigh it really carefully. What will 

happen? What risks am I willing to take before I cast that vote on 

behalf of our country and our allies like Israel? 

Mr. Secretary, I think it is an extraordinary job you have done, 

and I would like to give you the opportunity to talk about two problems. And you, too, Mr. Secretary, Secretary Moniz. If we walk 

away from this agreement, what in your analysis is likely to happen? 

And secondly, Secretary Moniz, to me one of the real 

vulnerabilities in this agreement is that 24-day problem. All of us 

have reason to be concerned about that. That is not quite the robust inspection we had hoped for. 

Secretary KERRY. So I am going to be very quick, because I want 

Ernie to get in here. 

But it is not speculation, it is clear, if Congress rejects this, Iran 

goes back to its enrichment, the Ayatollah will not come back to 

the table. Anybody who makes that judgment has not talked to the 

intel community. And there is no way, given his feelings already 

about the West and his mistrust of us and his reluctance to even 

have engaged in this discussion, that he is suddenly going to reenter if we reject this. 

Moreover, the sanctions regime completely falls apart. The folks 

we relied on to provide a united front here, France, Germany, Britain, China, Russia, go off, and we will have set ourselves back, 

folks. I don’t know how I would go out to another country if that 

happens and say: Hey, you ought to negotiate with us, or you ought 

to talk to us about any issue, whatever it is, with the reliance that 

we can actually deliver. Because they will sit there and say: Well, 

39

you have got 535 Secretaries of State in the United States, we don’t 

know who we are negotiating with, and whatever deal we make always risks being overturned. 

That is not the traditional relationship that has existed between 

the Executive and the Congress. 

And finally, Iran will say: We are free. We can go back to our 

program. And what I said earlier about bringing year 15 to today, 

it happens, year 20, whatever it is. They will take their 19,000 centrifuges, they have the ability to enrich, and they will feel we have 

backed off. 

Ernie, would you address the——

Secretary MONIZ. Yeah. 

First, let me just add that from my 5 months at the negotiating 

table, I doubt our P5+1 partners would be any more interested in 

going back to the table than Iran. 

On the 24 days, again, let me emphasize that all the regular access—well, for declared sites—is constant. The 24 days is a new 

tool in the sense that there has never been any limit at all. And 

so the key is in getting enough of a compressed process where we 

feel confident in being able to detect any use of nuclear materials, 

number one, over that time period. And in a classified environment 

we could provide even more evidence than I have already discussed 

today. 

Chairman ROYCE. Thank you, Mr. Secretary. 

We go to Steve Chabot of Ohio. 

Mr. CHABOT. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Thank you for being here, Mr. Secretary. 

This administration, the President specifically called ISIS, famously, the JV team. That clearly wasn’t true. This administration 

cited Yemen as the model approach to U.S. counterterrorism, and 

that was shortly before Yemen’s near total collapse into chaos. So 

that wasn’t true either. President Obama declared al-Qaeda to be 

‘‘decimated,’’ ‘‘on the run,’’ ‘‘broken apart,’’ ‘‘on their heels,’’ ‘‘very 

weak,’’ and those are all quotes, by the way. Now, that may be 

wishful thinking, but it certainly wasn’t true and isn’t true. 

Why should the American people trust the administration now 

on this deal? 

Secretary KERRY. We are not asking them to trust. We are asking them to read the deal and look at the components. As I have 

said many times, nothing in this deal is built on trust. Nothing. It 

is on very specific steps that have to be taken. For instance, Iran 

gets zero relief from the sanctions until Iran has implemented the 

1-year breakout time by destroying the calandria, taking out their 

centrifuges, undoing their electrical, undoing the piping. They have 

to do all of that——

Mr. CHABOT. As you know, I have got limited time, so I am going 

to move on to my next question. 

Secretary KERRY. All I am saying is they have to take specific 

steps. 

Mr. CHABOT. But when you say that that doesn’t depend on 

trust, that just strains credibility, I think, to say there isn’t trust 

on both sides involved in this. There has to be or there is no deal. 

Sticking with this theme on trust, let me ask you this: Relative 

to anywhere, anytime inspections, you said, and I quote:

40

‘‘This is a term that, honestly, I never heard in the 4 years 

that we were negotiating.’’

Now, in fact, in April this year Deputy Secretary Advisor Ben 

Rhodes had said that the International Atomic Energy Agency 

would have immediate access—immediate access—to any site that 

the agency wanted to inspect. Now, immediate access sure sounds 

like anytime to me. 

And also, in April, Energy Secretary Moniz, who is the gentleman sitting next to you there, he said, and I quote:

‘‘We expect to have anywhere, anytime access to places that 

are suspected of out-of-bounds activities.’’

There is that anywhere, anytime once again. 

So, again, why should the American people trust what they are 

being told by this administration about this deal? 

Secretary MONIZ. May I say, my quotes have anytime, anywhere 

in the sense of a well-defined process and a well-defined timescale, 

and that is what we have. 

Mr. CHABOT. Okay. 

Secretary KERRY. But let me go further than that. I have been 

negotiating——

Mr. CHABOT. That really clears things up, Mr. Secretary. So 

thank you. 

Go ahead, Mr. Secretary. 

Secretary KERRY. We never had a discussion in the context of 

these negotiations that talked about anywhere, anytime. Nowhere 

on the planet Earth does any country anywhere under the NPT 

have anything called anywhere, anytime. What we have is called 

managed access, and it is a process by which we get in. 

Mr. Chabot. With this 24 days, okay, I mean, that came out to 

24 days. 

Secretary KERRY. Please let me answer, let me answer the question. 

Mr. CHABOT. And we know that that is longer. That is months 

actually. 

Secretary KERRY. Twenty-four days is an outside period of time 

during which time, and for 24 years or longer, 2,400 years, they 

would not be able to hide the remnants of nuclear activity, of fissile 

material, and Ernie Moniz will tell you that. 

But leaving that aside, the 24 days——

Mr. CHABOT. Mr. Secretary, as you know, I have only got 5 minutes, and I have got several more questions. Let me ask you this. 

Secretary KERRY. Congressman, you love asking questions and 

having no answers. 

Mr. CHABOT. If this is such a good deal, why is Israel so opposed 

to it? 

Secretary KERRY. First of all, I understand when you say Israel, 

there are people in Israel who support it. 

Mr. CHABOT. And the Prime Minister, okay, he is the representative, just like President Obama is the representative of our country 

on these types of things. 

Secretary KERRY. I understand, and you will agree that President Obama always talks for everybody in the country, right? 

41

Mr. CHABOT. Well, he is sure speaking for us in this agreement, 

and he seems bound and determined to go forward with this thing 

whether the elected representatives of the American people, the 

majority of us at least, are for it or not. 

Secretary KERRY. Let me speak to your question, because it is a 

serious question and it is important. As I said earlier, we fully understand, every Israeli has concerns, has fears. There are concerns 

about the region they live in, about the nature of the rhetoric that 

is used, death to Israel, death to America. Everybody is concerned. 

Which is why this is not based on some element of a dream they 

are going to change or some element of trust. 

But I will tell you there are people in Israel who——

Mr. CHABOT. You are going to name a couple of people. The 

Prime Minister is against it. And I am almost out of time. 

This is one of the main reasons, as a representative of the American people, I am so concerned, because Israel could be directly affected, but with these ICBMs and the technology that could be 

coming, it could make American cities at risk. 

Chairman ROYCE. Excuse me, Mr. Chabot. We have got to go to 

Mr. Ted Deutch of Florida. 

Mr. DEUTCH. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And thanks 

to our witnesses for being here. 

Secretary Kerry, thank you as well on behalf of my constituent’s 

family, Robert Levinson, for continuing to raise his plight and that 

of the three other Americans who are held. And I agree with you 

that it is time for them to come home. 

I want to talk specifically about PMD, because if we don’t address PMD, the military dimensions of the program, then it is impossible for us to believe that the IAEA will have the credibility it 

needs going forward. 

Under the terms of the agreement, the nuclear-related activities 

that are set forth that need to be satisfied in order for there to be 

sanctions relief refer to the road map, the IAEA-Iran road map, except they leave out the most important point, which is the one that 

the IAEA has to have final resolution of PMD. 

So I have two questions. The first question is, will we have access, will the IAEA have access to Parchin? The second question is, 

am I right, because I don’t see any other way to read the agreement, that satisfaction of PMD will not be a prerequisite to Iran 

getting sanctions relief? 

Secretary KERRY. It is. It is a prerequisite. If they haven’t complied with the IAEA and lived up to the dates that are laid out in 

the program, August and October, they will not get relief. 

Mr. DEUTCH. Mr. Secretary, I acknowledge that. But by October 

15, they have to have activities, they need to set out what they are 

going to do. But it is December 15 by which the Director General 

and the Board of Governors will assess whether or not they have 

complied, and that is not a condition under the deal. 

Secretary KERRY. Actually it is. They would be in material 

breach if they don’t do this. We have told them that and they understand that. Moreover——

Mr. DEUTCH. I understand. I would just point out it is specifically 

omitted in the list of past and present concerns. It is not a requirement. 

42

Secretary KERRY. Well, the outcome. If you are talking about the 

outcome, it is not dependent on the outcome because the outcome, 

we have no way of knowing which way obviously that goes. 

Mr. DEUTCH. But that is the issue, Mr. Secretary. 

Secretary KERRY. No, it is whether they comply or not. We know 

what they were doing. We have already drawn our conclusion 

about 2003. We know they were engaged in trying to make a weapon. 

Mr. DEUTCH. So that is my point. 

Secretary KERRY. So it is not the outcome that determines——

Mr. DEUTCH. This is important. So you are saying that even——

Secretary KERRY. It is compliance. 

Mr. DEUTCH. Right. So if they comply with the IAEA, but the 

IAEA ultimately concludes that they are not satisfied on PMD, either because they don’t have access, because they didn’t get access 

to the site——

Secretary KERRY. Then they are not in compliance. 

Mr. DEUTCH [continuing]. Because they didn’t get access to the 

scientists? 

Secretary KERRY. That would be a breach. We would not do sanctions relief. They know that. 

Mr. DEUTCH. Then I would respectfully suggest that it is not at 

all clear in the agreement. We could talk about that. 

I would like to move on to the issue of specifically the sanctions. 

This has been brought up by a number of my colleagues. The annex 

2 that lists lots and lots of individuals and entities that are getting 

sanctions relief under this deal, many of them are listed, are involved in not just proliferation activities, but they are also involved 

in terrorism, support for terrorism. They are involved in human 

rights abuses. They went on this list because it was easier to get 

our European allies to go along with the proliferation sanctions. 

And I have a very specific question. Secretary Lew, I appreciate 

that we are going to continue to sanction Hezbollah. But what I 

really want to know is, will we be able to and are we going through 

the process now of scouring this list, not just for individuals, but 

for banks and shipping lines and state-owned companies, to reimpose sanctions if they are subject to sanctions for terrorism? 

Secretary LEW. Well, Congressman, first, we have not listed for 

relief many entities. The IRGC——

Mr. DEUTCH. I understand. But I am asking about this——

Secretary LEW. There are institutions that were designated for 

their acts of terrorism or regional destabilization that have not 

been relieved. 

Mr. DEUTCH. Mr. Secretary, I understand that. I have a very specific question. Will we be able under this agreement to reimpose 

sanctions on all of these individuals and entities if we find they 

should be because of their terrorism? 

Secretary LEW. Congressman, we have retained all of our rights 

to designate firms and individuals under terrorism sanctions——

Mr. DEUTCH. Including everyone listed in this annex? 

Secretary LEW—including entities who are on the list. What we 

cannot do—and this is what Secretary Kerry was saying a few minutes ago—we cannot just put in place the nuclear sanctions——

Mr. DEUTCH. I understand. No, no, I understand. 

43

Secretary LEW. We have given up no ability to target individuals 

or entities. 

Mr. DEUTCH. Including, I hope we are going through the list and 

scouring it right now. I only have a few seconds left. And I would 

just ask for some acknowledgement that when we say that Iran is 

engaged in all these terrible activities now and it doesn’t cost much 

money, I would suggest that it has been reported that $200 million 

a year is the amount that they use to fund Hezbollah. So if only 

$1 billion of the $56 billion were to go to Hezbollah, we would double the amount of support for 5 years, at which time the arms embargo comes off and they are considerably more dangerous. We 

have to at least acknowledge that that could occur. 

Secretary KERRY. Congressman, we can put the arms—there are 

plenty of opportunities to deal with the arms. 

Chairman ROYCE. Joe Wilson of South Carolina. 

Secretary KERRY. There is a U.N. resolution preventing them 

from taking weapons to Hezbollah. There is a resolution preventing 

them from sending weapons to Iraq, preventing them from sending 

weapons to——

Chairman ROYCE. At this time we have got to go to Joe Wilson 

of South Carolina. Thank you. 

Mr. WILSON. Thank you, Chairman Ed Royce and Ranking Member Eliot Engel, for hosting this hearing, and I appreciate the panel 

being here today. 

Secretary Kerry, I share the concerns of an op-ed by David 

Horovitz of The Times of Israel where he presents 16 reasons the 

nuke deal is a catastrophe for the Western world. I will present 

these as questions for the record for you to answer during the coming month. We need this as a response for the American people so 

that as we vote in September, the American people will know, as 

you stated a few minutes ago, the correct facts. 

One, was the Iranian regime required to disclose the previous 

military dimensions of its nuclear program in order both to ensure 

effective inspections of all relevant facilities? No. 

Two, has the Iranian regime been required to halt all uranium 

enrichment, including thousands of centrifuges spinning at the 

main Natanz enrichment facility? No. 

Has the Iranian regime been required to shut down and dismantle the Arak heavy water reactor and plutonium production 

plant? No. 

Four, has the Iranian regime been required to shut down and 

dismantle the underground uranium enrichment facility it is building at Fordow? No. 

Five, has the Iranian regime been required to halt its ongoing 

missile development? No. 

Six, has the Iranian regime been required to halt research and 

development of the faster centrifuges, which will enable it to break 

out the bomb far more rapidly than is currently the case? No. 

Seven, has the Iranian regime been required to submit to anywhere, anytime inspections of any and all facilities suspected of engaging in rogue nuclear-related activity? No. 

Eight, has the international community established procedures 

setting out how it will respond to different classes of Iranian violaVerDate 0ct 09 2002 11:56 Oct 20, 2015 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00047 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 F:\WORK\_FULL\072815\95693 SHIRL
44

tions to ensure that the international community can act with sufficient speed and efficiency to thwart a breakout of the bomb? No. 

Eight, has the Iranian regime been required to halt its arming, 

financing, and training of Hezbollah terrorist army in south Lebanon? No. 

Ten, has the Iranian regime been required to surrender for trial 

the members of the leadership placed on an Interpol watch list for 

the alleged involvement in the bombing by the Hezbollah suicide 

bomber of the AMIA Jewish Community Center in Buenos Aires, 

Argentina, in 1994, and resulting in the deaths of 835 people? No. 

Eleven, has the Iranian regime undertaken to close its 80 estimated cultural centers in South America from which it allegedly 

fosters terrorist networks? No. 

Twelve, has the Iranian leadership agreed to stop inciting hatred 

among its people against Israel and the United States and stop its 

relentless calls for the annihilation of Israel? No. 

Thirteen, has the Iranian regime agreed to halt executions currently running at an average of some three a day, the highest rate 

in 20 years? No. 

Fourteen, does the nuclear deal shatter the painstakingly constructed sanctions regime that forced Iran to the negotiating table? 

Yes. 

Fifteen, will the deal usher in a new era of global commercial 

interaction with Iran, reviving the Iranian economy and releasing 

financial resources that Iran will use to bolster its military forces 

in terrorist networks? Yes. 

Sixteen, does the nuclear deal further cement Iran’s repressive 

and ideologically rapacious regime in power? Yes. 

I am going to be submitting these for the record, and I look forward to receiving them during the next month. In the meantime, 

the American people need to know there is bipartisan opposition to 

this deal. I was really grateful, 2 weeks ago we had Senator Joe 

Lieberman here who addressed my concern, and that is that the 

Secretary of State designated Iran a state sponsor of terrorism over 

30 years ago in response to the hundreds of Marines who were 

killed at the Marine barracks. And I asked Senator Lieberman, has 

there been a change in course? His quote directly:

‘‘This regime, the Iranian Government, the Islamic Republic of 

Iran, has the blood of a lot of Americans on its hands, the Marines at the barracks in Beirut, the soldiers of Khobar Tower, 

and I would go on. Incidentally, hundreds of American soldiers 

were killed in Iraq by Shia militias that were trained and run 

by the IRGC. Sir, your question is a good one: Has the government changed? There is no evidence of change.’’

Mr. Secretary, has there been evidence of change? 

Secretary KERRY. Yes, in that the President of Iran sent his Foreign Minister to negotiate an agreement to which I could pose you 

a lot of questions that I can give you the answer to that are ‘‘yes’’ 

too. Does Iran have to give up two-thirds of its centrifuges for 10 

years? Yes. Does Iran have to annihilate its——

Mr. WILSON. And, Mr. Secretary, those are words——

45

Chairman ROYCE. If the gentleman will suspend. Your time has 

expired. I have suggested to the members, ask the questions and 

leave time for a response. 

We are going to Brian Higgins of New York. 

Mr. Higgins. 

Mr. HIGGINS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

The snap-back provisions in this agreement are real and powerful, and I think are born out of a deep distrust of Iran. The snapback provisions, as I understand them, allow for any of the six 

powers to the deal to flag what it considers a violation. That concern would be submitted to a dispute resolution panel. If those concerns remain unresolved, the sanctions would resume or snap back 

after 30 days. Preventing a resumption of sanctions would require 

a vote of the Security Council, from which the United States and 

its Western allies would have veto power. It is unprecedented and 

I think very, very powerful and speaks volumes to this deal. 

Under this deal, uranium would be cut by 98 percent. The level 

of enrichment for what remains is 3.67 percent, a long way from 

the 90 percent enrichment that would need to occur to achieve a 

weapons-grade or fissile material. Centrifuges would be reduced 

from 19,000 to a little over 6,100 for 10 years. There would be no 

enrichment at Fordow, and the only centrifuges permitted for use 

would be older, first-generation centrifuges. Plutonium. The Arak 

facility would be reconstituted so it cannot make weapons-grade 

material, and materials that do exist there today would be sent out 

of the country entirely. 

Number four, Iran may try to build a nuclear weapon in secret. 

Mr. Secretary of Energy, I would ask you, through robust monitoring and verification and inspection, the deal would allow inspectors access and to inspect any suspicious site. I heard critics of this 

plan say that, well, that is like, because of this 24-day period, it 

is like a police officer calling a drug dealer to say that we are going 

to raid your apartment in 24 days so that they can clear all the 

evidence. 

Would you speak to this within the context of physics and talk 

about the half life of both uranium and plutonium? 

Secretary MONIZ. I will start with the last question then, if I 

may. Well, first of all, technically on the half life, the half life of 

the dominant uranium isotope is roughly the age of the Earth, 

which is why it still exists in the Earth. And that of uranium 235, 

which is the isotope that you would want to enrich for a nuclear 

weapon, is somewhat shorter and therefore is more rare in nature. 

However, first of all, the analogy to putting the drugs down the 

toilet is not very applicable to the use of nuclear materials. And as 

I have said, in the both unclassified and classified regimes, we 

have extraordinarily sensitive ways of finding miniscule amounts 

that are left over from using nuclear materials, whether it is enrichment or whether it is in an explosive environment to understand this nuclear weapons behavior. So on that we are very, very 

clear. 

And in addition, we have other constraints on them, some of 

them forever, in terms of other parts of weaponization, like neutron 

sources, where we also would have some interesting signatures 

should there be suspicious activity. 

46

Mr. HIGGINS. Secretary Lew, you had dealt with the issue of the 

projected amount of money that would be available to Iran once the 

sanctions are lifted. My understanding is that most of that money 

is Iranian money in foreign accounts, frozen in foreign accounts. In 

that Iran’s currency has lost about half its value over the past 3 

years, was that factored into your estimate about the amount of 

money which will be available to Iran once it comes back to them? 

Secretary LEW. Congressman, I was addressing the specific issue 

of their reserves that are tied up overseas because of sanctions. 

We have done enormous damage to their economy. It will take 

them years to get back to where they would have been if sanctions 

had not been put in place, even if they got that money back. So 

they are not looking at breaking out into a period of great growth. 

And I think the challenge here is we have a pretty good understanding of what the pressures in Iran are right now. We can’t 

know with certainty what decisions they will make. We know that, 

for example, just to get their oil fields up and running properly 

would require an investment of $100 billion to $200 billion. 

So I can’t tell you how much of the $50 billion they will apply 

to their oil fields, but you have to assume that one of the things 

they are going to want to do is get their economy moving. So that 

money will quickly be used for a lot of purposes. 

I wish I could say that zero, not a nickle, would not go to malign 

purposes. But even with the current sanctions regime, they are 

finding the money to put into malign purposes. The question is, do 

they do it with or without a nuclear weapon? 

Chairman ROYCE. Mike McCaul of Texas. 

Mr. MCCAUL. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Secretary Kerry, the countries that know Iran the best fear this 

agreement the most. And the reasons why are for the following reasons: It lacks the necessary verification measures to ensure Iran 

does not cheat. It lifts the restrictions on Iran’s intercontinental 

ballistic missiles, which the Ayatollah himself said they will massproduce. 

The international sanctions on Iran’s Revolution Guard Corps, its 

terror arm, will be relieved, and the European sanctions. This still 

could also, in my judgment, spark a nuclear arms race in the Middle East, as the Saudis told me when I recently visited there. 

And, as chairman of the Homeland Security Committee, what 

concerns me the most is this deal frees up hundreds of billions of 

dollars to the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism. Susan 

Rice, the President’s National Security Advisor, said,

‘‘We should expect that some portion of that money will go to 

the Iranian military and could potentially be used for the kinds 

of bad behavior that we have seen in the region.’’

And now you are asking this Congress to endorse an agreement 

that the President’s own National Security Advisor admits will 

spread terror in the region. 

Finally, Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister confirmed,

‘‘We will provide weapons to whomever and whenever we consider appropriate, and we will buy weapons from wherever we 

can.’’

47

Chairman Royce and I sent a letter, sir, to you and the President 

of the United States, asking you to first submit this deal for consideration by the American people through their representatives, first, 

before this deal was submitted to the United Nations. But, instead, 

you went around the Congress and the American people, submitted 

this to the United Nations, and then China, Russia, and Venezuela 

got a chance to vote on this and approved this agreement before 

we have had a chance to deliberate. 

My question is this: If the Congress overrides the President’s 

veto, what effect would that have on this deal? In other words, 

would it kill the deal? 

Secretary KERRY. Yes. We have said that many times. 

But let me come back to your earlier comment——

Mr. MCCAUL. But this is a very important point. Will the U.N. 

and EU sanctions be lifted and that will relieve Iran of these burdens, or would it—if we override the President’s veto, would it collapse the entire international deal? 

Secretary KERRY. The sanctions rely on the international community’s participation to be able to enforce them. Our sanctions alone 

did not do the job alone. It wasn’t until we went out and worked 

with other countries diligently—China, for instance, in order to 

persuade them not to buy X amount of oil; countries in the Middle 

East, to not be trading underneath the table or otherwise. There 

were a lot of different things necessary to make these sanctions 

work. 

If the United States unilaterally, through congressional decision, 

pulls away from this deal, they are not going to continue to apply 

those sanctions. They have no reason to. They are gone. They have 

already said they are gone. 

And, with respect to Saudi Arabia, there was an AP article the 

other day when Ash Carter visited Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia’s 

Foreign Minister said Iran’s nuclear deal appears to have the provisions needed to curtail Iran’s ability to obtain a nuclear weapon, 

and——

Mr. MCCAUL. Well, my time is limited. I have heard otherwise 

from the Saudis. But let me just—that is very important for us——

Secretary KERRY. Well, that is a very public comment——

Mr. MCCAUL. For us in the Congress to understand that if we 

override the President’s veto it will stop this entire agreement, I 

think that is important for us, as Members of Congress, to know. 

Secretary KERRY. But what I am hearing here is that——

Mr. MCCAUL. I have one more question. It has been debated by 

Secretary Lew and yourself that you did not approve the delisting 

of the Quds Force commander, the Iranian terror arm, from the 

European sanctions list. I am looking at the agreement right here. 

They are taken off the list, the European list, which is an agreement that was approved by you. 

The Quds Force, they killed Americans in Iraq and Afghanistan. 

What do I tell my Gold Star Mothers back home, whose children 

were killed by these Iranian forces, and tell them that this agreement will take them off the list? 

Secretary KERRY. Tell them that the United States of America 

will continue to keep the sanctions on him, specifically. He remains 

48

designated by our country, and we will not ever lift them and that 

that the United States will be pushing back on them. 

But, look, here is what I am hearing——

Mr. MCCAUL. My final question is this, too. 

Secretary KERRY. Let me——

Mr. MCCAUL. This secret deal between the IAEA and Iran——

Secretary KERRY. There is no secret deal. 

Mr. MCCAUL [continuing]. We have never seen this. Are you 

going to present that to the Congress? 

Secretary KERRY. There is no secret deal. There is an agreement, 

which is the normal process of the IAEA, where they negotiate a 

confidential agreement, as they do with all countries, between 

them and the country. And that exists. We have briefed on it, we 

know it exists——

Mr. MCCAUL. Are you going to present that to the Congress, sir? 

Secretary KERRY. We don’t have it. It is not in our possession. 

Mr. MCCAUL. Have you seen it? 

Secretary KERRY. We have been briefed on it. I have not personally seen it. 

But can I just say something?You know, we hear these complaints. We hear, well, this agreement doesn’t do this, it doesn’t 

stop their terror, this agreement is going to give them some money, 

this agreement is going to do this. What this agreement is supposed to do is stop them from having a nuclear weapon. Now, I 

want to hear somebody tell me how they are going to do that——

Chairman ROYCE. We are going to go to——

Secretary KERRY [continuing]. Without this agreement. I would 

like to know——

Chairman ROYCE. Mr. Secretary——

Secretary KERRY [continuing]. How you are——

Chairman ROYCE. We are going to go to Mr. William Keating of 

Massachusetts. 

The gentleman’s time has expired. 

Secretary KERRY. They have an ability to go enrich again. What 

is the next step for the United States? Nobody is answering that 

question. 

Chairman ROYCE. Mr. Keating. 

Mr. KEATING. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I thank our witnesses for being here and their hard work. 

Three threads I am going to throw out there, and one of them—

there have been reports in the media that have surfaced that 

among our European partners in this there was reluctance. And 

those reports centered on France, in particular. 

I am curious—and you can answer all three at the end—I am curious what issues that you can detail that they might have had 

qualms about, issues that weren’t addressed. And I wanted you to 

comment on those reports. 

Number two, if you could generally comment about the cooperative actions of North Korea and Iran and how this might be impacted. 

Number three, we have had witnesses before on this issue, and 

they really were forceful, including Ambassador Burns, they were 

forceful in saying it is important that we send a strong military 

message, should any agreement go forward. 

49

And when it comes to, you know, sales and transfer of arms and 

other things—you began to speak to this, and I want to give you 

the time to address what military options, what are our strongest 

options that we still have as a country and how we can act on this. 

And I am going to give all three of you the remainder of my time 

so that you can answer some questions. And I won’t be interrupting 

you. 

Secretary KERRY. Well, thank you, Congressman. 

Let me just say very quickly, because I want my colleagues to 

have a chance to catch up here, but on the European partners, 

France, in the final comments, when they signed on to the agreement, it was Bastille Day, July 14, and the Foreign Minister said 

that he thought this agreement was not only a strong agreement 

but he hoped it would be remembered in the same way, as having 

a positive impact for the world, the way Bastille Day was remembered as having the impact for the development of France. And 

they supported this agreement and voted for it. 

With respect to North Korea and Iran, this is a very different 

agreement from anything that ever existed with North Korea. 

There are about seven or eight different major differences between 

the North Korea agreement, not the least of which is North Korea 

pulled out of the NPT. And North Korea had already exploded a 

nuclear weapon, and Iran has not. There are many differences, and 

I would rather lay them out on the record, if we can. But this covers all possible nuclear-related activities. The agreement with 

North Korea did not. And we also have consent to the process of 

inspections. North Korea—I mean, there are a whole series of 

things. 

Finally, on the military option, I have said it again and again, 

everybody has, Ash Carter has reiterated it: President Obama is 

the only President who has actually commissioned the development 

of a weapon that can do what is necessary to deal with the facilities that are at risk. And he has not only commissioned its design, 

he has deployed it. 

And he has made it clear that Iran will not get a weapon, and 

he is prepared to use any option necessary in order to achieve that. 

But his preferred option is the one he is pursuing here, which is 

a diplomatic solution and which resolves this issue in a way that 

avoids the conflict that some people seem to be not even addressing, which would be almost inevitable as a consequence of not accepting this deal. 

Ernie? 

Secretary MONIZ. Well, in terms of the first question about the 

dynamics with the EU or the other partners in general, first of all, 

on the nuclear dimension side, I should emphasize that I have 

talked about our team, but every one of the six countries had technical experts involved. And they had very robust discussions. We 

did not share our own classified calculations but made sure we 

were coming out in the same place. And, to be honest, in many 

areas, we pushed the envelope; in some areas, they pushed the envelope. 

And the good news is I think we all came out of this very satisfied that the technical dimensions accomplished the job of blocking 

nuclear-weapons pathways. There are some specific examples one 

50

could give, in terms of additional infrastructure removal from centrifuge places in both Natanz and Fordow, in terms of 20-percent 

uranium issues. But these were very robust, and I think all six 

countries feel very, very confident in our conclusions. 

Secretary LEW. Congressman, I think that, on the sanctions side, 

we have very different systems here in the United States than the 

EU. And the questions that we are getting on IRGC kind of underscore the fact that we need to look at our system and their system 

and understand that they are different. 

They are not delisting the IRGC for terrorist activities. If they 

do, at the end of phase 2, delist for nuclear, the terrorist sanctions 

still stays in place. So I think people looking at the document ought 

to understand what is actually going to be in place after it is in 

effect. And I think cooperation with the Europeans on this requires 

that we not distort what they are doing. They are not taking the 

IRGC off of their terrorist list. 

Chairman ROYCE. Judge Ted Poe of Texas. 

Mr. POE. Thank you, gentlemen. 

I have received numerous questions from people in Texas, and I 

will submit those for the record. They are pretty simple questions, 

but I will submit those for you to answer. 

Secretary Kerry, this question is for you. Following up on Chairman McCaul’s comments about the secret deal, Secretary Rice said 

that she has seen this deal with the IAEA and that it will be 

shared with Congress. So if she has seen it, have you seen it? 

Secretary KERRY. I don’t believe that Susan Rice, the National 

Security Advisor, has seen it. I think she——

Mr. POE. She said she did 6 days ago. She said 6 days ago she 

seen it and reviewed it——

Secretary KERRY. Well, I don’t know that she——

Mr. POE [continuing]. And that Congress will get to see it in a 

classified session. My question is, have you seen it? 

Secretary KERRY. No, I haven’t seen it. I have been briefed on 

it, and——

Mr. POE. But you haven’t read it. You haven’t seen it. 

Secretary KERRY. No. 

Mr. POE. Let me ask you this——

Secretary KERRY. We don’t discuss it. It is in the possession of 

the IAEA. 

Mr. POE. [continuing]. Are you going to read it? 

Secretary KERRY. We don’t have access to the actual agreement. 

Or, at least, I don’t. 

Mr. POE. But Secretary Rice has access to it, but you don’t have 

access to it. 

Secretary KERRY. I don’t know about that. 

Mr. POE. Well, that is just what she said. I am just going on 

what she said. 

Is the policy of the United States still that Iran will never have 

nuclear weapons? 

Secretary KERRY. Yes. 

Mr. POE. Is it the policy of the Ayatollah, if you can answer for 

him, that Iran wants to destroy the United States? Is that still 

their policy, as far as you know? 

51

Secretary KERRY. I don’t believe they have said that. I think they 

have said ‘‘Death to America’’ in their chants, but I have not seen 

a specific——

Mr. POE. Well, I kind of take that to mean that they want us 

dead. That would seem like that would be their policy. He has said 

that. 

You don’t think that is their policy? I am not mincing words. Do 

you think it is their policy to destroy us? 

Secretary KERRY. I think they have a policy of opposition to us 

and of great enmity. But I have no specific knowledge of a plan by 

Iran to actually destroy us. 

I do know that the rhetoric is beyond objectionable. I know that 

we, you know, are deeply concerned with Iran’s behavior in the region, deeply concerned with their past activities, which is why 

President Obama felt——

Mr. POE. Reclaiming my time. I got your answer. I am going to 

ask another question. 

Secretary KERRY [continuing]. That it is——

Mr. POE. I am reclaiming my time, Senator. Thank you—Secretary. 

We have heard a lot of comments about——

Secretary KERRY. But if they did want to destroy us, they would 

have a much better shot of doing it if they had a nuclear weapon. 

Mr. POE. But you don’t know if it is their policy or not. That is 

the question, and that is your answer. 

Next question: Is it our policy or belief that, after the deal, 

whether the deal is approved or not, do we have a policy in the 

United States that we want, expect, desire a regime change by the 

people of Iran to have their own say, free elections? Weigh in on 

our policy toward a regime change in Iran. 

Secretary KERRY. Well, as you know, Congressman, President 

Obama was very outspoken with respect to support for transformation in Iran around the time of the elections. 

Our policy today is specifically focused on pushing back on their 

activities within the region that destabilize the region, threaten 

Israel, threaten our friends and allies. And that is specifically 

where we are gearing up to take a specific set of steps that will 

define a new security alliance for the region. 

Mr. POE. Okay. So we want to push back. We want them to stop 

their naughty ways. But regime change—I mean, I personally 

think the best hope for the world for safety, including in Iran, is 

for the people of Iran to have free elections and to let the people 

of Iran really decide who their government should be in a free setting. 

Let me ask you another question, Secretary Moniz. This might 

be my last question. If I understand the agreement, the oil sanctions, which is prohibiting Iran from exporting oil, that is going to 

be lifted. Is that correct? 

Secretary MONIZ. Well, if sanctions are relieved, that would be 

among those relieved, correct. 

Mr. POE. Under this deal, that is one of the ones that will be relieved. 

Secretary MONIZ. If the sanctions are relieved, yes, and then——

Mr. POE. Okay. 

52

Secretary MONIZ [continuing]. Then oil export. 

Mr. POE. Now, being the Secretary of Energy, let me ask you 

this: Why is the United States lifting the sanctions on the exporting of oil on Iran, but we are not lifting the sanctions on America 

exporting crude oil, like Texas sweet crude? 

Secretary MONIZ. We don’t have sanctions on oil exports. We 

have a congressional law that in the 1970s restricted exports. 

Mr. POE. But do you support——

Secretary MONIZ. Secondly——

Mr. POE. Do you support that law being changed? 

Secretary MONIZ. Secondly——

Mr. POE. Do you support that law being changed? 

Secretary MONIZ. Secondly——

Mr. POE.You know that is the question. Do you support the law 

being changed? 

Chairman ROYCE. The gentleman’s time has expired, and we can 

get that for the record. 

Mr. POE. Okay. I will put that in writing. Thank you. 

Secretary KERRY. Mr. Chairman, point of——

Chairman ROYCE. We need to go to David Cicilline of Rhode Island. 

Secretary KERRY. Mr. Chairman, just a point of personal privilege here. 

I wanted to make sure that we knew what we were talking about 

and the record properly reflects this. Susan Rice’s quote is:

‘‘We know their contents, and we are satisfied with them. We 

will share the contents of those briefings in full and classified 

sessions with Congress.’’

She has not seen them. She has been briefed on them. 

Mr. POE. And that question——

Chairman ROYCE. And we will, of course—reclaiming my time, 

we are still looking forward to that briefing. 

But now we must go to David Cicilline of Rhode Island. 

Mr. CICILLINE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Thank you to the witnesses not only for being here today but for 

the ongoing conversations. 

And I want to particularly thank the administration for really 

making sure that Members have all the information that we need 

as we navigate through a very sober decisionmaking process with 

enormous consequences. 

And I thank all three of the Secretaries for their service. 

I have a series of questions that I am not asking to support a 

conclusion that I have already made but actually to help me in arriving at the right conclusion. So I would like to set forth the questions, recognizing you can answer some, and, on the others, if you 

would submit in writing, I would appreciate it. 

The first is on Parchin. The agreement says that the IAEA will 

provide progress reports by October 15 and then the final assessment by December 15. We know, obviously, that this is a site 

where there was nuclear testing of some kind. 

My first question is, is it at all concerning that this final conclusion, or the set of final conclusions, might inform in a substantive 

way whether we should go forward? And is there any concern that 

53

there will be something revealed in this report that would impact 

whether or not Iran is in compliance from the outset? 

That is the first question. Because we will be asked to vote on 

and the first round of sanctions relief will be provided before, obviously, that December 15 date. 

My second question is, it has been argued that we are in the 

same position in 15 years, with no options off the table, except 

some have argued the economy of Iran will be fortified, that they 

will be able to withstand sanctions in an enhanced way, and that 

the ability to reassemble this international coalition will be very 

difficult as countries will be doing business and reengaging with 

Iran. 

Do you agree with that assessment? And do you just conclude 

that that is a sensible tradeoff, as some have suggested? 

Third, you concluded, Mr. Secretary, that this agreement makes 

the world, our allies, including Israel, and the region safer. And I 

have no doubt that you have concluded that that is correct based 

on your best assessment. If you would just provide for us, kind of, 

some thinking of why it is that the current Israeli leadership does 

not see it that way, you know, as they, obviously, sort of, have 

come to a different conclusion. Why do you think that is? 

Four, after 15 years, Iran, most have suggested, is a nuclear 

threshold state but that they must negotiate comprehensive safeguards again with the IAEA, whether or not, I know there has 

been some discussion, have you seen those. But do we have some 

ability to influence what that agreement is? Do we have any ability 

to influence its content or to monitor their compliance going forward—that is, between Iran and the IAEA? 

Fifth, what is the likelihood of an international consensus remaining if the deal is rejected? What happens if the deal is rejected? 

Some have suggested, actually, some top-level Israeli officials 

have suggested Iran will comply with the terms of the agreement, 

will get relief from our other partners, and the U.S. will be isolated. Others have suggested that Iran will rush toward the development of a nuclear weapon with no constraints. 

Is there any reason to believe that Iran would comply with the 

terms of the deal if it is rejected, as some have suggested, and not 

proceed quickly to a nuclear weapon? 

Sixth, if weapons are transferred to Hezbollah during the 5-year 

period, which is a violation of the U.N. resolution but also a violation of the Interim Agreement, would that constitute a violation 

and cause snapback in these intervening 5 years, if arms are sold 

to Hezbollah? 

And, finally, what will happen to the U.N. Security Resolution, 

specifically the lifting of the arms embargo and the ICBM provisions, if Congress does not approve the agreement? Do those remain intact? 

And the last question, Secretary Lew, is for you. The JCPOA describes a process in which noncompliance with the agreement 

might result in sanctions snapping back at the U.N., but this process will likely only work in the case of major violations of the 

agreement. How will the administration treat minor violations? 

54

And I would invite you to—maybe we will start with you, Secretary Lew. But the ones that you obviously can’t get to, I would 

very much appreciate your answers. And thank you for the work 

that you have done, gentlemen. 

Secretary LEW. Well, thanks, Congressman. I will start with the 

snapback question. 

We have reserved the right to snap back in whole or in part. Obviously, if there is some small technical violation, that will not 

bring back the whole sanctions regime. 

I think that the goal would be to get them back into compliance. 

If there is a need to make it clear that violations that are small 

will get a response, we have the option of putting some of the 

smaller sanctions back into place. 

If there is a major violation, we have the option of putting in 

force all of our unilateral sanctions and ultimately going back to 

the U.N. for the international sanctions, as well. We have all the 

authority we need to do that. 

Chairman ROYCE. Matt Salmon of Arizona. 

Mr. SALMON. Thank you. 

Mr. Secretary, you have said no country would accept anytime, 

anywhere inspections. But I would submit that Iran is not a normal country. In fact, Iran is a terrorist state under heavy international sanctions. It neither is the moral nor the geopolitical equal 

of the United States or our negotiating partners, and I think we 

have to stop treating it like one. It aspires to be a regional power. 

The U.S. right now is the only world superpower. And my question: Is this really the best deal that we could get, given the fact 

that we seem to have most of the cards and we have had most of 

the cards since these sanctions were imposed? 

Secretary Moniz, you say the deal includes anytime, anywhere, 

in the sense of a well-defined process and a well-defined end date. 

But all of that depends on Iran acting in good faith. We shouldn’t 

make that assumption, because Iran has been stonewalling the 

IAEA on the military dimensions while claiming to cooperate for 

years. They are doing that as we speak. 

First, the process is not just 24 days. If Iran balks, it is a minimum of 24 days. Before the clock even starts, the IAEA has to tell 

Iran its concerns about a particular site, and Iran then is supposed 

to provide an explanation. But there is no time limit. Does anyone 

believe that Iran will respond immediately or the back-and-forth 

discussions or negotiations won’t take place? 

Only after these delays and the high barriers are taken care of, 

at best maybe, can the IAEA make a formal request and start the 

24-day clock. But at the end of the 24 days, there is no punishment 

if Iran says no. Instead, the matter goes to the dispute resolution 

mechanism, which has lots of opportunity for delay and more barriers. 

Does anybody believe that the P5+1, not this administration and 

certainly not the Europeans, will derail the entire agreement by 

imposing sanctions and restarting Iran’s nuclear program just because Iran is denying access to one sensitive site? 

More likely, there will be overwhelming pressure for a compromise, one that is no more substantive than what is in the final 

55

agreement. Kicking the can down the road is always one option. It 

has worked in Iran for years. 

I think all of this led CIA former Director Michael Hayden to 

warn in front of this committee that the deal has taken inspections 

from the technical level and put it at the political level. And I just 

think that is a formula for chaos, obfuscation, ambiguity, and 

doubt. 

My question, besides the fact that I think that, on the 24 days, 

we are kidding ourselves if we think that the 24 days is the total 

length of the deal—I think that it could be much, much longer. And 

I would like to know how, ultimately, we are going to deal once we 

do find infractions. 

My second question is, of all the sanctions to be lifted in the Iran 

nuclear agreement, few are more significant than those against a 

shadowy $100 billion network of foundations belonging to the Islamic Republic’s Supreme Leader, Ali Khamenei. 

The U.S. delisting the headquarters for the Execution of Imam 

Khomeini’s Order, also known as EIKO, will pump tens of billions 

of dollars into the Supreme Leader’s personal coffers, helping him 

secure his grip on the Iranian people and bolstering Iran’s ability 

to promote its agenda abroad. In fact, it is estimated he will gain 

access to as much as $95 billion. 

The U.S. Treasury designated EIKO and 37 subsidiaries in June 

2013, noting its purpose is to generate and control massive off-thebooks investments, shielded from the view of the Iranian people 

and international regulators. 

Secretary Kerry, please explain why EIKO will be de-designated. 

Secretary KERRY. Well, Congressman, I am going to turn to 

Ernie for the first part of that because it is important to understand these 24 days. You are, I say respectfully, misreading how 

the 24 days—by the way, the 24 days is an outside period of time. 

It could be less than that. It is very possible it could be in 18 days 

or something. 

But, Ernie, why don’t you discuss that. 

Secretary MONIZ. Well, first, you started out with this question 

of Iran being unique in terms of verification. That is exactly why 

we have a verification system in this agreement that is unparalleled. This goes beyond what anyone else has accepted exactly because of the distrust of Iran built up from previous behavior. 

With regard to the 24 days, first of all, the IAEA can cut that 

off anytime by declaring their request for access, and then the 24-

day clock runs. It is not the beginning of dispute resolution; it is 

the end of dispute resolution. And, in fact, at that point, they are 

in material breach. 

Now, you asked about, would there be a response if it was ‘‘only 

one site’’? Well, I want to turn it over now to my colleagues, but 

I want to emphasize that, in the snapback, it says ‘‘in whole or in 

part.’’ So a graded response is possible. 

Chairman ROYCE. We are going to go to Mr. Alan Grayson of 

Florida. 

Mr. GRAYSON. Mr. Secretary, I have 5 minutes. I have 10 short 

questions. I am hoping for 10 short answers. 

Will implementation of the agreement increase Iran’s support for 

terrorism? 

56

Secretary KERRY. You want these sequentially? 

Mr. GRAYSON. Yes. 

Secretary KERRY. We have no way to know. I presume in some 

places, possibly. Only in the sense that they are committed to certain things that we interpret as terrorism, they don’t, and we are 

going to continue to conflict on those issues. 

Mr. GRAYSON. All right. 

If the agreement is implemented, will Iran, in fact, allow inspections at all of its military sites? 

Secretary KERRY. Well, they have to. If they don’t, they are in 

material breach of the agreement, and we will snap back the sanctions or take other action if necessary. 

Mr. GRAYSON. If the agreement is implemented, do you suspect 

or do you think that there is a significant risk that Iran will cheat 

on the agreement and develop a nuclear weapon secretly? 

Secretary KERRY. I don’t think they are able to develop a nuclear 

weapon secretly because our intelligence community tells us, with 

the regime that we have established here, it is physically impossible for them to create an entirely covert secondary fuel cycle. 

And we have a sufficient, intrusive inspection mechanism and capacity on their fuel cycle that they can’t do it. You can’t make a 

bomb at 3.67-percent enrichment for 15 years. You can’t make a 

bomb with 300 kilograms of the stockpile for 15 years. 

You can’t make a bomb if you can’t go enrich and move forward 

without our knowing it. And we have submitted and we believe 

with clarity that we will know what they are doing before they can 

do that. 

Mr. GRAYSON. If an agreement is implemented, is there a significant risk that Iran will adhere to it for a year, let’s say, then pocket the $50 billion and then violate the agreement and go ahead and 

build a bomb? 

Secretary KERRY. Again, they can’t do that, because the red flags 

that would go off, the bells and whistles that would start chiming 

as a result of any movement away from what they have to do. 

They have to live for 15 years under this extraordinary constraint of a limitation on the number of centrifuges that can spin; 

on a limitation in their R&D; on 24/7 inspections; on day-to-day accountability, with live television, with respect to their centrifuge 

production; and so forth. So it is not possible for them during that 

period, in 1 year, 2 years, 5 years, to sort of make this decision and 

stiff us. 

And if they did in some way, if they just radically said, you 

know, we are going to change this whole deal and we are breaking 

out of here, then we have snapback of all the sanctions with the 

full support of the international community, which would then be 

absolutely in agreement that they have to do it. And we have the 

military option if that was necessary. 

Mr. GRAYSON. But, briefly, to follow up, isn’t it true in that scenario that they would then have $50 billion in their pocket that 

they wouldn’t otherwise have? 

Secretary KERRY. No. I doubt that after 1 or 2 years they would. 

They would have investments in their economy, and they would be 

moving, but, I mean, you have to look at this in the real world. 

57

Here they are, trying to attract investment from France, Germany, China, Russia, Britain, all kinds of countries. Is it your presumption that a country that has destroyed its stockpile, reduced 

its centrifuges by two-thirds, put concrete in its calandria, totally 

stripped the ability to do fissile material at Fordow, and is now 

seeking investment and trying to build its economy, with a population of 50 percent of the country under the age of 30, who want 

jobs in the future, is it your presumption that they are just going 

to throw this all to the wind and go create a nuclear weapon after 

saying, ‘‘We will strip our program down,’’ and won’t? I don’t think 

it is going to happen. 

Mr. GRAYSON. What about after 15 years? If the agreement is implemented, is Iran, in fact, likely to build a nuclear weapon after 

15 years, at the end of the deal? 

Secretary KERRY. All I can say to you is that they can’t do it 

without our knowing what they are doing. Because, after 15 years, 

they have to live by the Additional Protocol, they have to live by 

the modified Code 3.1, they have to live with inspectors. One hundred and fifty additional inspectors are going to be going into Iran 

as a consequence of this agreement. And those inspectors are going 

to be given 24/7 access to declared facilities. 

So, if Iran suddenly starts to enrich more, which we will know, 

all the bells and whistles go off. The international community 

would be all over that with questions and restraints. 

Mr. GRAYSON. All right. 

My time is almost up, and I want to ask you this——

Secretary MONIZ. May I just add that this is the agreement that 

codifies a permanent ban on nuclear weapons in Iran, and we have 

to take——

Mr. GRAYSON. Thank you, Mr. Secretary. 

Secretary MONIZ. Okay. 

Mr. GRAYSON. I do want to ask this one additional question. And 

I had four more, but that is the way it goes. 

Tell me exactly what you expect will happen if the agreement is 

rejected. Specifically, there has been some suggestion that Iran will 

adhere to it anyway and that——

Secretary KERRY. Iran can’t adhere to it anyway. 

Mr. GRAYSON [continuing]. Sanctions will remain in place anyway. 

Secretary KERRY. I have heard that. 

Mr. GRAYSON [continuing]. If the agreement is rejected. Explain 

to me what you expect to——

Secretary KERRY. I actually heard that for the first time last 

night when I met with an Israeli friend who suggested that might 

be possible. It is physically impossible. 

Mr. GRAYSON. Explain why, please. 

Secretary KERRY. Well, I will tell you why. Because in the legislation that you have passed, in which you have given yourself the 

ability to vote, you have also put in an inability for the President 

to waive the sanctions. So there will be no waiving of the sanctions. 

So there is no way for the deal to work, because our lifting of 

sanctions is critical to the ability of other countries to invest and 

work and critical, obviously, for Iran to get any money. So nothing 

works for them unless this deal is accepted. 

58

Chairman ROYCE. We have a lot of members who still want to 

ask questions. We need to go to Tom Marino of Pennsylvania. 

Mr. MARINO. Mr. Secretary of State, we all know what Iran has 

done as far as giving weapons to terrorists to do Iran’s dirty work. 

And what will stop Iran from giving nuclear material or even more 

weapons to terrorist organizations? 

And how is a nuclear Iran going to make the world and the 

United States a safer place? And, more particular, how is a nuclear 

Iran going to make American citizens feel safer? 

Secretary KERRY. Well, the opposite of your question is to suggest that somehow you or we can prevent them from having any 

nuclear program at all. 

Mr. MARINO. Okay. 

Secretary KERRY. Now, you all have a responsibility to show us 

how that is going to happen. 

Mr. MARINO. I am going to show you how that is going to happen. 

Secretary KERRY. President George Bush——

Mr. MARINO. I am going to show you right now how that is 

going——

Secretary KERRY. President George Bush——

Mr. MARINO [continuing]. To happen, Mr. Secretary. You have 

answered my question. I am going to show you how that is going 

to happen. 

I am going to take Secretary Lew’s words. The sanctions have 

crippled Iran. If we ratchet them up and get our allies to ratchet 

those sanctions up, you can bring Iran to its knees, where it cannot 

financially function. That is how to do it, because it——

Secretary KERRY. Congressman, let me——

Mr. MARINO [continuing]. Is proved that it has been done. 

Secretary KERRY. Congressman, let me just tell you——

Mr. MARINO. Please. 

Secretary KERRY [continuing]. I suggest—I really suggest, very 

respectfully, that you go spend some time with the intel community. Ask the people who have spent a lifetime following Iran very 

closely whether or not they agree with your judgment that an increase in sanctions will, in fact, bring Iran to its knees. They do 

not. They do not believe there is a capitulation theory here. 

And you will not sanction Iran out of its commitment to what it 

has a right to. Iran is an NPT country. There are 189 of them——

Mr. MARINO. And we have a right to protect the American citizens from this disaster of this country having nuclear power. 

Secretary KERRY. That is exactly—Congressman——

Mr. MARINO. Sanctions have worked. Are you going to retract 

these——

Secretary KERRY. Congressman——

Mr. MARINO [continuing]. Statements made by Secretary Lew 

and anyone else that says it has crippled them, it will take years 

for them to get servicing again? 

Secretary LEW. Congressman, if you are going to quote me, let 

me speak for myself. 

Mr. MARINO. No. I quoted exactly what——

Secretary LEW. No. 

Mr. MARINO [continuing]. You said. 

59

Secretary LEW. No. 

Mr. MARINO. Yeah, it——

Secretary LEW. Congressman——

Mr. MARINO [continuing]. Crippled Iran, and it will take them 

years to recover. 

So if we upped——

Secretary LEW. But the other part of what I said, Congressman, 

is that the reason it was crippling is that we had international cooperation. 

We have worked very hard to get that international cooperation. 

The parties that we worked with reached an agreement here. If we 

walk away from it——

Mr. MARINO. Look who we worked with. We worked with China, 

and we worked with Russia, the people who want Iran to be in that 

position because it jeopardizes the United States. 

Secretary LEW. But, Congressman, the power of our sanctions is 

not going to have the effect——

Mr. MARINO. I disagree with you. 

Secretary LEW [continuing]. You want or that we want. 

Mr. MARINO. Economists disagree with you. Individuals that I 

have read article after article on disagree with you. 

Secretary KERRY. But, Congressman, as we have said again and 

again, and I want to repeat it now, we are absolutely committed 

that Iran will never get the material for one bomb—not for one 

bomb. 

Mr. MARINO. Okay, but you didn’t answer my original question, 

Mr. Secretary. My original question is, how is that going to make 

the United States citizens safer? 

Secretary KERRY. Let me tell you. I will tell you exactly how it 

makes United States citizens safer. Because if Iran fully implements the agreement that we have come to, Iran will not be able 

to make a nuclear weapon. 

And we have created an agreement which has sufficient level of 

intrusive inspection and verification that we are confident in our 

ability to be able to deliver on preventing them from having enough 

fissile material for the one bomb. 

Now, mind you, we started in a place where they already had 

enough fissile material for 10 to 12 bombs. We have already rolled 

that back, and that made America safer. By the way, it also made 

Israel and our friends and allies in the region safer. Everything 

that we have done thus far in the Interim Agreement, which has 

been in force for 2 years, has made the world safer. 

Mr. MARINO. Okay, sir, I am going to reclaim my time——

Secretary KERRY. But the alternative——

Mr. MARINO [continuing]. Because you are repeating——

Secretary KERRY. No, I am——

Mr. MARINO [continuing]. Statements that you have made. I understand, but I have 40 seconds left. 

Secretary KERRY. If you kill this deal——

Mr. MARINO. I hope that you are right. 

Secretary KERRY [continuing]. That is not making Americans 

safer. 

60

Mr. MARINO. I hope you are right. Because, if not, you, the executive branch, and Congress is going to have a disaster on our hands. 

And we need to be accountable to the American people. 

Thirty-two seconds. I want to ask an important question. Secretary Kerry, this is an extremely important topic for the future of 

this country’s security and the safety of the American people as 

well as our allies in the Middle East. 

I first want to ask you a simple yes-or-no question. In accordance 

with the Office of Management and Budget as well as the National 

Archives and Records Administration directives, along with State 

Department policy, have you ever used a nongovernment and personal email account to conduct official business? 

Secretary KERRY. No. I conduct my business on a government account. 

Chairman ROYCE. We need to go to Dr. Ami Bera of California. 

Mr. BERA. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

And I want to thank the witnesses. 

I am going to go through a series of questions as I try to make 

my decision with regards to this deal. 

Secretary Kerry, multiple times you have said this negotiation 

had one objective, to make sure they cannot get a nuclear weapon. 

Secretary Moniz, you are the expert here. In your opinion, do you 

believe this deal makes it less likely within the next decade, next 

15 years, over a lifetime, for Iran to obtain a nuclear weapon? 

Secretary MONIZ. Far less likely. 

Mr. BERA. Okay. Great. 

I don’t trust Iran. Secretary Kerry, you have said multiple times 

there is nothing in this agreement that is based on trust. 

Secretary Lew, you have said there will be no immediate sanctions relief. Is that an accurate statement? 

Secretary LEW. Sanctions relief will only come after Iran complies with all the measures to stop their nuclear program. 

Mr. BERA. And, in your estimation, is there enough in the 

verification regime in this deal that will allow us to——

Secretary LEW. I would defer to Secretary Moniz, but I have been 

persuaded by everything I have read and seen that it is the toughest verification regime we have ever had. 

Mr. BERA. Is that correct? 

Secretary MONIZ. Yes. 

Mr. BERA. And, Secretary Lew, there is no signing bonus. 

Secretary LEW. There is no signing bonus. 

Mr. BERA. Okay. Great. 

Moving on, then, Secretary of Defense Ash Carter is not here, 

but I will direct this to Secretary Kerry. 

In your opinion, would you say that Secretary Carter as well as 

our Joint Chiefs are satisfied with the ICBM provision of no missiles for 8 years, as well as the arms embargo for 5 years, as the 

best—that they would be okay with that provision? 

Secretary KERRY. Yes. 

Mr. BERA. Okay. 

Moving on, Secretary Kerry, you have pointed out, in your time 

and history in the Senate, you were a very strong defender of Israel 

and had a strong record of support of Israel. In your opinion, do 

you believe this deal makes Israel safer or less safe? 

61

Secretary KERRY. I am absolutely convinced beyond any doubt 

this deal makes Israel safer, and the region and the world. 

Mr. BERA. And would you say that President Obama shares that 

opinion? 

Secretary KERRY. Yes. 

Mr. BERA. Okay. 

Secretary Moniz, we have talked a lot about the 24-hour framework. Is it accurate that you believe, as an expert here, that within 

that 24-hour framework we will be able to detect any activities, nuclear activities, et cetera? 

Secretary MONIZ. Well, the 24——

Mr. BERA. I am sorry. Twenty-four days. 

Secretary MONIZ. For the 24-day access to undeclared sites that 

work with nuclear material, I feel quite confident that we can detect, yes. 

Mr. BERA. That there will be no cheating, that we will be able 

to detect it within that 24-day period. 

Secretary MONIZ. I want to emphasize ‘‘work with nuclear materials.’’ Other work, non-nuclear work, might be a little more difficult. 

Mr. BERA. Okay. Great. 

Secretary Lew, if, in fact, you know, there is no nuclear activity 

going on and Iran is complying with the terms of this deal, I do 

have serious reservations that they will continue to fund terror 

groups, fund organizations that destabilize the region. And that is 

worrisome, obviously. 

In your opinion, do you believe that if we acted in a unilateral 

manner to impose new sanctions or reimpose existing sanctions, 

not based on breaking the nuclear deal but based on other activities, that we would be able to impose sanctions strong enough that 

they are felt in Iran? 

Secretary LEW. Congressman, we totally agree that their actions 

on terrorism and regional destabilization are and continue to be an 

area of concern. We have been putting sanctions in place. We have 

reserved the right to put even parties who were delisted on the list 

again if, in fact, they are violating terrorism or regional destabilization provisions. 

I think that we have powerful tools. I think that the world knows 

we mean to use them. And I believe that our credibility in doing 

it has to be for real. It has to be that we are listing people for reasons of terrorism and regional destabilization. 

Mr. BERA. And you feel we have the tools, if we have to do——

Secretary LEW. Yes. 

Mr. BERA [continuing]. This unilaterally, to make it——

Secretary LEW. We definitely have powerful tools. 

Mr. BERA. Okay. Great. 

I will actually yield back the remainder of any time. 

Chairman ROYCE. Thank you. 

We will go to Jeff Duncan of South Carolina. 

Mr. DUNCAN. Thank you. 

Secretary Kerry, there are still three or four Americans in prison 

in Iran. I put their pictures here to remind you of them today. 

62

I understand not using them as pawns in negotiations, but what 

should have happened is they should have been released as a precondition before ever sitting down with Iran for anything. 

And, with that, I will yield to Mr. DeSantis from Florida. 

Mr. DESANTIS. Well, I thank the gentleman from South Carolina. 

Secretary Kerry, for these side agreements between the IAEA 

and Iran, can you at least confirm that one of the agreements is 

about the Parchin military site, the other one is about the possible 

military dimensions of Iran’s nuclear program? 

Secretary KERRY. I believe there is just one basic agreement, 

which contains the approach to the PMD. 

Mr. DESANTIS. So can you confirm that the Congress will not——

Secretary KERRY. I am advised that—I think he has been more 

briefed than I have, but the two appendices, apparently. 

Mr. DESANTIS. Two appendices. And is it your testimony that the 

Congress will not get to review those agreements before voting 

on——

Secretary KERRY. No. Congress will be briefed on the contents of 

those agreements per what we know. 

Mr. DESANTIS. But we will not be given the actual agreements 

to review, correct? 

Secretary KERRY. I don’t believe you will get the actual agreement, Congressman. 

Mr. DESANTIS. The problem with that, though, is that the Iran 

Nuclear Agreement Review Act that the Congress passed and that 

President Obama signed required the executive branch to provide 

Congress with all documents and specifically defined ‘‘all documents’’ to include any side agreements. So the executive branch 

has a binding legal obligation under the Iran Nuclear Review Act 

to provide all documents——

Secretary KERRY. Well, actually, we don’t have a side agreement, 

so we are in compliance. 

Mr. DESANTIS. It doesn’t matter. The agreement——

Secretary KERRY. The IAEA is an independent U.N. agency, and 

it makes an independent agreement under standard procedures 

with——

Mr. DESANTIS. And the Nuclear Review Act, with all due respect, 

applies to any agreement that Iran may have with any other parties, any related agreements, whether entered into or implemented 

prior to the agreement or to be entered into or implemented in the 

future. So if there is an agreement between Iran and the IAEA, 

under the Iran Nuclear Agreement Act, that needs to be provided 

to Congress. 

And so, if you are not in compliance with that act, how has the 

clock even started to run for the 60-day review period? 

Secretary KERRY. Congressman, I am not sure, legally, that the 

Congress of the United States has the power, powerful as it is, to 

be able to dictate to the IAEA a change in its procedures. 

Mr. DESANTIS. That is not what we are doing. We passed a bill; 

the President signed it. 

Secretary KERRY. We don’t have——

Mr. DESANTIS. It lays out the conditions before we would then 

have——

63

Secretary KERRY. We don’t have the agreement. We don’t have 

the agreement. 

Mr. DESANTIS. You are not going to request the agreement and 

bring it so that we can review it? 

Secretary KERRY. Congressman, we don’t possess the agreement. 

Secretary MONIZ. These are protocols worked out to satisfy the 

IAEA-Iran agreement on resolving the PMD——

Mr. DESANTIS. Which are very important issues, because we 

need to know the PMD, we need to know more about Parchin. We 

want to be able to evaluate the efficacy of the agreement that you 

guys have negotiated. 

Secretary MONIZ. The IAEA will then be providing its report on 

December the 15th, which summarizes all that they have found. 

Mr. DESANTIS. Which is after the window that Congress has to 

review the agreement, so we are not going to be privy to that information, and we are going to be asked to cast a vote on this. 

Let me ask you this, Secretary Kerry. You had alluded to in previous questioning about the ability that if Iran cheats we can snap 

back the sanctions. The problem, though, that I see is that, in the 

agreement itself, it says, 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 the JCPOA in whole or in part. 

So if you have a situation where Iran is doing incremental cheating and then there is a movement to then have the sanctions reimposed, if you do that, Iran is saying, well, okay, it is going to walk 

away from its commitments. 

And so, for me, it is structured in a way to allow Iran to get 

away with small violations, because the cost of going to actually 

impose the sanctions would be to blow up the deal that you guys 

have spent so much time negotiating. 

Secretary KERRY. Congressman, with all respect, that is a misread of the paragraph and a misread of what we have here. 

The paragraph was requested by Iran because they were afraid 

because Congress kept rattling its sabre about more sanctions. And 

so they said, well, what guarantee do we have, if we agree to this, 

that Congress isn’t going to pass more sanctions on the same 

thing—or, excuse me, not ‘‘more’’—just take the sanctions they had 

and bring them back after we made an agreement? 

So that paragraph merely says that we are not going to—we 

agree that we are not just going to reimpose the same sanctions 

and put them back. It does not, as Secretary Lew has said, prevent 

us from bringing any other additional or appropriate sanctions for 

other things. 

And the sanctions language also says ‘‘in whole or in part.’’ So 

we are allowed, for any minor infraction—we are not facing this 

draconian choice of bringing the whole thing and risking the whole 

deal. We could bring a small amount. 

Also, remember, the reason Iran is coming to the table to make 

this agreement is they want the relief from the sanctions. And if, 

indeed, they were in flagrant violation, all of our friends who 

helped negotiate this are going to be standing with us, all in agreement that we have to put the sanctions back. And that is what——

Chairman ROYCE. We must go to Grace Meng of New York. 

Secretary KERRY [continuing]. Generates the behavior from Iran. 

64

Chairman ROYCE. Grace. 

Ms. MENG. Thank you to all of you for being here, for your time 

and dedication to this important issue, and for spending so much 

time with us here in Congress, on the Hill, to discuss so many of 

our concerns. 

I want to ask, during the negotiations, did this law of the land, 

the Iran Nuclear Agreement Review Act, signed by President 

Obama and known to all parties of the negotiation, was it known 

to all the parties? 

Secretary KERRY. Well, obviously, the other parties became very 

aware of the fact that Congress was requiring a review period, and 

they were very concerned about it. 

Ms. MENG. And so I want to bring up one example of, during the 

Cold War, Congress played a very important role in the development of nonproliferation agreements dealing with nuclear weapons, 

specifically the Threshold Test Ban Treaty, which I know was a 

treaty, but we also have our law here. 

This treaty was initially blocked by the Senate because of concerns over Soviet compliance. The treaty was not submitted to the 

Senate for approval for 2 years after signing and wasn’t ratified 

until after the U.S. and Soviet Union reached agreement 14 years 

later on additional provisions to enhance America’s ability to verify 

Soviet compliance. 

So this all leads me to believe that Congress should be, and we 

are, and we have the ability and authority to compel a better deal, 

should it choose to disapprove of this one. 

What are the key differences between the JCPOA here and the 

Cold War examples, other than the fact that it was a treaty and 

there were multiple parties? 

Secretary KERRY. Well, one of the principal differences is that we 

have not had any engagement or any dialogue with Iran since 

1979. And the lack of diplomatic relations, even, which is different 

from what we had with the Soviet Union, makes this a very, very 

complicated situation. 

So you have to take and analyze what is achievable here in the 

context of the threat, the nuclear program. And I believe, given the 

nature of the political system in Iran, the challenges with respect 

to their own politics, the notion that we are going to be able to go 

back to the table is just a fantasy. There is no latitude here. 

Because Iran came to this table with enormous suspicions about 

even engaging with the United States. There was a huge debate in 

the country about whether or not they should, whether or not we 

could be trusted, whether or not they thought this was worth the 

risk. And many people in the country suggested that we would not 

act in good faith. 

If, indeed, all of a sudden, we stand up in Vienna, seven-nationsstrong, embrace an agreement, the United Nations has supported 

the agreement, and we turn around and say, ‘‘We are not going to 

perform,’’ I think the intelligence community will confirm to you resoundingly we will not be back at the table, certainly in the near 

future, and I would think certainly not with this Iranian Government or leadership. 

65

Ms. MENG. One final question. You have also, obviously, asserted 

that, if Congress does disapprove, the international sanctions regime will fall apart, and Iran goes back to 2-months breakout time. 

I understand that Russia and China’s top priority and interests 

may not be the views of Congress here in the U.S., but if you can 

help me understand, what is the basis for the view that these two 

countries would also just allow Iran to fully violate the deal? Why 

wouldn’t they hold Iran to the nuclear commitments set forth in 

the agreement? 

And if they allow them to do that, then why do we also believe 

that they will be there with us in any sort of snapback scenario? 

Secretary KERRY. Well, I think that Russia and China are very, 

very serious about the nonproliferation component of this, as serious as we are. Russia has agreed to export the spent fuel and process it in Russia in order to help make this work. China has accepted major responsibility to be the lead entity, with our co-chairmanship, on a committee that will work to redesign the Arak reactor 

in a way that is acceptable to all of us. And they have taken on 

major responsibility. 

So they both have a huge interest in the nonproliferation piece 

of this. But they both believe that the other components of the resolution, with respect to the arms and missiles, was thrown in as 

an add-on, as punishment, in effect, not because it referred directly 

to the nuclear part of the resolution or agreement. The resolution 

of the U.N. was a nuclear agreement. And, in that regard, I think 

they would have serious reservations—they did express serious reservations about continuing. 

Chairman ROYCE. We will go to Darrell Issa of California. 

Mr. ISSA. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I guess I have to be careful when I say ‘‘Mr. Secretary,’’ but, Secretary Lew, let’s start with you. 

Were the sanctions, or are the sanctions that are in place as of 

today effectively curtailing both the money flow and the economy 

of Iran in a way that has brought them to the table? 

Secretary LEW. Congressman, I think that the sanctions have 

been very effective at slowing the rate of growth in Iran’s economy, 

at making inflation high, unemployment high, and the exchange 

rate on their currency very unfavorable. 

I don’t think it has stopped them from doing a lot of other bad 

things around the world. And they have maintained, even in a very 

difficult set of fiscal challenges, malign activities, which we have to 

stay focused on stopping even if we have a nuclear agreement. 

Mr. ISSA. Okay. The question, though, Mr. Secretary, was, did it 

bring them to the table, or did they come out of just goodwill? 

Secretary LEW. No, I believe that the sanctions brought them to 

the table. And the sanctions were, in fact, designed to bring them 

to the table. 

Mr. ISSA. Secretary Kerry, you would agree with that? 

Secretary KERRY. I do agree. I think the sanctions and other 

strategic designs. But I think, essentially, the sanctions are what 

crystalized their timing. 

Mr. ISSA. And when I look at the sanctions that will be lifted 

under this agreement, I looked at—in the classified annex, but it 

wasn’t the classified portion of it—a long list of ships and aircraft 

66

and banks that will receive the relief under this. I am sure you are 

both familiar with those 20, 30 pages. 

The question I really have here—because I think we are all focusing on the nuclear deal, but I want to focus on Iran—an exporter of terrorism; a killer, directly and indirectly, of Americans; 

a kidnapper, indirectly and directly, of Americans since 1979. 

All of those sanctions that we are agreeing to lift, is there anyone 

that doesn’t think that those sanctions and more are appropriate 

as long as they continue to export terrorism, kill Americans and 

others, and destabilize not one, not two, not three, but at least five 

countries throughout the Middle East? 

I will start with Secretary Lew, from a standpoint of those tools 

that we are lifting, those 40 pages or whatever, single-spaced, a 

huge amount of things that will now be able to carry oil, move 

money, and so on, those are, most of them, equally effective in deterring or slowing their ability to export terrorism, aren’t they? 

Secretary LEW. Congressman, as a class, we are lifting for relief 

from sanctions entities and individuals who were violating the nuclear provisions. 

Mr. ISSA. Right, but those entities are banks, in many cases. 

Secretary LEW. Well, so a bank that was designated as a nuclear 

violator stays on. So Bank Saderat stays on the list. 

If there are institutions that are delisted that are relisted subsequently under other authorities that deal with terrorism, we have 

every right to do that. But I think that the delisting of nuclear parties is what you would expect if there is a nuclear agreement. The 

nuclear sanctions would go away, but other sanctions stay in place. 

Secretary KERRY. And they can be—again, Congressman, I want 

to emphasize that we share with everybody the concern about 

Iran’s behavior within the region, and we have the ability to bring 

sanctions with respect to that behavior as we go forward. 

Mr. ISSA. Well, let me just give you a hypothetical, and it is not 

a hypothetical without some thought. What if, at the same time as 

we don’t reject this plan, we bring you a package of new sanctions? 

What if, in fact, Congress determines that the only way we can accept this risk is if we can truly, essentially, snap back now relative 

to their promise? 

Just the day after you signed this, they promised to destabilize 

Bahrain, to continue what they are doing in Yemen; obviously, 

their support for Hezbollah and Hamas, their support for the Assad 

regime, and the taking of both Lebanon and Syria. 

So, with that real threat, with that goal, with that continued activity, is there any reason that we should not either reject this 

agreement and/or include further sanctions in order to keep them 

from expanding their support for the murder of Americans and our 

allies around the world and the destabilizing of the Middle East, 

one that is leading to an arms race? 

Secretary LEW. Congressman, we have powerful tools to snap 

back sanctions——

Mr. ISSA. No, not snapback. I am saying today. Today, they are, 

in fact, doing all of this. What would you say about the fact 

that——

Chairman ROYCE. We need to——

Mr. ISSA. Well——

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Chairman ROYCE. If the gentleman would suspend, we need to 

go to Lois Frankel of Florida——

Mr. ISSA. I just wanted him to answer the question I asked. 

Chairman ROYCE [continuing]. Simply because these junior members do not have sufficient time. And so, Lois. 

Ms. FRANKEL. Thank you, Mr. Chair. 

Thank you, gentlemen. Some quick followup questions and then 

some new ones. 

If new enrichment sites are detected under that 24-day rule, will 

those sites then become under a constant inspection? 

Secretary KERRY. If a new site emerges in this? 

Ms. FRANKEL. Yes. 

Secretary KERRY. Absolutely. 

Ms. FRANKEL. Okay. And could you tell me how many countries, 

other than the P5+1, are currently engaged in sanctions? And how 

long would you say that it takes to have all these sanctions in place 

to get Iran to the table? 

Secretary LEW. Congresswoman, I would have to go and check 

the number, but our sanctions and international sanctions are 

being honored around the world, so it is many, many countries. 

And it has taken us years to put that regime in place. 

And I would have to underscore really two points. One is, our 

unilateral sanctions are powerful, but the ability for them to really 

have an effect still requires cooperation. And the international 

sanctions wouldn’t exist without cooperation. We have spent a lot 

of effort with countries for whom it is at substantial economic cost 

they have cooperated to try and stop Iran from getting a nuclear 

weapon. 

Ms. FRANKEL. How would a snap-back effect all those countries? 

It concerns me how you could actually get the snap-back——

Secretary LEW. I think, as Secretary Kerry said earlier, there is 

enormous unity in the goal of keeping Iran from getting nuclear 

weapons. If they violate the agreement, if, in fact, a snap-back is 

warranted because of nuclear issues, I think that both the international and the U.S. unilateral sanctions would, in fact, snap 

back. 

We are going to continue to prosecute our unilateral sanctions on 

things like terrorism, on things like regional destabilization and 

human rights, but they are obviously different regimes. 

Ms. FRANKEL. Once Congress, if we don’t disapprove this agreement, if it goes forward, will the Congress, U.S. Congress have any 

role, any further role in this agreement, number one? Number two, 

can any President alter this agreement or refuse to abide by it in 

the future? 

Secretary KERRY. Well, Congress will always have a role, obviously, and you have made that crystal clear in a context of what 

we are doing here now. So, yes, I mean, there will be an ongoing 

role with respect to the enforcement, the implementation, our——

Ms. FRANKEL. Will we have to vote on anything? 

Secretary KERRY. Afterwards? 

Ms. FRANKEL. To repeal sanctions. 

Secretary KERRY. Ultimately, yes. Ultimately, there is the Iran 

Sanctions Act itself. There is the lifting of sanctions. Ultimately, 

you would have to vote. 

68

Ms. FRANKEL. And if we don’t do that pursuant to the agreement, 

are there any penalties on our part? 

Secretary KERRY. Actually then Iran is free to break the agreement because we will have broken it, and then all bets are off in 

terms of compliance. 

Ms. FRANKEL. Can a future President refuse to abide by the 

agreement? 

Secretary KERRY. Absolutely. A future President can. But it is 

our judgment that if this agreement is fully implemented and is 

working well, no future President is going to choose to do that because of the implications. If this is working, it is achieving our goal 

of not having a nuclear weapon in Iran. 

Secretary LEW. And just to be clear, the actual repeal of sanctions will be way down the road. It is not something that happens 

in the next year or 2. It is many, many years in the future, probably 8 or more years. 

Ms. FRANKEL. I want to get again to the troubling issue of the 

inspections. Are you saying that there is no limit to inspections by 

the IAEA, that it will go on forever? Did you say that? 

Secretary KERRY. Yes. What I am saying is there is a process, 

Congresswoman——

Ms. FRANKEL. Excuse me. And who pays for that? 

Secretary KERRY. We pay a certain element of the budget. It is 

a U.N. agency. We represent a certain percentage of that budget, 

about 25 percent, and others contribute to it. We actually train all 

the inspectors. That is one thing that we do and do very effectively. 

But it is an independent entity other than that. 

Ms. FRANKEL. Excuse me. Is it this separate secret agreement 

that we don’t see that is going to allow this continuation of inspections? That is what is not clear. 

Secretary KERRY. No. The continuation of inspections is under 

what is called the Additional Protocol. And the Additional Protocol 

is exactly that. It is an add-on——

Ms. FRANKEL. That is what we don’t get to see? 

Secretary KERRY. Yes. No, you can see, absolutely. You can see 

that. You can read every component of it. And I was sharing some 

thoughts with the committee earlier about the things that it empowers the IAEA to do. The kind of accountability is very in-depth 

and significant. That is what I was trying to point out. This is not 

some light set of requirements. 

Chairman ROYCE. We will go to Mr. Mo Brooks of Alabama. 

Mr. BROOKS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Secretary Kerry, my questions require brief answers to comply 

with my 5-minute time limitation, and I hope you will cooperate in 

that context. 

Three months ago, Iranian Brigadier General Mohammad Reza 

Naqdi stated that erasing Israel off the map is non-negotiable. Do 

you believe his comments accurately reflect Iranian Government 

goals? Yes, no, or I don’t know. 

Secretary KERRY. I think it accurately reflects some people’s 

rhetoric and some people’s attitude. But I don’t think it is possible——

Mr. BROOKS. In the Iranian Government? 

69

Secretary KERRY [continuing]. I don’t think it is possible for Iran 

to do that. And I think Israel has enormous capacity, obviously——

Mr. BROOKS. Okay. I didn’t ask for all that other. I am just asking if you have a judgment as to whether his comment accurately 

reflects Iran’s Government goals. 

Secretary KERRY. My judgment is it is not an implementable policy by Iran. 

Mr. BROOKS. Okay. Well, less than 2 weeks ago Iranian Supreme 

Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei led a rally that was frequently 

punctuated by chants of death to America and death to Israel. Do 

you believe his comments accurately reflect Iranian Government 

goals? Again, yes, no, or I don’t know. 

Secretary KERRY. I think they reflect an attitude and a rhetorical 

excess, but I see no evidence that they have a policy that is implementing that against us at this point in time. 

Mr. BROOKS. Well, do you believe that Iran is the world’s foremost sponsor of terrorism? 

Secretary KERRY. Yes. 

Mr. BROOKS. And that they will use the conventional weapons 

made available by the Iran nuclear treaty to kill Americans or 

Israelis? 

Secretary KERRY. Well, they may. They may. And we have, as 

you know, responded to that from 1979, when they took over our 

Embassy, forward. We have put sanctions in place specifically because of their support for terror, because of their abuse of human 

rights——

Mr. BROOKS. Okay, I understand that. You have answered my 

question when you said, yes, they may. 

Next, is the Obama administration willing to use military force 

to prevent Iran from obtaining, building, testing, or using nuclear 

weapons? 

Secretary KERRY. Yes. 

Mr. BROOKS. And what has Iran done in the past couple of years 

that causes you to believe Iran will abide by the Iran nuclear treaty or that Iran wants to become a responsible member of the international community? 

Secretary KERRY. The only thing that indicates to us a willingness to try to comply with this agreement is the fact that they have 

complied fully with the interim agreement for the last 2 years and 

that we have put in place such a strict set of consequences that it 

is deeply in their interest to comply if they have reduced two-thirds 

of their centrifuges, stripped their stockpile, put concrete in the calandria of Arak, emptied out Fordow. There is a lot of incentive 

therefore to fully comply with this agreement. 

Mr. BROOKS. Okay. That focuses to a large degree on the nuclear 

side. What about the use of the conventional weapons and whether 

they will maintain their status as the world’s foremost sponsor of 

terrorism? 

Secretary KERRY. We have serious concerns, which is precisely 

why we are engaged with our friends in the region. It is why I will 

be in Doha in a few days to meet with them. As we lay out the 

plans for pushing back against those activities, we will be engaging 

in Special Forces training, counterterrorism, counterinsurgency, 

70

counterfinance, a whole series of steps in order to empower all of 

us to do a better job of reducing those activities. 

Mr. BROOKS. September 11, 14 years ago, proves Muslim fundamentalists are very willing to sacrifice their own lives in furtherance if their desire to kill non-Muslims and other foes. Given the 

religious zealotry of the Iranian Government, how confident are 

you that Iran will not use nuclear weapons to further death to 

America or death to Israel if Iran obtains nuclear weapons? 

Secretary KERRY. Well, they won’t obtain a nuclear weapon. And 

I am confident that under this agreement and with President 

Obama’s commitment, they are not going to secure a nuclear weapon. 

Mr. BROOKS. And is that in part because of your statement that 

this administration is willing to use whatever means are necessary 

of a military nature to prevent Iran from having nuclear weapons? 

Secretary KERRY. That is certainly the final backup to it, but I 

believe all of the elements of this agreement will, if it is implemented fully—again, if it is implemented—will prevent them from 

even getting near that possibility. 

Mr. BROOKS. On occasion you have used the phrase ‘‘all options 

are on the table.’’ Do those options to prevent Iran from having nuclear weapons include the use of nuclear weapons by the United 

States? 

Secretary KERRY. I have never asked—I have never asked—I 

mean, I know of no President of the United States who have ever 

taken all military options available to them off the table, but I also 

don’t know of any realistic situation in which that would present 

a very feasible strategy given the proximity of great friends of ours 

to Iran and the consequences of that. But I don’t think the President has taken any—there is no option that has ever been discussed that has been taken off the table. 

Mr. BROOKS. So when you talk about the use of military force, 

is it fair to infer that we are really talking solely about conventional weaponry? 

Secretary KERRY. What the President has laid out and what the 

military has designed is an approach—and I am not going to discuss that plan in open session here—but a plan that sufficiently 

meets the task of preventing them from having a nuclear weapon. 

That is the goal. That is the objective. And our current set of options accomplished that. 

Mr. BROOKS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman ROYCE. Thank you. 

Joaquin Castro of Texas. 

Mr. CASTRO. Thank you, Chairman. 

And thank you, gentlemen, for your work and diplomacy on behalf of the Nation. 

I want to imagine for a moment another scenario, a scenario 

where we don’t take a deal, we walk away from it, and there is 

military action against Iran. Can you imagine for me for a moment 

what would the fallout be from a destabilized Iran? We have seen 

other nations, Libya, Iraq, Egypt, where there have been destabilized regimes, secular leaders who have been replaced by fundamentalists, and terrorism that has now been franchised almost 

71

across the world. What would happen if Iran was destabilized in 

the same way? 

Secretary KERRY. You know, Congressman, it is very hard for me 

to get into the speculative game here, and there is too much talk 

about the military option and this and that. 

When we have in front of us a plan that accomplishes the task 

of preventing Iran from achieving a nuclear weapon, which they 

say they don’t want to do anyway and have made very strong averments about their commitment not to do, it seems that to be focused on the destabilized side of it and the military side of it is not 

the right focus. The right focus is on this agreement that accomplishes the goal of preventing them from having a weapon. 

Now, the region is obviously destabilized and in flames, and that 

is another reason why I think we should think really carefully 

about the consequences of turning away from this deal. 

Mr. CASTRO. And I guess, let me point out, Secretary Kerry, so 

that I am not coy here, I am inclined to support the deal. One of 

the questions I have, though, is I think a concern is that we find 

out that they are cheating, and at that point a decision has to be 

made if we are going to hold true to our position, which is we are 

not going to let them have a nuclear weapon. 

Secretary KERRY. But that is, frankly, Congressman, that is the 

easiest decision in the world for this President and for all of us 

here. 

Mr. CASTRO. But here is my question, Secretary. What is the tipping point where sanctions will no longer work and you have to 

take military action if, in fact, you are going to keep them from not 

having that weapon? 

Secretary KERRY. The tipping point is a clarity with respect to 

what effort is being put into breaking out, if that is the choice they 

have made, and where they are in that process. The tipping point 

is how much time you make a judgment that you have with respect 

to where they are starting and where they can wind up. 

But we are convinced that with the depth of accountability and 

verification that is built into this agreement, we will have enormous tipoff to that. That is why a year was built into this agreement for the first 10 years and even after that. There is a lengthy 

enough period of time that our interests, the interests of the region, 

our friends, Israel, others, is protected. And we are confident about 

our ability to have accountability in that process going forward. 

But I would say to everybody, if this is rejected, then you have 

no inspections, you don’t have a regime in place, you don’t have the 

sanctions, Iran may undertake, not immediately, but they have certainly indicated they would consider themselves free to do so. And 

as they do it, what are the options that are then available to us? 

It seems to me when you compare those two scenarios, this becomes not that complicated a choice. 

Mr. CASTRO. And then my final question is, to put this in context, can you go over again—I missed some of the discussion—but 

can you go over again the deal that was offered in 2003 by the 

Bush administration? 

Secretary KERRY. In 2008 is when it was offered. 

Mr. CASTRO. 2008, I am sorry. 

72

Secretary KERRY. In 2003 there was discussion. There were 

about 163 centrifuges. But the P5+1, the same P5+1, made an offer 

to Iran for their suspension of enrichment and reprocessing that 

the United States and the P5+1, excuse me, would then recognize 

Iran’s right to nuclear energy for peaceful purposes, treat Iran’s 

nuclear program in the same manner as that of any non-nuclearweapon state party to the NPT once confidence had been built, provide technical and financial assistance for peaceful nuclear energy, 

including state-of-the-art power reactors, support for R&D and legally binding fuel supply guarantees, improve relations with Iran 

and support Iran in playing an important and constructive role in 

international affairs, work with Iran and others in the region on 

confidence-building measures and regional security, reaffirmation 

of the obligation to refrain from the threat or use of force, cooperation on Afghanistan, steps toward normalization of trade and economic relations, and it goes on. All of these things were offered in 

exchange for suspending enrichment and so forth. 

Now, they didn’t suspend. They went up to 19,000 centrifuges. 

And that fact is one of the driving factors in our coming to the conclusion, the President coming to the conclusion that we needed to 

arrive at an agreement which recognized their ability to have nuclear power under a safeguards agreement, under the NPT, with 

our ability to know what they are doing. 

Chairman ROYCE. Randy Weber of Texas. 

Mr. WEBER. Thank you. 

Mr. Kerry, I appreciate you being here. You said that we are 

going to briefed on that side agreement that the IAEA has with 

Iran. Is that correct? 

Secretary KERRY. Yes, that is correct. 

Mr. WEBER. Well, I want to implore you to use your power to 

make sure that we are not briefed by the same staff that briefed 

Susan Rice and Hillary Clinton on Benghazi or Sergeant Bowe 

Bergdahl. Okay? Make sure that we get a decent briefing there. 

Mr. Kerry, you say frequently that this is the strongest negotiation that you could get, you feel like it was. The President said he 

would walk away from a bad deal. And I would submit this. Now, 

you come to us and you say there is not 535 Secretaries of State 

and that other countries don’t appreciate that Congress is weighing 

in. But if you are going to get a strong deal, I have said from the 

get-go, I think there is a lot stronger position you should have 

taken. So I am going to lay out some preclusions, and you tell me 

if you operated from that basis. 

Number one, I agree with Jeff Duncan over here when he said 

American hostages should have been released first and foremost. 

Number two, the demand should have been for Iran to dismantle 

all of its centrifuges. Number three, give the IAEA unfettered 24/

7, 365-day access. Number four, stop the exporting of terror to 

Syria, to Iraq, and everywhere else. Number five, denounce terrorism and prosecute those who perpetrate it. Restore civil rights 

in their own country, number six. Stop the death chant to America 

and Israel, and they need to recognize Israel’s right to exist—even 

as a Jewish state, I might add. And, number seven, Secretary 

Kerry, they have been a bad actor for 36 years, going back to 1979. 

73

So if this is not based on trust, if this is based on actions, 

shouldn’t we have required them to show by their own actions, I 

don’t know, say for half of the time since 1979, say 18 years, or a 

fourth of the time, 9 years, how about just 2 years, shouldn’t we 

have required them to show with their actions? 

You said in your exchange with Grace Meng earlier that Iran 

came to the table with enormous suspicions about the United 

States. And me and my colleague up here are thinking, who cares? 

We are not the bad actors here. They are the ones exporting terrorism. 

Did you start from that basis of strength? And then if you did, 

how did we get here, you consider this to be a good deal? 

Secretary KERRY. Well, Congressman, plain and simple, all the 

things that you just listed, there never would have been a negotiation. 

Mr. WEBER. My heart pains for them. These are bad actors. My 

heart pains for Iran. These are bad actors in the area. 

Secretary KERRY. Congressman, what you need to think about is 

our security. We are better off with Iran not having a nuclear 

weapon. 

Mr. WEBER. No question. 

Secretary KERRY. Our primary objective here was to have a negotiation, because they were already at 19,000 centrifuges, already 

with enough material for 10 to 12 bombs, already enriching at 20 

percent, and they were a step away from a plutonium reactor that 

could produce enough material for one to two bombs a year. 

Mr. WEBER. How long was——

Secretary KERRY. So we stepped into that——

Mr. WEBER. I get that. 

Secretary KERRY [continuing]. And we have rolled it back. 

Mr. WEBER. You said that earlier. How long before we knew 

about Fordow? 

Secretary KERRY. I beg your pardon? We knew about Fordow—

we discovered Fordow. We blew the whistle. 

Mr. WEBER. How long was it there before we knew about it? 

Secretary KERRY. I don’t know the precise amount of time. 

Mr. WEBER. Ten years? 

Secretary KERRY. I know, but, Congressman, we discovered that 

and we also discovered——

Mr. WEBER. I am sorry——

Secretary KERRY. Let me just tell you. In 2003, we discovered 

that they were actually trying to make a bomb, and we did it without inspectors, without this regime. 

Mr. WEBER. You have said all that. I get that. But it is about 

the trust that you keep saying that we are going to have. 

Secretary KERRY. No, there is no trust. 

Mr. WEBER. Well, you are implying that we can catch them at 

what they are doing, yet Fordow went uncovered for about 10 or 

12 years. 

Secretary KERRY. That is not trust. That is verification. 

Secretary MONIZ. We can supply that information——

Mr. WEBER. All right. Let me do this. 

Secretary MONIZ. Sir, in a classified environment we will be 

happy to——

74

Mr. WEBER. We will talk about that. I am running out of time. 

Are you aware of the fact that today—today—‘‘Iran to United Nations: New Sanctions Could Kill the Nuclear Deal.’’ They are still 

uttering threats against us, I may remind us. We are not the bad 

actors here. 

In a letter to a 15-member body, Iran’s U.N. envoy, Gholamali 

Khoshroo, said Tehran ‘‘may reconsider its commitments’’ under 

the nuclear pact if U.S., European, and U.N. sanctions lifted under 

the deal are ‘‘impaired by continued application or the imposition 

of new sanctions with a nature and scope identical or similar to 

those that were in place prior to the implementation date, irrespective of whether such new sanctions are introduced on nuclear-related or other grounds, unless the issues are remedied within a 

reasonably short time.’’

Today they are threatening to walk away from this deal if we implement other sanctions on even other grounds, and you are saying 

the hostages are different? 

The CHAIRMAN. We have got to go to Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii. 

Ms. GABBARD. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

With the U.N. Security Council voting unanimously to support 

this nuclear deal with Iran, the toughest global sanctions will be 

dismantled in exchange for Iran’s compliance. Practically speaking, 

what is the status of this U.N. resolution and the implications if 

Congress disapproves this deal and overrides a Presidential veto? 

Secretary KERRY. Well, Congresswoman, we built into this agreement a process that was kind of compromised because our friends, 

our allies, thought they should go immediately to the U.N. and implement immediately. But because Congress had already voted to 

have a review period, we persuaded them to have a 90-day period 

during which time it could not be implemented. 

So they had their vote, but there is this grace period in order to 

protect the rights of Congress. And that was a balance between the 

desire of our friends to exercise their own sovereignty and do what 

they wanted under the U.N., versus our desire to try to protect 

Congress’ right to review. 

Ms. GABBARD. So if Congress does go through the review process 

and disapprove of the deal, at that point what happens with the 

resolution? 

Secretary KERRY. If Congress were to override a veto and disapprove the deal there would be no deal. 

Ms. GABBARD. That U.N. resolution that was passed unanimously would no longer stand? 

Secretary KERRY. It dies. The entire deal dies because we can’t 

lift the sanctions without the ability to waive, and that has been 

taken away, and that would be part of the vote. So we would see 

this deal die. 

Ms. GABBARD. Okay. Thank you. 

Secretary KERRY. Die without any other option, no alternative 

whatsoever. 

Ms. GABBARD. Secretary Moniz, what evidence or materials could 

potentially be cleaned up or hidden within the 24-day period listed 

in the inspections regime? 

Secretary MONIZ. Well, there would be an attempt, presumably, 

to replace flooring, do all kinds of cleanup. And, as I said, we have 

75

experience in both the unclassified and classified arenas in terms 

of being able to detect very, very small amounts of uranium. So, 

using nuclear materials, there would typically be a strong signature. 

Ms. GABBARD. And if Iran fails to allow inspectors entry within 

that 24-day period, what consequences would they face and under 

what time line? 

Secretary KERRY. If they fail to do it, they are in material breach 

of the agreement. We can snap back all the sanctions. And obviously all options are available to us that are available today. 

Ms. GABBARD. So immediately after that 24-day period, if they 

have still not allowed inspection——

Secretary KERRY. If they fail to live up to the 24-day period and 

provide the access, they are in material breach of this agreement. 

And if we had cause to have gone and asked for access to an undisclosed facility about which we have deep concerns, everybody will 

join with us in ratifying that concern and we will be operating with 

the consent, if you will, of the international community because of 

Iran’s noncompliance, which is one of the reasons why I believe we 

have huge leverage for compliance. 

Ms. GABBARD. And after termination day when the snap-back 

mechanism will no longer apply, Iran will still be subject to the Additional Protocol. What are the consequences if they violate that 

Additional Protocol after termination day? 

Secretary KERRY. We still have the power of bringing unilateral 

sanctions. Congress and all of us can join together. We can go right 

back to where we were at square one. Or we have obviously other 

options available to us. 

Ms. GABBARD. I think the concern is that the time that it takes 

for those kinds of unilateral sanctions to apply, whether they be 

from the United States or from the global community, as you have 

seen from the past, what other immediate consequences would 

there be at that point? 

Secretary KERRY. If they are in material noncompliance in a way 

that is threatening, obviously, we are in a much more serious kind 

of situation and confrontation with the potential, needless to say, 

of the President taking the most dramatic options. 

Secretary MONIZ. I would just add, yes, exactly as Senator Kerry 

said, that it would depend upon their motivation, what they were 

doing. Certainly in my view anything that shows movement toward 

a nuclear weapon would have to be responded to quite forcefully. 

I would also add, going back to something Congresswoman Meng 

asked, and I think it is relevant to your statements as well, is that 

the P5 by definition have a special role in the NPT and a very, very 

strong interest in seeing its integrity maintained. 

Ms. GABBARD. Thank you. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman ROYCE. Mr. Scott Perry of Pennsylvania. 

Mr. PERRY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Thank you, gentlemen. We certainly appreciate your indulgence. 

We know it has been a long time. 

In the context of these statements is how I would like to ask my 

questions. From 1994—so not too long ago, right, we are talk about 

76

an 11-, 15-year context of this deal for the most strict portions of 

it—so from 1994:

‘‘The entire world will be safer as we slow the spread of nuclear weapons,’’

is one statement. And also:

‘‘The United States and international inspectors will carefully 

monitor North Korea to make sure it keeps its commitments.’’

And we all know those are, of course, quotes from President Clinton. 

None of that happened. I mean, North Korea is what it is, and 

we are where we are. 

In that context, Secretary Kerry, reading your quote recently 

with a reporter from Al Arabiya:

‘‘I don’t know how to interpret it at this point in time, except 

to take it at face value,’’

in relation to chants of death to America, death to Israel, we are 

going to continue our policy. And then:

‘‘It is very disturbing, it is very troubling, and we will have to 

wait and see.’’

What will we have to wait and see, Secretary Kerry? 

And before you answer, 1979, 52 U.S. hostages, 444 days; 1983, 

the U.S. Marine barracks, 241 Americans killed; 1992, the Israeli 

Embassy in Argentina bombed; 2011, the attempted assassination 

of the Saudi Ambassador in DC; the killings and maimings of hundreds in Iraq and Afghanistan; not to mention support of Assad, 

Hezbollah, Hamas, and activities in Iraq, Syria, and Yemen. 

What will we have to wait and see? What was your——

Secretary KERRY. To see the implementation of the plan, Congressman. 

Look, you and I can have a speech-off if you want——

Mr. PERRY. I don’t want to have a speech-off. I am just trying 

to understand your comments. 

Secretary KERRY. No, no, no, but I am just saying, we could have 

a competition for who is angrier about some of the things Iran has 

done historically. We understand they have killed Americans. We 

understand what they did in Khobar Towers. We understand all of 

this. But they were marching toward a nuclear weapon. 

Mr. PERRY. Mr. Secretary, you must understand, I appreciate it, 

this is my time. 

Secretary KERRY. No, no, no, no, let me, Congressman, let 

me——

Mr. PERRY. You must understand the American people see Iran 

as like a crocodile or a shark that does what it does. And we are 

saying: Well, we are going to give the crocodile or the shark a few 

more teeth, and let’s see if it does something different. 

Secretary KERRY. That is just not accurate. That is not accurate 

in the least. 

Mr. PERRY. But that is what we see. 

Let me say this too. You have said that we don’t have a better 

option. You keep on saying, well, you haven’t provided a better option. 

77

Secretary KERRY. Congressman, we have——

Mr. PERRY. First of all, Mr. Secretary, with all due respect, it is 

not Congress’ job. This is the administration. And if you would use 

the treaty process as provided by the Constitution, maybe we 

wouldn’t be in this situation. 

Furthermore, you say: Well, this is the only deal we can get, that 

there is no better deal. Congress has a long history of instituting 

better deals. Examples are 200 treaties, including 80 multilateral 

accords modified by Congress, including the arms control agreement, SALT II, and the Threshold Test Ban Treaty that failed to 

reach a vote and were modified. So there is a history for that of 

getting a better deal. 

And if the Ayatollah doesn’t like it and doesn’t want to negotiate 

it, oh, boo hoo. We are here for America. We stand for America. 

You represent America. 

With that having been said, in another interview: ‘‘If you don’t 

get a majority in Congress to support this deal, doesn’t that undermine the deal?’’ And your statement, it is abbreviated: ‘‘They don’t 

care over there’’—and I am assuming you mean Iraq—‘‘as long as 

the deal is implemented. And that is what we care about, that this 

deal be implemented.’’

So do you care more about this deal or the U.N.’s approval or 

American sovereignty and the approval of the American people 

through their duly elected representatives, Mr. Secretary? 

Secretary KERRY. Congressman, I don’t need any lessons from 

you about who I represent. I have represented and fought for our 

country since I was out of college. 

Mr. PERRY. And God bless you for your service. 

Secretary KERRY. So don’t give me any lessons about that, okay? 

Now, let me just make it crystal clear to you: This is America’s 

interest, because America is the principal guarantor of security in 

the region, and particularly with respect to some of our closest 

friends. Now, we believe that Iran was marching toward a weapon 

or the capacity to have a weapon, and we have rolled that back, 

Congressman. That is indisputable. 

Mr. PERRY. Okay, that is your opinion, and I understand that is 

your belief. 

Secretary KERRY. No, that is a fact. That is a fact. 

Mr. PERRY. Let me ask you this, let me ask you this, Mr. Secretary. Is it possible that Iran will acquire Russian air defense missiles in relation to the arms embargo lifting to protect nuclear sites, 

possible or not possible? 

Secretary KERRY. Say that again? 

Mr. PERRY. Is it possible that Iran will acquire Russian air defense missiles to protect nuclear sites? 

Secretary KERRY. Those are not in the agreement. They have 

A300s——

Mr. PERRY. In relation to the arms embargo lifting. 

Secretary KERRY. No, they are not banned by the arms embargo. 

They are outside of it. 

Chairman ROYCE. We are going to Mr. Brendan Boyle of Pennsylvania, and my intention is to keep going to give our junior members an opportunity to ask their questions. 

Mr. BOYLE. Thank you. 

78

I actually want to direct my question to Secretary Moniz. And I 

am probably going to be a little boring, here but a very technical 

question that when I ask the White House and the President specifically, he directed us to you saying that you are one of the top 

10 experts in the world on this. 

So with that buildup, there was a report about 6 days ago in The 

New York Times that really questioned this issue of the 24 days, 

and there are some, such as you have said earlier, that say, look, 

24 days, it is not exactly like you are flushing a whole program 

down the toilet, that certainly wouldn’t be enough time in which 

to hide illicit behavior. 

The former deputy director of the IAEA contradicted that and 

said that while it is true with some of the larger scale operations, 

some things such as manufacturing uranium components, as well 

as triggers, actually could be covered up in the 24 days. 

So I am really trying to get a clear answer on this issue because 

I actually think it is one of the key components when trying to look 

at this in an intellectually honest way to see if we really have a 

verifiable deal here. 

Secretary MONIZ. Yes. And I have spoken with Mr. Heinonen, of 

course, he is up the river from MIT, at Harvard these days. 

But the issue I really want to emphasize, what I have always 

said is that work with nuclear materials, we have very, very high 

confidence in terms of finding microscopic amounts there. When 

you go to things like triggers, things that do not involve nuclear 

materials but are important for a nuclear explosive, then that gets 

into a higher stage of requirement, as I have said. And in a classified environment we could talk a little bit more about it. 

Even there, there can be some signals, some signals that are 

quite interesting and certainly may be quite detectable. But certainly one gets farther away from the nuclear materials, then there 

are more possibilities of both coverup and for at least maybe semicredible explanations for pursuing other activities. For example, 

any military does work with conventional explosives in chambers, 

so the question is, was that work around certain hemispherical 

shapes, for example, with multipoint detonation, and that requires 

more and more investigation. But nuclear materials leave quite significant signatures typically. 

Mr. BOYLE. I wanted to, just with only a couple minutes, let me 

switch, because this something that the Israeli Ambassador raised 

in my office and has been raised a couple times and, again, I think 

is a legitimate—I realize that some of this is bash the administration and that is part of politics, but there are those of us on the 

Democratic side who do have real, genuine concerns. The 24-day is 

one of them. 

The other is the question of how exactly we bring forward and 

what we have to reveal in terms of our intelligence to demand or 

request that a site is being inspected. It has been pointed out that 

we would have to reveal why exactly we suspect a site, meaning 

we would have to compromise where we got intelligence and why 

we suspect it. 

Can you talk about how that process would work and how much 

we would have to reveal to the Iranians just in order to inspect the 

site? 

79

Secretary MONIZ. Well, that is something that ultimately you 

really should pick up with the intelligence community, obviously. 

And certainly protecting sources and methods is particularly important. 

Now, having said that, clearly in the past intelligence agencies 

from many countries have been able to share information. And I 

also note that, of course, four out of the seven countries involved 

in the talks work together quite closely, namely the Europeans and 

the United States, and I think we would do all that we could to 

provide the IAEA with relevant information that would point to a 

suspicious site no matter where it was. 

But clearly, again, in terms of sources and methods, I think you 

have to go to the intelligence——

Mr. BOYLE. Could I ask Secretary Kerry to weigh in on that 

point? 

Secretary KERRY. Yeah, Congressman, I have been through this 

kind of thing a little bit on occasion, and we are very careful not 

to disclose sources and methods, and we have ways of providing information and making it available in ways that don’t compromise 

that. I can assure you that will not happen. It is not something 

that our community feels prevented or stopped by. 

But let me just point out, because you mentioned the Israeli Ambassador was in there talking to you about these concerns, Sandy 

Levin is the longest serving Jewish Member of the United States 

Congress, and he came out today in favor. 

Mr. BOYLE. I read his statement. 

Secretary KERRY. He was asked about it and he said:

‘‘Israel’s security has and always will be of critical importance 

to me and our country. I believe that Israel, the region, and 

the world are far more secure if Iran does not move toward the 

possession of a nuclear weapon. I believe the agreement is the 

best way to achieve that.’’

Chairman ROYCE. We are going to Mr. Ron DeSantis of Florida. 

There is a vote on. There are 2 minutes remaining. 

Mr. DESANTIS. Secretary Moniz, with respect to the agreement 

between Iran and the IAEA for Parchin and a possible military dimension, have you read those documents or agreements? 

Secretary MONIZ. No, sir, I have not seen them. 

Mr. DESANTIS. Okay. And to your knowledge, nobody in the U.S. 

Government has a copy of the agreements? 

Secretary MONIZ. To my knowledge, we do not have a copy. 

Again, in Vienna we had very broad oral—I had at least a broad 

oral briefing, but I never saw any paper. 

Mr. DESANTIS. So you were briefed in Vienna before the JCPOA 

was announced? 

Secretary KERRY. Yes. 

Secretary MONIZ. Shortly before, yes. 

Mr. DESANTIS. Who briefed you? 

Secretary MONIZ. DG Amano. 

Mr. DESANTIS. Okay. And do you have any plans to request that 

those documents be provided to Congress consistent with the Iran 

Nuclear Review Act? 

80

Secretary KERRY. I don’t know if it is consistent, so I will check 

with our folks and make a determination. I don’t think we judge 

that it is consistent, but as we have said, we will certainly brief 

the contents in an appropriate classified session. 

Mr. DESANTIS. Well, if you don’t, if you could provide us the rationale for why you don’t think the definition of agreement would 

encompass——

Secretary KERRY. Well, I said I don’t know. Congressman, I just 

said I don’t know. 

Mr. DESANTIS. No, I know. But I am saying, if you would make 

that determination, if you could provide us the kind of the legal 

justification so that we can look at it. 

Secretary KERRY. Well, of course we would have to, of course we 

would do that. 

Mr. DESANTIS. Okay. Very good. 

There was a report on the Associated Press today that the agreement between Iran and the IAEA may not even be completed. 

There was something about maybe Iran would be the one to take 

the soil samples. Can you guys comment? Is it, in fact, still being 

negotiated between Iran and the IAEA? 

Secretary KERRY. We can’t, in session here, we can’t discuss what 

the methodology is. We will be happy to take this on in classified 

session. 

Mr. DESANTIS. Can you confirm the AP story? Have you seen it? 

Secretary KERRY. Absolutely not. I can’t. 

Mr. DESANTIS. You cannot in open session? 

Secretary KERRY. I cannot confirm it. 

Mr. DESANTIS. Okay. 

Secretary KERRY. I haven’t seen it, among other things. 

Mr. DESANTIS. Secretary Moniz, obviously it is a very complex 

agreement. We get into a lot of different things. Obviously very important, and I know you guys worked hard on it. But sometimes 

I would just like to take a step back, and just a few years ago it 

had been pretty much the general policy of the United States that 

an agreement would be simply Iran gives up its nuclear program, 

no enrichment. The U.N. had always said no enrichment. The 

President, when he was debating Governor Romney in 2012, said: 

‘‘The deal we will accept is that they end their nuclear program. 

It is very straightforward.’’

Secretary Moniz, do you acknowledge that this agreement—I 

know you guys think it is good, and let’s put that aside—but do you 

acknowledge that this agreement doesn’t meet that standard of 

where they are ending their nuclear program, that they are allowed 

to maintain a significant nuclear program? The international community is going to be helping them develop nuclear technology? I 

know you guys are going to say that you are confident you will be 

able to detect if that is used in a military capacity. But that does 

represent a change, does it not, from where we were just a few 

years ago? 

Secretary KERRY. Congressman, I have had conversations with 

members of the prior administration, and I am not going to—it is 

inappropriate for me to tell you who or speak for them. But I think 

if you talk to them, you will learn that they had come to a conclusion by the end of that administration that that policy wasn’t workVerDate 0ct 09 2002 11:56 Oct 20, 2015 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00084 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 F:\WORK\_FULL\072815\95693 SHIRL
81

ing and that they were going to need to, in fact, have some structure of enrichment and some structure of a program. 

There is a distinction here between Iran’s nuclear weapons capacity and a peaceful nuclear program. Unlike North Korea, which 

pulled out of the NPT, Iran is still a signatory to the NPT. Iran 

has not exploded an ordnance. Iran has not yet gone forward to 

make a weapon, even though they had enough material for 10 to 

12 bombs. 

So Iran is stating in this agreement its willingness to comply 

with and live within the Nonproliferation Treaty. Under the Nonproliferation Treaty, countries have a right to a peaceful nuclear 

program. 

Mr. DESANTIS. Just so I get clear with the question, you are acknowledging that there has been a reappraisal in kind of the goal 

posts, and it is one that has been shared by both people in the 

Bush administration and the Obama administration? 

Secretary KERRY. Well, I don’t think they shared it publicly, but 

they shared it with us privately, and it is——

Secretary MONIZ. May I just add that the construct going in 

then, and this was among the P5+1, that our basic construct would 

be to get the 1-year breakout time to fissile material. 

Mr. DESANTIS. I am almost out of time. Secretary Kerry, just 

real quickly, because this is not going to be ratified as a treaty, 

there are a lot of States, and Florida particularly, where State legislatures have enacted sanctions against Iran in various capacities. 

Do you acknowledge that this deal will not affect states’ ability to 

do it since it is not going to be approved as a treaty, it is not going 

to be considered the supreme law of the land, it will be more of an 

Executive-to-an-Executive agreement? 

Secretary KERRY. That is accurate, but we would urge those 

States, if Iran is fully complying with this agreement, we will take 

steps to urge them not to interfere with that. 

Chairman ROYCE. Mr. Ted Yoho of Florida. And don’t feel compelled to use all your time. 

Mr. YOHO. Yes, sir, I understand. I appreciate it. 

I appreciate you all being here. 

Mr. Secretary, I want to ask you a simple yes-or-no question. The 

Iran Sanctions Act expires on December 31, 2016. Will this administration support legislation simply extending the Iran Sanctions 

Act so that the nuclear-related sanctions it provides for can be 

snapped back if Iran is caught cheating? 

Secretary KERRY. Yeah——

Mr. YOHO. It is a yes-or-no. 

Secretary KERRY. Well, we obviously are committed to the ISA, 

but I don’t think any decision has been made on timing or what 

steps the President will take with respect——

Mr. YOHO. Well, can we do the snap-backs without this? 

Secretary KERRY. Yes, we can. 

Mr. YOHO. According to this, we can’t because the Iran Sanctions 

Act expires, and those are necessary to have the snap-backs. 

Secretary LEW. No, we have other existing authorities where we 

could snap back both financial and——

82

Mr. YOHO. Can you guarantee this body that those acts or facilities are going to be in place so that snap-back does work without 

an act of Congress? 

Secretary KERRY. Yes. 

Mr. YOHO. And I have a problem with the secret deals that are 

going on, and you are asking us to support this deal without being 

able to read it. It kind of reminds me of the healthcare law. I don’t 

want to be in that situation. You are asking us to vote on something. We don’t know what is in that deal. And I think it is very 

disingenuous to ask us as Members of the—Representatives of 

United States’ citizens to vote on a deal without knowing what is 

in it. 

Secretary KERRY. Well, we are not. I have said to three or four 

Congressmen that they will be briefed. 

Mr. YOHO. I heard that. But it is not clear that the information 

is going to be forthright. We are going to get briefings, but briefings is not the same as being able to read the actual agreement. 

And I realize it is the IAEA with Iran, but, you know, we are paying 25 percent of the budget of that place, I think we as the representatives of the American people, we deserve that, and I 

wouldn’t support this without that. 

Secretary LEW. Congressman, on the Iran Sanctions Act, can I 

just add two things? First, it doesn’t expire until the end of 2016, 

and now would not be the appropriate time, it is premature to take 

action. And I think, respectfully, we know that if there is a problem 

in 2016, it won’t take very long for Congress to act. 

Mr. YOHO. You say it is premature to take action, and this will 

be my last question, or statement, I think. You say this is the best 

deal we get, and if we walk away from the table, we walk away 

alone. I feel that you, this negotiating team, put America in that 

situation because of the way you negotiated this from the very beginning. 

If we go back to the very beginning, Iran will not be allowed to 

have a nuclear weapon. And, you said, Mr. Secretary, I heard it 

come out of your mouth, anywhere, anytime, anyplace. That has 

been passed on. We are beyond that point. And it is beyond the 

point of trying to prevent Iran from having a nuclear weapon. We 

are trying to prevent something that we can’t, instead of preparing 

for that which we will have. 

And we have been boxed into a bad corner because you guys negotiated from weakness instead of as the superpower, and you go 

into the U.N. to get their approval first so that we look like the 

bad guys. This is a bad deal, and I think if we operate from a level 

of strength Iran will come back to the negotiating table. To think 

that they are going to come back to the negotiating table a year 

or 2 from now, I think that is a fallacy, and I think it is disingenuous to America. 

Secretary KERRY. So, Congressman, I urge you, I urge you, Congressman, with all respect, to spend time with the intel community. 

I think you will hear a very different judgment from them 

about——

Mr. YOHO. No disrespect, but we get those people in here all the 

time. We sit in intelligence briefings and we hear from them. 

Secretary KERRY. And secondly——

83

Mr. YOHO. And they are telling us this is a bad deal. And if you 

say and President Obama says this is going to make America 

safer——

Secretary KERRY. Congressman, the intelligence community——

Mr. YOHO. Wait a minute. And the Middle East safer, but yet the 

intelligence community is telling us to build missile defense systems on the East Coast, bolster the ones on the West Coast and 

Alaska, because this is a great deal? I think we should run away. 

I am going to yield back. Thank you. 

Secretary KERRY. The intelligence community is not saying this 

is a bad deal. The intelligence community supports this deal, Congressman. And what is more, they were an integral part of helping 

to shape it. 

And furthermore, the reason we are able to get the good deal we 

got is because we did operate out of a position of strength, which 

is why they are dismantling two-thirds of their program, undoing 

their stockpile, living by restraints on their enrichment, and have 

accepted the Additional Protocol, as well as 25-year restraints on 

their uranium and so forth. 

Chairman ROYCE. So we will go to Mr. Reid Ribble of Wisconsin. 

Secretary MONIZ. Just to add, Mr. Congressman, that the agreement is that IAEA and Iran, the IAEA will complete its PMD. That 

is the agreement. That is the protocol. 

Chairman ROYCE. Mr. Ribble. 

Mr. RIBBLE. Thank you. 

Secretary Kerry, earlier in the hearing today you said that countries in the future, if the Congress rejects the deal, countries in the 

future will not trust negotiating with the U.S. State Department 

because they are now negotiating with 535 individual Members of 

Congress. For 228 years the Constitution provided a way out of 

that mess by allowing treaties to be with the advise and consent 

of 67 U.S. Senators. Why is this not considered a treaty? 

Secretary KERRY. Well, Congressman, I spent quite a few years 

trying to get a lot of treaties through the United States Senate, 

and, frankly, it has become physically impossible. That is why. Because you can’t pass a treaty anymore. It has become impossible 

to, you know, schedule. It has become impossible to pass. And I sat 

there leading the charge on the Disabilities Treaty, which fell to 

basically ideology and politics. So I think that is the reason why. 

Mr. RIBBLE. Yeah, okay. I may not disagree with that. I mean, 

the political world around here is pretty challenging for both political parties and certainly for the Congress and the President. 

I would say this, that one of the concerns that has been voiced 

to me by my constituents is the fact that in the President’s press 

conference about this agreement he threatened to veto the Congress’ action if we didn’t agree with him anyway. And so there was 

this arbitrary poke in the nose of the Congress when it was unnecessary. So my folks back home are saying: I want to have some say 

in this and my only say is through you. So I think that maybe 

could have been handled a little bit different. 

Secretary Moniz——

Secretary KERRY. I understand. 

Mr. RIBBLE. Go ahead, Secretary. 

Secretary KERRY. No, I understand. 

84

Mr. RIBBLE. Yeah, okay. 

Secretary Moniz, is it not billions of dollars cheaper to build a 

natural gas power plant rather than a nuclear power plant? Why 

do you suppose the Iranians have gone down the nuclear road 

when they are so carbon rich? I mean, they have got a trillion gallons of reserves in natural gas. Wouldn’t it have been much cheaper for them, if the idea was just peaceful electricity, to have gone 

that route? 

Secretary MONIZ. Well, a natural gas power plant has lower capital cost, but typically a nuclear plant has lower operating costs. 

That is one point. 

Mr. RIBBLE. But in this case the natural gas would be free to 

them. It is their primary energy source. 

Secretary MONIZ. I am not sure it is free. Certainly in the 

sense—again, I am not arguing one way or the other, but just what 

the argument is, is that it is more valuable than as an export product, where, of course, with LNG prices for example, in parts of the 

world, there is quite a bit of rent to be captured. 

Mr. RIBBLE. Yeah, sure. 

Secretary Lew, I appreciate your patience today. You haven’t 

been called on that much. But in light of how penalizing the economic sanctions have been on this economy it still strikes me odd 

that Iran would continue to move toward this very, very expensive 

construction project as opposed to other alternatives. Does this 

seem odd to you? I mean, it is billions and billions of dollars to 

build a nuclear power plant. 

Secretary LEW. Which expense? 

Mr. RIBBLE. The expense of actually constructing nuclear power 

plants. They have been under great stress economically. 

Secretary LEW. I think that they have been under enormous 

stress. Like any government, they make decisions based on their 

short and their long-term needs. I can’t question why they have 

chosen one form of a power plant over another. 

What I do know is their infrastructure, including their power infrastructure, is highly inadequate. In order to have a foundation for 

economic growth they do need more power, and that is going to require investment. It is one of the reasons that I believe they have 

domestic needs that far exceed any relief they are going to get. 

Their domestic infrastructure is in a pretty bad condition right 

now. 

Mr. RIBBLE. Well, it seemed to me that one of the possible solutions of this whole deal would have been for the P5+1 countries to 

assist them in building alternative sources of electrical power to 

meet that need as opposed to setting this canard up where now in 

15 years if they choose they can go ahead and nuclearize from a 

weaponry standpoint. 

And with that, I will go ahead and yield back. 

Chairman ROYCE. Thank you. 

Mr. Trott and Mr. Zeldin, if you can keep these comments brief, 

there are votes going on the floor. 

Mr. Trott. 

Mr. TROTT. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I want to thank the witnesses for being here and for your service. 

85

Secretary Kerry, you said in your opening statement that there 

have been major distortions, and President Obama actually said 

yesterday that there have been no factual arguments on the other 

side that are worth scrutiny. 

So a simple yes or no. These the facts that we are basing the negotiations off of at the outset: They are holding American hostages, 

they are sponsoring terrorism, calling for death to America, want 

Israel wiped from the face of the Earth, guilty of egregious human 

rights violations, and generally creating instability around the 

world. Are those facts true, yes or no? 

Secretary KERRY. Yeah, they are. But——

Mr. TROTT. So would you say those facts looked at collectively 

would suggest that Iran is guilty of bad behavior? 

Secretary KERRY. Well, I think it is more than just bad behavior. 

Destabilizing countries and blowing people up somewhere is beyond 

bad behavior. 

Mr. TROTT. I will take that as a yes. 

So how would a deal, let’s say I wanted to sell my business to 

Lee. Back when I was in the business world, we were doing an acquisition, I would say to my team: You can’t do a good deal with 

a bad guy. So can you sort of understand our concern about this 

deal? Because it sure looks like, if you are doing a good deal as you 

suggest, it is with a bad guy. 

Secretary KERRY. I understand exactly what you are saying. We 

confronted questions about what could be achieved or not achieved 

in the course of these negotiations ourselves and came to the conclusion, therefore, that nothing is based on trust, that we are going 

to set up something that you can read, we can read, that everybody 

can understand what the expectations are. 

And that is one of the reasons why, from a position of strength, 

we believe we achieved something that really helps establish some 

level of confidence over the years, and that is the level to which 

they will reduce their current program, reduce their stockpile, live 

by limitations on enrichment, which are absolutely ascertainable, 

and so forth. 

So we have created, we think, a dynamic here where you get over 

the hurdle of the things you don’t like and are bad behavior because you have created something that is verifiable and has certainty in it. 

Mr. TROTT. Is there any chance that Iran’s strategy is to get the 

deal signed, get the $50 billion, and then a year or so down the 

road start to violate the agreement, knowing that——

Secretary KERRY. That is what was said earlier. 

Mr. TROTT. Yeah. And I know that is the challenge of going last 

or next to last, but I appreciate you staying. But isn’t there a 

chance that a year from now it is going to be a whole lot more difficult for us to get the band back together and be able to put in 

place some of the protections that led to——

Secretary KERRY. Not if they are breaking the agreement. 

Mr. TROTT. So Russia and China are just going to go along and 

say: Gosh, United States, we understand your concern, and what 

can we do to get back in——

Secretary KERRY. We are convinced about the seriousness of purpose of all of our five other partners in this effort. 

86

Mr. TROTT. Hindsight is 20/20, and I am not asking you to necessarily evaluate how we got to this point. But is there any credibility to the concern that I think someone earlier mentioned that 

maybe decisions by Ambassador Rice or the administration or your 

negotiating team really put us in a position now where if we don’t 

sign this deal we are really left without any good options? Any concern in hindsight we could have done things a little differently, 

maybe U.N. Resolution 1929, other decisions that were made along 

the way, that put us in this box in terms of having no great options? 

Secretary KERRY. Well, we think we have a great option. The 

great option is the agreement that we came to. And we did not create the box, by the way. You know, you guys decided you wanted 

to review it, and now you are reviewing it. And I am sorry about 

the consequences of that review, but that is not our creation. The 

consequences of the review are the reality that this agreement cannot go forward, and there are consequences to that. 

Mr. TROTT. I have no regrets, sir, about having the responsibility 

of reviewing this agreement. 

Secretary KERRY. No, and I am not arguing with you about your 

right to do it. But we are arguing that the consequences, when you 

weigh the benefit of this agreement going through versus the consequence of not doing it, are serious. 

Mr. TROTT. One last question, sir, and I appreciate your time. 

You said earlier this was never about making sure Iran did not 

have a nuclear program but rather about making sure they did not 

have a nuclear weapon. 

Secretary KERRY. The capacity to build a nuclear weapon or to 

get one. 

Mr. TROTT. So what did candidate Obama mean in the debate 

with Mitt Romney in 2012 when he said: ‘‘The deal we will accept 

is they end their nuclear program. It is very straightforward.’’ So 

he really was just talking about the capacity to create a nuclear 

weapon, not having a nuclear program? 

Secretary KERRY. Yeah, having played Mitt Romney for him in 

preparation for that debate, I can assure you that is what he 

meant. 

Mr. TROTT. Thank you for your time again, sir. I hope you are 

doing all right on your crutches. I spent a lot of time over the years 

on crutches. They are not any fun. Thank you, sir. 

Secretary KERRY. Thank you very much. 

Chairman ROYCE. Mr. Lee Zeldin of New York. 

Mr. ZELDIN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. Kerry, just now in response to Mr. Ribble’s question, I just 

want to understand, with regards to a treaty, you said this isn’t a 

treaty because it was difficult to pass. Is that correct? 

Secretary KERRY. No. There are a lot of other reasons. We don’t 

have diplomatic relations with Iran. It is very complicated with six 

other countries. It is just a very complicated process. So we thought 

that the easiest way to get something that had the leverage, had 

the accountability, could achieve our goal, was through a political 

agreement, and that is what we have. 

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Mr. ZELDIN. And, Mr. Secretary, if you would be able to submit 

for the record just a little more background as to why this is not 

treated as a treaty, I think it would be helpful for us. 

Secretary KERRY. Absolutely. Sure. Be happy to do it. 

Mr. ZELDIN. Okay. And you said a little bit earlier the reason 

why Iran came to the table is because they wanted the relief from 

the sanctions. The Iranian Supreme Leader said:

‘‘The Islamic Republic of Iran will not give up support of its 

friends in the region, the oppressed people of Palestine, of 

Yemen, the Syrian and Iraqi Governments, the oppressed people of Bahrain, and sincere resistance fighters in Lebanon and 

Palestine.’’

There is so much state sponsorship of terror in that list, Mr. Secretary. 

The Hezbollah leader, Hassan Nasrallah, said this past weekend: 

‘‘The United States remains the ’Great Satan,’ both before and 

after the nuclear accord.’’

The leverage, as you said, that brought the Iranians to the negotiating table was the sanctions relief. Let me just recap some of the 

stuff that wasn’t even part of the negotiations: Iran developing 

ICBMs, overthrowing foreign governments, sponsoring terror, they 

are unjustly imprisoning United States citizens, including a marine 

and a pastor, a reporter, pledging to wipe Israel off the map, chanting death to America. None of that was even part of the negotiations. 

Iran’s neighbors, who know them the best, trust them the least. 

It is just something for us to think about. 

I would also ask if you can submit for the record, just for the 

sake of time, a little bit more in the plan as for stopping all the 

other Iranian terror that wasn’t part of the deal. I think it would 

be very helpful for Congress to have a better sense of what the 

plan is regarding everything that wasn’t part of the deal. 

And, Mr. Secretary, if we remove the sanctions, we are removing 

the leverage that brought the Iranians to the table. Over 70 years 

ago, a leader of the free world held up a document, declared it 

‘‘peace for our time.’’ I am afraid that many years from now if the 

American people, through their representatives in Congress, accept 

this bad deal, that just like the Munich Agreement of 1938, this 

Iranian agreement will prove to not be in the best interests of 

American security or the stability and safety of the free world. 

There is an alternative other than war. It is a better deal. Now, 

you said getting a better deal is Fantasyland. Some other stuff that 

I would consider Fantasyland is believing that you have access to 

military sites when the Iranian leadership tells us that we don’t. 

Fantasyland is agreeing to a three-member advisory board where 

one of the members is declared an independent member, but there 

is no details in the agreement whatsoever as to how that independent member is selected. Fantasyland is saying that there is no 

secret deal with Iran and the IAEA even though we are acknowledging that there is an agreement and that it is secret. 

Fantasyland is saying that this deal provides 24/7 where necessary, 

when necessary inspections, which don’t, in fact, exist. A 

Fantasyland is saying that Iran does not want to destroy the 

88

United States, dismissing their death to America pledge as just 

rhetoric. 

I don’t believe that this is a great option, as you just said to the 

last person. I know it, the American public knows it, that there is 

an alternative other than war and it is a better deal. America got 

played like a five-string quartet. 

Mr. Secretary, a lot of Americans have fought and died to make 

our country the greatest Nation in the world. And you, sir, respectfully, you don’t have the power to surrender our greatness. 

And I would strongly, with all these hypotheticals, that if Congress rejects this deal, that everything falls apart, you have not yet 

answered what you would do next. What would you three Secretaries do if Congress rejects the deal? Because the answer on the 

next day is no one shows up to work. No one is working with the 

international community to try to protect America and the free 

world. So if Congress rejects this deal, when you wake up the next 

morning, sir, what would you do? 

Secretary KERRY. Well, Congressman, you threw a lot out there 

all at once. 

All of us take affront at the comments that are made publicly by 

many people in Iran, whether it is a general or a leader of one kind 

or another or the Ayatollah’s comments. 

What is important is what Iran does, not what it says, what it 

does. For 2 years now, Iran lived by a deal that many of your colleagues here called an historic mistake, but they lived by it. They 

have actually rolled their program back. And President Obama is 

the first President in the United States who has challenged this 

issue, who has actually rolled the Iranian program back significantly and stopped them from the path to get a weapon. 

Now, we have laid out——

Mr. ZELDIN. Mr. Secretary, with all due respect, for the sake of 

time——

Secretary KERRY. No, with all due respect, I think——

Mr. ZELDIN [continuing]. I am just asking what you would do the 

next morning, you have not answered the question of what the administration would do. 

Secretary KERRY. I am coming to that. 

Chairman ROYCE. Mr. Zeldin, there is a vote on and your time 

has expired. 

Mr. ZELDIN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

If you could submit that for the record, I think it is important 

for Congress to know what you would do next. 

Secretary KERRY. Sure. 

Chairman ROYCE. I want to thank our witnesses for being with 

us today. These are not easy issues. Congress will be taking a historical vote on this agreement in September. The committee will 

continue doing its job before that vote and after. And I thank each 

of our witnesses again for being with us today and staying through 

the process of having all of the members ask their questions. 

We stand adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 2:01 p.m., the committee was adjourned.] 

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