Iran is poking the bear again

The Iranian regime invites more U.S. bombing by stonewalling nuclear inspectors.

Iran keeps behaving like an outlaw regime. Australia expelled Tehran’s ambassador last week based on intelligence that its government masterminded an attack on a synagogue in Melbourne and a kosher food company in Sydney. The head of the United Nations nuclear watchdog is receiving enhanced security because of what he calls a threat “from the direction” of Iran. On Sunday, the Iran-backed Houthis raided the offices of the World Food Program, World Health Organization and UNICEF in Yemen’s capital.

Two and a half months after the United States launched airstrikes against Iran’s nuclear facilities, after which President Donald Trump brokered a ceasefire to end Israel’s 12-day war, leaders in Tehran are back to playing their old games of defiance, threats and subterfuge to conceal information about what remains of their program. Iran’s recalcitrance raises the prospect that American military forces might need to be called in again.

Since the June strikes against the facilities at Fordow, Natanz and Isfahan, the regime has mostly suspended cooperation with international nuclear inspectors. Tehran has also refused to account for the now missing stockpile of highly enriched, near-weapons-grade uranium that it possessed before the attacks. Last Wednesday, inspectors visited the Bushehr reactor, which remains live, but they have not been allowed to see what’s left of the facilities struck by B-2 bombers as part of Operation Midnight Hammer.

The most hopeful explanation is that Iran is blocking the inspectors because it fears independent confirmation that its costly 30-year nuclear program has been destroyed — but hope has never been an effective counterproliferation strategy.

This predicament comes partly because there was never a fully reliable assessment of the effectiveness of the airstrikes. Lingering questions include how much of the Iranian program was destroyed vs. severely damaged, and whether Iran’s capabilities were set back by years or only months.

Frustratingly, these questions became embroiled in partisan politics after Trump insisted that Iran’s program had been “totally obliterated.” The head of the Defense Intelligence Agency, Lt. Gen. Jeffrey Kruse, was fired in August after his staff assessed that the strikes had set back Iran’s program only by months. This has had a chilling effect on the intelligence community.

But questions remain. There was ample evidence that Iran had removed uranium from Isfahan before the strike. But Trump posted on social media: “Nothing was taken out of facility. Would take too long, too dangerous, and very heavy and hard to move!” He was apparently referring to Fordow, but Isfahan is where the uranium was thought to be stored.

The only way to know for certain what’s left is for the inspectors to fully return and for the Iranian government to come clean about what, if anything, it still has. To prevent further conflict, Iran also needs to reenter negotiations with the United States over any future nuclear program for civilian-only use. The United States says it is ready to talk, but Iran has insisted as a precondition, among other things, that Trump commit to no further strikes. That would give away too much leverage.

Iran is indisputably violating its obligations under the 2015 international nuclear agreement. Trump withdrew from that agreement in his first term, but the deal remained in force for the other signatories. On Thursday, Britain, France and Germany triggered a 30-day countdown period to reimpose sanctions.

These will go into effect unless the regime resumes full cooperation with the International Atomic Energy Agency, commits to direct talks with the United States and accounts for the missing uranium. Tehran warns of a “harsh response” if sanctions are imposed, threatening to go so far as withdrawing from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.

Renewed sanctions might have relatively limited impact because Iran’s economy is already in bad shape. Its currency, the rial, trades at over 1 million to $1. At the time of the 2015 deal, it was 32,000 to $1. The United States and Europe do minimal trade with Iran.

The country’s most important trading partner is China, which buys about 90 percent of Iran’s shipped oil. Beijing is unlikely to abide by any new sanctions, which would also place restraints on Iran’s exports of ballistic missiles and drones, but those are mostly sold to Russia, which would similarly ignore any new sanctions.

If Tehran takes any lesson from June, it should be that the United States is not afraid of using military force to prevent Iran from getting nuclear weapons. Trump resisted pressure from the vocal isolationist faction in his base, and he could do so again if he feels it is necessary to protect the nation’s security.