If Iran accepts new inspections, can the U.S. even make them work?

A new U.S.-Iran peace plan can work only if the United States can overcome three difficult challenges, experts said: the Iranians must agree to tighter international inspections, the inspecting agency must fix its budget crisis, and the White House must heed nuclear experts over real-estate developers with ties to President Trump.

As U.S. and Iranian diplomats met in Switzerland on Monday, they seemed unable to agree even about whether they disagreed on inspections. U.S. Vice President JD Vance triumphantly proclaimed that the Iranians had agreed to allow the return of International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors back to monitor nuclear materials and research activity. Iranian officials said they’d done no such thing. Should the Iranians agree, experts said, the IAEA will have enough technical expertise to make inspections work again, but only if U.S. nuclear security professionals are involved, experts said. 

That’s because the job would be harder than it was in 2015, when Tehran accepted broader international monitoring and sharp limits on nuclear development under the JCPOA deal forged by the Obama administration and several international partners. After the Trump administration withdrew from the deal in 2021, Iran began restricting inspectors’ access to data and facilities.

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