The U.S.-Saudi nuclear agreement could put the kingdom “on a glide path to have a nuclear weapon in 10 to 15 years,” Rep. Brad Sherman (D-Calif.) told JNS on Thursday. Sherman, who reviewed the agreement after the Trump administration submitted it to Congress last month, is one of the first members of Congress to object to the “alarming” deal that he said “clearly envisions enrichment and reprocessing” of uranium without inspections by the International Atomic Energy Agency. “From that standpoint, it’s worse than the JCPOA,” Sherman said, referring to the 2015 Iran nuclear deal. The administration signed the agreement with the Saudis in July and submitted it to Congress, as required by law, in a letter dated Aug. 24.
Chris Wright, U.S. energy secretary, stated at the time of the signing that “these agreements uphold the highest standards of nuclear safety and nonproliferation, while relying on the world’s best nuclear technology and scientists, designed right here in the United States.” The terms of the deal, which according to Sherman include both classified and unclassified sections, have not been released to the public. JNS has not reviewed them. The Jewish congressman, who is the second-ranked Democrat on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, stated on Wednesday that the agreement “explicitly allows uranium enrichment on Saudi soil under certain conditions.”
More than 30 countries around the world operate civilian nuclear power plants, but according to the International Panel on Fissile Materials, only 12 have operational uranium enrichment facilities, excluding Iran, the status of whose enrichment sites is unknown. Eight of those countries have nuclear weapons. “There’s supposed to be a two-year process for evaluating whether the Saudis should move forward with enrichment and reprocessing, but it could be a two-year process or it could be a two-day process,” Sherman said. “It’s an essential element of the deal, but not one on which Congress gets any input,” he told JNS. “Only President Trump, not Congress, will determine if those vague conditions have been met,” he said.
He added that the terms of the presidential approval process were unclear and consisted of consultation between U.S. President Donald Trump and Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. The crown prince, widely known by the moniker MBS, is the de facto ruler of the country on behalf of his 90-year-old father. In a 2018 interview with CBS, the crown prince said that “without a doubt if Iran developed a nuclear bomb, we will follow suit as soon as possible.” Other Saudi officials have made similar statements, including Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir, who said in a 2018 interview with CNN that the kingdom would seek to match Iran’s nuclear program. “If Iran acquires a nuclear capability, we will do everything we can to do the same,” al-Jubeir said. Sherman told JNS that a Saudi nuclear weapons program should be as concerning as the Iranian one. (Read More)
