Snapback and Preemptive Action

In the midst of growing protests around Iran, on January 6, 2026, Iran International reported the following two disturbing developments.

The reactivation of pre-2015 United Nations sanctions through the snapback mechanism in September 2025 has proven difficult to circumvent, constraining access to finance, insurance and energy markets. These constraints have translated into economic pressure.

Iran’s newly formed Defense Council warned on January 6 that the country could respond before an attack if it detected clear signs of a threat, amid rising tensions with the United States and Israel: ‘Any infringement on national interests, interference in internal affairs or action against Iran’s stability will be met with a proportionate, targeted and decisive response... An escalation in threatening language and interventionist conduct that goes beyond verbal posturing may be interpreted as hostile behavior.’

Shahram Kholdi assessed that ‘2026 will test the limits of Tehran’s endurance’. The nuclear conundrum has moved away from center stage. But IAEA still has to deal with it.

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‘New war with Israel at any moment’, ‘still digging through rubble’

The news about Iran has taken an ominous tone in the last couple days. Here is some reporting and commentary. Newsweek on August 18, 2025, reported that Yahya Rahim Safavi, senior military adviser to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, said ‘ We are not in a ceasefire; we are in a stage of war. No protocol, regulation, or agreement has been written between us and the U.S. or Israel. A new war with Israel could break out at any moment .’ Yonah Jeremy Bob commented in The Jerusalem Post on August 19, 2025, that ‘ Khamenei can either “drink from the poisoned chalice” of diplomatic concessions … or face more airstrikes, possibly next time some targeting him directly ’. Bob also noted that ‘ right now Iran is still digging through rubbl e’. The U.S. attacked Fordow, Natanz and Esfahan on June 22. Two months of digging. No surprise that there has been no public news about that.

Assessing possible outcomes of the snapback mechanism

The initiation by the E3 of the 30-day snapback mechanism in the UN Security Council makes everything more difficult and there is great uncertainty about the outcome. Will it be peaceful with a new nuclear deal with Iran, negotiated by the U.S., endorsed by the UNSC and verified by IAEA, or will Iran withdraw from NPT with further military action by Israel and the U.S.? To perhaps shed a little light on what the outcome will be, here is my analysis of how the players - Iran, U.S. and E3 - may be assessing the acceptability of the range of outcomes. Four levels of acceptability were used: 1 Fully acceptable; 2 Less acceptable; 3 Just acceptable; and 4 Not acceptable. Four near term 30-day outcomes are listed, and two optimistic outcomes with an interim U.S.-Iran agreement reached within a 6-month extension. For the 30-day near term, the best outcome would b...

‘Making nuclear fuel’ under the NPT

It is with some hesitation that I take issue with the latest publication of the renowned Henry Sokolski and Sharon Squassoni on August 15 in the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, titled: “ Actually, the NPT doesn’t guarantee a right to make nuclear fuel .” But someone should defend the IAEA and international safeguards! Here are points in question. ‘ The [NPT] treaty was designed to prevent dangerous bombmaking activitie s.’ NPT is far more complex than that. It is common to state the three pillars of NPT: nuclear disarmament; nuclear nonproliferation; and peaceful uses of nuclear technology. Nonproliferation involves the commitment of non-nuclear states not to pursue nuclear weapons and to accept IAEA inspection to confirm that commitment is being followed. Perhaps Sokolsky intends to refer to INFCIRC/153, which lays out how IAEA and the state cooperate to carry out that confirmation. If so, INFCIRC/153 is not designed to ‘prevent’...

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