August 18, 2025 | The National Interest
Donald Trump Set a Nuclear Precedent. Now He Must Enforce It
Stopping nuclear proliferation in the Middle East will require a consistent policy, not just sporadic interventions.
August 18, 2025 | The National Interest
Donald Trump Set a Nuclear Precedent. Now He Must Enforce It
Stopping nuclear proliferation in the Middle East will require a consistent policy, not just sporadic interventions.
Excerpt
Two months ago, President Donald Trump laid down a marker: the United States and Israel will act militarily, if necessary, to prevent Iran from making nuclear weapons.
“Iran was beaten up very badly, for good reason. We cannot have them have a nuclear weapon. But they still talk about enrichment…we’re not going to allow that to happen,” Trump declared.
Yet, while Washington and Jerusalem have both pledged to prevent Tehran from reconstituting its ability to enrich uranium or produce separated plutonium they seem prepared to permit enrichment by Iran’s other rival, Saudi Arabia.
Given the world’s experience with Iranian enrichment and how close Tehran came to possessing the bombs, Trump should rule out such cooperation with the Saudis. Instead, he should broaden his no-enrichment policy and announce that America will intervene to prevent not just Iran, but any new countries, from enriching uranium or separating plutonium.
Henry Sokolski is executive director of the Nonproliferation Policy Education Center, was deputy for nonproliferation policy in the Department of Defense (1989-1993), and is the author of China, Russia, and the Coming Cool War (2024). Andrea Stricker is deputy director of the Nonproliferation and Biodefense Program and a research fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.