Indeed. The key point is that Iran needs to build its own banking system and integrate it with Russia, China, Venezuela, Cuba, Syria, Yemen, Lebanon, you name it. However, this hugely depends on the willingness of the aforementioned countries to join this network. The Ukraine-Russia standoff is like a once in a lifetime opportunity for Iran to benefit from a Russia that is hostile to the West. If the Westerners go ahead with their plans to strangle the Russian economy, this could become a reality. However, I think they will throw Ukraine under the bus and call it a day.
The 60% enrichment is not a good strategy. In short term, it is a good strategy and it did send a signal to other parties. But in long term, it can in fact turn into a burden for Iran. I mean if Iran doesn't intend to build nukes, what good is 60%-enriched uranium for us? What civilian application can Iran find for 60% enriched uranium? Nuclear submarines? We'e not there yet and Ali Akbar Salehi said that we'll probably not get there until 2030. So, what could we do with our stockpile of 60% enriched uranium? Well, nothing. If the JCPOA gets restored, we'll have to dilute it down to 3.5% which means that huge money will be flushed down the toilet. Even if the JCPOA doesn't get restored but we don't want to build nukes, it's still money wasted on something useless because at best, we'll have to dilute it down to 20%. So, we spent money on an energy intensive process that has to be reverted unless we want to produce nukes.
However, if we instead enrich uranium to 20%, we can stockpile it and not only reduce our breakout time greatly, but we can later use it for production of medical isotopes at the Tehran Research Reactor. The difference between 20% and 60% for reducing the breakout time is not much to justify its huge energy and political costs.
Again, Iran needs a master plan to know what it wants to do with its nuclear program. Do we want a civilian program? Fine. Then we need to ramp up uranium enrichment and forget about the JCPOA completely because the JCPOA directly targets our independence to produce the nuclear fuel required for our development plans. Do we want a nuclear weapons program? Fine, then we need to leave the NPT and build the bomb and start working on miniaturization and thermonuclear weapons and return at the negotiating table only to give guarantees that we won't build more nukes or more powerful nukes and we won't share our knowledge or weapons with others. Either way, the decision makers have to make a really tough decision soon or else, we'll remain confused and stuck in a situation that wastes our resources for achieving nothing.
