When I was writing yesterday early afternoon about the just-announced Iran nuclear framework agreement, since officially named “Parameters for a Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action regarding the Islamic Republic of Iran’s Nuclear Program”, no details were available. Now at least many are available. Do the details change the basic analysis? No. But…

First, as predicted, exaggerations already abound about the supposed significance of what happened yesterday. The President claimed, in a call with the Israeli Prime Minister, that if the deal can be worked through to finality it will cut off all avenues to an Iranian bomb—in sotto voce, for at least 15 years. The odious Trita Parsi claimed that the agreement, which by the way is unsigned, is a victory for peace and proves hawks wrong about everything… But then what would one expect from someone who amounts to an unregistered agent of the Iranian regime? Neither statement is true yet.

Again, there is a long road to travel between yesterday and the end of June. Some major matters have yet to be worked out, and there is no guarantee they will be worked out: the timing of sanctions relief and the disposition of Iran’s enriched uranium being foremost among them. There is still a significant chance, therefore, that unless the U.S. position caves completely, the Supreme Leader will reject the deal and emasculate President Rouhani as he has emasculated every President before him. There is also a chance that the Republicans in Congress will make it lots easier for him to do so, which would be unfortunate for several reasons.

And the main point remains: Given the way this whole business has been postured in a pro-Iran tilt, with the delinking of the nuclear portfolio from regional geopolitics and the Administration’s penchant to abuse its allies, the nightmare scenario of a mousetrap regional WMD proliferation might actually be more likely now as a consequence of this agreement. Let us suppose for a moment the hypothetically ridiculous: The Iranian program has always been exclusively civil and peaceful in intent. But if now Saudi Arabia, Egypt, the UAE, and in due course Turkey lurch for the bomb, the necessary boomerang consequence will be that Iran must do the same in reaction. Ironic? It would be if the ridiculous were not in fact ridiculous.

So what about the “but”? Well, like most observers not privy to the negotiations, I am surprised by the level of detail in the PJCPA. I am also relieved that the U.S. position has not been completely supine. It is rather bent, yes, but not entirely broken; clearly, the Iranians made significant concessions, too: over the Arak reactor core, their stockpile of low-enriched uranium, and more. That outcome supplies hope that the U.S. position will not crumble between now and June 30, which raises the likelihood, in my view, that the Supreme Leader will bolt.

The most optimistic interpretation of the agreement is that it buys at least ten years of below-breakout status for the Iranian program, even though it leaves Iran with a significant and growingly sophisticated nuclear infrastructure. One can reason that the Iranian negotiators were willing to trade a decade’s forbearance for sanctions relief now. A decade is by some measures a long time, and so again we are back to the old “race” proposition: If the Iranian regime implodes or enters Thermidor before it gets nukes, then that alters the danger inherent in the proliferation scenario. As I have argued before, this scenario is no longer as persuasive as it once was, since the regional proliferation impulse may have already been fueled beyond recall. But it’s not totally irrelevant either.

The most pessimistic interpretation is that the combination of the U.S. concession on allowing Fordow to operate at all—despite it having been built to deceive and conceal—the concession on allowing advanced centrifuge research at Natanz, and the heavy reliance on an IAEA inspection regime adds up to minimal constraints on the Iranian program. Yes, the Iranians have agreed to a smaller number of older-type centrifuges than they wanted, and that number is bound to be sold as a major P5+1 negotiating achievement. Even so, 5,060 centrifuges can still produce more enriched uranium than Iran could possible need for non-military purposes.

But the key really is the inspection regime seen together with the restrictions on Iranian activity at Fordow (and allowed advanced research activities at Natanz). Iran can only produce medical isotopes at Fordow, not fissile material; but if we cannot verify that, then the limitation is meaningless. As David Albright recently put it in congressional testimony, if the Iranians have stiffed the IAEA when sanctions were biting, what makes anyone think they will stop stiffing the IAEA when our leverage is gone?

It’s an excellent question. So the President’s claim late yesterday afternoon that if the Iranians cheat we will know it is less persuasive than he wants it to be. As these things go, too, if they cheat and we don’t know it, it will be embarrassing to take the trouble to really find out, because then we will put pressure on ourselves to do something possibly noxious and risky about it. That’s not a good situation.

Finally, while it has long been clear that while preventing a regional proliferation nightmare is the main priority of the Administration’s policy, denaturing Iranian hostility toward the United States is another, with the hope that a more normal relationship can develop in time. That normality, many also hope, will help transform Iran internally from a harsh and intolerant theocratic dictatorship into something kinder and gentler.

This is all possible, and certainly worth a shot, given the potential payoff for regional security. And were it to be pursued properly, it need not roil U.S. relationships with its other regional allies. (Except of course, as already suggested, it has not been pursued properly.) But the broader political positive impact of an agreement is by no means guaranteed. President Obama is not the only one who made questionable statements yesterday: Javad Zarif said yesterday afternoon that “U.S.-Iran relations have nothing to do with this; this was an attempt to resolve the nuclear issue.” That is an odd remark for a Foreign Minister to make, if you think about it. But he made it because one quite plausible regime reaction to an Iranian opening to the United States will be a severe preemptive crackdown on civil society, and Zarif is trying to put blue sky between the deal and what it means politically in Iran so as to obviate a crackdown. For the short term his effort is likely to be futile. How all of this will turn out in the longer run no one knows.

For the time being then, the wise way to react to what happened yesterday is not to jump to premature conclusions, and certainly not to jump to confusions fueled by either wishful thinking, or undue pessimism. As sick as some of us might be with this whole business, the truth is that it’s really only just begun.