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| Iran |
| Iran’s Nuclear Threat |
| 2003-03-08 |
| Time via Drudge: Saturday, Mar. 08, 2003 With war in Iraq looming and North Korea defiantly pursuing its own nuclear program, the last thing President Bush needs is another nuclear crisis. But that is what he may soon face in Iran. On a visit last month to Tehran, International Atomic Energy Agency director Mohamed ElBaradei announced he had discovered that Iran was constructing a facility to enrich uranium — a key component of advanced nuclear weapons — near Natanz Oh so surprising due to their riches in natural gas and petroleum.... But diplomatic sources tell TIME the plant is much further along than previously revealed. The sources say work on the plant is "extremely advanced" and involves "hundreds" of gas centrifuges ready to produce enriched uranium and "the parts for a thousand others ready to be assembled." "Calling the IDF? Oh, I'm sorry, be busy for a couple weeks? oh? ready after that for an emerging opportunities? why yes, thank you" Iran announced last week that it intends to activate a uranium conversion facility near Isfahan (under IAEA safeguards), a step that produces the uranium hexafluoride gas used in the enrichment process. Sources tell Time the IAEA has concluded that Iran actually introduced uranium hexafluoride gas into some centrifuges at an undisclosed location (and how would they know that without Israeli or American spies?) to test their ability to work. That would be a blatant violation of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, to which Iran is a signatory. blatant yes, punishable while the French exist? not...... The IAEA declined to comment. A senior State department weasel official said he believed El Baradei was trying to resolve the issue behind the scenes before going public. But experts say the new discoveries are very serious and should be handled in public. "If Iran were found to have an operating centrifuge, it would be a direct violation [of the non-proliferation treaty] and is something that would need immediately to be referred to the United Nations Security Council for action he said with a stupid grin...," says Jon Wolfstahl of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Iran insists that its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes and told elBaradei that Tehran intends to bring all of its programs under IAEA safeguards per the North Korean precident . U.S. officials have said repeatedly they believe Iran is pursuing nuclear weapons. The new discoveries could destabilize a region already dangerously on edge in anticipation of war in Iraq. Israel — which destroyed an Iraqi nuclear plant in Osirak in a 1981 raid — is deeply alarmed by the developments. "It's a huge concern," says one Israeli official. "Iran is a regime that denies Israel's right to exist in any borders and is a principal sponsor of Hezbollah. If that regime were able to achieve a nuclear potential it would be extremely dangerous." Israel will not take the "Osirak option" off the table, the official says, but "would prefer that this issue be solved in other ways." "We hate to listen to the recriminations from the nations who illegally sold the technology to the Persian Mullahs - and then bitch about the fallout when we defend ourselves" The revelations come at a particularly bad time for Washington, which is locked in a battle to gain U.N. approval or see who the Tessios are for an attack on Iraq and to build consensus among its allies for a multilateral approach to the crisis in North Korea. Critics of the Administration Democrat ankle biters say Bush's hard public line against the so-called "Axis of Evil," combined with the threatened war with Iraq, have acted as a spur to both Iran and North Korea to accelerate their nuclear programs. "Of course, without the words of encouragement we wouldn't spend these hundres of millions to defy international agreements to development these weapons to kill Jews and Merkins" "If those countries didn't have much incentive or motivation before, they certainly did after the Axis of Evil statement," says one western diplomat butt boy familiar with the Iranian and North Korean programs. The Administration counters that both programs have been underway for many years. Wake up Idiots! |
| Posted by:Frank G |
| #2 Sources tell Time the IAEA has concluded that Iran actually introduced uranium hexafluoride gas into some centrifuges at an undisclosed location (and how would they know that without Israeli or American spies?) to test their ability to work. Actually the IAEA laboratory at Seibersdorf (near Vienna) can measure micron size particles of uranium hexafluoride from swipe samples taken on or around the centrifuges. No country is currently advanced enough to clean up a used centrifuge to have it pass a swipe test of this kind. Isn't science fun. |
| Posted by: Russell 2003-03-09 04:18:26 |
| #1 Well, Time mag, everyone has known about Bushehr reactor for over a year. We have been downloading satellite const progress images for over a year, 2.5 megs at a throw. So there is your source of Pu239 when it comes on line. It has been common knowledge that Iran has uranium deposits, so there is the U235 source. Well better late than never, now you know why Bush calls em a member of the axis of evil. Are these writers special ed or do they have their heads up their collective asses or what? |
| Posted by: Alaska Paul 2003-03-08 22:58:32 |