So the IAEA has concluded in a confidential analysis by it's experts, that Iran has the the capacity to design and produce a workable nuclear bomb. The conclusions are tentative , subject to further confirmation, and based on intelligence gathered by intelligence agencies and it's own investigations.
Well, this comes as no surprise to anyone who's been paying attention. I mean a secretive weapons grade uranium enrichment plant was just discovered, or rather announced - the US had been tracking it for years - that is built into a mountain on a Rev Guard military base. Alarm bells anyone?
One has to wonder what else intelligence agencies and the IAEA know. As I diaried the other day in, How Many Hidden Nuclear Facilities Does Iran Have? there are more than a dozen sites in Iran suspected of carrying out nuclear weapons research, testing, engineering and the like. Spy satellites monitor the sites, but inspectors need to gain access to prove their purpose. But given that the IAEA has been in Iran for years they must have gathered some evidence on their own, plus one wonders how many spies the West has inside them, gaining first hand knowledge of any illicit activities.
The report, titled "Possible Military Dimensions of Iran’s Nuclear Program," was produced in consultation with a range of nuclear weapons experts inside and outside the agency. It draws a picture of a complex program, run by Iran’s Ministry of Defense, "aimed at the development of a nuclear payload to be delivered using the Shahab 3 missile system," Iran’s medium-range missile, which can strike the Middle East and parts of Europe. The program, according to the report, apparently began in early 2002.
Most dramatically, the report says the agency "assesses that Iran has sufficient information to be able to design and produce a workable implosion nuclear device" based on highly enriched uranium.
Weapons based on the principle of implosion are considered advanced models compared with the simple gun-type bomb that the United States dropped on Hiroshima. They use a blast wave from a sphere of conventional explosives to compress a ball of bomb fuel into a supercritical mass, starting the atomic chain reaction and progressing to the fiery blast. Implosion designs, compact by nature, are considered necessary for making nuclear warheads small and powerful enough to fit atop a missile.
The excerpts of the analysis also suggest the Iranians have done a wide array of research and testing to perfect nuclear arms, like making high-voltage detonators, firing test explosives and designing warheads.
http://www.nytimes.com/...
"The agency's tentative analysis also says that Iran 'most likely' obtained the needed information for designing and building an implosion bomb 'from external sources' and then adapted the information to its own needs," the Times said
http://www.reuters.com/...
The IAEA report raises concerns about evidence it received indicating that Iran had conducted studies on ways to build a nuclear warhead, said David Albright, founder of the Institute for Science and International Security and a former nuclear inspector, who said he had viewed excerpts from the IAEA study. The report also documents what it said was growing evidence that Tehran was studying how to place a miniaturized nuclear device atop Iran's long-range Shahab-3 missile.
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The IAEA has not denied the existence of its report, which was first reported by the Associated Press last month. But IAEA officials have denied that the agency had suppressed making public the report. Past agency reports have raised concerns about potential military applications of Iran's nuclear program
http://online.wsj.com/...
Meanwhile a date has been agreed upon for inspection of the newly discovered facility in Qom. It's Oct. 25th which is further away than the two week deadline Obama had set. Given this facility has been known about for a week or two already and now won't be inspected for more than another three weeks, David Albright says that Iran has time to conceal it's activities. Why has Iran been given so long? The West should have insisted on immdediate inspections. Now Iran presumably has time to mask the facility and can stall another three weeks.
Reporting from Geneva - Iran's promise to admit inspectors to a secret nuclear plant, though hailed as a major step this week by U.S. officials and their allies, may come too late to glean key information about the facility's design and history, experts and foreign government officials said Friday.
David Albright, a former international weapons inspector and president of the Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security, said that it would probably take Iran some time to conceal activities at the facility.
But, "if you have a month, you have the time," he said.
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Iran has previously gone to great lengths to conceal nuclear activities.
Charles D. Ferguson, a nonproliferation expert and former State Department official now with the Council on Foreign Relations, recalled that when the so-called Lavizan site on the outskirts of Tehran came under suspicion as an undeclared nuclear site in 2003, Iran delayed access. Ultimately, the Iranians razed the building and covered it with topsoil, satellite photos have shown.
http://www.latimes.com/...
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