Iran Still Pursuing Nuclear Enrichment: This Is A Deal Breaker
Anyone who thought that Iran was going to stop their enrichment process in favor of the president's overture for face-to-face talks is a fool. And today Breitbart reveals that Iran actually played some as fools:
An Iranian official has confirmed that the country has stepped up its nuclear activities, following a report from the UN atomic agency that said Iran has accelerated uranium enrichment.
"Iran has started another stage of injecting hexafluoride gas into centrifuge machines," the student news agency ISNA quoted an unnamed official as saying on Friday.
"Iran is also pursuing a plan to have a 3,000-centrifuge cascade by the end of the current year (March 2007)," he noted, adding that all the material used in uranium enrichment facilities has been produced domestically.
A report from the International Atomic Energy Agency obtained by AFP on Thursday said that Iran had accelerated uranium enrichment on June 6, the same day world powers asked it to halt the work and open talks to guarantee it will not make nuclear weapons.
On that Tuesday, European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana visited Tehran to present a package of benefits aimed at enticing Iran to suspend uranium enrichment.
Enriched uranium makes nuclear reactor fuel, and in a highly refined form can produce atom bomb material.
"Iran is continuing its installation work on other 164-machine cascades," said the report from the IAEA chief, Mohamed ElBaradei.
Iran built the cascade as a pilot plant for what it hopes will eventually be an industrial plant of more than 50,000 centrifuges, used to refine the uranium 235 isotope.
Iran started last August to make feedstock uranium hexafluoride gas, which it then fed into centrifuges in February this year. It produced enriched uranium beginning in April.
The quality of enriched uranium being produced in April was appropriate for nuclear reactor fuel and was not the highly-enriched variety needed to make weapons.
While it may not be the necessary quality for nuclear weapons, it is the first step in the process. There is no doubt that because they have the ability to enrich uranium that they will not build weapons with it when it does reach that caliber. Iran, in short, is pushing the West. They are hoping that as long as the toothless IAEA (or should we say "incompetent") cannot get into their secret facilities, they can go about their business because the IAEA will continue to state that the enriched uranium is not weapons grade.
The West can ill afford to make this mistake. It is clear that Iran has nuclear ambitions. One does not threaten a regional state with annihilation with said weapons, and then never pursue that goal. There is the added bonus of the fatwa issued from one of the mullahs in Iran stating that Allah would not look down on them for creating such weapons because all of their enemies already possess them. Their continued efforts to obtain more advanced missile technology from Russia and China displays an ambition to use those weapons in the future. With the rhetoric on the table as a starting point, and we look at all the saber-rattling that has gone on thus far, it is impossible for analysts to conclude that they are not moving towards creating nuclear weapons.
And Iran is already on the exact same path that North Korea was when it engaged the United States in one-on-one talks. North Korea did not end their enrichment programs, and allowed only their "peaceful" purposes program to be seen by the world. This is what bamboozled and duped Madeline Albright and President Clinton into giving Kim Jong-Il what he wanted, which was nuclear fuel for his reactors. Once the fuel was obtained, the deal was broken, and Kim Jong-Il ordered a crash program to build North Korea's first nuclear weapon.
Is that what awaits the West in this set of talks? We believe so. On the table, again, is an offer for nuclear fuel. Depending on where the Iranian nuclear program is depends on how quickly a crash program could proceed. And, of course, there is the fact that Iran has been a part of the AQ Khan network already, and that such technology could be "shared" by another member of that network; someone like North Korea, maybe?
Their continued push should be looked at, by this administration and the failed EU-3, as a deal breaker. ALL enrichment is ceased, or there are no talks. It should be made perfectly clear that the West does not care if it is for "peaceful" purposes. The condition of these talks is a cessation of enrichment. If they fail to comply then the president needs to push for the sanctions in the UN. If Russia and China fail to back this play, then we move onto the next available option, which in our opinion, should be some sort of military operation. Whether it is saboteurs slipping over the border, or an air-strike targeting a specific facility/stage of their nuclear program is up to the administration, but steps must be taken, and soon.
Marcie
ADDEDUM: Captain Ed Morrissey shares similar sentiments over a New York Times story that basically says the same thing, but with an added Chamberlain-esque addition to the story: That being a quote from the Times article from EU Foreign Minister Javier Solana:
Mr. Solana, apparently unaware of the critical I.A.E.A. report, was upbeat in remarks to reporters in Paris on Thursday. "I am more optimistic than pessimistic," he said after emerging from a meeting about the Iran crisis with President Jacques Chirac of France. Calling the incentives package "a pretty, beautiful package," he said it provided a way for the Iranians to extricate themselves from the crisis over their nuclear program.
"What is needed is to work with them with respect," Mr. Solana said, adding that the countries that made the offer had "the intention to work with them in the most constructive fashion possible."
Adolf Hitler broke the Munich Agreement in March of 1939 as his armies entered Prague, and proceeded onto Bavaria and Moravia. It was on September 29, 1938 that the Munich Agreement was signed, and it took Hitler six months before he broke the accord. We cannot trust Iran to abide by any agreement that it signs, as they have already lied and cheated the world when it comes to their nuclear program. To continue down the same path now could be devastating to the world, again.
Anyone who thought that Iran was going to stop their enrichment process in favor of the president's overture for face-to-face talks is a fool. And today Breitbart reveals that Iran actually played some as fools:
An Iranian official has confirmed that the country has stepped up its nuclear activities, following a report from the UN atomic agency that said Iran has accelerated uranium enrichment.
"Iran has started another stage of injecting hexafluoride gas into centrifuge machines," the student news agency ISNA quoted an unnamed official as saying on Friday.
"Iran is also pursuing a plan to have a 3,000-centrifuge cascade by the end of the current year (March 2007)," he noted, adding that all the material used in uranium enrichment facilities has been produced domestically.
A report from the International Atomic Energy Agency obtained by AFP on Thursday said that Iran had accelerated uranium enrichment on June 6, the same day world powers asked it to halt the work and open talks to guarantee it will not make nuclear weapons.
On that Tuesday, European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana visited Tehran to present a package of benefits aimed at enticing Iran to suspend uranium enrichment.
Enriched uranium makes nuclear reactor fuel, and in a highly refined form can produce atom bomb material.
"Iran is continuing its installation work on other 164-machine cascades," said the report from the IAEA chief, Mohamed ElBaradei.
Iran built the cascade as a pilot plant for what it hopes will eventually be an industrial plant of more than 50,000 centrifuges, used to refine the uranium 235 isotope.
Iran started last August to make feedstock uranium hexafluoride gas, which it then fed into centrifuges in February this year. It produced enriched uranium beginning in April.
The quality of enriched uranium being produced in April was appropriate for nuclear reactor fuel and was not the highly-enriched variety needed to make weapons.
While it may not be the necessary quality for nuclear weapons, it is the first step in the process. There is no doubt that because they have the ability to enrich uranium that they will not build weapons with it when it does reach that caliber. Iran, in short, is pushing the West. They are hoping that as long as the toothless IAEA (or should we say "incompetent") cannot get into their secret facilities, they can go about their business because the IAEA will continue to state that the enriched uranium is not weapons grade.
The West can ill afford to make this mistake. It is clear that Iran has nuclear ambitions. One does not threaten a regional state with annihilation with said weapons, and then never pursue that goal. There is the added bonus of the fatwa issued from one of the mullahs in Iran stating that Allah would not look down on them for creating such weapons because all of their enemies already possess them. Their continued efforts to obtain more advanced missile technology from Russia and China displays an ambition to use those weapons in the future. With the rhetoric on the table as a starting point, and we look at all the saber-rattling that has gone on thus far, it is impossible for analysts to conclude that they are not moving towards creating nuclear weapons.
And Iran is already on the exact same path that North Korea was when it engaged the United States in one-on-one talks. North Korea did not end their enrichment programs, and allowed only their "peaceful" purposes program to be seen by the world. This is what bamboozled and duped Madeline Albright and President Clinton into giving Kim Jong-Il what he wanted, which was nuclear fuel for his reactors. Once the fuel was obtained, the deal was broken, and Kim Jong-Il ordered a crash program to build North Korea's first nuclear weapon.
Is that what awaits the West in this set of talks? We believe so. On the table, again, is an offer for nuclear fuel. Depending on where the Iranian nuclear program is depends on how quickly a crash program could proceed. And, of course, there is the fact that Iran has been a part of the AQ Khan network already, and that such technology could be "shared" by another member of that network; someone like North Korea, maybe?
Their continued push should be looked at, by this administration and the failed EU-3, as a deal breaker. ALL enrichment is ceased, or there are no talks. It should be made perfectly clear that the West does not care if it is for "peaceful" purposes. The condition of these talks is a cessation of enrichment. If they fail to comply then the president needs to push for the sanctions in the UN. If Russia and China fail to back this play, then we move onto the next available option, which in our opinion, should be some sort of military operation. Whether it is saboteurs slipping over the border, or an air-strike targeting a specific facility/stage of their nuclear program is up to the administration, but steps must be taken, and soon.
Marcie
ADDEDUM: Captain Ed Morrissey shares similar sentiments over a New York Times story that basically says the same thing, but with an added Chamberlain-esque addition to the story: That being a quote from the Times article from EU Foreign Minister Javier Solana:
Mr. Solana, apparently unaware of the critical I.A.E.A. report, was upbeat in remarks to reporters in Paris on Thursday. "I am more optimistic than pessimistic," he said after emerging from a meeting about the Iran crisis with President Jacques Chirac of France. Calling the incentives package "a pretty, beautiful package," he said it provided a way for the Iranians to extricate themselves from the crisis over their nuclear program.
"What is needed is to work with them with respect," Mr. Solana said, adding that the countries that made the offer had "the intention to work with them in the most constructive fashion possible."
Adolf Hitler broke the Munich Agreement in March of 1939 as his armies entered Prague, and proceeded onto Bavaria and Moravia. It was on September 29, 1938 that the Munich Agreement was signed, and it took Hitler six months before he broke the accord. We cannot trust Iran to abide by any agreement that it signs, as they have already lied and cheated the world when it comes to their nuclear program. To continue down the same path now could be devastating to the world, again.
posted by Syd And Vaughn | 10:33 AM
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