Iran will have enough enriched uranium to make a single nuclear weapon later this year, the prestigious International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) predicts.
The International Institute of Strategic Studies (as well as Jane’s) is one of my absolute favorite sources to cite. Reputable, good history, non-partisan, fantastic database, incredible members.
The think tank’s Mark Fitzpatrick made the announcement at today’s launch of its annual global review of military powers.
“During 2009, Iran will probably reach the point at which it has produced the amount of low-enriched uranium needed to make a nuclear bomb,” he said.
“But being able to enrich uranium is not the same as having a nuclear weapon.”
However, the survey reports doubts over US Intelligence estimates that Iran halted its work on nuclear weapons six years ago. This points to Tehran’s continued development of long-range ballistic missiles able to reach targets in Israel and beyond.
The IISS recommends a mixture of carrot and stick as the best international response.
It concluded a dual policy of engagement and sanctions, testing possibilities for Iranian cooperation while adopting targeted containment strategies, is the best way to deal with Iran’s nuclear programme.
Feeling Hopeychangey yet?
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Take a look at a world map. If you had borders with Russia and Pakistan, had NATO on your eastern and western borders plus you had 200+ Israeli nuclear warheads and god knows what from India and China, wouldn’t you demand a working nuclear weapon system like, yesterday?
I think I’d embrace democracy, freedom, and make friends w the US, NATO, EU, etc. Making nukes and creating massive terrorist proxy forces ain’t a way to make friends. It’s a way to give potential opponents a litany of excuses for attack.
Exactly. This isn’t freaking 1914 and Iran is not Imperial Germany being hemm’ed in by France and Russia.
Good gracious, what a foolish statement.
From a political perspective (internal to Iran), the mullah’s and secular leaders need to keep discontent high as to create/keep control.
I wonder what would be the best approach to deal with their nuclear ambitions and foster democracy in a very literate country?
I’d like to change my New Year’s Resolution if I may. My new resolution is to see Iran at the UN demanding the extermination of Israel because the Zionist’s turned their peaceful nuclear power production facilities into huge piles of useless ruble and also caused peace loving every day average men, women, and children living in those facilities to die.
The real issue here is that there are no simple solutions to keep Iran from producing nuclear weapons if they wanted them. I have yet to see anyone present a good idea that would suggest to Iran that it is in their best interest to disontinue with their nuclear technology.
What a load of BS. First of all having enough low-enriched uranium which could THEORETICALLY be further enriched to make Highly-Enriched URanium isn’t the same thing as “having the bomb”
Secondly, Iran’s enrichment program is transparent and conducted under IAEA safeguards and cannot be used to make HEU withou being noticed.
This is BS scaremongering. Read IranAffairs.com for the details.
The way I see it, Israel has to hope that Iran can’t do much of anything for another 16 months. Then the US combat units will be out of Iraq and there will be nothing left to stop Israel from launching a strike that must fly over Iraq.
Expect to see Obama change the “16 month thing”. The only question is what excuse he will use.
@james manning:
I would say self preservation is high on the list. How do you think the US and Israel would take Iran testing a nuke? What about Israel? They are surrounded by people refusing to acknowledge their existence much less, and want them dead or wiped off the earth. If you were a country WITH nukes and your neighbors are making those kinds of threats, but they can’t beat you with their conventional army, what would be the best weapon to accomplish their goal?
And come on timmy.. you are making it sound like they own a food processing plant under strict control from the FDA. If you are so ignorant to think that their weapons development is an open book, you might want to do more research. And not from your liberal anti-Israel sources. Try more than one source for your information (accredited would be nice and not from a blog). Plus, since when are blogs a source of authority on things like this? Unless that is the head Iranian scientist working on the project, I could care less. FA is a great place to visit, but isn’t my source for facts. That is why you will see everyone that posts here, has millions of references included in the articles.
I am a big supporter of Israel and of keeping Iran, or any other countries from developing nukes. But could you explain why Iran would attack Israel with nukes if they know Israel has many (or believes) sophisticated nuclear weapons and the ability to deploy them? Would it not be suicide for Iran to makes such a move?
blast:
Thanks for asking… More than anything, I was making an overarching analogy that had to do with neighbors that hate you…nothing real concrete there in terms of attack scenarios or motives (unless you look at the Israel reference). Personally, I do believe that Iran would be very careful, but you can’t push asunder the price that insane leaders have on their people. To put things into perspective, if we had mexico developing nukes and in the mean time, their president is saying how they would like nothing more than to see America wiped off the map, there has to be a certain sense of insanity in saying those words to a world theater. Maybe for them, its kind of like being in prison? You show your colors, and hopefully you attract those people that support you before that big guy benching two Volkswagens beats you up in the shower.
I imagine for anti-Zionists, the collateral damage of wiping out Israel would far outweigh the price it would cost them. Think… Much of these people are of the same thought that blowing yourself up is a good thing, not a bad thing. Plus, when was the last time sanity or unbiased rational thought had anything to do with politics?
I have thought about it also, it would be suicide, but yes, would they be nuts enough to do it? Are they big talkers trying to posture with the only weapons they have (mouths). It would be a blood bath if it happened and for sure there would not be a city of village in Israel, or Iran that would be left inhabitable, provided there were living casualties. The anti-Zionists want to push Israelis into the sea, but I doubt that incinerating the middle east will accomplish their goals.
Good comment man, like the prison analogy too.
@blast:
Iran uses proxies to do their dirty work then sits back and watches while the world faults Israel. Now we have that Arab peace plan on the table, can’t remember who Obama sent over there, but he is in favor of the plan, win, win for Iran. It involves truncated and porous borders and forcing Israel to take Arabs into their country, lots of them. Iran instigated, funded and supplied Hamas and Hezbollah, Israel lost the media war with Hezbollah, with Hamas, not so much, these types of conflicts brings the neighbors in to solve this problem once and for all usually causing more concessions for Israel, Iran snickers and starts another fire.
Former Sen. George Mitchell, the guy who helped negotiate the end of the the Northern Ireland conflict.
Missy, wouldn’t you agree that Israel isn’t exactly a pushover either? They may loose the media war, but I am pretty sure they could care less. I doubt they will let their neighbors (or even the U.S. under Obama) tell them what to do if they don’t want to do it. When it comes down to facing the music, Israel practically conducts the symphony. In general I think mahmoud ahmadinejad is making a lot of mistakes by the way he talks, but it is still talk. When they decide to mobilize and do something about it, I am pretty sure we can expect to see Israel make up for the last several years in about 3 days. Its like all the crazy dictators over the years speaking about the destruction of the U.S…
Yes, I certainly agree that Israel is no pushover, but I fear for them. I don’t think their best interest is being taken into account, this latest effort within the Arab states could be a set up. By not agreeing to the terms they will suffer consequences politically leaving an out for the US to walk away which is something I worry the Obama administration would be willing to do. How they could endorse the Arab plan is beyond me. Israel has already gone the limit IMHO and what have they gained? Yet, without US support they will indeed have a great deal to fear, they better have everything they need before they strike.
Mahmoud(Iran) shoots his mouth off and gets attention from Obama, it will be followed by a letter the new administration has been working on since the election. Iran has been meddling all around them, trying to damage democracy where ever a hint of it can be found. Our forces are still digging up their weapons caches and figthing the Quds forces in Iraq. And, Obama wants to talk, just words.
I agree, but I would also add that political ‘diplomacy’ is different than a leader slamming Zionists in a speech. For an american president to sit down with someone like iran, with no preconditions, would be almost unheard of. Maybe that is why obama is doing it? It seems like he wants to be the new sheriff in town that questions the old ways and implements his new ways. Afterwords, everyone rejoices because their eyes were finally opened to the truth.. hardly. I think every president wants to prove their worth in some way, and I think obama wants to take it over the top. I personally am not a fan of politicians of any kind. It seems like they all have to be good at manipulation and distortion as a prerequisite for their job. If they say they are transparent, well they might just be proving my point (tongue-in-cheek comment of course)
You bring up a good point that many overlook… many of the IED’s, fighters, weapons etc… that are used against our forces are from Iran. But in the same breath most of the weapons found in vietnam used against our soldiers, were from russia and china. There were many reasons we lost that ‘war’ (cough, police action) and probably the greatest was the fact we were limited by who we could take out or attack. If that is the same case for us today with iran, we can expect to lose the war on terror and begin to face a new era of fear with Iran as a central player. Talking is always best done in a coffee shop with good friends. Not at a world table with a crazy tyrant.
But liam, there are preconditions……Both the leader of the Taliban and Iran have the same preconditions, leave Iraq and Afghanistan and renounce Israel.
Did I say something to the contrary?