By CKR
I’ve been talking about uranium enrichment in the US and Brazil, but not Iran. This morning I’m almost tempted to put my two cents in on Iran (why should I be the only one not to?), but I think I won’t.
I’m trying to put together some background on this sort of thing and work up to how the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) is being used and ignored in today’s diplomacy, and what might be done to improve the situation. I’m packaging what is really a longer argument in smaller blog chunks.
Iran combines the technical with a very complex set of political considerations, so I think I’d better hold off on my two cents.
Just a quick technical summary for now: In the publicly available evidence, there is no reason to believe that Iran is currently working on nuclear weapons. But an enrichment plant can be used for reactor fuel or weapons. Iran’s earlier unwillingness to be open about its plans is suspicious, as is its apparent rush to stockpile uranium hexafluoride before it accedes to the enrichment ban. That looks like it wants to be ready to go at any time. Colin Powell’s evidence on the missiles appears to be from a single not-entirely-reliable source, so I’ll discount that for now.