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Iran Needs to Believe America's Threat
(Atlantic) Dennis Ross - The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) discovered uranium residue enriched to 84% in Iranian centrifuge cascades. Weapons-grade fissile material is typically characterized as enriched to 90%, but it is worth recalling that the U.S. atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima in 1945 was a weapon enriched to 80%. The discovery should set off alarm bells. Iran has achieved the capacity to produce weapons-grade material very quickly. Creating weapons-grade fissile material is the most important element needed for bomb-making. At its current pace, Iran could easily accumulate 10 bombs' worth of fissile material enriched to 60% by the end of this year. A senior defense official suggested it would take the Iranians less than two weeks to make such material weapons-grade. The idea that Israel will sit back and not act against what its leaders view as an existential threat is an illusion. Israeli leaders from across the political spectrum share the prime minister's concerns about the quantity of bomb-making fissile material that Iran is accumulating and the hardening of its nuclear infrastructure, which will make it more and more difficult for Israel to destroy. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has already told U.S. officials that if nothing is done soon to stop the advance of the Iranian nuclear program, Israel will have no choice but to attack. Israel is not prepared to live with Iran getting a bomb. To avoid a war with a threatening adversary, that adversary has to believe you will use force. A clear signal of a new American approach may now be essential not only to persuade the Iranians to stop their advance toward a nuclear weapon, but also to show China and Russia that the U.S. is capable of dealing with multiple threats at once and that it has the will to do so. The writer, who served in senior national security positions for four presidents, is counselor at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.