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An Iran Nuclear Deal Is Coming into Focus, But There's One Glaring Problem

(Business Insider) Armin Rosen - U.S. negotiators believe restrictions on enrichment and rigorously enforced enriched uranium stockpile limits will be able to prevent Tehran from accumulating enough highly enriched uranium to construct a nuclear weapon undetected. By this logic, the problem with Iran's nuclear program isn't its 19,000 centrifuges, secretive and heavily guarded nuclear facilities, weaponization and advance centrifuge research, Revolutionary Guards Corps involvement, ballistic-missile program, and plutonium reactor. If Iran were really building a nuclear program for purely civilian reasons, it could just purchase all of its enriched uranium from a foreign seller. Even the U.S. actually imports the vast majority of its enriched uranium and has no currently operating industrial-scale enrichment facilities, says Olli Heinonen, former deputy director general for safeguards at the International Atomic Energy Agency. Allowing Iran to keep 4,500-6,500 centrifuges would be to let Tehran remain within striking distance of building a nuclear weapon. Under an agreement that allows Iran to keep thousands of centrifuges, Iran will be given a green light to enrich uranium - something it has no practical need to do - thanks to decades of recalcitrance, single-minded policy dedication, and outright deceit.
2015-02-24 00:00:00
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