Iran is weeks away from 'threshold and more

Iran is within weeks of crossing a "threshold" for its nuclear weapons capability, Israeli Defense Forces intelligence chief Maj. Gen. Amos Yadlin said last week.

"The Iranians are acting to enrich uranium and to cross a technological threshold which would let them state that they possess nuclear technology, so that they would no longer need any external assistance," Yadlin told the Ma'ariv newspaper.

"In respect of the technology gap, they are a few months away from crossing the threshold that I mentioned," he said. "Afterwards, the length of time that they will need to attain the bomb will depend on their rate of progress in producing the necessary materials. It may be that the international community should exert such pressure on them so that they would not wish to advance, but if they do want to, it would be a matter of another few years until they attain a bomb." Yadlin said the nuclear program is "reversible at any state" and that if the threshold is not crossed, a nuclear program is out of the question.

As to when Iran will have a nuclear weapon, he stated: "It is very hard to predict the exact date. International pressure is being exerted on Iran. But assuming that the program makes progress in technological terms, then judging by the standards and pace that we know from other countries, and assuming that Iran does not retreat in the face of international pressure — it may possess a nuclear bomb toward the end of this decade."

Asked about differing Western intelligence assessment of the timeline, Yadlin said: "We, who have to provide a response, to build up our strength, and to be ready to meet this threat, naturally take the worst case scenario into account — the one that assumes the most rapid pace. The United States, on the other hand, takes into account what seems to them to be a more realistic scenario: a slower rate of development, with the mishaps that characterize such complex projects. But there are no abysmal gaps between our assessment and theirs."

Yadlin also said Iran has the Shahab-3 missile with a range of 1,300 kilometers as well as AS-15 cruise missiles from Ukraine with ranges of up to 3,000 kilometers. "We do not know whether these cruise missiles are operational, or the Iranians bought them to study the technology," he said.

Iran also has North Korean BM-25s with a ranges of 2,500 and 3,500 kilometers, Yadlin said, enough to cover all of Europe.

North Korea has two versions of the Taepodong missile with similar ranges.
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Iran switching to improved P-2 centrifuges in underground facilities near Pakistan - GeoStrategy-Direct

NICOSIA — Iran plans to rapidly expand uranium enrichment by deploying an advanced gas centrifuge.

Officials said Iran has been testing an advanced centrifuge to accelerate nuclear fuel production. Teheran has been testing the P-2 centrifuge, deemed a significant improvement over Iran's P-1 model.

Western intelligence sources said Iran has already been using the P-2 in underground facilities located in eastern Iran near the border with Pakistan.

"Many of the announcements by Iran regarding its uranium enrichment program reflected technology achieved as early as November 2005," an intelligence source said. "Since then, Iran has been steadily advancing in its program and capabilities."

On April 12, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad disclosed the P-2 tests. In an address to students in Khorasan, Ahmadinejad said P-2 had four times the enrichment capacity of P-1.

"Our centrifuges are P-1 type," Ahmadinejad said. "P-2, which has quadruple the capacity, is currently under the process of research and testing in the country."

It was the first time Iran announced a program to develop the P-2 centrifuge. Until now, many Western analysts dismissed Iran's uranium enrichment program based on the inferior capabilities of the Pakistan-origin P-1.

On April 10, Ahmadinejad reported the production of nuclear fuel from a cascade of 164 centrifuges comprised of P-1 centrifuges.

The P-2, based on German technology, is regarded as more reliable than the P-1. Iran reportedly received the blueprints of the P-2 from the nuclear smuggling network headed by Pakistani scientist Abdul Qadeer Kahn.

On April 12, a leading Iranian nuclear physicist, Hassan Ghafuri Fard, told Iranian television that Teheran would assemble up to 60,000 centrifuges by 2008. He said that by in March 2007 Iran would accumulate 3,000 centrifuges for what he termed "semi-industrial nuclear fuel production."

"Then we will have to obtain at least 54,000 to 60,000 [centrifuges] to produce industrial fuel for our reactor [at Bushehr]," Ghafuri Fard said. "This process will take between one and two years."
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U.S. strike on Iran to include Britain and France, not Israel - www.insightmag.com

The United States has dropped Israel as a potential partner in any attack against Iran.

Sources close to the administration said that instead the White House has been discussing a joint military campaign with two European states to destroy Iran's nuclear program. They identified the states as Britain and France.

"Whatever happens, Israel will not be part of an operation," a source close to the administration said. "There will be other players."

The sources said Israel was located too far from Iran to provide significant support for an air strike on the nuclear facilities of the Islamic republic. They said Tehran's neighbors, including Turkey, would not allow Israeli fighter-jets to enter their air space on any mission against Iran.

Over the next three months, the sources said, the United States and its allies would seek to pass a United Nations Security Council resolution that would pave the way for military force against Iran. The resolution would invoke Chapter 7, which calls for sanctions or military force should Iran continue to enrich uranium in violation of demands by the International Atomic Energy Agency.

The IAEA was scheduled to submit a report on Iran by April 28.

"If Iran does not comply with the demand in the presidential statement we adopted on March 28 to come into compliance with the existing IAEA resolutions, we would consider at that point a resolution under Chapter VII which would make the IAEA resolutions binding on Iran," U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations John Bolton said on April 12.

The sources said the discussions on Iran have taken place in several departments. They cited U.S. Central Command, which has been drafting a range of military responses, the Defense Department and the office of Vice President Dick Cheney.

At one point, Mr. Cheney suggested an Israeli air strike on Iran. On Jan. 20, 2006, the vice president said, "Given the fact that Iran has a stated policy that their objective is the destruction of Israel, the Israelis might well decide to act first, and let the rest of the world worry about cleaning up the diplomatic mess afterwards."

Britain and France were also working on contingency plans, the sources said. Both countries have a significant presence in the Gulf, with Britain maintaining the deployment of more than 8,000 troops in Iraq.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad again attacked Israel on Friday, vowing that it was "heading toward annihilation." These blistering comments came just days after Iran increased international concerns about its nuclear activities by saying it successfully enriched uranium for the first time.

Ahmadinejad denounced Israel as a "permanent threat" to the Middle East that will "soon" be liberated.

"Like it or not, the Zionist regime is heading toward annihilation," he said at the opening of a conference in support of the Palestinians. "The Zionist regime is a rotten, dried tree that will be eliminated by one storm."

The Iranian president engendered international condemnation from world leaders in October when he said Israel should be "wiped off the map."

The Bush administration charges that Tehran is using a civilian nuclear program to secretly build an atomic weapon. Iran denies this, saying its program is intended only to produce civilian energy.

"We are engaged in a diplomatic process with our European partners and the United Nations to keep them from developing such a weapon," Deputy White House Chief of Staff Karl Rove said on April 12. "It's going to be difficult. It's going to be tough because they are led by ideologues who have a weird sense of history."

So far, Central Command has spent the last year probing Iranian air and ground defenses. The U.S. military has sent numerous unmanned aerial vehicles and other assets to determine Iranian vulnerabilities as well as close-up reconnaissance of several potential targets.

"We're not close to a presidential decision on a military strike," a source said. "We're at the stage of drafting plans at the military command level and their review by the Joint Chiefs."

The Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies has released a report that raised a scenario in which the United States would "encourage Israel to openly declare its strike options as a deterrent" to Iran's nuclear weapons program. The report, authored by Anthony

Cordesman and Khalid Al Rodhan, however, said Israel has few options in launching a major strike on Iran.

"There is no doubt that such a strike would face problems," the report said. "The Israelis do not have conventional ballistic missiles or land/sea-based cruise missiles suited for such a mission. The shortest flight routes would be around 1,500-1,700 kilometers through Jordan and Iraq, 1,900-2,100 kilometers through Saudi Arabia, and 2,600-2,800 kilometers in a loop through Turkey."

"All such missions would probably be detected relatively quickly by the radars in the countries involved, and very low-altitude penetration profiles would lead to serious range-payload problems," said the report, entitled "Iranian Nuclear Weapons? The Options if Diplomacy Fails."

"The countries over flown would be confronted with the need to either react [or have] limited credibility in claiming surprise," the report said.



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