Iran holds enough uranium for bomb
By Daniel Dombey in Washington

Published: February 19 2009 21:18 | Last updated: February 20 2009 00:51

Iran has built up a stockpile of enough enriched uranium for one nuclear bomb, United Nations officials acknowledged on Thursday.

In a development that comes as the Obama administration is drawing up its policy on negotiations with Tehran over its nuclear programme, UN officials said Iran had produced more nuclear material than previously thought.

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Italy seeks to involve Iran in G8 talks - Feb-18In depth: Iran: 30 years on - Feb-06They said Iran had accumulated more than one tonne of low enriched uranium hexafluoride at a facility in Natanz.

If such a quantity were further enriched it could produce more than 20kg of fissile material – enough for a bomb.

“It appears that Iran has walked right up to the threshold of having enough low enriched uranium to provide enough raw material for a single bomb,” said Peter Zimmerman, a former chief scientist of the US Arms Control and Disarmament Agency

The new figures come in a report from the International Atomic Energy Agency, the UN’s nuclear watchdog, released on Thursday. This revealed that Iran’s production of low enriched uranium had previously been underestimated.

When the agency carried out an annual stocktaking of Natanz in mid-November Iran had produced 839kg of low enriched uranium hexafluoride – more than 200kg more than previously thought. Tehran produced an additional 171kg by the end of January.

“It’s sure certain that if they didn’t have it [enough] when the IAEA took these measurements, they will have it in a matter of weeks,” Mr Zimmerman said.

Iran’s success in reaching such a “breakout capacity” – a stage that would allow it to produce enough fissile material for a bomb in a matter of months – crosses a “red line” that for years Israel has said it would not accept.

UN officials emphasise that to produce fissile material Iran would have to reconfigure its Natanz plant to produce high enriched uranium rather than low enriched uranium – a highly visible step that would take months – or to shift its stockpile to a clandestine site.

No such sites have been proved to exist, although for decades Iran concealed evidence of its nuclear programme.

A senior UN official added that countries usually waited until they had an enriched uranium stockpile sufficient for several bombs before proceeding to develop fissile material. He conceded that Iran now had enough enriched uranium for one bomb.

“Do they have enough low enriched uranium to produce a significant quantity [enough high enriched uranium for a bomb]?” he said. “In theory this is possible, [although] with the present configuration at Natanz it isn’t.”

David Albright, the head of the Institute for Science and International Security, said: “If Iran did decide to build nuclear weapons, it’s entering an era in which it could do so quickly.”

olympia wrote:One Iranian nuke will hardly be able to redress the balance of power in the region given Israel's 300+ nukes.

Frazzled wrote:What about Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Egyopt, Qatar, and every other Middle Eastern country. They have just as much to fear from a nuke tipped Iran. Indeed more so, becuase there's much less potential issue that the US would nuke Iran in reply.

But it just goes to show, rely on the UN and you'll end up under the gun.

olympia wrote:

Frazzled wrote:What about Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Egyopt, Qatar, and every other Middle Eastern country. They have just as much to fear from a nuke tipped Iran. Indeed more so, becuase there's much less potential issue that the US would nuke Iran in reply.

But it just goes to show, rely on the UN and you'll end up under the gun.

My advice to these nations would be to acquire a credible deterrent as soon as possible.

sexiest_hero wrote:IBefore they can launch they will have to test. One tested explosion will be picked up instantly, and the USA, along with It's Allies are simply itching to end them. I'm more worried that North Korea will try something stupid. One Nuke isn't enough to flatten Israel. And iff it was it would flatten the Palistinians as well. Iran wants to grap power not be wiped out. By the time they built all the componets to arm, aim, guid and launch it, they'd be pounded flat. Trust me when I tell you The Airforce can have Iran flattened within hours.

warpcrafter wrote:We'll get the ultimate sign if Iran actually does start upgrading their facility, that will be a massive unilateral action by Israel. Remember, it's easier to get forgiveness than permission.

Frazzled wrote:One nuke would eliminate Israel.

Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:Or we could all just remember Nuclear Weapons were a stupid idea in the first place and disarm all of them.

dietrich wrote:

Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:Or we could all just remember Nuclear Weapons were a stupid idea in the first place and disarm all of them.

While I'd agree with disarming them, you're wrong about the first part.

The US estimated it would lose 1 million men if it invaded Japan. That's US casualties. No counting the number of Japanese military and civilian casualties. Also, after Japanese civilians commited mass suicide on one of the islands (the name escapes me at the moment), the concern was there would be mass suicides by the civilian population since they viewed surrender as a stain on their honor.

While distasteful, the use of two nuclear weapons to end WW2 was the right decision. The number of deaths at Nagasaki and Hiroshima were signficantly less than what would have occured if the US invaded.

The fact that my late Grandfather was a US Marine in the Pacific theater, having been at both Iwo Jima and Okinawa, he surely would have been thrown into a meatgrinder on the main island, does jade my perspective a bit.

Mango wrote:There is a major difference between Iran and Israel. This becomes especially relevant when discussing the number of nukes one nation has. The vast bulk of Israels population is concentrated in three cities. Tel Aviv, Haifa, and Jerusalem. Three nukes and you have wiped out 90% of Israel. One nuke can knock out 30% of Israels population. One nuke would definitely hurt Iran. But Iran would likely survive one nuke.

olympia wrote:

dietrich wrote:

Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:Or we could all just remember Nuclear Weapons were a stupid idea in the first place and disarm all of them.

While I'd agree with disarming them, you're wrong about the first part.

The US estimated it would lose 1 million men if it invaded Japan. That's US casualties. No counting the number of Japanese military and civilian casualties. Also, after Japanese civilians commited mass suicide on one of the islands (the name escapes me at the moment), the concern was there would be mass suicides by the civilian population since they viewed surrender as a stain on their honor.

While distasteful, the use of two nuclear weapons to end WW2 was the right decision. The number of deaths at Nagasaki and Hiroshima were signficantly less than what would have occured if the US invaded.

The fact that my late Grandfather was a US Marine in the Pacific theater, having been at both Iwo Jima and Okinawa, he surely would have been thrown into a meatgrinder on the main island, does jade my perspective a bit.

This has not been a credible position for decades since Gar Alperovitz's Atomic Diplomacy: Hiroshima and Nagasaki: The Use of the Atomic Bomb and the American Confrontation with Soviet Power appeared in 1965. The book was reissued with even more archival evidence to support its argument in 1994.

Simply put:
1. By the Spring of 1945 the U.S. had decided Japan could be defeated without being nuked and without an invasion. These is key--neither was necessary. Remember, in May 1945 the U.S. fire-bombed Tokyo and killed 50,000.
2. The Soviets invaded Machuria after the first nuclear strike. The Japanese army collapsed utterly. The U.S., desperate to consolidate its hold over Japan and limit Soviet power, dropped the second nuke and promised more.
3. The Japanese were looking for a negotiated surrender in the Spring of '45. Their sole condition: retention of the Emperor. Why, then, did the U.S. reject this condition in the Spring of 1945 but accept it in August? Answer: to prevent the Soviets from having any influence on the occupation of Japan.

Planning the Invasion of Japan
By Denis WarnerPublished: THURSDAY, JUNE 15, 1995
MELBOURNE: In mid-June 1945, while the battle for Okinawa was grinding to an end, leaving more than a quarter of a million deadon both sides, the planners in Washington and Tokyo were preparing for the next round: the invasion of Japan itself.

Operation Olympic — the planned invasion of Kyushu, the southernmost of the Japanese home islands — had been tentatively set for Nov. 1. But as late as May 25, Admiral

Chester Nimitz, the U.S. naval commander in the Pacific, had second thoughts. In a message to Admiral Ernest King, the chief of naval staff in Washington, he warned that when the Japanese occupied well-prepared defenses and had adequate supplies, they were a force against which the best American troops — even with air, artillery and naval gunfire support — could advance only slowly.

It would be unrealistic, Admiral Nimitz said, to expect that such obvious objectives as southern Kyushu and the Tokyo plain would not be as well defended as Okinawa.

Admiral Nimitz believed that it would be better not to try to invade in 1945 but instead to continue the isolation of Japan and destroy Japanese forces by air and naval attack. However, General Douglas MacArthur dismissed isolation and bombardment as likely to prolong the war indefinitely.

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Presented with these conflicting opinions, President Harry Truman had doubts. On June 14, he summoned the Joint Chiefs of Staff to the White House. They were advised to come four days later, armed with information on the number of American soldiers and ships needed to defeat Japan, an estimate of the time required, and of the casualtiesthat would result from an invasion.

The U.S. joint war plans committee thought that 14 divisions — 11 army and 3 marines — would be needed to overrun southern Kyushu. Casualties might run to 132,000, with 25,000 killed.

At the White House meeting, General George Marshall, the chief of army staff, read the digest of the memorandum approving Operation Olympic. When it came to casualties, he said,"it is a grim fact that there is no easy, bloodless way to victory in war, and it is the thankless task of the leaders to maintain their firm outward front ... Any irresolution in the leaders may result in costly weakening and indecision in the subordinates."

Only Henry Stimson, the secretary of war, who had beeninvolved from the beginning with plans to produce the atomic bomb and bacteriological weapons, expressed some qualified doubt when he said he hoped "for some fruitful accomplishment through other means."

As more and better intelligence flowed in, however, it became apparent that even the highest U.S. casualty estimates were likely to prove much too low.

Some reports suggested that the figures tossed around at the White House on June 18 might be surpassed in a single day.

In the final year of the war, Japanese intelligence correctly anticipated American offensive plans. It predicted the invasions of Saipan, Guam and Tinian and assumed correctly that Iwo Jima would be next and that Okinawa and then southern Kyushu would follow.

Japanese intelligence even named the beaches where the U.S. forces would come ashore. Southern Kyushu was given the highest priority by military planners. New divisions were brought in from Manchuria, Hokkaido and Honshu. Instead of 3 army divisions, the Americans would have to face 14, about 12,000 kamikaze planes and a fleet of naval suicide craft.

The Joint Chiefs asked Admiral Nimitz and General MacArthur for their assessments of the new intelligence. The war archives indicate that Admiral Nimitz had not replied before the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki brought the war to an end. General MacArthur, often contemptuous of intelligence, repliedthat the Japanese air potential was greatly exaggerated: "We have recently seen the 3d Fleet approach the southern and central coastline of Japan close enough for gunfire bombardment, and yet no reaction from the air has taken place. Our air forces are daily flying throughout Japan and provoke no reaction ... In my opinion, there should not be the slightest thought of changing the Olympic operation."

What he did not know was that the disappearance of the kamikaze planes, as the U.S. 3d Fleet ranged down the coast of Japan and American B-29s firebombed the cities, was a matter of policy. The kamikazes were being saved for the critical battle of southern Kyushu.

The U.S. 6th Army planned to use eight divisions in the initial assault, one to secure the offshore islands and seven in the attack on Kyushu. American forces would have been opposed by six static Japanese divisions, two independent mixed brigades, the equivalent of two tank brigades, and miscellaneous fortress and naval troops deployed in the vicinity of the landing beaches. In addition, three mobile Japanese reserve divisions were positioned to intervene in the fighting for the initial beachheads.

In the Okinawa campaign, the United States had the conventional 3-to-1 superiority in numbers. In the invasion of Kyushu, American troops would have been outnumbered 8 to 5. No doubt the Americans would have prevailed. But they would have had to call in extra divisions earmarked for the invasion of the Tokyo plain. The cost in lives would have been enormous. And the United States would most probably have resorted to use of poison gas tohasten an end to resistance.

The Allies had avoided using gas during the war, but it was seriously considered during planning for Operation Olympic. Brigadier General William Bordern, director of the New Development Division of the U.S. War Department, discussed use of gas in the numerous caves that American forces expected to encounter in the invasion of Kyushu. He said it would be effective when fired directly into the mouths of the caves. If gas was to be used, the U.S. Navy had planned that it would make up about 20 percent of the air bombardment.

The Pacific war had its tally of horrors. The atomic bomb was one of them. But its use almost certainly avoided another.

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The writer, who covered the war in the Pacific for Australian and British newspapers, contributed this comment to the International Herald Tribune.