Monday, 25 January 2010

Secret Report: Iran will Have Nuclear Bomb This Year

by Malkah Fleisher     Shevat 10, 5770 / January 25, '10    

(IsraelNN.com) A secret intelligence dossier currently being reviewed by US, Israeli, German, and Austrian governments reveals secret Iranian tests and hierarchies of power dedicated to the successful development of a nuclear bomb, and predicts that Iran will have a primitive nuclear bomb by year's end.

According to the classified document featured in an exposé by Germany's Der Spiegel magazine, Iran is well on its way toward obtaining its first nuclear bomb. The country's nuclear research program, it turns out, has a military wing answering to the Defense Ministry which the West was not aware of until now.

Der Spiegel explained the structure of Iranian nuclear establishment at length. Iran's new Minister of Science, Research, and Technology, Kamran Daneshjoo, 52, is in charge of the country's nuclear energy agency. A close ally of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Daneshjoo was educated in Manchester, England. He worked for some time at Tehran's "Center for Aviation Technology", which later developed into FEDAT, the "Department for Expanded High-Technology Applications". FEDAT ultimately became what the German paper calls "the secret heart of Iran's nuclear weapons program", answering directly to the Defense Ministry.

FEDAT is currently run by Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, 48, a professor at Tehran's Imam Hussein University and officer in the Revolutionary Guard. Western intelligence agencies say FEDAT and the Ministry of Science are working together to create the bomb. 

They also believe that a primitive nuclear weapon the size of a truck will be completed this year.

Two to four years after that, the bomb will be compressed to a size capable of fitting into a nuclear warhead and being launched at Israel.

Iran is believed to have conducted successful tests of a nuclear detonating device 6 years ago.

'Not just Israeli propaganda'
Despite the severity of the situation, the international community is still undecided on sanctions of Iran. China is considered likely to try to block sanctions, as it currently holds billions of dollars in energy deals with the country.

A military option may prove difficult, according to military experts, because many of the Iranian nuclear installations are deep underground.

The report will likely cause the US government to raise its alarm level from yellow to red, according to Der Spiegel.  "Skeptics who in the past, sometimes justifiably so, treated alarmist reports as Israeli propaganda, are also extremely worried," including IAEA officials, said the magazine. The report also says, somewhat cryptically, that a laptop computer passed on to the IAEA by way of German and American intelligence agencies contained highly volatile material.

No compromise
Fears of a nuclear Iran have been compounded by information provided by Iran's former deputy defense minister, Ali Reza Asgari, and nuclear scientist Shahram Amiri, both of whom defected to the United States and were given new identities.

Iran has consistently stated that its nuclear program is for the peaceful provision of nuclear energy to the country's citizenry.

In October, the IAEA presented a plan to Iran which had been developed by the US government. Under the plan, Iran would send 70% of its low-enriched uranium abroad.  A year later, the uranium would be exchanged for fuel rods, a potent form of nuclear fuel which is very difficult to enrich for military purposes.

The plan would have provided sufficient fuel for a nuclear energy program and to fuel the reactor for scientific experiments.  At the same time, the world would have been assured that Iran truly had no intention of developing nuclear weapons.

On January 19, Tehran offered a "counter-proposal", effectively rejecting the IAEA plan and casting off illusions of a compromise with the West.

 

January 25, 2010
 
"Weep for America"
 
And then stand strong and bring her home again.
 
In reading Barry Rubin's most recent column, "F for failure," I recognized concerns that have gripped me of late.  And so, while I hadn't intended to post today, I knew I wanted to share this. 
 
Many of you on this list will understand what he's saying, but across the board I believe his points are more obvious from here in Israel.  A great many Americans are still not seeing the forest for the trees.  And too many cling to that last bit of residual hope in Obama, and won't yet grapple with the enormity of the failures of his government. 
 
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Writes Rubin:
 
"We must now face an extremely unpleasant truth: Even giving the Obama administration every possible break regarding its Iran policy, it is now clear that the US government isn't going to take strong action on the nuclear weapons issue. Note that I didn't even say "effective" action, I'm saying that it isn't even going to make a god show of trying seriously to do anything.
 
"From its behavior, it still seems to expect, incredibly, that some kind of deal is possible with Teheran despite everything that has happened...And it is too fixated on short-term games about seeking consensus among other powers; two of them -- China and Russia -- are clearly not going to agree to anything serious.  This fact was clear many months ago, but the administration still doesn't recognize it...
 
"Not only is the Obama administration failing the test but it is doing so in a way that seems to maximize the loss of US credibility in the region and the world.  A lot of this comes from the administration's philosophy of unprecedented concepts of guilt, apology, defeatism and refusal to take leadership never seen before among past liberal Democratic governments from Franklin Roosevelt to Bill Clinton.
 
"Yet the British, French and Germans are ready to get tough on Iran, yearning for leadership and not getting it.  (Emphasis added)  
 
"...After these. six failures [documented in the full article], the US is now -- in effect -- resting. And that is the seventh failure.  There are no signs that anything is changing in Washington.
 
"To believe that the administration has learned anything, we would have to see the following: An angry US government [that] feels that Iran's regime made it look foolish; a calculating administration that believes the American people want it to get tough and [hopes to] gain politically from being seen as decisive; a great power strategy that would make an example of Iran to show what happens to a bunch of repressive dictators who defy the US and spit on its friends and interests; and a diplomatically astute government that understands the uses of threats and pressures to force its opponent into a compromise.
 
"There is not the slightest indication that the Obama administration holds any of these views.  On the contrary, without any apparent realization of the absurdity of the situation, high-ranking officials keep repeating in January 2010 as in January 2009 that, some day, the US might do something to put pressure on Iran. Perhaps those in the administration who do understand what's wrong don't have the influence to affect the policy being set in the White House.
 
"This is going to be a case study of how failing to deal with a problem sooner, even if that requires some diplomatic confrontations, will lead to a much bigger and costlier conflict later involving military confrontation." (emphasis added)
 
Directly implied, but not explicitly spelled out here, is the effect of Obama's non-policy on Israel.
 
 
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While I'm at it, I want to also share a January 16th NY Post piece by Ralph Peters -- "Hood massacre report gutless and shameful" -- that echoes similar themes. (And thanks to Dave A. for calling this to my attention.)
 
Wrote Peters:

"There are two basic problems with the grotesque non-report on the Islamist- terror massacre at Fort Hood (released by the Defense Department [January 15]):

" [] It's not about what happened at Fort Hood.

" [] It avoids entirely the issue of why it happened.

"Rarely in the course of human events has a report issued by any government agency been so cowardly and delusional. It's so inept, it doesn't even rise to cover-up level.

"'Protecting the Force: Lessons From Fort Hood' never mentions Islamist terror. Its 86 mind-numbing pages treat 'the alleged perpetrator,' Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, as just another workplace shooter...

"...Murderous political correctness is pervasive in our military...

"...This report's spinelessness is itself an indictment of our military's failed moral and ethical leadership...

"We agonize over civilian casualties in a war zone but rush to whitewash the slaughter of our own troops on our own soil. Conduct unbecoming."

http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/opedcolumnists/hood_massacre_report_gutless_and_yaUphSPCoMs8ux4lQdtyGM#ixzz0dehDKzxG

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America is too great -- in its courage and its principles -- to go down this way.  Her come-back (for which I sincerely pray) will depend on the legion of good Americans who do understand what is going on and will, finally, refuse to let it happen. 

I hope this makes you spittin' mad, and that you share what is written here broadly.

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see my website www.ArlenefromIsrael.info