I just hope we don’t screw it up. The Iranians are our natural allies, in my opinion, [...]
On this, I agree with you completely. I have friends who have friends and family living there. The Iranian expats I’ve known have all been (at least) decent people, and from what I know of the indigenous culture (as opposed to the culture of the mullahs), we and they can coexist perfectly well.
If we wind up in an all-out fight with Iran, it will surely be bad for us, and disastrous for the Iranians. I’m really, really hoping that the decent Iranians will somehow gain control of their country before anything drastic happens… and that we don’t start a fight unnecessarily.
I’d much rather party with them than fight them.

I agree on converging. Here’s my conjecture: The Iranians originally wanted a graphite reactor for plutonium production. After many years of trying to acquire outside assistance they eventually gave up and switched their focus to a HW reactor. Probably with design help from the Russians, Chinese, or both, they felt they could build their own given enough time and went ahead with the construction of a HW plant. A HW reactor has many benefits over a graphite reactor anyway, so they probably ditched the graphite reactor idea altogether.

If they want bombs to put on their ballistic missiles, they will want them to be plutonium-based for a variety of reasons (The main one is that plutonium devices are more efficient and weigh less, but much depends on how pure they want to make their HEU). In my opinion, they are planning to start with HEU devices in a couple of years then switch to plutonium weapons once their production gets rolling - provided they can hide it from the IAEA and us, which won’t be easy. It may take a significant amount of time and effort to develop the covert infrastructure necessary to get the plutonium unless they take the drastic step of withdrawing from the NPT, which will have severe consequences for them. In the meantime, they will probably have some HEU-based devices and they will learn a lot about bomb design and manufacture which will help them immensely when/if they get plutonium.

I’ve followed the Iranian military for a decade and they’ve concentrated on three main objectives: Defending critical targets, like their nuclear facilites, especially from an air attack. Developing the capability to strike at regional opponents - this basically boils down to their ballistic missile program. They want the ability to attack Israel and possibly other states directly since their Air Force isn’t up to the task. The final focus is building the ability to control the strait of hormuz and a large portion of the Persian/Arabian Gulf. The majority of the hardware they’ve purchased or built in the last decade supports one of these three key objectives. However, the weapons they displayed on TV last week are show pieces of outdated Soviet technology. They look cool for the cameras, but aren’t a significant military threat, especially when compared to the weapons and tactics they didn’t show on TV. The most serious threat to us, and the world, frankly, is their focus on the SOH. If they managed to sink a couple of tankers in the right spots, they’d close the gulf to most oil exports for months. Of course, it would take pretty drastic circumstances for them to do that since the regional and global repercussions would be huge. Even so, the threat and ability to close the strait, even for a short period, gives them an advantage in dealing with oil dependent countries and the gulf Arab states.

It’s certainly all very complex and fascinating, despite being scary as hell. I just hope we don’t screw it up. The Iranians are our natural allies, in my opinion, and we will need them as a bulwark when the gulf Arab states finally weaken and collapse into chaos or revolt into unfriendly governments. The Saudi’s have screwed up their country so much that they’ve virtually guaranteed a radical Wahhabi state will be born if they ever loose power. What a nightmare that will be.

Stepping back (and taking a deep breath), I have to wonder how much of Iran’s visible activities - not just the uranium enrichment, but the military exercises, flying boats, and demolition frogmen video - is meant to be serious, and how much is just for show. And, of course, how much is hidden… or whether what they’re hiding is the fact that they don’t have anything to hide (as seems to have been largely the case with Saddam).

The whole business of an aggressive regime announcing that it will have nukes soon just seems wonky. A nuke in the hand is a deterrent; a nuke in the near future is a “bomb me” sign. I have to assume that games are being played, and I suspect that I’m not the intended audience.

If they really don’t have a well-hidden development program that’s doing much better than the open one, then by the time they have deliverable warheads, I expect we’ll have the ability to intercept their delivery systems, if we know approximately where and when they’ll be launched. Presumably their intelligence service has seen the same press releases I have, so….

So maybe the whole thing is really just about prestige, and the crazy talk about Israel is just posturing? I dunno, and trying to comprehend the thinking of politicians (never mind religious foreign ones) gives me a headache. How much are they serious about? Heck, some of our own Senators have the same problem with Dubya.

Ah, well… it’s a weekend for looking for the Easter Wabbit. And ODing on chocolate, and suchlike happy things.
Happy Holiday Indexed to the First Full Moon of Spring, everyone!

You are quite right about the two types of plants. Isotope separation plants generally refer to uranium enrichment when talking about bomb design, and chemical separation, or reprocessing as it is commonly called, is the means to extract plutonium. Please forgive my sloppy error.

Much of the evidence is contradictory, but there were reports in the late 1990’s that China was negotiating with Iran to build a graphite production facility. However, it appears that China pledged to cease cooperation with Iran on nuclear matters except to complete a Zirconium production facility and 4 small research reactors at Isfahan (which are now operational). No graphite production facility has been found to my knowledge. However, the Iranians recently completed a heavy water production plant at Arak, which is located next to a 40MW HW moderated research reactor that is under construction and will probably be completed in 3 or 4 years. Iran supposedly failed to purchase one from the Chinese or Russians, so this is reportedly an indigenous design. So far, they have only submitted preliminary blueprints (with important details missing) to the IAEA, so we don’t yet know the details of the design. Once that is complete and fueled, it could reportedly produce enough plutonium for 2-3 bombs per year depending on how often they operated it. The only thing missing at that point is a reprocessing facility. Any reprocessing facility will likely be located at Arak to preclude the long-distance transport of dangerous spent fuel.

So, provided they construct a reprocessing facility, complete the reactor on schedule, and have the equipment and design to make a plutonium device, they could conceivably have their first one in 4-5 years. There isn’t much opportunity to move the schedule up because the reactor will require 80-90 tons of heavy water and the plant at Arak can reportedly produce about 16 tons a year.

Anyway, that is enough for a Friday night, have a good weekend.

Nor were we faced, in dealing with Communism, with leaders who believed in the emergence of a mythical Hidden Imam who would arise from a catastophic destruction of nations to reestablish the Caliphate.

I’m just saying.

Now if, as you say, the Iranians are trying to get the Chinese to build them a graphite plant, it seems to indicate that they don’t already have a stockpile of graphite ready to start building a clandestine, risky reactor - nor already built into one. Whether or not they have a supply of uranium available, this puts them further back on the curve, and lowers the alarm level considerably.

I am done with this argument, you believe what you want. But it begs the question of why the Iranians would get us, then the Germans, then Russians to build their Bushehr reactor over the course of over 25 years when they, as you indicated, could do it in less than three years on their own. Why are they asking the Chinese to build them a reactor-grade graphite plant if they could do it themselves and build your Hanford reactor in less than a year. Why was their program languishing until AQ Khan gave it a technical boost?

I’ll just correct one small point - I said, “You also need an isotope separation plant.” You said, “Nope. You need a chemical separation plant…” Well, a chemical separation plant IS an isotope separation plant since what you’re doing in the plant is separating nuclear isotopes - so they are the same thing, just different terminology.

Once again: you’re asserting that something is impossible, and I’m pointing out that it’s already been done once. It may be difficult, dangerous, and unlikely, but it’s clearly not impossible.
Just how unlikely it is depends on the degree and nature of motivation, which comes back to intentions. Are we looking at a resurgent Persian Empire, or at a doomsday cult? Big difference in the risks they’d be willing to take.

Of course, the feasibility of the weapons program depends heavily on the cooperation of Iran’s talent pool, which I understand is relatively alienated from the mullahs at present. Overly agressive moves on our part might encourage the talent to cooperate with the leaders… which, from our perspective, would surely be counterproductive.

I don’t want to be mean, but you really don’t know what you’re talking about with respect to Iran’s plutonium capabilites. You don’t simply need a supply of LEU and a moderator, you need a full-blown reactor to produce the quantities of plutonium necessary to make a weapon. A reactor the Iranians don’t have. You also need an isotope separation plant - again something the Iranians don’t have. Your argument that they could build these by themselves and produce a weapon in less than three years is ludicrious. They can’t even build a convential reactor on their own without Russian help. And you didn’t even address the issue of doing it covertly, which is what they’d need to do to keep the IAEA and everyone else off their backs.

What you’re essentially doing is confusing nuclear science, which is well known and understood, with nuclear engineering, which is the difficult part. Knowing the science behind nuclear technology and knowing how a nuclear bomb or reactor works is much different than actually building one and overcoming the many important technical challenges along the way. Iran has the science part down, but they don’t have the engineering expertise or the industrial base to support your claims. That’s why they rely heavily on the Russians for their reactor design and construction, and AQ Khan and North Korea for enrichment and other technologies. I’m not assuming incompetence, far from it. I’m talking about capabilities, and the requirements for them to achieve those capabilities. If there is any assumption it is by you and other bloggers who make assumptions based on heresay or ignorance.

“Doing it for the tenth time is a job for a team of good engineers and technicians.” Sorry, but that is complete BS. I don’t know why this myth about how easy these things are persists. It’s like saying it’s easy for a bunch of recently-graduated aerospace engineers to build the space shuttle. Even if you have all the necessary detailed plans, the materials, and the proper equipment, there are still signficant challenges.

And just to add some credibility (and I’ve said this before on this and other sites), my wife is a nuclear engineer who’s worked non-proliferation issues for about 13 years. I have been involved in a variety of intelligence disciplines for almost 15 years including ballistic missiles, some wmd, and naval and air force capabilities. My wife is an expert on what is and isn’t possible and is intimate with the details of what’s necessary to achieve a certain result with respect to nuclear weapons. I’ve learned from her enough to become a competent layman but she is always there when I have questions.

So we not only have to look at intentions, but also capability. You simply can’t assume the capability will be there and only focus on intent, especially in matters of war and peace.

As for intent, if you look at it from the Iranian perspective, it’s pretty obvious. First is national prestige. Iran is the heir to the great Persian empires of centuries past, and they view their pursuit of nuclear technology through that lense. Secondly, and probably the primary reason for their desire for weapons, is self protection. Nothing guarantees regime survivability like deployable nuclear weapons. With “hostile” American forces to the east and west of them (and our tough rhetoric), Pakistan and India with nukes, and of course Israel, it’s only natural for them to want them as well as a security guarantee and counter to perceived and real threats. Any further intent is speculation. Many have speculated that they will use them as soon as they can deploy them, either directly or through their proxies. This is obviously the greatest concern we have. Hopefully we’ll get (or already have) reliable intelligence on their true intent so we’re not forced to speculate, which always makes for poor decision making.