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US believes Iran looking at potential ways to quickly build nuclear bomb — report
Pronouncements catching up to long-known reality… that CIA 2003 Nation Report thingy that lied to hobble President George W. Bush’s actions in the WoT and Israel’s thereafter, if I have the right label for it.
[IsraelTimes] Tehran has not chosen to break out toward nukes, but is secretly examining shortcuts to a weapon should it make that decision, The New York Times reports

New American intelligence indicates that a covert team of Iranian scientists is exploring ways to quickly develop a nuclear weapon if the country’s leadership decides to pursue one, The New York Times

...which still proudly claims Walter Duranty's Pulitzer prize...
 reports.
New intelligence? How very interesting. Is that new as in this week or new as in sometime after 2003? Who shared this information with the New York Times reporter, pray tell, and did he/she have permission from the new management to do so, or is this one of those leak thingies that’s going to lead to somebody or somebodies losing their clearance, their employment, and possibly their freedom? Oh, and has the unnamed source gone on any dates lately? James O’Keefe’s OMG and Project Veritas are only two of the many conservative New Media news orgs, undercover and otherwise, on the prowl for major scoops nowadays.
The report says the information points to Iran
...a theocratic Shiite state divided among the Medes, the Persians, and the (Arab) Elamites. Formerly a fairly civilized nation ruled by a Shah, it became a victim of Islamic revolution in 1979. The nation is today noted for spontaneously taking over other countries' embassies, maintaining whorehouses run by clergymen, involvement in international drug trafficking, and financing sock puppet militias to extend the regime's influence. The word Iran is a cognate form of Aryan. The abbreviation IRGC is the same idea as Stürmabteilung (or SA). The term Supreme Guide is a the modern version form of either Duce or Führer or maybe both. They hate Jews Zionists Jews. Their economy is based on the production of oil and vitriol...
seeking a shortcut to a bomb that would enable them to convert their uranium stocks into a weapon within months rather than years, if necessary, though a decision to race toward a bomb has not been made.

The paper says the intel was gathered in the final months of the Biden administration and shared with the new administration of Donald Trump
...Perhaps no man has ever had as much fun being president of the US...
It notes that with Iran’s regional power weakened by the blows to its proxy forces in the region and its failure to significantly hit Israel with its missile barrages, Tehran is anxious to find new ways to deter a strike by Israel or the US.

Concerns have grown among Iran’s top decision-makers that US President Donald Trump might in his second term empower Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to strike Iran’s nuclear sites while further tightening US sanctions on its oil industry.

Last month, UN nuclear watchdog chief Rafael Grossi said Iran was "pressing the gas pedal" on its enrichment of uranium to near weapons grade.

Grossi said Iran had informed the ineffective International Atomic Energy Agency that it would "dramatically" accelerate the enrichment of uranium to up to 60% purity, closer to the roughly 90% of weapons-grade.

Western powers called the step a serious escalation and said there was no civil justification for enriching to that level, and that no other country had done so without producing nuclear weapons. Iran, which frequently threatens to destroy Israel, has said its program is entirely peaceful and it has the right to enrich uranium to any level it wants.
Taqqiya.
However,
nothing needs reforming like other people's bad habits...
 US intelligence agencies and the IAEA say Iran had an organized military nuclear program up until 2003, and continued to develop its nuclear program beyond civilian necessity. Israel contends that the Islamic Theocratic Republic never truly abandoned its nuclear weapons program.
Contend is precisely the wrong word here. Proved using Iran’s own warehouse archive of documents liberated almost a decade ago under Iran Revolutionary Guard noses starts to approach the level of Israeli documentation for the claim. This kind of thing makes the CIA look unwise, defensive, and spiteful. Ditto for the New York Times, but nobody expects anything else from them.
According to an ineffective International Atomic Energy Agency yardstick, about 42 kilograms (93 pounds) of uranium enriched to 60% is enough in principle, if enriched further, for one nuclear bomb. Grossi said Iran currently had about 200 kilograms of uranium enriched to up to 60%.

Tehran’s foreign minister told Al Jazeera TV last week that Iran will respond immediately and decisively if its nuclear sites are attacked, which would lead to an "all-out war in the region."

Israel and the US launching a military attack on Iranian nuclear facilities would be "one of the biggest historical mistakes the US could make," Abbas Araghchi said.
Posted by: trailing wife 2025-02-04
http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=738622