Published September 11th, 2009 by Future Atlas
Iranian Nukes Closer?
Iran may now have enough nuclear fuel “to make a rapid, if risky, sprint for a nuclear weapon,” the New York Times reported this week.
However, design work on an actual nuclear weapon may have been halted in 2003, and “it is unclear how many months — or even years — it would take Iran to complete that final design work, and then build a warhead that could fit atop its long-range missiles.” This makes the US believe it would have ample warning if Iran actually began pursuing a nuclear weapon in earnest — the Times notes that the official estimate is that Iran could have a bomb between 2010 and 2015, with later dates in that range more likely.
It also remains unclear how much effect the acquisition of nuclear weapons by Iran would have. NPR explored this issue late in August.
- Experts interviewed for that story suggest, as others have, that Iran is not ruled by a suicidal regime, and could likely be deterred, just as more radical regimes (such as Mao’s China) have been in the past.
- “If Iran gets the bomb, we’re going to have a period of experimentation in the beginning, where Iran is trying to figure out how much power this new capability has conferred,” says Gary Milhollin, the director of the Wisconsin Project on Nuclear Arms Control, noting that this could lead to a confrontation stemming from miscalculation.
- Mike Shuster of NPR notes: “If Iran does eventually build nuclear weapons, its deterrent is unlikely to grow beyond a handful of bombs. Iran’s own supply of natural uranium is believed to be quite small and dwindling already. Acquiring uranium from other nations could be difficult if Iran sought to keep it secret.”