A great article by Australia's unofficial energy/environment national treasure, Dave Kimble.

The author is self-contradicting. He claims that the announcement means that the US KNOWS (his emphasis) that Iran is not planning to make a bomb, and yet this announcement states that Iran has 80Kg of 20% enriched uranium.

There is no discernible reason for Iran to enrich uranium to that level except to make bombs. Power station uranium only needs to be enriched to 3-4%,

As a result I find his suggestion that the US knows that Iran is NOT developing a bomb to be unconvincing, to say the least.

How about the publicly stated reason - for fuel rods for a research reactor for producing medical isotopes ?

This stuff in the hands of radicles is not a good idea. An election coming up and half the opposition is in jail. We know the result.
With what they have 80 kg; they could cause drastic problems for millions.
Radiation from Japan has been found 600 km's away.

This is a poorly argued position. One has to wonder what the author's personal agenda might be.

He quotes the Director as saying:

"Iran nevertheless is expanding its uranium enrichment capabilities, which can be used for either civil or weapons purposes."

This would appear to be a fairly straightforward statement. The processes that the Iranians are presently undertaking can, according to the Director, be used to make weapons.

But in a breathtaking leap of logic, Mr Kimble ploughs on with:

>>As you can see, they "do not know if Iran will eventually decide to build nuclear weapons". This implies that Iran is not doing so now.<<

It does no such thing.

OK, so they probably haven't built any yet. But how does that prove that there is no intention to do so?

Despite the lack of any substance in his material, we still get the pompous assertion that:

>>...the US knows Iran does NOT have a nuclear weapons program<<

Absolute nonsense.

There is nothing, not a scrap of evidence anywhere in the article that even remotely suggests that Iran does not have a "nuclear weapons program". And everything to suggest that they do, indeed, have one under way.

And while I'm here...

The subheading to this article is "The official US line on the Iranian WMD threat and sanctions"

Just out of interest, what makes this particular individual report to a Senate Committee the "official US line"?

Back to the real world.

--Iran, a relatively poor country, has expended enormous resources on giving itself the capability to make nuclear weapons.

--It has also devoted considerable efforts to developing a nuclear-capable delivery system *.

--It is specious to compare mullah-ruled Iran to Japan – blind Freddy can see that the differences go deeper than US likes and dislikes.

Only a fool would conclude that taking the final decision is anything more than a mere formality. Nothing is certain in life but the odds are overwhelming that once Iran has the capability it will take the final step.

Then we have the problem that if Iran goes nuclear so will Saudi Arabia** giving us two nuclear armed Muslim theocracies and that's not counting Pakistan.

I think it reasonable to infer that if Iran, Turkey's Shia neighbour, goes nuclear Turkey itself will start thinking along similar lines.

A nuclear Iran could, most likely will, trigger a nuclear arms race in one of the most unstable regions in the world.

Destroying Iran's nuclear facilities is not a good option. The fallout (pun intended) will be unpleasant.

But it may be the least worst option.

And maybe the least worst option is the best we can do.

Palloy

The idea that Iran would go to all this effort to produce medical isotopes that can be bought much more cheaply on world markets is a bit far fetched - and that's putting it kindly.

*IRAN TESTING MISSILES THAT COULD CARRY NUCLEAR WEAPON, UK'S HAGUE SAYS

http://articles.cnn.com/2011-06-29/world/iran.missiles.tests_1_nuclear-program-nuclear-activities-peaceful-nuclear-technology?_s=PM:WORLD

**HOW IRAN NUCLEAR STANDOFF LOOKS FROM SAUDI ARABIA: MUSTAFA ALANI

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-02-16/how-iran-nuclear-standoff-looks-from-saudi-arabia-mustafa-alani.html