Posted on 06/25/2005 9:15:36 PM PDT by Flavius
DRIVING along the blasted sands of the Gulf coast, the pristine geometric dome of Iran’s first nuclear reactor rises amid dusty eucalyptus trees, looking for all the world as if it were a Bond villain’s hideout, writes Marie Colvin in Bushehr.
The double barrels of anti-aircraft guns pointing to the sky from their earthwork berms on the road are the first indication that the Bushehr plant is not a film set. The reactor is a focus of fears that Iran is developing nuclear weapons.
Tehran insists the plant will be used only to generate electricity when it goes on line, scheduled for the middle of next year. The West, particularly the Americans, fear Bushehr is the visible tip of a clandestine programme.
Asadollah Saboury, vice-president of Iran’s nuclear plants programme, said the reactor would provide 1,000 megawatts of electricity — enough power for a city of 500,000. Being built by 4,000 Russians and 2,000 Iranians, it was now 84% complete.
The Russians would deliver the reactor’s fuel in the next few months, he said — a deal that President George W Bush tried to stop during his February summit with Vladimir Putin, the Russian president.
A scientist by training, Saboury sought to dismiss worries that the fuel would be diverted or that spent nuclear fuel would be reprocessed into plutonium, one of the paths to building a nuclear weapon.
“The fuel will be sealed in Russia by the International Atomic Energy Agency,” he said. “Here in Bushehr, the IAEA will open the seal and observe the fuel being put in the reactor.”
Without such controls, America has said the waste from Bushehr could be reprocessed to produce enough plutonium for several nuclear bombs a year. Washington’s fears are not unfounded. Iran recently said it had conducted experiments to create plutonium for five years longer than it had previously admitted to.
Saboury’s assurances will go only a small way towards allaying western concerns. A tense stand-off remains — Iran insists it has the right to make nuclear fuel through a second method, the enrichment of uranium.
“This is the plan of our country, to obtain the technology to produce our own fuel,” Saboury said. “We will need it for Bushehr because our contract with the Russians for the supply of fuel runs only 10 years and we intend to construct more than one (nuclear) unit.”
His insistence is far from academic. Two years ago, after a leak from an opposition group, Iran admitted it had been working secretly to enrich uranium with centrifuges at an underground site near Natanz. Such clandestine work is banned under the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty, which Iran signed in 1968.
Washington has said that Iran was working secretly to develop a nuclear bomb; Tehran says it hid the programme because of international sanctions. The fight is central to the dispute, because centrifuge technology to enrich uranium to the low level required for nuclear fuel could readily be shifted to the higher level required for nuclear bombs.
Iran has suspended its enrichment activities while the EU3 — Britain, France and Germany — try to defuse the confrontation through negotiations, set to resume no later than August.
No. What does that have to do with this discussion anyway?
...lol!!
I'm a hard assed American red neck that doesn't like his toes being stepped on. There are more of us than you can imagine.
P.S. I use the word "hell' above in it's fondest sense.
Not until they have a stable democratic government accountable to the people. And an unwillingness to use nuclear weapons. That is what I say. G-d forbid Iran should get nuclear weapons.
The Iran and Iraq war was pushed by a brutal dictator and a religious fanatic. Put the blame where it belongs.
America's toes were intentionally stepped on when The World Trade Center was leveled and people who committed no other crime than going to work were killed.
Oh, and on study material, I'm sending a Freepmail to you.
Because they are kill crazy fanatics.
To be honest, I thought that there was no way that Iran would be able to be this close to complete building the nuclear plant. Seriously, I thought the plant would have been bombed before the first day of 2005. Now the year is halfway over.
The Israeli/American alliance does not have what it takes to bomb the plant because we do not want to suffer International condemnation.
It's a PC world that we all live in. (Unfortuantely)
I think the 4,000 Russians on-site has added a complication to the mix - I'm sure Putin has had a quiet word with TPTB in Israel about what may heppen if they get killed.
I suggest you read about Mar Samuel, Maimonides, Vilna Gaon and the Satmar Rav.
Also, the best guide is of course the Tanach, expecially the Pentateuch, i.e. The first five books.
Beware of supremacists of all kinds, including Jewish supremacists. Most of the Talmud is complete rubbish, and Kabbalah is generally to be avoided.
The Karaites are interesting to learn about as well.
Is TPTB in the Knesset ?
:)
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