Posted on 09/11/2022 3:03:35 PM PDT by elpadre
The UN’s IAEA has reported that Iran has 55.6 kilograms (122.6 pounds) of 60% enriched uranium. The body says this means Iran is able to produce up to 25 kg (55 lbs) of 90% enriched uranium, enough for a nuclear bomb.
The real story could be even more concerning. Consider the hoary phrase, “There’s more than one way to skin a cat.” Similarly, there’s more than one way to make a nuclear bomb.
The Union of Concerned Scientists has said that it might be possible to produce a fission-type nuclear weapon with as little as 15kg (33 lbs) of highly enriched uranium. The Hiroshima bomb, which was uranium-fueled, required 64kg (141 lbs) of enriched uranium.
But if enriched Uranium-235 is one way to produce a nuclear bomb, a plutonium bomb is also possible – and Iran has pursued both. It is worth considering that Iran could have a hidden plutonium program – or, alternatively, is acquiring plutonium from outside.
North Korea produces plutonium at its Yongbyon reactor complex situated 60 miles north of Pyongyang. It appears to have surplus plutonium and is aiming to produce even more. North Korea, Iran and Syria cooperated in building a clone of this reactor in eastern Syria at Al Kibar. That reactor was destroyed in a complex Israeli operation on September 5-6, 2007.
For the record, the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) nuclear agreement declared all plutonium production off limits for Iran. Iran was required to halt the construction of a plutonium reactor at Arak and was said to have filled the reactor’s core with cement.
But in 2020 Iran’s atomic energy chief, Ali Akbar Salehi, announced that the JCPOA-required optic was only for show. “When they told us to pour cement into the tubes,” he recalled, “we said: ‘Fine. We will pour.’ But we did not tell them that we had other tubes. Otherwise, they would have told us to pour cement into those tubes, as well.”
Yea, but Maverick took it out.
With American power completely sidelined and impotent (by Biden and Obama design) evil is running rampant in the world. No kind of evildoing can be discounted. When Trump walked out of the White House, we were all left to the wolves.
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Yep dem wolves are a ruinous pack.
How do you repel wolves?.......
Intimidate them. Yelling, throwing sticks or stones, waving your arms,
and generally making yourself look as big and scary as possible can
deter predatory wolves, which tend to become submissive when other
animals demonstrate dominance. Not sure is that works on the two
legged wolves
Iran tells the truth as often as Bill/Hillary/Psaki/the media/the troll present press secretary/and Milley.
Is the Pope ... No wait, does a bear poop in the woods?
Bkmk
How’s that go? “does a one legged duck swim in circles”?
Supersonic flying metals.
Time for more Mossad action.
Rat Party Headquarters want Iran to have a nuke. Of course they won’t admit this but there can be no doubt that it’s true. They do,after all,believe that Israel is the source of all evil in the region and see her as the only obstacle to “peace”.
Why doesn’t anyone ask the architect of the Bomb program, John Kerry??
They wouldn’t dare lie to Chomo Joe
A nation of fanatics wouldn’t go back on their word, would they?
Another “science” writer who doesn’t understand the science he’s writing about. Or the history of the bomb. Because there was no point in raising the topic of Uranium-235, the only Uranium isotope suitable for use as fission bomb fuel, without also going on to mention the only Plutonium isotope similarly suitable, Pu-239.
It was unexpectedly high contamination levels of Pu-240 in the Plutonium being manufactured at the Washington reactors that forced the scrapping of the Manhattan Project’s original gun bomb design (Codename: Thin Man) and building a the U-235-fueled Little Boy in its place.
It also accelerated the work on the Neddermeyer team’s design for an implosion design because their math indicated it would have a lesser sensitivity to the Pu-240 contamination, and the Washington reactors could produce Plutonium far faster than Oak Ridge was making U-235.
It’s not as if the world cares. If they did, they would be subjected to a rigorous inspection regime, which they aren’t currently.
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