The question has been asked many times: with so much oil, why does Iran need nuclear power at all? Iran’s nuclear power program is a tactical threat and not purely commercial.
By Linda Pentz Gunter
“As a party to the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), the Islamic Republic of Iran, based on its religious and ethical principles, has never sought nuclear weapons and remains committed to the principle of non-production and non-use of weapons of mass destruction.”
That was the reassurance given by Iran’s foreign minister, Seyyed Abbas Araghchi, during the Tehran Dialogue Forum hosted earlier this month by the Center for Political and International Studies of Iran’s Foreign Ministry.
It’s a familiar refrain. Iran has consistently argued that it is exercising its “inalienable right” as a signatory to the NPT “to develop research, production and use of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes” as allowed under Article IV of the treaty.
But is it?
Iran has freely admitted that it has enriched uranium-235 up to 60% — considered at least “weapons usable” (higher than 90% is considered weapons-grade.) Why would it choose to — or need to — do this if it has no intention of seeking nuclear weapons production, as Araghchi and others before him have claimed?
The answer to that question seems obvious and one we have repeated ad infinitum when exposing the flaw in the NPT which, in granting the development of civilian nuclear programs to signatories, ensures the pathway to the bomb is left permanently clear.
Even should Iran never actually develop nuclear weapons, it can use its civil program as a threat to do so. It is no idle threat. The possession of a civilian nuclear program affords Iran the materials, equipment, personnel and know-how to transition to nuclear weapons should it so choose.
What might push Iran to make that choice depends a lot on how the current talks go. Keeping Israel at bay — which wanted to start bombing Iran’s nuclear installations immediately — was one of the few sensible decisions the Trump administration has made.
However, in the view of Mohsen Milani, Executive Director of the Center for Strategic & Diplomatic Studies and Professor of Politics at the University of South Florida, developing nuclear weapons has always been on Iran’s agenda.
Further confirmation of the West nauseating hypocrisy and absolute lack of moral compass.
Nuclear powers smash to pieces countries like Libya and Syria at will, and threaten to do the same to Iran, and then have hysterics when Iran considers joining the club. How dare they defend themselves!
Meanwhile the fact that Israel refused to join the non-proliferation treaty, and the open secret that the horror state has developed nuclear weapons, goes totally unscrutinised.
Where is your article on Israel’ s nukes?
Israel has had nuclear weapons since about 1966, but nearly 60 years later has made no use of them, or even threatened to use them. Does that do?
No
The May 1st, 1992 edition of the Sacramento Bee newspaper has an article copied from an Associated Press report that claims Iran obtained at least two nuclear warheads that had been reported missing from Kazakhstan. This former Soviet republic’s Semipalatinsk nuclear test site had several nuclear warheads turn up missing. The article is on page A12 of the newspaper.