…while the world sits on its collective hands and this continues unabated.

Confidential intelligence documents obtained by The Times show that Iran is working on testing a key final component of a nuclear bomb.

The notes, from Iran’s most sensitive military nuclear project, describe a four-year plan to test a neutron initiator, the component of a nuclear bomb that triggers an explosion. Foreign intelligence agencies date them to early 2007, four years after Iran was thought to have suspended its weapons programme.

An Asian intelligence source last week confirmed to The Times that his country also believed that weapons work was being carried out as recently as 2007 — specifically, work on a neutron initiator.

The technical document describes the use of a neutron source, uranium deuteride, which independent experts confirm has no possible civilian or military use other than in a nuclear weapon. Uranium deuteride is the material used in Pakistan’s bomb, from where Iran obtained its blueprint.

Can we really afford to have a government so clearly desiring to destroy another country (i.e. Israel) to have a nuclear bomb?  Even if they never use it, they’d be untouchable since the threat would always be there. 

Not to mention the inevitable Middle East arms race it would spawn.

But OK, perhaps the world isn’t really sitting on its hands.  The United Nations has written letters and gotten perturbed over all this.  So there’s that.

But not much else.

Filed under: DougIranMiddle East

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