Slashdot Mirror
An Inside Look At Iran's Nuclear Program
NotBornYesterday writes "On April 8, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad visited his country's secretive nuclear enrichment plant at Natanz for a photo op. What came out of this visit is a series of photos which have caused a fair amount of interest among western scientists. Shown in the photos are not only some of the inner workings of the plant and current generation of enrichment centrifuges, but also key components to newer generations of more effective centrifuges. Analysts are 'intrigued' not only by the technical revelations in the pictures, but also because Iran's Defense Minister Mostafa Mohammad Najjar accompanied Ahmadinejad through the facility."
Iran like any other signatory of the NPT has a right to nuclear technology for peaceful purposes. They also have a right to develop, purchase and sell said technology freely and without any hindrance as long as they abide by the NPT. Iran unlike other countries such as India, Pakistan and Israel (which are not signatories of the NPT) intends to use its nuclear technology for generating energy as a way to decrease dependence on oil exports (as any sane country should be doing now).
When other nuclear powers (lead by a country where its own president can't even pronounce the word nuclear properly) get in the way of this process it sends a clear message to other countries that are signatories of the NPT they it may not be as easy as they think to develop peaceful nuclear technologies within their own countries. As a result black-markets start popping up making ratifying the NPT all that more difficult.
If the US and UK just abide by the terms of the NPT then the majority of problems they are now seeing will all but disappear.
Arash Partow's Philosophy: Be a person who knows what they don't know, and not a person who doesn't know.
The anti-Israel position has become a point of nearly complete cultural blindness. If you seriously believe that Iran would use nukes in a first-strike scenario , you've been horribly mislead by propaganda. Get a grip. The anti-Iran propaganda that pervades the American life is a subterfuge in support of the corrupt and autocratic government in United States.
The anti-Iran position has become a point of nearly complete cultural blindness.
for sure? the main reason for a heavy water reactor is that it can run on natural uranium. It is one way to start a nuclear program when there is no enriched fuel. Sure it can do some neat tricks for bomb making, but also for research and industry. You seem to be confused like a few others here on history, Iraq invaded Iran to start the Iran-Iraq war. Iraq even used chemical weapons. Iran has invaded no one for centuries.
And the "wiped from the map" quote is, at best, a disputed translation of Ahmedinejad misquoting a statement their Supreme Leader made about the Israeli government, and at worst it's just a bunch of random empty threats. We'd waste less of our time taking Chinese seriously when they claim all sorts of land as their own - they have a history of actually sending their army out to secure the claim.
And as far as the Hitler comment goes...come on. Show me where he's trying to usurp control of Iran for his own nefarious purposes. You don't honestly belive that he, and Khamene'i, and the councils that have some power over them, and all their advisors and assistants are all in it to blow up Jerusalem (which is actually holy to them) and then promptly die, do you? Not only that, but that they've somehow kept this a secret fom all the beurocrats that they employ to do their bidding, who would expose them in an instant if they were actually planning on getting Iran depopulated - let alone the Iranian people, who would certainly revolt if they seriously believed their leaders were out to get them killed.
All I see is a politician dancing for the cameras, trying to draw people's attention away from the fact that since their government directly controls something like half of that nation's economy (in addition to the usual stuff like education and the justice system and basic infrastructure), it is directly responsible for a huge portion of whatever domestic problems they may be having right now.
No. The nation-sized suicide bombing is top-grade bullshit. If they're building nukes they'll be using them the same way all the other countries that have nukes use theirs - as a cheap way to guarantee that nobody ever invades your territory to take your land.