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Iran Complies With Nuclear Deal; Sanctions Lifted (nytimes.com)
An anonymous reader writes: Iran has shipped most of its nuclear fuel out of the country, destroyed the innards of a plutonium-producing reactor and mothballed more than 12,000 centrifuges. This compliance with the nuclear accord struck in July has caused the U.S. and Europe to lift financial sanctions on Iran, releasing ~$100 billion in assets. "Under the new rules put in place, the United States will no longer sanction foreign individuals or firms for buying oil and gas from Iran. The American trade embargo remains in place, but the government will permit certain limited business activities with Iran, such as selling or purchasing Iranian food and carpets and American commercial aircraft and parts. It is an opening to Iran that represents a huge roll of the dice, one that will be debated long after Mr. Obama he has built his presidential library. It is unclear what will happen after the passing of Iran's Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has protected and often fueled the hardliners — but permitted these talks to go ahead."
During election time, if Israel doesn't like it, then expect every candidate to dance for Israeli money.
About 20% (> $500 million) of the $3.15 billion that flows into Israel as military defense aid, flows back into US politics via commercial conduits (Israeli/US companies that receive lucrative government contracts, whose US subsidiary in turns drives US politics directly and indirectly.
So a large part of this election cycle will be dominated by pro-Israel lobbies.
Iran didn't like the centrifuges with systemd and enrichd?
Another pure political topic with no tech relevance. slashdot has become a very mediocre, even bad tech news web site. Much like Fox News is for politics.
What a great achievement for the Obama administration. Hopefully we won't piss it away with the coming wave of rising Islamophobia. I could imagine some politicians *cough*Trump*cough* reinstating the sanctions with the justification that their theocratic regime is inherently evil.
On the other hand, the handling of the Iranian protests after the sketchy election isn't doing them any favors in that regard.
The real question is, did the strikes against nuclear scientists, and sabotage of centrifuge SCADAs help contribute to this deal.
Corruption is convincing someone that the selfless ideal is the same as their selfish ideal.
Perhaps, but enriched fuel is HARD to make. The technology is quite.. finicky and specialized and not available to you and me.
To enrich uranium to weapons grade requires centrifuges, a lot of them (because it's the only way to separate U-235 from U-238). Civil enrichment uses a few centrifuges to none (there are designs that don't need enriched fuel). But that's because they only need 5% U-235 to work. Weapons grade is 40% or higher (and bombs need almost pure - 90%+), which requires a stunningly large array of centrifuges at which point it's really hard to do and keep a secret underground - it's going to be a huge facility.
And let's not forget that the world IS watching and monitoring. You cannot detonate a nuclear bomb anywhere without it being detected by third parties. Underground? The earth is covered with seismographs recording everything from earthquakes to nuclear bombs. There are isotope detectors scattered around detecting the products of the nuclear reactions. And you can't do it out in the open because a lot of satellites carry detectors.
Plus, nevermind the intelligence capabilities of everyone - think of what it would take to design something like Stuxnet to only fire at the right target configured a certain way. Chances are, if there is such an underground facility, it's well known. You can't really hide such a facility - having to dig out lots of earth and then moving it places means it's captured on satellite photos and everything. And such a facility requires a lot of infrastructure and likely will generate quite a bit of heat, which shows up nicely on thermal cameras, again on satellites.
And if it really posed a threat, well, a "bomb" will be accidentally dropped on it. After all, it landed out there in the middle of the desert where there was nothing there.
Yuo. I remember when this site was about some cool new mod for a window manager, now its just a feed of the usual 'news' crap you can get anywhere but on a 6 hour delay with a bunch of snark. I appreciate the snark but these days its just low hanging fruit. How the mighty have fallen...
Iran have seen the light - from the sun and realised it's much cheaper to use solar panels and renewables than to waste huge amounts of money on more expensive systems like nuclear power.
Waterfox - a Firefox fork with legacy extension support, security updates and better privacy by default.
It's part of an intelligence test to identify people that can't identify the critical element in a statement. You lose.
Those in need of mental health treatment being told to seek it on their own, probably has the same kind of track record as corporations self regulating...
There are other methods, but none of them are easy.
a,e,i,o,u and sometimes w and y (at be if of up cwm by)
Perhaps, but enriched fuel is HARD to make. The technology is quite.. finicky and specialized and not available to you and me.
Reminder that India became a nuclear power thanks to Canada, and them using "peaceful reactors" to produce nuclear weapons. The world was also watching when India decided to give a big-ol-fuck you as well.
Om, nomnomnom...
The Iranians will just buy what they need from N. Korea. They were already on that path before Israel took out the nuke plant in Syria a few years back. So in 10 years, their missile technology will have been perfected just in time to receive N. Korean warheads. And in the meantime, the Iranians will get back into the international economy to fund their foreign adventures. They are willing to fight for Syria to the last Arab.
The U.S. Administration just kicked the can down the road.
That is certainly NOT a "purely political" story; although I can understand why someone would make that mistake. It's a story about the decline of technology in the United States caused by those who make money favoring secret actions by secret U.S. government organizations.
NSA = No Sales for America.
Boeing Might Lose $4B Brazil Deal For F-18 Jets After NSA Surveillance Scandal; Analysts Say Politics Won't Trump Business (09/12/13)
Three months later: President Dilma Rousseff Announces Brazil Is Buying Sweden's Saab Gripen Jet Fighters (12/18/13)
NSA = Not a Sensible Arrangement.
The NSA does not provide "Security". Instead, the secrecy makes everyone feel insecure. Anyone can claim that a secret organization did something destructive; that's an easy sale when a small group wants violence. Suppose an NSA manager wants a promotion. The manager can arrange something likely to cause violence; there is no outside review; new violence can be used as a reason for new authority.
Consider the Culture of fear. Nazi leader Hermann Goring: "The people don't want war, but they can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. This is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and for exposing the country to danger. It works the same in every country."
Quote from that same Wikipedia page: 'Former US National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski argues that the use of the term War on Terror was intended to generate a culture of fear deliberately because it "obscures reason, intensifies emotions and makes it easier for demagogic politicians to mobilize the public on behalf of the policies they want to pursue." '
Another quote: "... journalist Adam Curtis argues that politicians have used our fears to increase their power and control over society."
NSA = No Structural Authority.
There are complicated problems in running ANY organization. Managing secret organizations sensibly is impossible. Each manager of a secret organization has an excuse to hide his or her mistakes. There can be no outside ideas to fix problems because no outsiders are allowed to know what is happening.
Backdoors:
The U.S. government allows secret government agencies to go to any executive in any company, make demands for "security", and threaten the executive with prison if he or she doesn't do what the secret agency wants. Is that the reason that U.S. computer equipment has backdoors? We are not allowed to know. Secret agencies are allowed to lie, so even if an agency says it didn't force a backdoor, no one can know if the statement is true.
A few of the many stories about backdoors in U.S. hardware:
D-Link: Reverse Engineering a D-Link Backdoor (Oct. 12, 2013)
Arris: 600,000 Arris cable modems have 'backdoors in backdoors', researcher claims (Nov. 20, 2015)
Juniper Networks: Juniper drops NSA-developed code following new backdoor revelations (Jan. 10, 2016)
Cisco: Snowden: The NSA planted backdoors in Cisco products (May 15, 2014)
Netgear
True. All Islamic countries follow the directive of the Qur'an "war is deceit". Nobody same world expect them to follow the deal, especially while shouting " death to America".
Uhm, it is a 'democracy' where eligibility is limited by a religious council, ultimate power is held by a not-popular-elected (not even indirectly) individual with potentially dictatorial authority, suspicion of massive voting fraud exists, where independent polling organisations are closed down to hide this, and where the press is severely limited ("one of the world’s most repressive in 2014" ; Last but 7 in 2015).
Please remember: "Voting not a democracy make."
This was an international agreement. Interational sanctions were going to fall apart no matter what. This deal was the best we were going to get.
SLOWER TRAFFIC KEEP RIGHT
Iran continues to enrich bomb-grade nuclear fuel in underground/concealed sites.
Of course they do - don't you remember when the voices inside Bush's head led him to declare Iran, Iraq, and North Korea "The Axis of Evil"?
The nuclear-armed two of those didn't get attacked. Iran saved itself from colonization. The country might be controlled by a group of sociopathic assholes, but their strategy played out according to plan. The dispassionate math of it says that they fared better than Iraq did -- despite the horrors of sanctions, the horrors of war are even worse.
We live in a screwed-up world where nuclear arms are the tools of peace. Because politicians are all-too eager to risk others' lives for their own power, but not their own. The US seems poised to elect still-crazier leaders for the next round. When John McAfee is the least-bad option you know things aren't looking bright.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
"... just before the US economy collapses."
This won't help. Iran just ordered 114 new passenger planes.
From Airbus naturally and they also won't buy any US cars.
They are willing to fight for Syria to the last Arab.
Epic fail. Persians (i.e. Iranians) loathe Arabs and vice versa. The Middle East is complicated and the West isn't their only foe. Whilst they have common enemies, they don't get along with each other either.
The US planes may be better in many respects but with US domestic politics as unstable as it is...who knows if the US would let them buy the planes.
However I would expect Iran Air to order a lot of spare parts for the 7 747 boeing planes it already owns and perhaps purchase additional boeing planes on the open market (there are plenty available).
Yes, Reagan said, "Trust, but verify." With this deal, Obama is saying, "I will take the word of a government that regularly proclaims 'Death to America', that they will stop working on a program that might allow them to actually bring death to America." Meanwhile, the Iranians have ALREADY violated part of the deal by continuing to work on improving their ballistic missiles.
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
Or to have one of the plane engines fall off and hit the ground, making a "Boeinggggg" noise.
Not a fail at all, read again. The Iranian government will continue to pour funding and weapons into Syria until the last Arab is dead. They need the proxy state.
they also won't buy any US cars.
Thats because on the whole compared to what is available from the rest of the world they're quite crap, especially in the fuel economy, power per litre and quality of materials used for interiors. Mitsubishi/Toyota make better pickup trucks, Land Rover and Toyota make better 4x4s, almost everyone else including European arms of US manufacturers like Ford and GM make better cars.
I only please one person per day. Today is not your day. Tomorrow isn't looking good either. - Scott Adams
The Iranians haven't been trusted since November 1979. Oh, they'll play nice until they get what they want, then it will be back to business as usual. Just as with North Korea. Obama has a lot of work to do, until the '16 election to fully destroy the USA. Heck, I'm still of the opinion that he will stir something up before the election (especially if a Republican looks to be elected), so he can suspend the election.
This post sponsored by Lear Capital. Cash out your 401k and sell your car to buy precious metals from us today!
P.S. The apocalypse is coming!!!!!
+1 for yet another misuse of our favorite high school debate team crutch.
+1 for declaring your straw men
with no allies they will be wiped off the face of the planet (and I assume that is your hope).
If you think I voted for Trump because of this post, you're wrong. I voted for Dr. Jill Stein of the Green Party. Again.
Airbus airplanes have substantial content sourced from the United States. Likewise Boeing airplanes have content sourced from the EU, including from subsidiaries of Airbus. The prime and its preferred contractors obviously get the greatest benefit but the industry is one big bowl of international spaghetti.
sPh
The 1980s called; they want their auto industry analysis back.
sPh
This deal was the best we were going to get.
Given the spinelessness of our current administration, yes, probably so.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
The agreement with Iran is about as polarizing a subject as any can be; our own nation is thoroughly divided on it, and Israel, one of the U.S.'s allies and bitter enemy of Iran, is very much violently opposed to it, to the point of perhaps being irrational in their response.
For myself, as I suspect it is for many others, I am internally divided on it, as I am both a cynic and hopeful at the same time.
On the one hand, continued hostilities towards Iran serves to maintain and promote tensions between Iran, the U.S., and many other nations, so finding a diplomatic solution that is mutually agreeable could be a good thing for everyone all around. However on the other hand I am aware that the subtext of the entire effort to come to an agreement with Iran, may be just a way to 'give them enough rope to hang themselves'; we put forth a show of trust, in the outward hope that they play it straight with us and the rest of the world, but at the same time knowing that we might have just driven their ill intent so far underground (in the literal as well as figurative sense of the word) that we can't detect it, and are biding their time until they can launch doomsday upon Israel and the U.S. and whoever else is at the top of their hit-list -- at which time, once they've been caught red-handed violating the agreement, the U.S. and it's involved allies can say "Hey, we tried! But they betrayed our trust!" and then nobody that matters will blame us for going balls-out to neutralize them once and for all.
But at the same time that my cynicism reads the potential subtext, I'm hopeful that while Irans' secular leadership is (excuse the turn of phrase here) hell-bent on destroying Israel and the U.S. and (likely) our other allies and anything that doesn't fit into their limited, rigid world-view, it's non-secular leadership is more open-minded and far-thinking, realizing that the World of today has become too small and all Irans' neighbors too close, in the literal as well as figurative sense, to allow the leadership decisions of an entire country to be guided by misguided tradition, narrow-mindedness, and hate.
The worst part of all of this, of course, is the waiting; it will take decades of waiting and watching to determine which direction this will take -- and humans, I've noted, very often do not excel at waiting.
Are YOU using the TOOL, or is the TOOL using YOU? Think about it!
Well, tell you what, actually produce better cars and we'll send that 1980s complaint that you still haven't managed to stop being true back to the 80s.
Deal?
The Chevy Malibu is a good example: the 2010 model was as good as any in its class and better for North American driving conditions than most of its European- and Japan-optimized competitors. I haven't seen the 2016 yet but early reviews are that is it substantially improved over the 2009-2011 type. There are many very good Big 2.5 designed and built models on the market that are competitive with anything (particularly in North America). Also some not-so-great models - which is also true of Mazda, Toyota, Nissan, etc (not even getting into the VW cult/mess). Toyota automatic transmissions? Woah, there's a great design ;-(
sPh
scientific progress goes boeing!
This. Just to make the point even clearer, it takes a long, long time to go from ore to bomb grade uranium. The only way to speed up the process is to scale it up -- to have lots and lots of centrifuges working in parallel on lots and lots of uranium, like the US did in the Manhattan Project. Here is what our plant looked like. You can also peruse aerial images Pakistan's enrichment facility to see what a more modern plant would look like. These are not small, readily concealable facilities.
Is it possible that Iran is operating centrifuges completely underground where our intelligence services can't see them, as the GP poster claims? Sure, but only if their patient enough to wait decades to produce enough HEU for a bomb. The construction of an underground facility large enough to achieve "fast breakout" would be if anything harder to conceal than a surface plant. All the other parts of making a bomb and a delivery system are readily concealable, which is why anti-proliferation efforts focus on fuel. That means either Pu production, which would be very hard to conceal, or uranium enrichment, which is impossible.
So what paths does this leave Iran to "fast breakout"? Well, without a concealable enrichment program they'd have access to secret stashes of fuel that's already bomb grade or nearly so. But if that were the case the game's essentially over; there's nothing left that further sanctions could accomplish.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
Surely Iran won't secretly develop nukes anyway with all the billions they get from the sanctions being lifted
If Iran really has the ability to secretly develop nukes, then sanctions really have no point. Consider Iran in comparison to North Korea; Iran has 3x the population and 30x the GDP. Iran generates 750,000 university graduates/year and has substantial industrial, technological and scientific capabilities. If Iran wants a nuke it can develop a nuke, and it'll be a lot better than North Korea's nuke, provided they can get the fuel.
It should also be noted that Iran and North Korea share one advantage in the proliferation game that Iraq did not have: their own uranium mines. So they don't have to go to Niger for yellow cake, they can dig it out of their own ground.
So this leaves us with three options when it comes to sanctions and nuclear non-proliferation in Iran.
(1) We can maintain the status quo and hope that the sanctions render Iran incapable of developing its own nuke, despite Iran's obvious and massive advantages over North Korea even with sanctions in place.
(2) We can cut a deal which makes it much more difficult for Iran to produce weapons grade fuel. Naturally since this is a "deal" we have to have something to offer them.
(3) We can try to do to Iran what we did to Iraq in 2003-2011.
Before you decide you should consider the immensely greater geographical difficulty of fighting in Iran than in Iraq. Iran is a mountainous country 3x the size of Iraq and twice the population. Unlike Baghdad, Tehran is beyond the reach of US naval aviation, except from the extreme northern end of the Persian Gulf, and the entire length of that be extremely perilous for US ships to operate in. Basically we're looking at the most difficult land campaign the US has undertaken in since the WW2. The end result of that campaign isn't in question, but it's not reasonable to expect better or faster results than we got in Iraq.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
Oh and I loved it so much! Little ol' India, unable to feed its populace, gave the middle finger to the West and exploded the nuke. How wonderful! Fricking Westerners, always full of knowledge and righteousness about everything! I remember a line from somewhere: My views may have changed but not the fact that I'm right!
You know what's amazing? Despite being in one of the toughest neighborhoods around (Pakistan in the West, China in the East - both nuke powers), India's been ballsy enough to say "No first use". And Big Ol' Merica and Righteous Ol' Europa never said that. So mostly, whenever peeps start whining about India being irresponsible and mean and lying and all that, I have just one thing to say, "Kiss my ass".
I know you were probably just trying to make a point vis-a-vis Iran and nukes, but it's just that I am tired of my country being dragged in for comparisons like the one you did.
A crank is a little thing that makes revolutions
Yes, I am aware that there are other countries involved in the deal...countries which have a history of entering into deals which are contrary to their interests because those deals enrich their decision-makers (key leaders of most of those other six countries were implicated in taking bribes under the "food-for-fuel" deal with Saddam Hussein).
I am also unsure why those other countries failing to verify that the Iranians are keeping their word makes it any less gullible of the U.S. to fail to verify it.
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
There would have been no negotiations if not for the current administration. Or they would have fallen apart early on. And like North Korea, nothing would slow down Iran from getting nukes.
SLOWER TRAFFIC KEEP RIGHT
There would have been no negotiations if not for the current administration. Or they would have fallen apart early on. And like North Korea, nothing would slow down Iran from getting nukes.
Why do you care if there was or was not negotiation? Iran will continue to develop their nukes, continue to export support for terrorists as they've been doing for decades, and will continue to pursue hegemony throughout the middle east ... and now they'll have access to billions of dollars to make it easier for them. The negotiations were worthless. They didn't happen previously because everyone else recognized that the Iranians aren't honorable negotiating partners. Obama knows this too, but he was willing to go through the motions for entirely domestic political purposes - it's all about what he can say he's done (never mind whether anything positive actually occurred).
So what is it that you think has been actually accomplished, other than the Iranians getting everything they wanted, including a huge financial windfall and no obligation to change their ways, at all?
And yes, there were ways to prevent the North Koreans from getting nukes. Those opportunities were blown. They couldn't have done it without help from Pakistan, and allowing it to happen was an intelligence and policy failure.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
They used to be crap. Ford actually does make the best pickup trucks, and Ford and Chevy's newer sedans are actually pretty nice for what they cost. I still really like Hondas, but new American cars are actually pretty comparable to European and Japanese cars of similar prices.
Examine even your most deeply held beliefs. Nobody is always right.
Drop a bomb because there is nothing there. Nothing except three hospitals, a baby milk factory and five mosques.
Right. The US caused the communists to invade Vietnam and South Korea. The US caused Saddam to invade Kuwait.
Yes, dealing with people who start wars frequently involves the use of violence in order to stop them. Let me guess, you're planning to accompany that folk singer who says he's traveling to visit ISIS and sing them into changing their ways, right?
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
It's going to be hard for them to develop nukes without the stuff they've mostly given up. Iran is not going to go after nukes for at least a while, which is a better position than we were in before the negotiation.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
Yup, just like they weren't going after nukes during those years that they actually were, in fact, going after nukes. Hilarious.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
Toyota's trucks and 4x4s share a code base with those cars that have unintended acceleration problems and over 2000 global variables. Remember them? For the price of a Land Rover you can get a Ford F350 - a vehicle that could literally pull a Land Rover up a 45 degree incline at freeway speeds while it fought with all its might to drive the other way.
We have this thing in the US called a blizzard. When your Land Rover gets stuck in snow (which isn't easy, their excellent 4x4s), an F350 or its GMC or Dodge equivalent shows up to save you. And then it continues on saving a few dozen more like you before it's driver has to stop for a nap.
Every rule has more than one consequence.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
Casteism
I think USA is trying to replace Saudi Arabia with Iran as its Oil ally;
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
Casteism
I know you were probably just trying to make a point vis-a-vis Iran and nukes, but it's just that I am tired of my country being dragged in for comparisons like the one you did.
You know the the difference between Iran and India is? Nothing, they both broke the NPT.
Om, nomnomnom...
They've given up stuff important for building nukes. As far as we can tell, they aren't continuing a nuke program. I'm not at all fond of the Iranian government, but that's about the best we're going to get, and it's a lot better than nothing.
Exactly what were we supposed to do about Iran anyway? I don't want us to have to conquer another Middle East country and release all that mess yet again.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
As far as we can tell
Right, because the IAEA wasn't allowed to establish a baseline for their stores of processed uranium, and the 100% lopsided agreement puts Iran in charge of inspecting and reporting on the remaining amount as they see fit, no IAEA inspections allowed. In other words there IS something we can tell: that Iran got exactly what it wanted: no inspections, and billions of dollars with which to continue their project.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
5 bullies get together and decide that they are the only folks in the world who are allowed to eat cheese - called it the NCT. Some others decided not to pay attention to the NCT, made their own cheese and had it. Poor NCT "signatories" all got their panties into a twist! Ooooh! I love that squeezed balls look they've got!
A crank is a little thing that makes revolutions