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That is IF you take what they said for granted in the amount.
Fact is we have no ing idea how much they have refined...
U.S. intelligence agencies say Iran is years away from building nukes
WASHINGTON — U.S. intelligence agencies say Iran is several years away from being able to produce enough enriched uranium to build a nuclear weapon, the nation's chief intelligence analyst said Thursday.
The nation's 16 intelligence agencies haven't changed their view of Iran's capability, said Thomas Fingar, chairman of the National Intelligence Council.
That's despite Iran's announcement Tuesday that it had mastered the ability to enrich uranium for a civilian nuclear reactor, raising the possibility it could make a bomb.
"Our timeline hasn't changed," said Fingar, a top analyst for intelligence chief John Negroponte.
Despite the technical hurdles, "we believe that Iran is intent on developing a nuclear weapon," Gen. Michael Hayden, the nation's No. 2 intelligence official, said at the briefing.
The intelligence community assessment comes as the Bush administration and the United Nations' nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), continued to pressure Iran on Thursday.
• White House spokesman Scott McClellan said President Bush was skeptical about a peaceful resolution to the standoff with Iran, "given the regime's history."
• John Bolton, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, said "Iranians are expressing their disdain for the Security Council" by vowing to continue uranium enrichment. The Security Council has set a deadline of April 28 for Iran to halt enrichment activities, after which it may consider sanctions on Iran.
• Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said that Iran would have no choice but to comply with worldwide insistence that it stop its nuclear program.
RICE: Consequences needed for Iran's defiance
While acknowledging Iran's continued nuclear program, Kenneth Brill, head of the National Counter-Proliferation Center, said it was critical to separate Iran's most recent claims from its actual capability. He and Fingar were among 10 intelligence officers who met with reporters Thursday.
"An announcement is one thing," Brill said. He referred to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's claim Tuesday that Iran plans to build 3,000 uranium enrichment centrifuges linked in a "cascade" by next year as a first step toward a system of 54,000 centrifuges.
"It will take several years to build that many centrifuges," Brill said.
Iran has 164 centrifuges in a system that Ahmadinejad said had been used to enrich uranium to a degree useful in a civilian nuclear reactor but not in a weapon. Centrifuges spin at a high rate to separate a gaseous form of enriched uranium.
With such a small number of machines, it would take 13 years to produce enough highly enriched uranium for a nuclear weapon, Stephen Rademaker, U.S. assistant secretary of state in charge of non-proliferation issues, said Wednesday.
With 3,000 centrifuges, enough material for one weapon could be produced in 271 days, Rademaker said. With 54,000 centrifuges, enough for a single weapon could be produced in 16 days.
Kennette Benedict, executive director of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, estimated it would take Iran until 2009 at the earliest to build 3,000 centrifuges capable of enriching uranium.USA Today
Iran rebuffed a request by the U.N. nuclear agency chief in talks Thursday that it suspend uranium enrichment. Mohamed ElBaradei, head of the IAEA, emerged from meetings with Iranian officials in Tehran on Thursday to say there is no evidence Iran has diverted nuclear material for weapons.
"But the picture is still hazy," he said. During the 20 years of Iran's nuclear program, "lots of activities went unreported," ElBaradei said.
California Rep. Jane Harman, the ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, has read the intelligence reporting on Iran and said it does not make a strong case that the threat is imminent.
Fingar said such "skepticism is both appropriate and welcome." After the failure of U.S. intelligence in assessing Iraq's supposed weapons of mass destruction, he said, "we realize that we have got to rebuild confidence in the work we put out."
Someone should e-mail this story to all the local wing-nut talk-show hosts.
That is IF you take what they said for granted in the amount.
Fact is we have no ing idea how much they have refined...
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What I do in the privacy of my own home is no one's business.
What you do in the privacy of your own home is YOUR business.
we have 16 intelleginces agencies?
Nuke Iran!
Save the Beluga Stergeon in the Caspian Sea!
First when it came to Iraq our intelligence wasn't any good according to Dan. Now we're supposed to listen on this.
Just admit you're a pacifistic pussy and get it over with Dan, how's that learning Arabic thing working out?
And according to you, the pre-Iraq intelligence was good enough. Now we're supposed to listen to you say this is rubbish?
You guys make my head hurt.
I don't think anyone is suggesting using a nuke against a population center a shock weapon like WWII. What they are talking about is 2 facilities. The russian reactor and the underground refinery.
They are so fortified that even massive conventional attack may not destroy the facility. Use of a tac nuke will make the facility contaminated and thus will take them a LOT longer in terms of years to clean up and start again.
Airstrikes will only defer the programs. Which might be long enough for a revolution in Iran.
Actually you touched on another idea Vashner... Howabout a dirty bomb? Load up a conventional bomb with a bunch of radioactive garbage and make those places a death trap for anyone who wants to go near it.
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