Iran decides to cool it with the nukes

Iran has decided to cool it with the nukes until after their upcoming Presidential election in June according to a report in Tuesday's Wall Street Journal. The report is based on conversations with senior United States, European Union and Israeli officials.

Seeking to ward off international pressure, Iranian nuclear officials have kept the country's stockpile of uranium enriched to 20% purity below 250 kilograms (550 pounds). Iran would need such an amount—if processed further into weapons-grade fuel—to produce one atomic bomb, experts believe. It is also the amount Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told the United Nations in September that the world should prevent Iran from amassing, through a military strike if necessary.

The U.N.'s nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency, said in late December that Tehran had amassed 232 kilograms of uranium enriched to the 20% level but that almost 100 kilograms of that amount is being converted into fuel plates to power Tehran's research reactor. Fissile material in this form is difficult to use in a weapons program, U.S. and European officials said.

"Based on the latest IAEA report, Iran appears to be limiting its stockpile of 20% enriched uranium by converting a significant portion of it to oxide," said a senior U.S. official working on Iran. "But that could change at any moment."

U.S. and Israeli officials believe Iran's moves represent a delay, rather than a change of heart, and that other actions are accelerating the pace at which the country could create weapons-grade fuel. It has installed thousands of new centrifuge machines at an underground military facility in the holy city of Qom, the IAEA reported. The site, called Fordow, is in a fortified bunker and seen as largely immune to U.S. or Israeli military strikes.

Iran also has been adding advanced centrifuge machines that are seen as capable of tripling the pace at which it enriches uranium. If Mr. Khamenei decides to breach Israel's mark later this year, U.S. and Israeli officials said, Iran could move more rapidly to produce the weapons-grade fuel required for a bomb.

"There is a good point to be made that Iran has accepted 250 kilograms as the red line, but they are doing this very cleverly," said Michael Oren, Israel's ambassador to the U.S., in an interview. The country's moves would "enable Iran to cross the red line clandestinely in a matter of weeks," he said.

Gary Samore, until recently the White House coordinator for arms control and weapons of mass destruction, has told the Brookings Institute that he does not see a breakthrough in negotiations with Iran in the offing. The negotiations are due to resume later this week.

“Even if there isn’t a formal deal, I do think the Iranians are exercising some constraints on their program for political reasons,” said Samore, who was speaking at the Brookings Institution.

He assessed that Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei was being careful not to come near the red line of advanced uranium enrichment that Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu laid down at the UN in the fall, since he doesn’t want to trigger more sanctions or a military attack before the elections are held.

In the context of Iran’s careful political calculations and what Samore described as “a fundamental disconnect” between Tehran and world power negotiators, the former White House official said it would be “unrealistic to expect there would be some kind of breakthrough in these talks” at the end of the week.

Samore also said he didn’t think a military attack would be an impossible scenario so long as talks were going on. Instead, he suggested that more important than what’s happening at the negotiating table in determining a strike would be the situation on the ground.

It sounds like there's going to be a war later this year.