Who Are We SupposedTo Believe??

[mkemse]

Top Rnking Officlas at the Pentagon and Defense Departmnt said Yesterday (Feb 28,2009) that Iran has enough Fossel Fuel and could make a Nuclear bomb in a matter of months

Today, March 1st, 2009, Secretry Of Defense Robert Gtes said "They are no where near ready to make a Nuclear Bomb,they do not have enough fossel fuel??
Who do we believe??
How can ther by such a drastic difference of opnion between the Defense Department, The Pentagon and Secretary Of Defense Gates??

[Thorne]

Top Rnking Officlas at the Pentagon and Defense Departmnt said Yesterday (Feb 28,2009) that Iran has enough Fossel Fuel and could make a Nuclear bomb in a matter of months

Today, March 1st, 2009, Secretry Of Defense Robert Gtes said "They are no where near ready to make a Nuclear Bomb,they do not have enough fossel fuel??
Who do we believe??
How can ther by such a drastic difference of opnion between the Defense Department, The Pentagon and Secretary Of Defense Gates??

I think you mean fissile (fission?) fuel? Fossil fuels are oil and coal, not nuclear.

I tend to doubt any government pronouncements by default, so it really doesn't matter which one you believe. The thing to remember is that any nation which even tries to launch a nuclear attack is liable to be nuked back to the stone age by any number of other nuclear powers, and it's unlikely that anyone would complain too loudly. And if they sell the bombs to terrorists they risk similar sanctions. It's relatively easy to determine where the material for a nuclear weapon came from (compared to actually making a bomb, that is.)

[wmrs2]

Top Rnking Officlas at the Pentagon and Defense Departmnt said Yesterday (Feb 28,2009) that Iran has enough Fossel Fuel and could make a Nuclear bomb in a matter of months

Today, March 1st, 2009, Secretry Of Defense Robert Gtes said "They are no where near ready to make a Nuclear Bomb,they do not have enough fossel fuel??
Who do we believe??
How can ther by such a drastic difference of opnion between the Defense Department, The Pentagon and Secretary Of Defense Gates??

Don't worry. Pres. Obama has promised not to tolerate a Nuclear Bomb in Iran and the President has not taken anything off the table. With his strong resolve, you know that Iran will not dare go nuclear during Obama's term in office.

[Dr_BuzzCzar]

Admiral Mullen said they have enough fissile fuel to build a bomb. Estimates are they have about 2300 lbs and it takes about 2000 lbs to make one bomb.

Sec Gates says they aren't near to having a bomb, much less a stockpile of weapons. Having the fissionable material and having the technology to build a bomb plus a delivery system are very different things. I believe Sec Gates was pointing out there's time to reach a diplomatic way of keeping Iran from joining the "club" before other more drastic measures might be taken.

As I see it, one man is viewing this as a military problem and the other is viewing it as a diplomatic problem.

[mkemse]

I think you mean fissile (fission?) fuel? Fossil fuels are oil and coal, not nuclear.

I tend to doubt any government pronouncements by default, so it really doesn't matter which one you believe. The thing to remember is that any nation which even tries to launch a nuclear attack is liable to be nuked back to the stone age by any number of other nuclear powers, and it's unlikely that anyone would complain too loudly. And if they sell the bombs to terrorists they risk similar sanctions. It's relatively easy to determine where the material for a nuclear weapon came from (compared to actually making a bomb, that is.)

Thank you for that correction, yes I meat fissel Fuel not Fossel fuel

Ok just could not figure out how one party says says and other says no

[Mr.Quirt]

Here is an article from which I have excerpted the salient explanation for Adm. Mullin's statement:

THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

REVIEW & OUTLOOK MARCH 4, 2009 Obama's Iran Crisis

It's arriving faster than he thinks.

As a Presidential candidate, Barack Obama called a nuclear Iran "a grave threat" and said "the world must prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon." But he also called for direct, high-level talks in the hopes that the mullahs could be persuaded to abandon their nuclear dreams.

We've never held out much hope for those talks, which would inevitably be complicated and protracted. Mr. Obama is already trying to lure Russian help on Iran by offering to trade away hard-earned missile defense sites in Eastern Europe. Russia's President claims to be unimpressed. And now it turns out that the rate at which Iran's nuclear programs are advancing may render even negotiations moot.

That's a fair conclusion from the latest report by the U.N.'s International Atomic Energy Agency. Among other disclosures, the IAEA found that Iran has produced more than 1,000 kilograms of low enriched uranium (LEU), enough for a single bomb's worth of uranium after further enrichment. The IAEA also found that Iran had underreported its stock of LEU by about 200 kilograms, which took the agency by surprise partly because it only checks Iran's stockpile once a year. This is the basis for Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Michael Mullen's weekend acknowledgment that the U.S. believes Iran has enough fissile material to make a bomb.

Iran now possesses 5,600 centrifuges in which it can enrich uranium -- a 34-fold increase from 2006 -- and plans to add 45,000 more over five years. That will give Tehran an ability to make atomic bombs on an industrial scale. Iran has also announced that it plans to begin operating its Russian-built reactor at Bushehr sometime this spring. That reactor's purposes are ostensibly civilian, but it will eventually produce large quantities of spent fuel that can covertly be processed into weapons-usable plutonium.

That's not all. The IAEA says its inspectors have been denied access to a heavy water reactor in Arak, and that Iran has put a roof over the site "rendering impossible the continued use of satellite imagery to monitor further construction inside the reactor building." Most proliferation experts agree that the Arak reactor, scheduled for completion in 2011, can have no purpose other than to produce weapons-grade plutonium.

True to form, Iran continues to deny the IAEA access to other parts of its nuclear programs, including R&D facilities and uranium mines. "Regrettably," says the report, "as a result of the continued lack of cooperation by Iran in connection with the remaining issues which give rise to concerns about possible military dimensions of Iran's nuclear programme, the Agency has not made any substantive progress on these issues."