Unthinkable (66 page)

4.
 George Jahn, “Iran Says It Will Speed Up Nuclear Program,” Associated Press, January 31, 2013,
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jPHLK4rK7Md1f42qK3DZwSHvQM_A?docId=82f8ffeeab294344bc57c3df6f719acc
.

5.
 David Albright and Christina Walrond, “Iran's Gas Centrifuge Program: Taking Stock,” Institute for Science and International Security, February 11, 2010, available at
http://isis-online.org/isis-reports/detail/irans-gas-centrifuge-program-taking-stock/
. Richard P. Cronin, Alan Kronstadt, and Sharon Squassoni, “Pakistan's Nuclear Proliferation Activities and the Recommendations of the 9/11 Commission: U.S. Policy Constraints and Options,” RL32745, Congressional Research Service, January 25, 2005, p. 11.

6.
 Kenneth M. Pollack,
The Persian Puzzle: The Conflict Between Iran and America
(New York: Random House, 2004), p. 318.

7.
 Patrikarakos,
Nuclear Iran
, pp. 141–43.

8.
 Pollack,
Persian Puzzle
, p. 362; Ward,
Immortal
, p. 320.

9.
 One superb recent study has concluded that Iran could have purchased the same fuel abroad for 10 percent of the cost of manufacturing it domestically—and that does not include the cost of sanctions, lost investment, and other penalties Iran has suffered that dwarf the simple cost comparison. See Ali Vaez and Karim Sadjadpour, “Iran's Nuclear Odyssey: Costs and Risks,” Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, April 2013, esp. pp. 13–17.

10.
 Seth Carus, “Iran and Weapons of Mass Destruction,” pre-publication copy prepared for the American Jewish Committee Annual Meeting, May 3, 2000, pp. 2–4; Gary Milhollin, “The Mullahs and the Bomb,”
New York Times
, October 23, 2003; “Nuclear Weapons—2004 Developments,” GlobalSecurity.org, available at
http://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/world/iran/nuke2004.htm
, accessed on August 5, 2004; “Nuclear Weapons—2003 Developments,” GlobalSecurity.org, available at
http://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/world/iran/nuke2003.htm
, accessed on August 5, 2004; “Nuclear Weapons—2002 Developments,”
http://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/world/iran/nuke2002.htm
.

11.
 In 2005, Iran took out a full-page ad in the
New York Times
to explain its version of the nuclear standoff and this should be seen as the most authoritative statement of Iranian claims about its nuclear program. See
“An Unnecessary Crisis—Setting the Record Straight About Iran's Nuclear Program,”
New York Times
, November 18, 2005, p. A11.

12.
 Simon Shercliff, “The Iranian Nuclear Issue,” in Amin Tarzi, ed.,
The Iranian Puzzle Piece
(Quantico, Va.: Marine Corps University Press, 2009), pp. 50–51; Stuart Winer, “Iran Admits It Deceived the West over Nuclear Program,”
Times of Israel
, September 20, 2012.

13.
 As part of signing on to the NPT, countries must have a Safeguard Agreement with the IAEA that describes procedures for handling nuclear materials, notification of changes in the countries' nuclear program, and other basic functions. It is unclear whether violation of the Safeguard Agreement constitutes a violation of the NPT itself, another problem with the NPT.

14.
 International Atomic Energy Agency, Report by the Director General, “Implementation of the NPT Safeguards Agreement in the Islamic Republic of Iran,” GOV/2003/40, June 6, 2003. Also see Joby Warrick and Glenn Kessler, “Iran's Nuclear Program Speeds Ahead,”
Washington Post
, March 10, 2003, p. A1. Note that Warrick and Kessler claim that the Natanz facility was designed to house 5,000 centrifuges while the actual IAEA report says 50,000. See IAEA, “Implementation of the NPT Safeguards Agreement in the Islamic Republic of Iran,” p. 6.

15.
 “Iran Signs Additional Protocol,” International Atomic Energy Agency, December 18, 2003, available at
http://www.iaea.org/newscenter/news/2003/iranap20031218.html
.

16.
 IAEA, “Implementation of the NPT Safeguards Agreement in the Islamic Republic of Iran: Resolution Adopted by the Board on 18 June 2004”; “Iran's Continuing Pursuit of Weapons of Mass Destruction: Testimony by Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security John R. Bolton,” House International Relations Committee, Subcommittee on the Middle East and Central Asia, June 24, 2004; Karl Vick, “Another Nuclear Program Found in Iran,”
Washington Post
, February 24, 2004, p. A1.

17.
 For a fuller account of how Iran's claims belie the economic realities of its nuclear program, see Vaez and Sadjadpour, “Iran's Nuclear Odyssey.”

18.
 Ibid., p. 17.

19.
 See “Tensions Grow over Iran's Nuclear Goals,”
PBS NewsHour,
September 27, 2004, available at
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/middle_east/july-dec04/iran_9-27.html
.

20.
 Shercliff, “The Iranian Nuclear Issue,” pp. 50–51.

21.
 Patrikarakos,
Nuclear Iran
, pp. 166–68.

22.
 David Patrikarakos reaches the same conclusion. See ibid., p. 169.

23.
 For the details of how much more cost-effective it would be for Iran to pursue
natural gas rather than nuclear power, see Vaez and Sadjadpour, “Iran's Nuclear Odyssey,” pp. 17–21.

24.
 Author's conversation with senior British officials, Washington, D.C., April 2004.

25.
 David Albright, Paul Brannan, Andrea Stricker, and Christina Walrond, “Natanz Enrichment Site: Boondoggle or Part of an Atomic Bomb Production Complex?” Institute for Science and International Security, September 21, 2011, available at
http://isis-online.org/isis-reports/detail/natanz-enrichment-site-boondoggle-or-part-of-an-atomic-bomb-production-comp/
.

26.
 Ali Akbar Dareini, “Iran Plans Enrichment Sites in Defiance of UN,” Associated Press, November 29, 2009; Thomas Erdbrink, “Ahmadinejad Vows Dramatic Expansion of Iran's Nuclear Program,”
Washington Post
, November 30, 2009.

27.
 See also David Crist,
The Twilight War: The Secret History of America's Thirty-Year Conflict with Iran
(New York: Penguin Press, 2012), p. 491.

28.
 See National Intelligence Council, “Iran: Nuclear Intentions and Capabilities,” National Intelligence Estimate, November 2007, p. 5. The text of the declassified version of the key judgments can be found at
http://graphics8.nytimes.com/packages/pdf/international/20071203_release.pdf
.

29.
 Commercial satellite imagery and expert analysis can be found at David Albright and Robert Avagyan, “Suspected Clean-Up Activity Continues at Parchin Military Complex: Considerable Dirt Movement Near Suspect Building,” Institute for Science and International Security, June 20, 2012, available at
http://isis-online.org/isis-reports/detail/parchin/
. On the IAEA efforts to get Iran to discuss its suspected weaponization, see International Atomic Energy Agency Board of Governors, “Implementation of the NPT Safeguards Agreement and Relevant Provisions of Security Council Resolutions in the Islamic Republic of Iran,” August 30, 2012, available at
http://www.iaea.org/Publications/Documents/Board/2012/gov2012-37.pdf
, p. 3; Kenneth Katzman, “Iran: U.S. Concerns and Policy Responses,” Congressional Research Service, RL32048, September 5, 2012, p. 28.

30.
 “UN Fails in Attempt to Restart Iran Nuke Probe,” Associated Press, January 18, 2013.

31.
 David E. Sanger and William J. Broad, “Inspectors Say Iran Worked on Warhead,”
New York Times
, February 19, 2010, p. A13.

32.
 George Jahn, “UN: Credible Evidence Iran Working on Nuke Weapons,” Associated Press, September 2, 2011.

33.
 One of these documents has since made its way into the public domain. See George Jahn, “Graph Suggests Iran Working on Bomb,” Associated
Press, November 27, 2012, available at
http://news.yahoo.com/ap-exclusive-graph-suggests-iran-working-bomb-161109665.html
.

34.
 Kenneth Katzman, “Iran: U.S. Concerns and Policy Responses,” Congressional Research Service, RL32048, September 5, 2012, p. 28.

35.
 International Atomic Energy Agency Board of Governors, “Implementation of the NPT Safeguards Agreement and Relevant Provisions of Security Council Resolutions in the Islamic Republic of Iran,” November 8, 2011, Report Gov/2011/65, available at
http://www.iaea.org/Publications/Documents/Board/2011/gov2011-65.pdf
, p. 8.

36.
 That the WMD fiasco was foremost an intelligence failure and the role of the Bush 43 administration in that disaster, see Central Intelligence Agency, “Misreading Intentions: Iraq's Reaction to Inspections Created Picture of Deception,” Iraq WMD Retrospective Series, January 5, 2006, declassified and released June 5, 2012; Robert Jervis,
Why Intelligence Fails: Lessons from the Iranian Revolution and the Iraq War
(Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 2010); Kenneth M. Pollack, “Spies, Lies, and Weapons: What Went Wrong,”
Atlantic Monthly
, January/February 2004, pp. 78–92; Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, “Report on the U.S. Intelligence Community's Prewar Intelligence Assessments on Iraq,” July 7, 2004, available at
http://web.mit.edu/simsong/www/iraqreport2-textunder.pdf
.

37.
 This is the Lavizan-Shian site. On that site, and Iran's efforts to conceal whatever it had been doing there, see Institute for Science and International Security, “Iran: Nuclear Sites: Lavisan-Shian,” available at
http://www.isisnucleariran.org/sites/detail/lavisan-shian/
.

38.
 According to declassified documents, the U.S. intelligence community believed by
at least
1974 that Israel possessed a nuclear arsenal. See the declassified text of the Special National Intelligence Estimate (SNIE), “Prospects for Further Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons,” September 4, 1974, available at
http://www.gwu.edu/%7Ensarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB181/sa08.pdf
, downloaded on January 16, 2008. The relevant page is the first page of the SNIE, which was also declassified as page 6 of “Memorandum from Atherton and Kratzer to Mr. Sisco, ‘Response to Congressional Questions on Israel's Nuclear Capabilities,' ” October 15, 1975, Secret, RG 59, Records of Joseph Sisco, Box 40, Israeli Nuclear Capability 1975, available at
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB189/IN-30.pdf
, downloaded on October 21, 2007. The third paragraph of the SNIE begins with the sentence: “We believe that Israel already has produced nuclear weapons.” This was the estimate's key judgment regarding the Israelis' nuclear arsenal. In addition, another declassified document (“Parker T. Hart to Secretary Dean Rusk, ‘Issues to be Considered in Connection with Negotiations with
Israel for F-4 Phantom Aircraft,' ” October 15, 1968, Top Secret/Nodis Sensitive, SN 67–69, Def 12-5 Isr, available at
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB189/IN-02.pdf
, downloaded October 21, 2007) states that as early as October 1968, the State Department had concluded that “[a]ll evidence suggests that present Israeli policy is to maintain its nuclear option and to proceed with a program to reduce to a minimum the lead time required to exercise that option.”

39.
 This report is the so-called Duelfer Report, named for Charles Duelfer, the head of the Iraq Survey Group, the official project to determine what had happened to Saddam's WMD programs between 1991 and 2003. It is more properly titled “The DCI Special Advisor Report on Iraq's WMD.” The entire report is available from the CIA website at
https://www.cia.gov/library/reports/general-reports-1/iraq_wmd_2004/index.html
.

40.
 Pollack, “Spies, Lies and Weapons,” pp. 78–92. Also see “The DCI Special Advisor Report on Iraq's WMD,” vol. 1, 2004, available at
http://www.foia.cia.gov/duelfer/Iraqs_WMD_Vol1.pdf
.

41.
 For one of the only works to make this argument before the invasion, see the extensive interview of Scott Ritter in William Rivers Pitt with Scott Ritter,
War on Iraq: What Team Bush Doesn't Want you to Know
(New York: Context Books, 2002).

42.
 David E. Sanger and William J. Broad, “Iran Is Seen as Advancing Nuclear Bid,”
New York Times
, May 22, 2013; Anthony H. Cordesman and Abdullah Toukan, “Analyzing the Impact of Preventive Strikes Against Iran's Nuclear Facilities,” Center for Strategic and International Studies, September 2012, available at
http://csis.org/files/publication/120906_Iran_US_Preventive_Strikes.pdf
, p. 14.

43.
 Frederik Dahl, “Iran Appears to Advance in Construction of Arak Nuclear Plant,” Reuters, February 22, 2013.

44.
 As a practical matter, nations have consistently found that to manufacture the first bomb requires twice as much LEU to produce the needed quantity of HEU because of various forms of wastage and inefficiency. See Mark Fitzpatrick, “Assessing Iran's Nuclear Program Without Exaggeration or Complacency,” International Institute for Strategic Studies, October 3, 2011, available online at
http://www.armscontrol.org/files/Iran_Brief_10_2011_Mark_Fitzpatrick.pdf
, p. 2.

45.
 International Atomic Energy Agency Board of Governors, “Implementation of the NPT Safeguards Agreement and Relevant Provisions of Security Council Resolutions in the Islamic Republic of Iran,” August 30, 2012, available at
http://www.iaea.org/Publications/Documents/Board/2012/gov2012-37.pdf
, pp. 3–4; Kenneth Katzman, “Iran: U.S. Concerns and Policy Responses,”
Congressional Research Service, RL32048, September 5, 2012, p. 30.