Mr. Adams – As a fan of the Atomic Show, I find it disheartening to hear that you are once again making the case for the mullahs having nuclear energy. You are right to say that Iran has valid reasons for wanting a nuclear energy program. However, Iran lacks sufficient domestic uranium reserves to go it alone, and turned down an offer of Russian pre-enriched fuel. They do have enough for some bombs, though. That’s without considering the crazy rhetoric they keep on chanting. Israel is a one bomb state? The Holocaust never happened? This is beyond “not being nice”, this is salivating at the chance to kill Jews.

Do you realize what kind of negative impact on the nuclear power industry a nation successfully transitioning from civilian to military would be? Now think for a moment that they actually use nuclear weaponry on Israel in a mad attempt to bring about the apocalypse. Aside from the massive human tragedy, the nuclear industry is going to get hit with the worst stigma since Chernobyl. (The Greens would love it – nuclear power and Israel gone in one swoop!)

I’m all for nuclear expansion, but let’s actually be realistic here.

Why have you linked what seems to be a legitimate commercial solicitation for two large scale, conventional nuclear power plants with an assumed weapons program?

If the solicitation is as open and above board as it seems, it provides even more credence to Iran’s stated intention to build up its nuclear energy program, not a bomb program.

If Iran were to build and operate the two large nuclear plants – and the others that it has stated it intends to build – its enrichment program would be hard pressed to keep up with the demand for fueling those reactors. There would be no spare capacity to divert to other uses. If it has enrichment and no reactors – that is far more cause for concern.

Iran is a large country that has a population of more than 70 million people. More than half of those people are under the age of 25, and many of them are aggressively developing interests in western lifestyles. Those people are rapidly increasing their energy consumption.

Though Iran does have some oil and gas reserves, they know they are not infinite. If they do not develop some other indigenous power sources, they will be net importers within 15 years if current trends continue. That is not a sustainable choice for their economy – it cannot survive without massive changes from dependency on oil and gas revenues.

I think there is a lot more logic on the part of Iran than on the part of the US in this matter, even though I acknowledge that the current elected leaders in Iran are not very nice people.

Many “friends” of the US have long standing animosity towards Iran – and I am not talking about Israel only. Saudi Arabia has been a commercial and political rival of Iran since it was called Persia.

It is in the commercial interest of the Saudis to try to suppress Iran’s energy production capability – perhaps the ruling family’s personal and long lasting friendship with the Bush family is a contributing reason that the president is so adamant about doing something about Iran when he ignores many other similarly led countries.