The Iranian Bomb: Within a Month?
A couple of days ago, I came across an odd story in Agence France Press, wherein I learned that Iran’s fanatical President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad — increasingly known by his derogatory nickname “the chimpanzee” — is calling for 5 million people to move out of Tehran. Why? Because, he said, “Iran’s capital sits on several fault lines and is threatened by earthquakes.” With five million fewer people, Tehran would be “more manageable in case of an incident.”
Ahmadinejad said that, while he couldn’t order anyone to move (although that’s precisely what he’s doing to the Ahwazi Arabs down in Khuzestan), the government was prepared to be very generous to anyone who chose to live in the countryside: free land, “substantial subsidies,” and cheap loans.
What’s going on? At first, I thought it was a scheme to make it easier for the regime to control the capital, and to deprive the Green Movement of millions of supporters in the ongoing struggle against the Islamic tyranny. And maybe that’s what it’s all about. But there’s another possibility, suggested by the remarkable statement of the #2 at Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization. The headline screamed it all: “Iran to Join Nuclear Club.” The happy event is supposed to take place within a month.
The reporters at the official Fars Agency were so excited that they made a mess of his name at their second opportunity.
No country would even think about attacking Iran after Iran’s membership in the club,” Deputy Head of AEOI for Research Behzad Soltani said on Tuesday.
Behzadi, who is also Secretary of the AEOI’s Scientific Cooperation Council, further pointed to the construction of 360 MW nuclear power plant and a 40 MW research reactor in Iran’s central city of Arak, and added that the projects are complete by 70%.
What if Mr. Soltani is saying that there’s going to be a nuclear test within a month? This might explain Ahmadinejad’s sudden concern about earthquakes shaking Tehran. And then I got an email from an Iranian nuclear physicist working in the West, which said, in part:
During last few weeks Iranian officials claimed a possibility of big earthquake in Tehran. Ahmadinezhad, Governer of Tehran, and several other officials repeated this earthquake is serious and it will be happened in next one month…
Deputy of iranian Atomic Energy yesterday in Kashan University claimed that in one month Iran will be 9th country in nuclear club and after the test the possibility of attack to Iran by any country will be zero.
Today Alzahra University in Tehran was evacuated and in next couple of days the regime has plan to evacuate very sensitive places in Tehran.
Alzahra, by the way, is an all-female university, where Green Leader Mir Hossein Mousavi’s wife was chancellor from 1998 to 2006. Why would the infamously misogynist regime decide to evacuate it? Because they want to save young women from quakes caused by a nuclear test? Or because they fear it’s a center of the revolution? Or because they think there are too many women getting college degrees?
I report, you decide. But all that talk about earthquakes is sure interesting. And if the mullahs are really going to “join the nuclear club in a month,” it’s not a long wait.
It looks like Stanley Baldwin will have plenty of company.
For, didn’t Churchill refer to the Second World War as the unnecessary war? Thanks to the policies of Baldwin, the war was fought.
Opportunity after opportunity was thrown away by the feckless deformed souls, scoundrels, scalawags, and similar ilk inside the Beltway since 9/11/01
Once again, Henry Ford has been proven correct: what we learn from history is, we do not learn from history.
Ahmadinejad blathers about earthquakes next month. Obama, passing another “Let me make this perfectly clear” deadline, blathers about exploring really tough sanctions next year, when China falls under the spell of the magic of his singing. while dissing our only true ally in the Middle East.
Only one thing is sure: Israel’s Intelligence is the best and it has drawn its line in the sand: the minute Iran sticks its toe over it, they will strike.
And the Obamites will howl, “They started it! Just when we had everything in place for our tough sanctions, You just can’t trust those dirty Jews!”
I have always believed that we could overthrow the fragile authoritarian government in Iran by using extremely aggressive covert actions. We should have immediately supported the Iranian protesters last summer in hopes of overthrowing the regime. Unfortunately, we failed to do that and now have lost our best chance to influence events inside Iran without having to attack it. All of the protest leaders from last summer are probably dead or in jail by now, so don’t expect much to happen inside Iran.
My bet is Iran will get their nuclear weapons, just like North Korea did, and we will make a lot of noise but not do much. The major problem is Israel. I may be out on a limb here, but I think that horrible meeting between Obama and Netanyahu last month had very little to do about settlements in Jerusalem. I think it had everything to do with Netanyahu’s decision to bomb Iran and Obama’s panic in NOT wanting to let that happen.
The problem here is that Obama knows what an attack by Israel will do to our war efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan (the situations could explode in both countries), but Netanyahu also knows what will eventually happen to Israel if Iran gets the bomb. We are now in this mess because the United States and Europe dithered with Iran over this issue for the past 8 or 9 years. I still think that our one, best, hope for avoiding a complete and total disaster with Iran is through massive covert actions to destabilize the government in Tehran, which would eventually mean the overthrow of that regime. It may be too late by now, but it is still worth a try.
It is more like the Iranian Tyrant dictators that parade as religious are on a land grab.
That does not mean (long war) “the nice long lasting war and sell lots of weapons” (C 1991) is not on going; and that promoting the war by all means: propaganda, fear, direct targeted attacks are ongoing.
This war is phoney; Obama, as I have posted since 2/2008, is “here” as the perfect patsy (read: useful idiot) to implement the “draft” after the next “can you believe it, can you believe it”!
What “they” throw at Israel will not work;
The USA has been “acting” like a country that has signed an unconditional surrender to Iran for most of 30 years.
The human sacrifices we send to the mid-east (presented as war and war casualties to the brainwashed out Americans) are terms of our (non public) surrender agreement.
Since winning the war is not being attempted; in fact any “move” to win is a “war crime”; since we fight foot soldiers but invite those who fund, train, send, the “terrorist” to the White House for dinner: Raygun, Bush, Clinton, Bush, Obumer. Carter and that traitor Brezezinski “stabbed the Shaw in the back” (Haig) and brought the Iranian dictators that parade as religious…
Americans have been sold out big time!
Dr. Ledeen,
In your long and distinguished career of journalism, intelligence work, academe, and punitry, have you not made the professional acquaintance of a seismologist or of a geologist whom you could querry about the likelihood of an earthquake being triggered by an underground nuclear test detonation in the general vacinity of tectonic fault lines?
Just asking.
amit: sure i could, but the issue is not what a serious scientist thinks, it’s what the mullahs think. and their view of science is very different from, say, a top notch geologist at Cal Tech.
Michael, your response gave me an idea. I am going to ask my son-a Caltech grad with 2 degrees-who he thinks from his alma mater would know the answer to the fault line/nuclear blast question.
While of course the mullahs don’t operate along the same scientific theories, it is still prudent to ask the question.
Few should doubt though that the Iranian Hitler may very well not get the chance to ‘test’ his bomb, as this IS an inviolate red line for Israel, one in which its (usually fractured)leadership is in agreement upon.
I’m just saying…..
Good catch Dr.
The people who run Iran are trying as hard as possible to obtain nuclear weapons because they believe that this will prevent a world super power that they have bad relations with from attacking them. (The ability to wipe out Israel is a nice bonus.)
The leaders of the Polish government all just died in a plane crash in Russia. If I were running Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Bulgaria, Romania, Lithuania, Estonia or Latvia, I would be thinking along similar lines to the Iranian Mullahs about now. The week after the Iranians set off their nuclear test and the world blusters but does nothing would be the right time to assemble the nuclear material into weapons and then make the announcements.
Egypt, Iraq, Turkey, Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia, UAE and Saudi Arabia will all want nukes too. Some have already started. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/middle_east/article624855.ece
I’ve been thinking for a long time (for about 15 months, in fact) that something very, very bad was coming. That feeling gets stronger by the day (and, most especially, whenever the president opens his mouth).
I am reminded that what put Canadian Prime Minister Diefenbaker in JFK’s doghouse was his refusal to allow nuclear armed weapons on Canadian soil.
Funny old world, isn’t it.
Despite being totally wrong about Iraq’s WMD and Saddam’s relationship with al-Qaeda, there are still people willing to listen to Michael Ledeen. Gee, another war for Israel’s benefit, just what we need! Same M.O., different country; both enemies of Israel. Could there be a pattern here?
you’re confusing me with Colin Powell
Lak-IQa? I read what Mr, Ledeen says and appreciate has opinion/observations.
Your comment seem out to lunch to me?
Neither Iraq war had anything to do with Israel; those wars were/are “only” to keep Iraq oil off the market as long as possible; to keep the price of oil high; so we could finance the war against ourselves: “Long lasting War and sell lots of weapons” (C 1991); the war that you, Mr.Lak-IQa, finance every day at the gas pump; you watch to much CNN (terrorist ministry of propaganda) and that is why Lak-IQa’s post make Lak-IQa appear as a useful…
I suggest you get rid of your idiot box (tv) as a first step in your deprogramming!
Let me get this correct….I pay school taxes for decades as an investment to better our citizenship so that we may all be on the same page, more or less? Lak-17a, I want my damned money back from you.
The headline is wrong. What Iran may have in a month is enough weapons grade material to build a bomb, but bomb parts are not functioning bombs. Sure, procuring weapons grade material is the hardest part in bomb making, but the assembly process takes time, not the least of which is building a suitable delivery system.
Mr. Ledeen -
as a fellow man of record, will you be kind enough to publish an authoritative post on the 1978 abadan fire?
i’ve tried to find the stuff, but all the best information either comes from shady confessions out of khomeini’s regime or from what the shah wrote in his book before he died about the perpatrator escaping to iraq and being caught by saddam and giving a shady confession to his police.
i’m hoping there is a better source them saddam and khomeini
keep up the good work, sir
btw, it kinda reminds me of the mullahs’ blaming of broad daylight assassinations on the opposition and their “controllers”. these people never change
if it isn’t in my old book “Debacle” I wouldn’t know where to find it. sorry.
Wasn’t there supposed to be a big announcement on the anniversary of the Islamist takeover?
Pure conjecture: maybe that’s when the test was scheduled before a technical glitch forced postponement.
A happy time indeed reminiscent of some glorious summer days of the past:
http://images.google.com/hosted/life/l?imgurl=93a92466c97361d5&q=Neville%20Chamberlain%20source:life&prev=/images%3Fq%3DNeville%2BChamberlain%2Bsource:life%26hl%3Den%26tbs%3Disch:1
Good one
“State-run Chinaoil has sold two gasoline cargoes for April delivery to Iran, industry sources said on Wednesday, stepping into a void left by fuel suppliers halting shipments under threat of U.S. sanctions.”
Here’s the link:
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE63D1CY20100414
I believe that Iran will indeed get nuclear weapons soon. By Airmail.
30 minutes or less, or the next one is free!
11. myth buster: Fissile Fizzle
No offense, but if you had _current_ knowledge
of bomb building techniques, you would not be
talking about the subject, even in generalities.
You have got to know that one does not need to build
even a simple ‘Dirty Bomb’ to make fatal use of fissile
material.
If the Iranian Government succeeds in destroying Israel,
the Iranian people will not survive to celebrate, nor
will there be rejoicing in the capital cities of the
western nations which allowed it to happen;
The Israelis call it the ‘Samson Option’
Dirty bombs suck as weapons of war. They are merely weapons of terror, and a poor use of fissile material at that. Enriching uranium to weapons grade is not that hard, given sufficient time and materials, and building a gun-type bomb is also rather simple. The difficulty truly lies in the delivery system. However, there is another aspect- a gun type device is very inefficient at producing yield, meaning gun-type weapons would be ineffective for inflicting large-scale destruction against modern cities. Little Boy completely destroyed Hiroshima not because it was that powerful, but because the city wasn’t robust- paper and bamboo couldn’t endure the overpressure and heat the way steel and concrete can. To get higher yield, you need an implosion device with a tamper- ideally depleted uranium with a deuterium-tritium gas as a buffer. This holds the core together longer and increases the number of fissions occurring. However, an implosion device requires very precise coordination of the explosive charges in the detonator- if the synchronization is off by a fraction of a microsecond, the bomb misfires and fissiles out, yielding less than a kiloton.
You got that right. The Samson Option is alive and well…..and western capitals will be duly included in the ‘menu’ of take outs.IF heaven forbid we do not survive, our leadership will take the whole damn lot of those who aided in our destruction down with us.
All is fair in love and war.Works for me.
Apparent;y it is believed that there is no casual relationship between thermonuclear explosions and seismic activity: http://seismo.berkeley.edu/faq/nuke_2.html
thanks, allston, good old Cal…
Chimpy McMahdi-Nejad? With an underground test proposed – close to a fault line?
If he has a unit (or two) for testing, is it home-made or imported? And why “announce” in advance? Is the point to create an emergency – if the thing doesn’t fizzle and if it does nudge the fault – that would require a massive military “assistance” to Teheran’s neighborhoods?
Speaking of nut-jobs and proposed military “assistance” to civilian areas…
Allston…
…a shallow “test” need only destroy buildings above to simulate – for the moment – the effects of a quake. It’s plausible that they’ve imported a device – but what a freaking expensive and risky way to go about justifying a crackdown.
I’m expecting a “fizzle” of the sort that nothing at all happens – it’s all just bluster.
No, there’s no causal relationship between thermonuclear explosions and seismic activity — but thermonuclear explosions underground can register somewhat like seismic activity. Seismologists can generally tell the difference if the nuclear explosion is big enough. But if it’s not, the indicators can be ambiguous. This has been the case with explosions conducted by North Korea and China.
I don’t think A’jad & Co expect a nuke explosion to “cause” earthquakes at all. It looks like they are preparing the “information” campaign with a ready explanation for whatever registers on regional seismographs when their test is conducted.
It’s kindergartenish, to be sure. If you live in California, you know how hilarious it is to think anyone could predict an earthquake a month in advance. You can’t predict the things 5 seconds in advance.
Interesting yes? I had a different take on this when I read it a few days ago. I figured they were preparing the general population for an evacuation when Israel attacked them.
Who knows?
I would want to know what their military and their guard were doing now and their hundreds of little boats in their navy. Of course only a few westerners will know those things and they might not leak it, well maybe, but only to the NY Times.
Papa Ray
If Israel attacks they won’t be hitting Tehran. I wonder where they are being evacuated to. Qom, Natanz, Arak, Isfahan, and Bushehr perhaps?
“No country would even think about attacking Iran after Iran’s membership in the club,” Deputy Head of AEOI for Research Behzad Soltani said on Tuesday.”
From this statement I can only assume they have a weapon. I wouldn’t think that “No country would even think about attacking Iran” would be because they have just weapons grade uranium or even because they have nuclear power, (their only stated purpose for enriching uranium). BTW don’t these statements prove they lied? The nuclear club refers to nations that possess nuclear weapons.
burguete: sounds logical to me. but then, they’re fanatics, they don’t think that way.
My son’s theory is that if you move a great number of people (with trucks, cars, etc)around, there is a better opportunity, better cover, to move terrorists and bombs around and, possibly, out of the country.
We are truly the dummest generation in history. Soo much history to learn from, indeed nothing comes to mind. NO, we now “invented” political correctness. That will sure do miracles to the Islamic Fundamentalists. They will be soo impressed by us…………they may even cansel their ages old dream / plan to distroy Israel. According to the Bible, something big will happen around the end of times.
If we couldn’t figure out which people would cause this, now we have a lead.
There is only one way idiots will learn. HIT THEM HARD !
Better to prevent than to cure / Normandy all over ! We should be ashamed of nower days world leaders. I hope Mr. Wilders will win in Holland. Let the VICTORY begin in Europe.
#Lak-17a
“Despite being totally wrong about Iraq’s WMD and Saddam’s relationship with al-Qaeda, there are still people willing to listen to Michael Ledeen. Gee, another war for Israel’s benefit, just what we need!”
Above all, I would like to tell you honestly “I as Syrian who very much thirsty for freedom, of course I am very glad to listen to the courageous people such as Dr Michael Ledeen. As for you, just keep listen to policymakers of wimps who wearing pink Obama t-shirts who kissing the hands of the terror masters and the turbans of evil regimes. I think here you can learn a lot, at least manhood maybe you lack.
As for Iraq’s WMD! Dear friend, YOU can ask Mr. George Tenet and Mr. Colin Powell and Mr. Ahmad Chalabi as well!!?
In any case, Saddam was internationally known to possess weapons of mass destruction, such as chemical weapon and biological where Saddam used it savagely against his people such as “genocide, expulsions and lethal gassing of his people.” Iraqi forces had been using chemical weapons against their own people. Iraqi forces had been using mustard and paralyzing gases as well as mass execution when Saddam massacred more than 100000 Kurds in the genocide in the 1980s…let alone thousands of victims were executed by savage regime by “shooting, hanging and throwing them alive into holes with explosives.”
Because of his aggression and military hysteria, he was pursuing development of nuclear weapon with a desire of founding an evil military arsenal, which was a real threat to his neighbors. In the 1980s almost whole the world has knew that Saddam used the chemical weapons and biological savagely against his people…So the WMD in Iraq existed at least!!! Wasn’t he?! No doubt all know that Saddam refused to allow the kind of intrusive and thorough inspections, even at that time Saddam expelled the international inspectors from Iraq, because that evil regime was in fact hiding such program as “development of nuclear weapon/chemical and biological weapons/.” But the question of life and death is, “where has it disappeared?!”
I think all that atrocities are evidence adequate enough to justify the decision of war against that savage regime that tyrannized the Iraqi people and impoverished them and massacred them.
I think Israel is well knows how can defend itself. No doubt Israel has nuclear weapons, but Israelis has never threatened any country by those weapons, even against those evil regimes who call every single day to destruct them. There is a rogue state in the region more likely has not yet possess the nuclear weapons “Iran is one of them”, where Iran has today the scientific, technical and industrial capacity to produce nuclear weapons. So, it hardly passes a day without hearing the speeches of contempt and hatred by those regimes which calls to destruct the Great Satan and to wipe Israel off the map. Time and again we heard Iranian leaders have said that they intend to use nuclear weapons to wipe Israel off the face of the earth. And all know that Ahmadinejad is always famous for his aggressive tone and his horrible speeches which call every single day to destruct the Great Satan and to wipe Israel off the map, and nevertheless the Israelis have NEVER used horrible speeches against them or even called to destroy them although Israelis have the ability enough to do so.
By the way, it is very great that Mr. Binyamin Netanyahu did not attend the conference of the US Nuclear Security Summit. Indeed most countries likely planned to demand that Israel sign up so that abandons its nuclear arsenal. So the strategy of reduce the role of nuclear weapons in the national security strategy, I think it will reduce the national security as well.
Once again, the Israelis have NEVER threatened any country by any weapons, and they will not threaten any country by that weapons “unless” in the case of self-defense!!!
Therefore the Israeli people have the right to protect their existence and survival, and we have the right to be a part of the civilized free world, this is irrevocable!!!
Jassem Othman
Another News – Supreme leader Khamenei is dead !
Another Old News – Iraq has WMD !
The first thing that sprang to mind, which was not included in the article, was the regime wants to move as many people near its nuclear factories for the purposes of human shields…
# Libertyship46
“I have always believed that we could overthrow the fragile authoritarian government in Iran by using extremely aggressive covert actions. We should have immediately supported the Iranian protesters last summer in hopes of overthrowing the regime.”
I totally agree with you. The wisdom of the Great Philosopher, Machiavelli: “sometimes it is necessary temporarily to resort to evil actions to achieve worthy objectives” to remove any despot leader. Yes, in fact we need more tendencies to evil to achieve the noble objectives, and that aggressive covert actions to destabilize any tyrannized regime SHOULD BE DIRECTED ONLY into the heart of the regime to break the morale of the regime.
Of course we need help Israel, we need help the West, and we need help the superpower to remove tyranny regimes. We need the west help to change our terrible world and our life. We have already sufficiently of oppression, fright, humiliation, scorn, backwardness, the dominance of clergy and the puritanical religious institutions over everything in our life… We NEED ONLY the severe courageous political decisions to confront terrorists and despotic Leaders in the Middle East. Yes, if you win the broader war against terror and the terror masters, you will BE SAFER!!!
But, but unfortunately, the shameful and sad thing is that your administration “Obamamism’s Socialist Administration”, is surprisingly does NOT interesting in supporting the alliances of democracies or supporting of freedom revolutions. This blind administration has been done nothing except a policy of pandering and appeasement and supporting Islamic States!!!
#WILDERS’ FAN
I am also extremely supporter for Mr. Wilders, it is support for freedom of speech and expression…Yes he needs our support although I strongly believe he will win.
Jassem Othman, Syrian, Poland.
I figure he’s probably worried about the Israelis/Americans secretly setting off a quake-causing nuke near Tehran, and knows that the threat of them doing this is long term one, and that the only way to reduce the resulting harm to Iranians is to move them away from Tehran.
Also, I agree with many of the commenters here – Americans really have become a very stupid breed of people.
I was the first who suggested that quake warnings by the fanatics in Iran can be translated as a plan for underground nuclear explosion in order to destroy the regime change development in Iran. Then I immediately warned the media about such possible plans.
The Islamic Republic could not have survived for no more than 2 years if the Iran-Iraq war didn’t start, at that time all the military personnel of the former Shah were united to overthrow Khomeini and replace the regime with a secular system, but when the war started, they had no choice but to back the mullahs in order to defend their country and for years after the war, they blamed all their failures on the war & the west.
The Islamic Republic needs external enemies in order to survive (fake or real), but at this point the majority of all Iranians consider the Islamic Republic itself as their number one enemy in existence. They can’t risk of starting a war because the people may side with the foreigners and overthrow the system (I am an Iranian and know how much my people hate the mullahs & their thugs)
Tehran is a city of over 10 million people, the majority of security forces from Tehran will easily side with the people of another million plus protest erupt and the foundations of the regime in the capital city will be removed overnight.
Therefore they are desperately looking for alternative solutions to war to dislocate the population.
Many Iranians believe that the Islamic Republic has been conducting underground nuclear tests for several years (and many of the quakes in recent years were the results of such explosions), has more than one nuclear bomb in its arsenal but looking to build enough for a full scale war and some suggest that Iran also have secret nuclear plants in Venezuela, has bought ready made warheads from Russian stockpiles and the fanatics are planning to prepare the world for the coming of the hidden Imam by killing as many non-Muslims they possibly can (based on their belief the imam will only appear if the whole world is Muslim) .