The Iranian nuclear impasse

Survival

Volumn 49, Issue 3, 2007, Pages 169-178

  Guldimann, Tim ^a  

^a NONE

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EID: 34547780135     PISSN: 00396338     EISSN: 14682699     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1080/00396330701564778     Document Type: Article

References (18)

1. According to the International Atomic Energy Agency, Iran could dispose of sufficient weapons-grade uranium for a bomb by 2010 at the earliest. Considering only the technical potential, assuming continued strong efforts to improve and expand enrichment activities, and assuming minimal technical problems, even in the light of most recent progress the worst-case estimate for production of the first critical amount of we apons-grade uranium is no earlier than sometime in 2009 (David Albright and Frank von Hippel, personal communications, March 2007). IAEA Director-General Mohamed ElBaradei said on 24 May 2007 that it could be 'at the earliest in three to eight years' (quoted in Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, 25 May 2007, p. 7).
2. A similar worst-case estimate of 'sometime beginning in the next decade, perhaps out to the middle to the next decade' was given by then Director of National Intelligence John Negroponte on 1 September 2006 (quoted by J. Cirincione and A. Grotto, Contain and Engage: A New Strategy for Resolving the Nuclear Crisis with Iran (Washington DC: Center for American Progress, March 2007), p. 10.
3. These estimates exclude the unlikely possibility that Iran has an alternative source of fissile material outside the known centrifuge programme, for example a parallel secret enrichment programme, imported fissile material or even an imported nuclear device. A similar assessment, with the time horizon of 2010 as 'the most commonly mentioned figure', is presented by Mark Fitzpatrick, 'Assessing Iran's Nuclear Programme', Survival, vol. 48, no. 3, Autumn 2006, pp. 5-26.
4. IAEA, GOV/2007/22/23, May 2007, p. 2.
5. According to available informa- information, up to spring 2007 the installed cascades were operating only about one-fifth of the normal operating time. See J. Shire and D. Albright, Iran's Centrifuges: How Well Are They Working? (Washington DC: ISIS, 15 March 2007);
6. D. Albright, J. Shire and Paul Brannan, 'IAEA Safeguards Report on Iran: Iran Making Progress but not yet Reliably Operating an Enrichment Plant', ISIS, 25 May 2007, http://www.isis-online.org; IAEA, GOV/2007/22/23, May 2007, p. 2.
7. Albright et al.'s interpretation is that either the Iranians are confident that they can forgo the pilot plant stage or they are using their large plant as a pilot plant. 'It is also possible that Iran is taking a technological risk, jumping as quickly as it can into industrialscale operation without an adequate testing phase and that the speed with which it has installed centrifuges... will later prove problematic.' This latter assumption seems, for political reasons, to be the most likely.
8. According to Sharq al Awsat, 21 May, Larijani submitted - in protest against Ahmadinejad's radicalism - his resignation for the fifth time to Supreme Leader Khamenei, who rejected it.
9. Available information on public opinion in Iran indicates strong support for the programme, understood to be civilian. The support, however, weakens as soon as the issue is associated with military aims or foreign isolation or confrontation. See Michael Herzog, Iranian Public Opinion on the Nuclear Program, Policy Focus no. 56 (Washington DC: The Washington Institute for Near East Policy, June 2006). The results of an opinion poll forthcoming in July 2007 by CSIS are reportedly similar, showing that support to the nuclear programme, even for military purposes, would shrink as soon as the price Iran has to pay for it in its international relations is taken into consideration.
10. Article IV of the Non-Proliferation Treaty stipulates implicitly the right to enrich; however, the article is explicitly conditioned by the fulfillment of Article II, the obligation of a non-nuclear-weapon state to refrain from any military nuclear activities. Doubts about Iran's compliance with Article II are the basis for international demands to suspend enrichment.
11. The offer of an 'authoritative dialogue between the governments without precondition' and 'in mutual respect' was first put forward by the American side (Assistant Secretary of State Martin Indyk, 14 October 1999) and con- firmed above all by Secretary of State Madeline Albright in her offer to 'open a new chapter in our common history', 17 March 2000. There was no positive response at that time from Tehran.
12. Honour and respect were also important for the Iranian negotiations with the EU - in a positive sense at the beginning with the breakthrough of Iran's acceptance to suspend enrichment thanks to the common 'pilgrimage' of the foreign ministers of the three leading EU powers to Tehran on 21 October 2003, a protocol deference never heard of in any other Third World country, and in a negative sense in the Iranian frustration with the European approach in the spirit of the donkey driver vocabulary of 'sticks' and 'carrots'.
13. The only decision of fundamental importance taken by the regime in its 28-year history was the 1988 ceasefire ending the Iran-Iraq War. A ceasefire years earlier would have been far better for Iran.
14. See Peter Rudolf, 'Die Iran Politik der Bush-Administration', Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik, SWP-Aktuell 25, April 2007 (regarding Iran, however, I do not agree with Rudolf's stance (p. 1) that 'Iran's position has been strengthened').
15. German Export Guarantee institution HERMES has reduced coverage from €2.3bn 2004, to €1.4bn in 2005 and €0.9bn in 2006. German exports in January 2007 were reduced by 10% compared to January 2006; the trend was clearly confirmed by a majority of consulted German firms. Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, 12 April 2007, p. 2.
16. Majlis elections are on the agenda for early 2008, the presidential elections for spring/summer 2009. There is a small possibility that the two elections could be held together in early summer 2008.
17. Different Iranian and Western energy experts told the author in a conference on Energy and Security in Tehran end of May 2007 that in spite of depletion problems in the oil industry Iran can be expected to maintain its oil production at a level of 4-4.2m barrels per day for a foreseeable future, above all due to an increasing proportion of production no longer being used for foreign investment repayments in the framework of 'pay-back' arrangements.
18. For the argument that the 'timetable provides time for diplomacy' see Fitzpatrick, 'Assessing Iran's Nuclear Programme'.