WASHINGTON — A leading U.S. think tank has assessed that Iran was ready to assemble its first nuclear weapon.
The Institute for Science and International Security, which reviewed a series of scenarios, determined that Iran was one month away from full nuclear weapons capability.
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he report said Iran’s stockpile of highly-enriched uranium has doubled over the last year, with the IR-1 centrifuge fleet increasing from 12,000 in 2012 to 19,000 today. ISIS, citing IAEA difficulty in determining the capabilities of Iranian centrifuges, said this would enable an immediate capability to rapidly produce weapons-grade uranium.
“These substantial changes merit updating our previous breakout estimates of the time Iran would need to produce one significant quantity of weapon-grade uranium, taken as 25 kilograms of WGU, using its existing safeguarded nuclear facilities and low enriched uranium stocks as of August 2013,” the report said.
“Combined with its dramatically increased centrifuge capability, these stockpiles bolster Iran’s latent capability to manufacture a nuclear weapon.”
The report, based on Iranian and International Atomic Energy Agency statements, came amid a drive by the administration of President Barack Obama to ease U.S. sanctions on Teheran. The ISIS assessment disputed that of Obama, who said Iran was one year away from accumulating an enriched uranium stockpile sufficient for its first nuclear bomb.
Full article: ‘Breakout time’: Report details how Iran could achieve undetectable nuclear capability (World Tribune)
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