Iranian Cleric: ‘Having a Nuclear Bomb is Necessary to Put Down Israel’

Top lawmaker reveals Obama courting Rouhani

A top Iranian lawmaker and cleric said that the country’s uranium enrichment program could allow it to build a nuclear weapon “in two weeks” in order to “put down Israel,” according to multiple reports in the Farsi language press.

Iranian lawmaker and cleric Muhammad Nabavian said on Friday that Iran would be able to build a nuclear bomb in “two weeks” if it gets “access to 270 kilograms of 20 percent [enriched uranium], 10 tons of 5 percent, and 20 thousand centrifuges,” according to reports on Iran’s Radio Farda and in Fararu.

Iranian scientists running simulations of large nuclear weapon

Diagram suggests Tehran’s planned bomb would be three times stronger than Hiroshima blast

VIENNA (AP) — Iranian scientists have run computer simulations for a nuclear weapon that would produce more than triple the explosive force of the World War II bomb that destroyed Hiroshima, according to a diagram obtained by The Associated Press.

The diagram was leaked by officials from a country critical of Iran’s atomic program to bolster their arguments that Iran’s nuclear program must be halted before it produces a weapon. The officials provided the diagram only on condition that they and their country not be named.

The International Atomic Energy Agency — the Vienna-based U.N. nuclear watchdog — reported last year that it had obtained diagrams indicating that Iran was calculating the “nuclear explosive yield” of potential weapons. A senior diplomat who is considered neutral on the issue confirmed that the graph obtained by the AP was indeed one of those cited by the IAEA in that report. He spoke only on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the issue.

The undated diagram that was given to the AP by officials of a country critical of Iran’s

atomic program allegedly calculating the explosive force of a nuclear weapon. The curve

peaks at just above 50 kilotons at around 2 microseconds, reflecting the full force of the

weapon being modeled. The Farsi writing at the bottom translates “changes in output and

in energy released as a function of time through power pulse” (photo credit: AP)