Seems that as far as it comes to Iran achieving nuclear power, it's time for U.S. and Israel and other like-minded countries to throw in the towel.
Iran begins loading Bushehr nuclear reactorhttp://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-11045537
Iran has begun loading fuel up its first nuclear power station in a ceremony attended by Russian officials.
Russia will operate the Bushehr plant in southern Iran, supplying its nuclear fuel and taking away the nuclear waste.
Iran has been subject to four rounds of UN sanctions because of its separate, uranium enrichment programme.
Experts say that as long as the plant is Russian-operated, there is little immediate threat of its fuel being diverted to make bombs.
The West fears Tehran wants to build a nuclear weapon, but Iran insists its plans are for peaceful energy production.
The Bushehr facility has taken 35 years to build and has been plagued by delays.
"Despite all pressure, sanctions and hardships imposed by western nations, we are now witnessing the startup of the largest symbol of Iran's peaceful nuclear activities," Iranian nuclear chief Ali Akbar Salehi told journalists at the plant.
The BBC's Jon Leyne says Iranian officials have promoted Saturday's launch as a victory for the Islamic republic against its enemies. Nationwide celebrations are planned to mark the event.
But Professor Ali Ansari, an Iran expert at the University of St Andrews, in Scotland, said Tehran was likely to exaggerate the importance of the start-up at Bushehr.
"It will obviously have a very theatrical opening but the delays have meant that the power plant is a very old model and the contribution to the national grid is very small," he said.
'Russian-US deal'
The Bushehr plant should begin producing electricity in about a month, experts say.
It is not seen by analysts as posing a significant proliferation risk.
The uranium fuel it will use is well below the enrichment level needed for a nuclear weapon. Weapons-grade uranium must be enriched by more than 90%. In contrast, the uranium at Bushehr is enriched by 3.5%.
The Bushehr fuel has been supplied by Russia, although Iran is already producing its own uranium enriched to fuel grade.
It has also begun a pilot program to enrich uranium to 20% which it says is needed for a medical research reactor.
It is that programme that has alarmed the West and Israel.
Reports in Washington suggested that the US lifted its objections to the completion of the plant at Bushehr as the price for Russia's vote in the latest round of sanctions against Iran.
Western officials have been changing their tune recently, our correspondent says, describing Bushehr as an example of the peaceful benefits of nuclear energy, to which Iran is entitled.
In a defiant statement on Friday, the head of Iran's Atomic Energy Organisation Ali Akbar Salehi said the country would continue uranium enrichment, the official Iranian news agency IRNA reported.
Referring to the Bushehr plant, he said: "Suppose we receive the required nuclear fuel for the plant from the Russians for the next 10 years, what are we going to do for the next 30 to 50 years?"
He said Iran could produce up to 30 tons of enriched uranium at its Natanz plant once the necessary centrifuges are installed at the site.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iranian_nuclear_program
Personally, I've never been against Iran's nuclear program for various reasons. I think a sovereign country has the right to whatever damn peaceful technology it wants and is capable of developing under it's own power. I'm of course opposed against them having nuclear
weapons, but find it hard to side with U.S. and Israel on that either with the obvious double standards in play. And the opposition to that is ideological as well, I don't actually believe they will ever use the nukes against anybody.
Either way, speak!
Posts
If anything I don't think the US is worried about Ahjdmenidjajajajajad having the weapon. What they're worried about is the same thing that could happen in Pakistan; a revolution or a riot occurs and suddenly that weapon is in the control of fanatics who won't think twice before pushing the button.
In the end only time will tell what happens....unfortunately....
IOS Game Center ID: Isotope-X
Why would "peaceful" nuclear energy ever be considered "a blow to [one's] enemies?"
On the flipside, Iran may finally get some regime change forcibly put upon them by NATO or whatnot, if we can stomach another conflict in that region.
When was the last time Iran invaded another country? When was the last time Isreal did it?
I really think the threat Iran poses is inflated. It's almost the most democratic and westernised country in the Middel East.
.
Island. Being on fire.
also level the whole area so we can make it into a parking lot lol i think muslims are okay though i have two muslim friends so i'm okay with those kind of people
It most likely is, but by their own doing by a lot. I think we're we to have an armed conflict against them, it would be just as anti-climactic and nebulous (if not moreso) than the Iraq invasion. Iran would boast about nuclear capability in vague terminology while making threats against America and Israel, at some point the West would intervene, and then a war would be fought to find out that Iran, like most Middle Eastern regimes, are completely full of horseshit.
And as far as regime change goes, in the context of the current upheaval, it's kind of like trading a physically-abusive husband for a verbally-abusive husband. Hooray!
And I hear it also has the tallest midgets.
I also know a few Muslims and I don't think we should gun them down in the street. Who wins this discussion, the one with the most Muslim friends?
.
Island. Being on fire.
i think ur wrong the tv told me iran is bad and osama might even be in there and if they have bombs we need to take it away from them because its safer if we have the bombs
and i am pretty sure i have more muslim friends than u m8
It's still a subjective judgment, but somewhat democratic Pakistan is still leagues ahead of Iran. Pakistan had a military dictator move in and move out without massive violence, with some approximation of popular support, and crucially with continuity of government. Iran, well... it's still stuck at the "let's pretend we have a majority" stage.
As for nuclear power, well, the cat is firmly out of the bag at this point, really - it is a matter of when, not whether, masses of small countries start clamoring for nuclear power within their borders. Oil is expensive and not everybody has dammable rivers or convenient thermal vents. Solar isn't here yet. Nobody wants to rely on a neighbor for something as crucial as electricity. The oil-importing third world faces the same costs buying oil as the oil-importing first world on the international market, but has far lower costs in suppressing domestic anti-nuclear NIMBYism and ignoring environmental concerns; it's just a matter of relative costs.
Pluto was a planet and I'll never forget
Okay, that was very nebulous. But the American one size fits all of isolating countries they don't like really don't help with de-radicalising them.
The Iranian people have a lot more to say about how the country is run then most in the Middle East, and almost all of Africa.
Sorry about that, I have a hard time detecting irony. I blame ModernMan and mrdobalina.
Looking at it from Iran's perspective I can understand why they would want nukes.
Everybody knows that Israel have them, and the country is slowly being taken over by the religious nutters in the country. As I understand it the moderate Israelites are also concerned about this.
.
Island. Being on fire.
I don't think it's good (if you are talking about nuclear weapons and not nuclear country), but I don't think it's a credible threat either. If Iran had a nuclear weapon, I wouldn't be any more worried then I am right now with Russia, China, Israel, North Korea, or Pakistan having them.
and I don't think people revolutioning against Iran are fanatics. The religious fanatics are just fine with the status quo. They already had their revolution.
And I just don't believe anyone insane enough to use nuclear weapons would be capable of actually achieving power so that they could do it. Who is the most powerful crazy militant who would do something like that? Probably, Osama Bin Laden. How many countries has he overthrown? When has there ever been a revolution where the instigator didn't do the damndest in his power to stay alive and in power? Because let me tell you, launching a nuke at someone else is the quickest way to not achieve that.
If Iran ever gets nukes they are going to be firmly under the thumb of the Revolutionary Guards, and they are not going to hand them over to the first militant group who comes calling.
Because your enemies have made giant efforts to prevent you from attaining it?
Yeah Pakistan is a great democracy, all two years of it. Oh, and that massive instability caused by civil war, financial collapse, political chaos and now natural disasters? It'll be fine, we can count on Pakistan being democratic for decades to come!
but... but... The Simpsons.
Let 'em eat fucking pineapples!
But do we have the right to prevent anyone from having nuclear power, despite ourselves having it?
I mean, to my full knowledge Iran hasn't killed anyone or stolen technology to gain nuclear power, and at least two other nuclear powers (China, Russia) are co-operating with them.
Most oil producing countries burn off natural gas because it's too expensive to ship to other countries, they could build NG plants.
I know for sure Saudi Arabia could run their power grid off NG for many decades (even after the oil is dry), I would imagine the same is true of Iran. I say we should work with India on thorium reactors, let whoever wants those have em.
But on the other hand, so could all the other countries that do have nuclear power.
It simply is a really damn good source of energy. Iran is going to have other benefits from electricity generated through nuclear power, not just hypothetical nukes.
Legally, yes we do. If you mean, in terms of general fairness, it's funny how people get into a moral hang-up about preventing a regime like Iran's from obtaining nuclear weapons. I have none.
I apply my sense of fairness to things like how society treats minorities, how international aid is distributed, and shit like that. Giving everyone a fair shake at having a nuclear arsenal is completely excluded.
Edit: By "people" I mean dirty fucking hippies.
AFAIK NG power is significantly cheaper than nuclear power per watt
Edit: A quick googling shows that Iran could power Europe with NG for decades if they had to, so yea, they dont need nuclear power. (note: I don't know if that's actually true, but they're the second largest holder of NG in the world)
Well I mean, U.S. can sanction whoever it wants, and so can other countries, but it's obviously not working.
So I guess I should have phrased it as "do we have the right to prevent anyone from achieving nuclear power with military means"?
Well yeah, and it could do the same with oil. Those benefits I was referring to meant against global warming, progression of technology, etc.
United Nations?
Is it worth the cost of invading another country when we're in no position to do so and the target of the invasion poses very little threat to us?
I don't understand what "right" means in this context. The things we should be considering are if the cure is worse than the disease. We may have the power to stop Iran from becoming a nuclear power, but is that outcome, with all the externalities considered, desirable?
And yeah, it's worth the cost. Much more than the bullshit we invaded and occupied Iraq on, even if half of that had turned out to be true.
That doesn't actually stop their nuclear program though, and they'll just move it even further underground. Most of them already are quite bomb proof. It's actually pretty much impossible to stop the Iranian nuclear development through a bombing of the nuclear sites themselves according to most analysts, only to postpone it...and without a huge number of deaths they can just carry on.
Plus Iran actually has the capacity to strike back at Israel should it bomb anything. It would probably strike even if it was fully an U.S. operation (which it wouldn't most likely be). So you are risking a Syria/Iran/Hezbollah missile volley against Israel as well.
First of all, to go further underground you have to build that. It's not instant. And building projects are very bombable.
And if they do go underground it's still not completely immune to a strike.
For the sake of a decent Israel-Palestine solution, and to annihilate all traces of the political movement that gave us the Iraq debacle, Abu Ghraib and the Afghanistan foibles, Iran must be kept from nuclear weapon capacity.
Also, they'd attack any American troops in the area, which means that they'd probably start another war in Iraq.