I mean what technical hurdles could be left to overcome?

We need a NATION WIDE STRIKE for Real healthcare reform

one for me, while you're at it.

_____________________________________________________
Distrust anyone who wants to teach you something.

...that is broadly appropriately caveated and reflects the significant uncertainties around the Iranian program (and western interpretations of the program). This is far more to be applauded than the faux certainty of "brutal" deconstruction such as that referenced above. We just came through a period where we survived the strategic straitjacket of the 1% doctrine - I'll be damned if we should be rushing to replace it with an equally restrictive 100% rhetorical doctrine. Certainty is for morals, not intelligence analysis.

“The absence of any US-Iran bilateral channel...may have the perverse effect of reinforcing Iranian interest in progressing in the nuclear realm so that the US will be forced to take it seriously and engage it directly." ~ Richard Haass

article was the fact that Iran doesn't have an HEU, but has LEU.

You and I both know that this is the supreme hurdle Iran has yet to overcome. It's all about potential at this point. Sure, Iran has the potential to turn the LEU into HEU, just as I have the potential to fellate myself. That doesn't mean either are going to happen any time soon.

^{"All men's gains are the fruit of venturing."}

-Herodotus

The Iranian government has told the Obama administration and its Western allies that it is ready to hold "comprehensive, all-encompassing and constructive" negotiations on a range of security issues, including global nuclear disarmament.

But the new proposal is silent on Iran's own nuclear program.

Propublica

Report Says Iran Has Data to Make a Nuclear Bomb

"While the analysis represents the judgment of the nuclear agency’s senior staff, a struggle has erupted in recent months over whether to make it public. The dispute pits the agency’s departing director, Mohamed ElBaradei, against his own staff and against foreign governments eager to intensify pressure on Iran.

Dr. ElBaradei has long been reluctant to adopt a confrontational strategy on Iran, an approach he sees as counterproductive. Responding to calls for the report’s release, he has raised doubts about its completeness and reliability...

In recent interviews, a senior European official familiar with the contents of the full report described it to The New York Times. "

Nice job of undercutting ElBaradei on Iran at a critical moment when he's in Iran

_{I feel the American worker has been sacrificed to the capitalist idols in the ancient Mayan fashion. - Sue Lamb, NYT reader}

http://www.newshoggers.com/blog/2009/09/german-intelligence-and-the-nyts-iran-nuke-hype.html

The allegations currently abroad of Iranian nuclear weapon development are proven propaganda disinformation issuing from the WH and Tel Aviv with ancillary mouthpieces yapping, as lapdogs will, in London, Paris, Berlin and Rome. Asia Times has a three part history of the lead up to Obama's G-20 revelations that he is a liar (the third part linked here has links to the prior parts:

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/KJ02Ak02.html

The only word missing out of Washington's disinformation and fear-mongering campaign is WMD but it is heavily implied in its absence. There is little changed otherwise from the run up (assault) to the attack on, invasion of and brutal genocidal occupation of Iraq and the subsequent judicial murder of the leading witnesses to US involvement in crimes against humanity in the region.
Links to Asia Times parts 1 and 2:

Part 1: http://atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/KI30Ak01.html

Part 2: http://atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/KJ01Ak03.html

Highly recommended reading, informative, having context and history in a competent narrative, unlike the propaganda rags that serve the American public. Asia Times provides the quality reporting that is required in a Republic and is so sadly missing in this republic. It will not end well.

It seems a "confidential" "unconfirmed" report is "leaked" by "unnamed" sources "alleging" "knowledge of knowhow" for "construction" of a weapon that has been independently developed by all nuclear weapons possessing countries.

What the NYT (and the Washington Post) need is a robot that can wave its arms and announce "Warning! Warning! unverified writing ahead". See for yourself:

Al Jazeera story here

count the unnamed and unverified and probable provenance of information, confirmed and unconfirmed. This beggars fiction.

BBC - The head of the UN nuclear watchdog says inspectors will visit an Iranian uranium enrichment plant revealed recently by Tehran, on 25 October.

Mohamed ElBaradei said after meeting Iranian nuclear chief Ali Akbar Salehi that he hoped Iran would be "as transparent as possible" with monitors.

The US had urged Iran to give the IAEA "unfettered access" to the site, near the city of Qom, within two weeks.

more at the link. How the piece incorporates and interprets the Sanger article makes interesting reading. hat the US will do about the "3 weeks, not 2 weeks" date ?

_{I feel the American worker has been sacrificed to the capitalist idols in the ancient Mayan fashion. - Sue Lamb, NYT reader}

...that's worth a listen. I also agree with their conclusion; we'll get stupid again and attack in '10.

http://www.linktv.org/video/4430/israel-vs-iran-the-writing-is-on-the-wall

From The Sunday Times October 4, 2009

Israel names Russians helping Iran build nuclear bomb

Uzi Mahanimi in Tel Aviv, Mark Franchetti and Jon Swain

Israel's prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, has handed the Kremlin a list of Russian scientists believed by the Israelis to be helping Iran to develop a nuclear warhead. He is said to have delivered the list during a mysterious visit to Moscow.

Netanyahu flew to the Russian capital with Uzi Arad, his national security adviser, last month in a private jet.

His office claimed he was in Israel, visiting a secret military establishment at the time. It later emerged that he was holding talks with Vladimir Putin, the Russian prime minister, and President Dmitry Medvedev.

“We have heard that Netanyahu came with a list and concrete evidence showing that Russians are helping the Iranians to develop a bomb,” said a source close to the Russian defence minister last week.

“That is why it was kept secret. The point is not to embarrass Moscow, rather to spur it into action.”

Israeli sources said it was a short, tense meeting at which Netanyahu named the Russian experts said to be assisting Iran in its nuclear programme.

In western capitals the latest claims were treated with caution. American and British officials argued that the involvement of freelance Russian scientists belonged to the past.

American officials said concern about Russian experts acting without official approval, had been raised by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in a report more than a year ago.

“There has been Russian help. It is not the government, it is individuals, at least one helping Iran on weaponisation activities and it is worrisome,” said David Albright, a former weapons inspector who is president of the Institute for Science and International Security.

However, Israeli officials insist that any Russian scientists working in Iran could do so only with official approval.

Robert Einhorn, the special adviser for non-proliferation and arms control to Hillary Clinton, the US secretary of state, is understood to believe that Russian companies have also supplied material that has been used by Iran in the production of ballistic missiles.

The disclosures came as Iran agreed at talks in Geneva to submit to IAEA inspections of its newly disclosed enrichment plant, which is being built under a mountain on a military base at Qom. Iran revealed the plant to the IAEA to pre-empt being caught out by an imminent announcement from western governments, which had discovered its existence.

The West says the plant is tailor-made for a secret weapons programme and proves Iran’s claim that its nuclear programme is intended only for peaceful purposes is a lie. The plant is designed to hold 3,000 centrifuges — enough to produce the material needed for one bomb a year.

Iran’s conduct over the next few weeks will determine whether the West continues its new dialogue or is compelled to increase pressure with tougher United Nations and other sanctions.

Ephraim Sneh, a former Israeli deputy defence minister, warned that time was running out for action to stop the programme. “If no crippling sanctions are introduced by Christmas, Israel will strike,” he said. “If we are left alone, we will act alone.”

more

The US National Security Adviser on Sunday refuted a newly uncovered IAEA report that suggests Iran has the information needed to build a nuclear bomb.

By Mark Sappenfield | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor
from the October 4, 2009 edition

A senior US security official Sunday disagreed with the assessment that Iran now knows how to make a nuclear bomb.

According to the Sunday New York Times, a secret International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) report says that Iran has "sufficient information to be able to design and produce a workable" atom bomb.

US National Security Adviser James Jones, however, disputed the IAEA's findings. Asked on CNN's "State of the Union" if Iran has the data to make a nuclear bomb, he said: "No, we stand by the reports that we've put out."

Two years ago, the US released a report suggesting that Iran has stopped work on its nuclear-weapons program in 2003. The Times emphasizes that other countries, including Britain and France, have begun to have doubts about this conclusion.

The authors of the so-called "secret annex" of the IAEA report acknowledge that their findings are not definitive and that further investigation is necessary.

But the report embodies a growing split within the nuclear agency on how hard to push Iran, The Times suggests.

Mohammed ElBaradei, head of the IAEA, has sought to emphasize progress in talks with Iran about its nuclear program.

In a visit to Tehran, he said: "I see that we are shifting gears from confrontation into transparency and cooperation."

In recent days, Iran has agreed to let IAEA inspectors visit its previously secret site near Qom on Oct. 25. It has also said that it is open to the idea of allowing Russia to enrich a stockpile of uranium that, international inspectors fear, could otherwise secretly be repurposed for weapons. In addition, Iran has agreed to further talks this month.

Mr. Jones agreed that Iran has taken positive steps. "What's happened with regard to Iran in the last couple of weeks has been very significant," Jones said.

more

Iran to Install New Generation Centrifuges
2009-10-05 23:18:31 Xinhua Web Editor: Zhang Zhang

Iran's Atomic Energy Organization Chief Ali Akbar Salehi said Iran is intending to install a new generation of centrifuges at its new nuclear enrichment site, the local satellite Press TV reported on Monday.

In an interview with the channel on Sunday, Salehi introduced Tehran's plans for the newly disclosed nuclear fuel enrichment site situated near the northwestern holy city of Qom, the report said.

Salehi expressed hope that his organization would be able to install a new generation of centrifuges in the new site, without elaborating the specifications and types of the new generation of centrifuges.

"During the past few months, we have also focused most of our efforts on developing new high-efficiency machinery that can be manufactured at home without the use of any imported parts. We hope to install the new centrifuges at the site," Salehi said.

Describing Iran's "peaceful" nuclear work as a necessity, he said it is a "launch pad" for future progress in the field of energy production, and that "constructing nuclear plants is the first step towards building fusion plants which will emerge in the future."

"If we do not enter the domain today we will not be able to take a leap and cross over to the field of fusion plants, which will be the technology in the next 40 to 50 years. We have to reach that stage gradually," he was quoted by Press TV as saying.

Last month, Iran confirmed that it is building a new nuclear fuel enrichment plant near the religious city of Qom.

Leaders of the United States, France and Britain have condemned Iran's alleged deception to the international community involving covert activities in the new underground nuclear site.

Wednesday Oct. 7, 2009 19:08 EDT
The still-missing central fact in the Iran drama ~ Glenn Greenwald
(updated below)

Ever since Iran reported the existence of its Qom enrichment facility to the IAEA, one central assertion has been repeated as fact over and over by the American media to make the story as incriminating as possible: namely, that Iran only disclosed this because they discovered they had been "caught," i.e., they found out that the West knew of this facility and they thus had no choice but to disclose it. That assertion has been fundamental to the entire Iran drama. After all, if Iran voluntarily notified the IAEA of the Qom facility before it was even operational and thus agreed to have the facility inspected, it's impossible to maintain the melodramatic storyline that Iran was planning something deeply nefarious here and got "caught red-handed." The assertion that Iran was forced into disclosure is vital to the entire plot, and it's been constantly repeated as fact.

But ever since this episode began, I've read countless accounts from numerous sources and never once saw a single piece of evidence to support this claim -- and I've been actively looking for it and asking if anyone has seen such evidence. Today in Time Magazine, Bobby Ghosh writes of an exclusive interview he conducted with CIA Director Leon Panetta about Qom, in which Panetta claims the CIA knew of the facility for three years...

more

http://www.csmonitor.com/2009/1015/p20s01-usfp.html