IRAN’S NUCLEAR

PROGRAM

1.History
2.Background
3. The Bushehr project

4. Iranian side

5. U.S. claims

6. International response

History
The Islamic Republic of Iran's nuclear program goes back
many decades. In recent years global political change has
caused Iran's program to fall under intense scrutiny and even
occasioned charges that Iran is seeking to develop nuclear
weapons. Iran, however, has maintained that the purpose of its
nuclear program is the generation of power; any other use is a
violation of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, of which
Iran is a signatory.

On August 14, 2002, an associate of Mujahedin-e-Khalq and critic

of Tehran, Alireza Jafarzadeh, revealed the existence of two secret
nuclear sites, a uranium enrichment facility in Natanz and a heavy
water facility in Arak. In response, the U.S. has since late 2003
claimed that Tehran is seeking to build nuclear arms in violation of
its agreements under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, and
also that Iran is seeking to develop nuclear missiles. However, no
direct evidence has ever been produced that Iran is pursuing a
covert nuclear weapons program.

On November 14, 2004, Iran's chief nuclear negotiator announced

a voluntary and temporary suspension of its uranium enrichment
program (not in itself a violation of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation
Treaty) after pressure from the United Kingdom, France, and
Germany acting on behalf of the European Union (known in this
context as the EU-3 or EU3). The measure was said at the time to
be a confidence-building measure, to continue for some reasonable
period of time, six months being mentioned as a reference. On
November 24, Iran sought to amend the terms of its agreement
with the EU to exclude a handful of the equipment from this deal
for research work. This request was dropped four days later.

On August 8 and August 10, 2005, the Iranian government

resumed its conversion of uranium at the Isfahan facility, allegedly
with continued suspension of enrichment activities. This has led to
(on September 19, 2005) the European Union pressuring the IAEA
was started in 1957 to promote use of nuclear energy for energy
production] to bring Iran's nuclear program before the United
Nations Security Council.
Background
The foundations for Iran's nuclear program were laid in the 1960
under auspices of the U.S. within the framework of bilateral
agreements between the two countries. In 1967 the Tehran Nuclear
Research Center (TNRC) was built and run by the Atomic Energy
Organization of Iran (AEOI). The TNRC was equipped with a US
supplied 5-megawatt nuclear research reactor. Iran signed and
ratified the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty in 1968. With the
establishment of Iran's atomic agency and the NPT in place plans
were drawn by Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi (Iran's monarch) to
construct up to 23 nuclear power stations across the country
together with USA by the year 2000.

By 1975, The U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, had signed

National Security Decision Memorandum 292, titled "U.S.-Iran
Nuclear Cooperation," which laid out the details of the sale of
nuclear energy equipment to Iran projected to bring U.S.
corporations more than $6 billion in revenue. At the time, Iran was
pumping as much as 6 million barrels (950,000 m³) of oil a day,
compared with about 4 million barrels (640,000 m³) daily today.

President Gerald R. Ford even signed a directive in 1976 offering

Tehran the chance to buy and operate a U.S.-built reprocessing
facility for extracting plutonium from nuclear reactor fuel. The
deal was for a complete "nuclear fuel cycle". The Ford strategy
paper said the "introduction of nuclear power will both provide for
the growing needs of Iran's economy and free remaining oil
reserves for export or conversion to petrochemicals."

The Bushehr project

The Bushehr Nuclear Power Facility is located 17 kilometers south
of the city of Bushehr (also known as Bushire), between the fishing
villages of Halileh and Bandargeh along the Persian Gulf.

The facility was the idea of the Shah of Iran, Mohammad Reza
Pahlavi, who envisioned a time when the world's oil supply would
run out. He said that, "Petroleum is a noble material, much too
valuable to burn." Instead, he wanted a national electrical grid
powered by clean nuclear power plants. Bushehr would be the first
plant, and would supply energy to the inland city of Shiraz.

In 1975, the Bonn firm Kraftwerk-Union A.G., a joint venture of

Siemens AG and A.E.G Telefunken, signed a contract worth $4 to
$6 billion to build the nuclear power plant. Construction of the two
nuclear generating units was subcontracted to ThyssenKrupp AG,
and was to have been completed in 1981.

Kraftwerk-Union was eager to work with the Iranian government

because, as spokesman Joachim Hospe said in 1976, "To fully
exploit our nuclear power plant capacity, we have to land at least
three contracts a year for delivery abroad. The market here is about
saturated, and the United States has cornered most of the rest of
Europe, so we have to concentrate on the third world."

Kraftwerk-Union fully withdrew from the Bushehr nuclear project

in July 1979, after work stopped in January 1979, with one reactor
50% complete, and the other reactor 85% complete. They said they
based their action on Iran's non-payment of $450 million in
overdue payments. The company had received $2.5 billion of the
total contract. Their cancellation came after certainty that the
Iranian government would unilaterally terminate the contract
themselves, following the 1979 Iranian Revolution, which
paralyzed Iran's economy and led to a crisis in Iran's relations with
the West.
In 1984, Kraftwerk-Union did a preliminary assessment to see if it
could resume work on the project, but declined to do so while the
Iraq-Iran war continued. In April of that year, the US State
Department said, "We believe it would take at least two to three
years to complete construction of the reactors at Bushehr." The
spokesperson also said that the light water power reactors at
Bushehr "are not particularly well-suited for a weapons program."
The spokesman went on to say, "In addition, we have no evidence
of Iranian construction of other facilities that would be necessary
to separate plutonium from spent reactor fuel."

The reactors were then damaged by multiple Iraqi air strikes

between March 24, 1984 to 1988. Shortly afterwards Iraq invaded
Iran and the nuclear program was stopped until the end of the war.

In 1990, Iran began to look outwards towards partners for its

nuclear program; however, due to a radically different political
climate and punitive U.S. economic sanctions, few candidates
existed.

In 1995 Iran signed a contract with Russia to resume work on the

half complete Bushehr plant. The construction is being done by the
state-controlled company Atomstroyexport (Russian for Atomic
Construction Export), an arm of Russia's atomic energy ministry,
Minatom. The Russians assert that because the reactor will be used
for civilian purposes only, their contract is legitimate under the
nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.

It was not until 2002 that the USA began to question Iran's nuclear
intentions after the MKO (an anti-government guerrilla group)
revealed the existence of the Natanz and Arak facilities.

Iranian side
Iran maintains that nuclear power is necessary for a booming
population and rapidly industrializing nation. It points to the fact
that Iran's population has more than doubled in 20 years, the
country regularly imports gasoline and electricity, and that burning
fossil fuel in large amounts harms Iran's environment drastically.
Additionally, Iran questions why it shouldn't be allowed to
diversify its sources of energy, especially when there are fears of
its oil fields eventually being depleted. It continues to argue that its
valuable oil should be used for high value products, not simple
electricity generation. Iran also raises financial questions, saying
that developing the excess capacity in its oil industry would cost it
$40 billion, let alone pay for the power plants. Harnessing nuclear
power costs a fraction of this, considering Iran has abundant
supplies of accessible uranium ore.

After the 1979 Islamic Revolution, Iran informed the International

Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) of its plans to restart its nuclear
program using indiginously-made nuclear fuel, and the IAEA even
planned to provide assistance to Iran under its Technical Assistance
Program to produce enriched uranium. An IAEA report stated
clearly that its aim was to “contribute to the formation of local
expertise and manpower needed to sustain an ambitious
programme in the field of nuclear power reactor technology and
fuel cycle technology”. However, the IAEA was forced to
terminate the program under U.S. pressure.

Iran has a legal right to enrich uranium for peaceful purposes under
the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, a right which in 2005 the
U.S. and the EU-3 began to assert had been forfeited by the
clandestine nuclear program that came to light in 2002. Iran and
many other developing nations who are signatory to the NPT
believe the Western position to be hypocritical, saying that the
NPT's original purpose was universal nuclear disarmament. Iran
also compares its treatment as a signatory to the NPT with three
nations that have not ratified the NPT: Israel, India, and Pakistan.
Each of these nations developed an indigenous nuclear weapons
capability: Israel by 1968, India by 1974 and Pakistan by 1998.

U.S. claims
Since 2002, the U.S. has countered that Iran does not need nuclear
power due to its abundant oil and natural gas reserves since oil
power is cheaper to produce than nuclear power. Also, in testimony
to Congress in 2003, John Bolton claimed that natural gas
currently being flared (burned off without being used) by Iran, if
used for electricity generation, could be used to generate 4000
megawatts of continuous electricity - as much as all four Bushehr
reactors. (This may be a misleading statement if intended to point
out an inconsistent energy policy; flaring of natural gas is common
practice in the oil industry as recovering the gas can often be
uneconomical or unfeasible - on the other hand, Iran is developing
its South Pars gas field for export).
One theory behind the U.S.'s resistance to accepting Iran's nuclear
power ambition lies in Middle Eastern geopolitics. In essence, the
U.S. believes that it should guard against Iran obtaining a nuclear
weapons capability.

International response
The claims and counterclaims have put pressure on Iran to reveal
all aspects of its nuclear program. Some pressure has also come
from Iran's trade partners: Europe, Japan, and Russia. Iran has said
this to be a result of an attempt by the U.S. government to prevent
it from obtaining nuclear technology.

Regarding the involvement of the IAEA, under the auspicies of the

UN, Iran has responded to the American accusations by
cooperating with the agency, since the enrichment activities they
have recommenced are not in violation of the Nuclear Non-
Proliferation Treaty. In August 2005, Iranian officials said they had
lost much of their confidence in the IAEA; the Speaker of the
Majlis said that he regarded an IAEA resolution summoning Iran to
suspend uranium conversion to be "illegal." Iran's degree of
cooperation has, in general, varied depending on other geopolitical
issues: at times the IAEA has had to admonish Iran, while at other
times it has praised it.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
TimeFrame Event Analysis
1967 Shah of Iran institutes The Shah of Iran was increasingly
exploratory research into worried about Iraq and Israel,
indigneous production of weaponsboth hostile and well known as
grade fissile materials. Small also exploring nuclear capability. 1
research reactor purchased from
the U.S. and brought online at the
Tehran University
1970 Iran signs the Nuclear Non- The move is cited by U.S. officials
Proliferation Treaty as an example of how peaceful
dissemination of nuclear
technology can and should take
place. This niavite is mourned by
non-proliferation experts and will
come back to haunt the western
world.
1979 Islamic Revolution Halts all NBC While other international
research relations effects of the revolution
in Iran were deemed disastrous,
perhaps this was a temporary
silver lining in the cloud for
diplomats and non-proliferation
experts. This was short lived
however, as only a decade later the
programs were back on again.
1984-1988 Iran acquires SCUD-B Missiles Capable of delivering a prototype
from Libya and/or North Korea. nuclear weapon 300 kilometers.
Nearly 100 fired at Iraq in the The Iranian Defense Miniistry
Iran-Iraq war, but armed with also began its own indigenous
 only conventional warheads. missile development program as
Also fired 10 Chinese Silkworm well as acquired Chinese SA-2
cruise missiles one hitting U.S. equivalent missiles (100 km range)
flagged tanker in Persian Gulf and SCUD Cs from North Korea
another striking in Kuwait. (200 km range).
1988 Major loss in the Iran-Iraq War, While Iran's so called moderate
led to Hashemi Rafsanjani's government postures to win favor
covert pledge to never allow Iran in Europe and other western
to be the victim again, some capitals, their actions
believe aiding in his election as clandestinely prove otherwise.
the President in 1989. One intelligence analyst from AFI
claims Iran is the world's leading
terrorist exporter and will also
stop at nothing to a)develop NBC
weapons capabilities, and b) use
the technologies to futher their
power base in the Middle East.
MILNET believes this analysis is
on the mark, with further
evidence of this Iranian mindset
shown througout this document.
Included are eyewitness reports
from covert operators who found
themselves targets or near targets
of Iranian covert operations to
gain knowledge and material on
the open and black markets.
1988-1996 Iran agrees to purchase and Documented publicly in 1996,
begins to take delivery of portions however it is thought that
of a research reactor that could classified intelligence data shows
easily be used as a training purchases and delievery of
reactor for a plutonium (weapons equipment began in the late
grade) production facility. 1980s. Intelligence analysts cite
(purchase in 1990 from China). confirmed dual and single use
China also sells Iran an purchases thorughout the period.
electromagnetic isotope
separation unit which can be used Several anonymous sources in the
to generate enriched uranium for Intelligence community indicate
weapons grade material. covert sanctions or clandestine
pressure brought to bear by
western intelligence agencies
against the suppliers in nations
"friendly" to U.S. and its allies.
Some of these companies are in
allied nations as well. Cited are
France,Germany as well as China

1994 Iran signs purchase agreement
with China and U.S. President
Clinton enacts an oil embargo
against Iran as a sanction.
1995 Iran signs cotnract with Russian U.S. Diplomatic response pledges
for completion of Bushehr
reactors.
1996 Adds more Chinese and North
Korean missiles to the Iranian
ballistic missile inventory,
including SCUD-C and CSS-8
(modified Chinese SA-2)
Also has continued to purchase or Turkey. Also exposed to the
more capable cruise missiles
and a number of the former
nations of the Soviet Union.
to add commercial sanctions to
anyone supplying Iran. Few
sanctions follow however, and
none against Russia.
An open secret 2 were the plans
announced and presumably
carried through to acquire North
Korean NoDong missiles which
could reach Saudi Arabia, Israel,
current SCUD-B and SCUD-C
missiles are Afghansitan, Bahrain,
India, Iraq,Kuwait, Pakistan,
Qatar, Syria, United Arab
Emirates and the Southern Asian
nations of the former Soviet
Union.

The U.S. publicly available

analysis indicates that the
Iranians, in 1996, also fielded a
number of SU-24 bombers capable
of delivering nuclear weapons.
1997 U.S. Intelligence indicates with a Rather than respond with full
very high confidence 3 , confirmed denials to U.S. revleations of hard
by several allied nations, that evidence of the Iranian program,
Iran has increased funding and the government has admitted to
effort in their NBC programs as existence of equipment choosing
well as made progress in missile deception -- "it's all for peaceful
programs. energy research". The rationale
used is that Iran would rather sell
its own non-nuclear energy
resources, thus gain revenue, and
use nuclear energy to sustain their
modest domestic energy needs.
Meanwhile the technology
purchases and builds continue to
point to more than is necessary,

1998 Intelligence Community sources 1
indicate the U.S. and its allies
have pressured the Ukrainian
manufacturer of steam turbines,
Turboatom to renig on their
contract with Iran.
1999 The U.S. finally imposes
commercial sanctions against
companies in Russia.
2000 The Wisconsin Project publishes
an excellent chronology 4 of the
Iranian Nuclear program after
several media outlets cite CIA
information on Iranian progress.
Slow progress by the Russian
contractors on the Bushehr
complex.
March 2001MILNET and AFI publish
articles on the threat posed by
Iran, including not only terrorist
activities and support but the
ongoing nuclear program. The
U.S. Government and media
and defying the dual use paradigm
by magnitudes.
This appears to be a waste of time,
since steam turbines are a
necessary development for a
peaceful use of nuclear power, the
focus and energy should be on
more nefarious items. Some
analysts believe the semi-public
revealation may be a cover for
other equipmetn that was being
shipped through Turboatom, thus
stopping the turbine shipments
may have also severed a
clandestine equipment pipeline.
This cannot be confirmed,
however.
Sanctions against Russa itself do
not take place leaving many to
wonder how effective commercial
sanctions against Russian
companies will be without a
sanction against the country
itself. Part of the problem, most
analysts believe, is that U.N.
sanctions are extremely difficult if
not impossible to levy against a
permanent member of the U.N.
security council, so the U.S.
cannot take any Russian sanctions
to the next step.
Some believe Russia is
succumbing to pressure from the
world community and is dragging
their feet. But slow progress is
still progress and members of the
intelligence community continue
to forecast a nuclear weapon by
2002.
Iran's denial continue to fit the
pattern of deception expected. As
2002 looms closer, the Intelligence
Community does not alter its
estimates for a nuclear weapon by
2002.
 outlets also charge Iran with
harboring terrorists and
continuing to build a nuclear
program.
1/29/2002 U.S. President Bush names Iran The denials are again, part of the
as part of the 'Axis of Evil' in the pattern against increasing
State of the Union Address. Iran worldwide pressure to own up to
denies they support terrorism and their nuclear program. The
say they do not participate in President's speech clearly puts
nuclear weapons trade or pressure on Iran, Iraq, and North
development. Korea. MILNET publishes an
article citing hopes diplomatic
pressure will prevent Iran and
North Korea from testing their
first device, and indeed to
abandon their programs.
MILNET is pessimistic, however.
5
12/13/2002 CNN Splashes commercial U.S. Intelligence analysts and
satellite photo of Iranian nuclear several anonymous sources
facility and cites U.S. spy satellite confirm that the Iranian facility
photos that reveal the site is more has far more traffic in military
than it seems. IAEA demands weapons researchers than a
Iran reveal the purpose of their peaceful energy facility should
nuclear facilities, Iran denies host. Clearly something sinister is
existence. going on at the site.

Iran's denials fit the pattern of

deception expected. MILNET and
AFI had earlier published articles
on the Iranian threat repudiating
the denials.

2/9/2003 Iran finally reveals the existence U.S. diplomacy may manage to
of their nuclear sites and invites tame the beast, however while
in IAEA, and the follow up report MILNET hopes along with most
from the IAEA demands more others that diplomacy will
details, clearly indicating the succeed, history has shown that
IAEA has found the evidence that rogue nations tend to use
traces of weapons grade material diplomacy as cover while they
has been found. Iran refuses. complete their work. MILNET
believes Iran will be the next
nation to test a nuclear weapon, if
not beaten to the punch by North
Korea.
 Iran's program is thought to be
further ahead than North Korea's
program, however no clear
evidence of fissile material in place
prevents the Intelligence
Community for confirming either
country has a testable weapon.
Most analysts will say, however,
"Any time Now".
3/17/2003 Media hype and political agendas
Time magazine 7 splashes photos aside, it is clear everyone must
taken from their own sources take notice of the Iranian refusal
that show the Iranian facilities to reveal their program. Their
and warns that the U.S. may find continued refusal indicates the
itself embroiled in another secrecy and progress in the
conflict shortly. (photo is linked toprogram. As the program gets
the Time Magazine article and closer to the completion of a test
may get unlinked if Time moves device, MILNET believes the
or deletes the image). dialog will get shriller and the
denials eventually to cease, the
refusal to accept or deny being the
indicator the weapon(s) are ready.

June 2004 All media outlets report on the MILNET concurs with media
ElBadarai (IAEA chairman) hysteria in this case, having
10
report that cites Iran may predicted this from as early as
already have all the ingredients to 1996 and tracked the progress
test a nuclear weapon. Traces of since then.
weapons grade material continue
to be found and the possible sites MILNET believes Iran is waiting
for weapons grade material for the appropriate moment to
manufacture continue to be conduct its test, already having
overly busy. constructed one or more devices.
Sources which wish to remain
anonymous are split 50-50 on
whether the device is actually
ready for test. This is a state of
affiars very similar to the months
leading up to the first test of a
device by India.
June 2004 Federation of American Scientists The FAS is perhaps a notorius
9
continues to support the claims anti-U.S. Government operation
that Iran's nuclear program is when it comes to things nuclear or
sufficient to build nuclear any sort of weapon for that
weapons matter, making their analysis
appear very much independent of
U.S. political interests.
IRAN’S NUCLEAR
WEAPONS

AMMAR HASSAN
6940
XI