Israeli DM Falsely Accuses Iran of Being 10 Weeks Away From Nuke Material Goal

Israeli accusations against Iran continue with the new government there, as Israel’s Defense Minister Benny Gantz informed the UN Security Council that he believes it is time for UN action, including military action, against Iran.

Israel wanting a war against Iran is hardly new, and is virtually the defining characteristic of recent Israeli governments. The excuse is routine too, as Gantz is claiming Iran is “10 weeks away” from having enough weapons-grade material to make a  nuclear weapon.

This is a commonly recycled accusation, and as is usually the case, Israel is wrong. The supposition is based around the idea that Iran’s civilian enrichment of uranium continues, and they have such-and-such amount, which further enriched to a certain level could be weaponized.

Yet in practice, Iran has no weapons-grade uranium, and has never attempted to enrich up to those levels. The Iranian stockpile of enriched uranium is growing chiefly because the US, at Israel’s behest, is preventing them from exporting uranium for conversion to fuel, which was part of the P5+1 nuclear deal.

Either way, Israel’s claim is based on the idea that the entire civilian program has this secret military dimension, and that at some point Iran is just going to drop everything and race for a breakout to a nuclear weapon.

Ten weeks, built around that idea, is built around Israel being right about Iran’s intentions, which for years haven’t panned out, as Israel has been accusing Iran of being on the brink of nuclear arms for decades. Their timing also assumes Iran perfectly achieves all of these further enrichment, which they’ve never done before, without any delays.

Getting to enrichment, Iran would hypothetically have to then achieve full weaponization and the miniaturization of the arms to a deliverable form. All of that is highly unlikely in a 10 week period.

And even then, the biggest problem with the Israeli accusation, ever-present but rarely acknowledged, is that all of this, best case and with their entire stockpile, is meant to be enough to produce one bomb.

But if Iran did that and wanted to let the world know that they are a nuclear power (ideally done soon enough that they aren’t immediately attacked) they’d have to perform a test explosion. At that point, Iran would’ve used its entire stockpile to make one bomb, blown up the bomb to prove it works, and then have nothing left to show for it.