@@ Nuts to Bush - James Gordon Prather @@
Arash
March 21, 2005
Nuts to Bush
Dr. James Gordon Prather
Nuclear weapons physicist
Last November, France, Germany, and the United Kingdom – as agents for the
European Union – began negotiations with Iran on "a mutually acceptable
long-term arrangement" that would:
(a) provide "objective guarantees" to the EU that Iran's nuclear program
was exclusively for "peaceful purposes",
(b) guarantee future EU-Iranian nuclear, technological, and economic
"cooperation", as well as
(c) provide "firm commitments" by the EU to Iran "on security issues".
The Bush-Cheney administration has badly mischaracterized these negotiations
as an attempt by the EU to get the Iranians "to live up to their
international obligations".
The EU is more likely attempting to head off the Iranians from concluding a
mutually acceptable long-term arrangement with Russia and/or China.
Now, the key to preventing nuke proliferation is the international control
of the acquisition and chemical/physical transformation of certain nuclear
materials. In return for a promise not to acquire or seek to acquire nuclear
weapons, the Treaty on Nonproliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) recognizes
the "inalienable right" of all signatories to acquire and transform those
materials, subject to oversight by the International Atomic Energy Agency
(IAEA) Safeguards regime.
The EU-Iran negotiating agreement also specifically recognizes that right.
When the IAEA's inspectors detect possible or actual noncompliance with a
Safeguards Agreement – or with the NPT itself – the director general reports
that to the Board. The Board can then decide – by a two-thirds majority –
whether or not to refer the director-general's reports to the UN Security
Council for possible action.
How was Iran to "provide objective guarantees" to the EU? By signing – as
Iran did more than a year ago – and adhering to an Additional Protocol to
its Safeguards Agreement, vastly expanding IAEA capabilities to provide such
guarantees.
But it is obvious that meaningful EU-Iran economic cooperation will not be
possible unless the threat of economic sanctions imposed by the U.S. on EU
companies that do business with Iran is lifted.
And, of course, the EU cannot provide firm commitments that Iranian nuclear
facilities will not be attacked by the U.S. or Israel.
However, the Russians and/or Chinese could make such an attack extremely
unlikely, especially if the facilities in Iran are effectively co-owned and
operated by the Russians and/or Chinese.
At his news conference Wednesday, Bush was asked this softball question by a
media sycophant (http://msnbc.msn.com/id/7206207/page/2/):
"The Iranians have dismissed the European incentive as insignificant.
Should more incentives be offered? How long do they [Iranians] have
until you take their case to the Security Council?"
While not answering the basic question, Bush made a lot of incorrect and/or
intentionally misleading statements to the effect that Iran had long kept
hidden from the IAEA a uranium-enrichment program, which he implied was a
violation of the NPT.
But Iran has not yet begun to enrich uranium. Hence, they were under no
obligation to report that program to the IAEA.
Furthermore, in the event Iran was ever discovered to actually be in
violation of the NPT, it would be up to the IAEA Board – not Bush – to refer
the matter to the Security Council.
As best the IAEA can determine, Iran is living up to its international
obligations, including its voluntary suspension of uranium-enrichment
activity, which is serving as a "confidence-building" measure for the
EU-Iran negotiations.
Since Bush didn't answer it, the reporter repeated the question – "And how
do long do you wait? When do you go to the Security Council?"
To which Bush responded: "The understanding is, we go to the Security
Council if they [Iranians] reject the offer."
What offer?
Apparently, it was Bush's offer to the Europeans to lift a decade-long
blackball of Iran's membership in the World Trade Organization (WTO) and to
waive sanctions on European firms that provide Iran with spare parts for
commercial aircraft, in return for a promise – if the negotiations fail to
satisfy Bush – by the French and the British to support Bush's contention
before the Security Council that Iran's safeguarded nuclear programs
constitute a "threat" to Mideast peace.
The negotiations will almost certainly fail to satisfy Bush.
Iran has repeatedly proclaimed that any long-term EU-Iran agreement must
recognize – at a minimum – Iran's inalienable right to enrich uranium.
Thus, the Iranians dismissed Bush's "offer", which was explicitly
conditional on their permanently suspending all uranium-enrichment and
fuel-reprocessing activities.
Sirus Naseri, an Iranian negotiating with the EU, wondered aloud
(http://newswww.bbc.net.uk/1/low/world/middle_east/4340453.stm), "Would the
United States be prepared to give up its own nuclear fuel production against
a cargo of pistachios delivered in truckloads?"
Besides exporting zillions of barrels of oil, Iran also exports nuts.
Listen to a recent interview with Dr. Prather
http://www.weekendinterviewshow.com
* Physicist James Gordon Prather has served as a policy implementing
official for national security-related technical matters in the Federal
Energy Agency, the Energy Research and Development Administration, the
Department of Energy, the Office of the Secretary of Defense and the
Department of the Army. Dr. Prather also served as legislative assistant for
national security affairs to U.S. Sen. Henry Bellmon, R-Okla. -- ranking
member of the Senate Budget Committee and member of the Senate Energy
Committee and Appropriations Committee. Dr. Prather had earlier worked as a
nuclear weapons physicist at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in
California and Sandia National Laboratory in New Mexico.
STOP_George
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