I’ve been writing this now since 2012 or earlier, but reporters and editors don’t care to learn about the uranium supply line and the processes that form it into a nuclear weapon. Or they like sensationalized clicks better. So here it is again.
The IAEA defines what it calls a “significant quantity” of enriched uranium as 25 kg of U-235 in enriched uranium. That’s approximately enough for a nuclear weapon, although it varies with the weapon design. The IAEA needs an arbitrary number like that for reporting on its inspections. It’s a quick rule of thumb. (If you click that link, you’ll see others writing about it in 2012.)
Because the United States has withdrawn from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA, Iran nuclear agreement), Iran has been ramping up its production of low-enriched uranium. That’s a few percent of U-235. You need 90% or more to make a nuclear weapon.
Yesterday, the IAEA’s latest report on Iran was released, with numbers, and oh boy now the reporters and editors can show us they can divide!
The low-enriched uranium that Iran has produced contains more than 25 kg of U-235. It would have to be further enriched to produce bomb-grade uranium. Then it would have to be formed into the proper shapes and explosives and electronics added to make it into a bomb. One bomb. One bomb would have a slight deterrent effect, but it’s not good for much else. In fact, announcing it for that deterrent effect would simultaneously paint a target on Iran.
I’ve seen two headlines this morning that ignore all that in favor of whipping up war fever. It doesn’t help that there are think tanks pushing this line, and that the Trumpies have been working with them hand in glove.
So here they are:
Business Insider: Iran has stockpiled enough uranium to produce a nuclear weapon in the latest sign Trump’s strategy has ‘failed miserably’. The last part is right, anyway.
New York Times: Iran Crosses a Key Threshold: It Again Has Sufficient Fuel for a Bomb. At least their subhead is better: So far, the evidence suggests that Iran’s recent actions are calculated to pressure the Trump administration and Europe rather than rushing for a bomb.
There’s no doubt Iran could build a bomb if they wanted to. The fact that they signed on to the JCPOA and that they haven’t built one is good evidence that they don’t want to. Let’s not convince them otherwise.
polyorchnid octopunch
One should also consider that fatwa that was released a number of years back calling nuclear weapons haram because they kill indiscriminately, and therefore violate the laws of jihad.
Cheryl Rofer
@polyorchnid octopunch: There are some questions about how binding that is, but it’s one more indication that Iran is not hell-bent on getting a bomb.
bbleh
… reporters and editors don’t care to learn about the uranium supply line and the processes that form it into a nuclear weapon. Or they like sensationalized clicks better.
Or both, of course. But if I have to pick one, I’ll go with Door Number Two.
Modern media really aren’t about information. They’re about entertainment and influence.
NotMax
Is this the place to toss in She Blinded Me with Science?
:)
MattF
There’s some sort of cognitive barrier between doing arithmetic and noting what the numbers mean. Back when I was teaching Physics 101, I’d set unit conversion exercises, and there would always be a disconcerting number of students who wouldn’t notice that spending trillions of joules to move a block of wood one meter was, somehow, not the right answer.
RepubAnon
@bbleh: Yup, it’s all about generating $$$ so the news room cost center shows a profit.
We need a graphic of a giant pile of steel bar stock. There’s enough steel there to make a car – but possessing the steel alone doesn’t mean you have the skills to make that steel into an automobile.
Dr. Ronnie James, D.O.
For democracy to work, the media has to provide Journalism, which means fact checking and context. The NYT pays how much goddamn money a year to reporters to be experts to provide this context…and they failed bc teh clickz. FTFNYT
RepubAnon
@MattF: And today, those students run our government and most media outlets.
WereBear
@MattF: Dyscalculia is real, and I suffer from it. I know how to add, and I got A’s in algebra, but still never was able to balance my checkbook, even with a calculator.
Every so often something falls out of the bucket during the process.
NotMax
Sigh. Fix for #10.
Cartoon (New Yorker?) from way back when. The scene: office of an obvious major business tycoon; employee standing, chagrined, in front of the massive desk. Captioning paraphrased from dim memory.
Employee: But sir, you’re the head of Gargantua Unlimited and you’re angry about that?
Bossman (waving sheet of paper): Millions and billions I can’t make head or tail of. 20¢ for a long distance phone call, that I understand!
jonas
What Cheryl’s analysis says to me is that Iran’s thinking on uranium, bombs, etc., is more about asserting its sovereignty than actually pursuing a weapon. The mullahs are walking a fine line between reducing tensions with the West and showing their own population that they’re effective defenders of Iran’s national honor and sovereignty. Leaders can suck in every way imaginable — and *nobody* in Iran save for the clerics in on the grift like the theocratic kleptocracy running the country — and yet people will rally around them if they appear to be “standing up” to those who don’t respect them. Hell, that’s how we got Trump.
Cheryl Rofer
@NotMax: I removed #10 for you. Now your fixed comment is #10.
@jonas: yep
catclub
That’s approximately enough for a nuclear weapon – when enriched to 90%. But the ‘enriched’ scale starts around 4%
NotMax
@Cheryl Rofer
In which case I need to reiterate it was prompted by @MattF.
TTT
The problem with the Iran deal is it’s just “What’s the matter with Kansas?” all over again. Technocrat policy wonks are always baffled and annoyed if people choose religious or cultural priorities over their economic self-interest. They failed to foresee Brexit and Trump – yet think they really understand decision making in Tehran.
We’ve been offering anti-abortion protestors and racists better jobs and more friends if they would just come over to our side…. but they don’t want our money or our friendship, they want to be anti-abortion protestors and racists. Iran has been threatening to annihilate the state of Israel for decades; the deal offered them $150B and new international friends in exchange for not doing that within 10 years, and then in year 11 why surely they’ll just learn to love their new money and friends. Is the IRGC more enlightened and reasonable than Ohio voters?
Cheryl Rofer
@TTT: If the Iranians’ primary consideration were obliterating Israel, they would have had a number of bombs by the early 2000s. But they didn’t do that. They were abiding by the terms of the JCPOA until Trump pulled the United States out of the deal. Nobody’s asking them to love anybody. The IRGC are the hardliners; not all of Iran shares their views. Trump’s actions have emboldened them.
Uncle Cosmo
Another factor to keep in mind is that a device ain’t (much of) a weapon unless it’s deliverable. E.g., the first detonation of a thermonuclear device (Ivy Mike, 1 Nov 1952) was, at “82 short tons (74 metric tons) … essentially a building that resembled a factory rather than a weapon.” (source)
Even Little Boy, the simplest sort of nuclear weapon (which used the guts of a 5″ naval cannon to fire a plug of enriched uranium through a ring of the same stuff fast enough to get an explosion), wasn’t a particularly deliverable beast at 9,700 lbs, 10′ long x 28″ diameter; at the end of WW2 the B-29 Superfortress, the largest & fastest bomber of its day, had to be specially modified to carry it & had to fly like hell for safety after release. Fat Man (plutonium implosion device) was even larger (10’8″ x 60″ diameter) & heavier (10,800 lbs), but did produce a bigger blast (21 kT vs 15 kT). (source)
Frankly the most effective delivery system for a single bomb – presuming time is not particularly of the essence & there’s no effective screening at ports of entry – is probably sneaking one in-country by sea in an intermodal cargo container & then transferring it to a truck to reach its intended point of detonation. Which I find occasionally concerning, inasmuch as any bad guys who want to nuke DC would probably ship through the closest container port (40 miles NW), here in Baltimore, where it might be touched off by a suicide bomber if discovered.
Captain C
I always wondered why one (or a few) bombs, for all their destructive capability, would cause such a freakout (other than not being to invade the possessor’s country at will anymore, which never really was an option for Iran, anyway) among such supposedly hard and brave people (who falsely claimed all the credit for staring down the Soviet Union and its thousands of deliverable nukes, no less).
Would the answer to this from, say, Iran or North Korea:
“Give us everything we want or we’ll fire one nuke at you (or your ally, or your forces in the region).”
be this:
“Oh, noes!!! We must give in!!!” (with the rest of the world going “yeah, that’s all cool, no reason to weigh in.”)
or
“You know, Supreme Leader, it would take less than a Trident sub’s complement of missiles to permanently and completely destroy your country and civilization. Are you sure you don’t want to try negotiating?”
Even if, say, Putin were to try and back up said aggressor with a promise of his own retaliation for the retaliation (highly, highly doubtful), I’m pretty sure that, other than with Trump, the response would be:
“Come on, Volodya, you’re not really going to sacrifice Moscow and St. Petersburg to defend a bunch of nuclear terrorists who don’t have your best interests in mind, are you?”
Nuclear proliferation is bad, but I can’t take the pants-shitting reactions of proven liars and war mongers in good faith.
brantl
And nobody seems to remember that Iran signed a nuclear deal, a long time ago, that they would be able to generate nuclear power, the same one that everyone else who wanted to generate nuclear power signed, and they have been generating nuclear power. Who didn’t sign the deal and went for the bomb? Pakistan, and it’s long been rumored and taken for fact, Israel. Why aren’t we all over them? Fait accompli.
Procopius
I think this is not quite the case. It looks to me that Iran could have lived with U.S. withdrawal from the agreement (although I can’t imagine how that would work), but the U.S. also unilaterally imposed sanctions even more stringent than in the past and threatened the European nations into failure to fulfill their own obligations under the JCPOA. Iran tried for two years to continue to comply with the agreement, and then it became impossible for them to do so because the sanctions prevented them from shipping the enriched uranium to their customers. Of course they could have stopped enriching uranium to fuel levels, but that was guaranteed to them under the JCPOA.