The threat of Iran’s alleged nuclear program is a major reason for the United States to attack the country. Donald Trump and his associates have recently claimed that Iran has resumed its nuclear program, that it could assemble a nuclear bomb within days and that it is working on long-range missiles.
What is the reality of Iran’s nuclear program? The New York Times conducted a fact-check on the above statements and concluded that all three statements incorrect or unproven are.
It is true that Iran has resumed work in some places covered by US intelligence services. But Trump exaggerates the nuclear threat. Governments, intelligence agencies and nuclear watchdogs have found no evidence that Iran is actively attempting to resume uranium enrichment or that it is working on a nuclear bomb.
It is unlikely that Iran could build such a bomb within a few days: the already enriched uranium is deep underground after the Israeli-American attacks in June last year. The claim about long-range missiles is also exaggerated. Iran has missiles that can travel the 1,500 kilometers to Israel, but not the 8,000 kilometers to Alaska or the 9,400 kilometers to the American east coast.
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This video shows Sahand University in Tabriz being attacked. The video has been verified by NRC.
Withdrawal from nuclear deal
In 2018, Trump pulled the plug on the nuclear deal with Iran, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JPCOA), which was concluded with President Barack Obama in 2015. In exchange for the lifting of economic sanctions, it was agreed that Iran would limit its nuclear activities. Trump unilaterally withdrew from this because the agreement was unsound as far as he was concerned, and he imposed new sanctions on the country.
Iran continued to adhere to the agreements after this, in the hope that Europe would maintain the economic benefits of the deal. When that did not happen, the country started enriching more uranium. According to the reports of the UN atomic society, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), in 2020 Iran further expanded its uranium stockpile and deployed more advanced centrifuges, exceeding the limits of the JCPOA.
Iran itself emphasizes the importance of uranium enrichment for medical applications. Enriched uranium is used in the production of medical isotopes: radioactive substances used in scans and cancer treatments. Due to sanctions, Iran had difficulty importing medicines for years, causing the country to place more emphasis on its own production.
In return for NRC Iran expert Peyman Jafari recently said that this is probably not the main reason why Iran enriches uranium. Medical applications mainly require low-enriched uranium, while Iran had enriched about four hundred kilos of uranium to 60 percent — a level much closer to the enrichment level required for nuclear weapons.
The Trump administration is using the real uncertainty about the nuclear program to magnify the threat. American government officials regularly contradict each other. The New York Times compared Trump’s State of the Union address this week to 2003, when his predecessor George W. Bush claimed that Iraq had searched for uranium in Africa. That later turned out to be incorrect.
A satellite image from February 12 shows Iran’s nuclear complex having recovered somewhat after last year’s US bombings.
Satellite image Vantor / Reuters
