Editor’s note: InsideIran’s Reza Akbari conducted an interview with Ali Vaez, a fellow for science and technology and director of the Iran project at the Federation of American Scientists, regarding Iran’s announcement of advances in its nuclear program.
Q: It was reported that Iran has started loading fuel rods into the Tehran Research Reactor. What do Iranian officials hope to communicate to the West by announcing this news?
A: The hype with which Iran trumpets its nuclear achievements was part of a political fanfare designed to send two distinct messages to the West. First, by demonstrating indigenous capability to manufacture fuel rods, Tehran is signaling that what was considered an important bargaining chip for the West is no longer an option. By showcasing its mastery of the nuclear fuel cycle, the Iranian government wants to increase its leverage at the negotiating table. Second, by orchestrating a nuclear spectacle against the backdrop of draconian sanctions on the country’s oil industry and central bank, Tehran is showing its iron resolve to continue its nuclear agenda unabated. It is precisely for this reason that Tehran’s letter to EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton expressing readiness for negotiations was sent on the same day as the announcement of new nuclear achievements.
Q: What does this mean for the outcome of the new round of negotiations? Should we realistically believe that Iran is still willing to negotiate on its nuclear program?
A: In practice, these developments have little tangible impact on the upcoming negotiations. Iran’s past announcements of “extraordinary nuclear achievements” have proven to be mostly bluster. President Ahmadinejad first announced domestic production of the new generation of Iran’s centrifuges (IR-2m and IR-4) during his first term in office. After six years, Iran has only been able to install two cascades of these centrifuges and we still don’t know if they are significantly more efficient from the antiquated IR-1 centrifuges. Despite boasting about 50,000 centrifuges installed at Natanz by 2011, only 8,000 machines are spinning there today. The centrifuge program is plagued with regular breakdowns and the output of the machines is constantly declining.
I am also skeptical of Iran’s claims regarding manufacturing fuel rods with 20 percent enriched uranium. Iran lacks reactors designed to test fuel rods under high pressures and temperatures. They use the Tehran Research Reactor to test their domestically-manufactured fuel, which is not constructed for such purposes. Additionally, the 45-year-old Tehran reactor has a history of technical problems even with its standard fuel. On several occasions, Iran has had to ask for assistance from the International Atomic Energy Agency to resolve problems with fuel rods stocked in the reactor. In reality, Iran is still a long way from being able to produce the medical isotopes needed for the 850,000 cancer patients in the country using domestically produced fuel rods.
Iran’s nuclear progress is much slower than what the Iranian government would like to admit. Having said this, the West should understand that Iran is seeking to project strength. If the West presumes that a weak Iran is more amenable to compromise, the next round of negotiations are doomed to fail. Instead of overlooking the implicit message in Iran’s nuclear spectacle, as State Department’s spokeswoman Victoria Nuland did by calling it, “merely for a domestic audience in Iran,” Washington should start developing a realistic agenda for negotiating with Iran. As the stronger party, the onus of taking the first constructive initiative is on the United States.
Q: It was also reported that Ahmadinejad would formally declare fully operational the underground Fordow uranium-enrichment facility. He did not announce such news. What are the latest stages of development at Fordow?
A: At the moment, four 174-machine cascades of IR-1 centrifuges have been installed at Fordow. According to the IAEA’s last report, only two cascades were installed in November 2011. It seems that uranium hexafluoride gas has now been injected to these machines and enrichment of uranium to 20 percent level has begun. The information, however, remains ambiguous. We have to wait for international nuclear inspectors to visit the site and report their findings in their to IAEA’s board of governors in March.
Q: Israel has threatened to carryout air strikes against Iran’s nuclear facilities. What impact would such a strike have on Iran’s nuclear program?
A: As Secretary of Defense, Leon Panetta, has clearly said, a military strike on Iran’s nuclear installations would at best “delay the program for one to two years.” Drawing parallels with bombing Iraq’s reactor in 1981 or Syria’s nuclear installments in 2007 are irrelevant for the Iranian case.
Iran’s nuclear program is extensive, widely dispersed and much more established. The underlying fuel cycle knowledge in Iran cannot be wiped out with an attack. The main backlash of such a folly would be that an almost certain expulsion of international nuclear inspectors and Iran’s withdrawal from the Nonproliferation Treaty. Under such a scenario, Iran with increased determination, would likely dash towards a nuclear weapon and there is not much that the world could do about it at that stage. The Iranian nuclear crisis has no military solution. Even the threat of military action is counter-productive as it bolsters the argument of hardliners inside Iran, who believe that only a nuclear deterrent can guarantee the survival of the Islamic regime.
