Iran hits softer note over nukes

But President Ahmadinejad issued a strong defense of the Iranian nuclear program this weekend, days before a UN deadline.

from the February 12, 2007 edition

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"Our 'worst case' assessment that they could have a bomb in 2009 hasn't changed," says Mr. Albright, noting that Iran would first have to make a definitive decision to go for a weapon – a step that Albright and other analysts believe that Iran has not yet made – and that "things would have to go well for them," which so far they have not.

"At some point, Iran has got to play its hand on how much it knows, if it is going to install these 3,000 machines this year," says Albright. "It's got to start hooking them together in cascades, and then turn them on and see if they work. I think we are going to learn a lot more in the next month or two about their capabilities."

When Iran first announced last spring that it had enriched uranium to 4.8 percent – high enough for nuclear fuel, but far short of the more than 80 or 90 percent necessary to make weapons-grade material – it declared plans to build its 3,000-centrifuge cascade by the end of 2006.

But technical difficulties and a fluid political dynamic inside Iran that has been partly influenced by surprise at the unanimous Security Council resolution against the Islamic Republic, are affecting Iran's nuclear timeline.

"The biggest impact on [Iran] is fear of what could happen in the future, and more pressure on countries not to invest in Iran. It's embarrassing; they are a very proud nation, and don't like being called a pariah by the Security Council," says Albright. "But is that going to slow down their nuclear program? I don't think so."

Rising tension with the West has been defined by Ahmadinejad's uncompromising language on the nuclear issue, and by denying the Holocaust and calling for the destruction of Israel.

The White House has also ratcheted up its rhetoric in recent weeks, accusing Iran of supplying anti-US militias and insurgents in Iraq with weapons. It has also taken concrete military steps – such as sending a second aircraft carrier battle group to the Persian Gulf, mine sweepers to key oil export routes, and Patriot anti-missile batteries to regional allies.

US officials are preparing a new Security Council resolution that would broaden economic sanctions if Iran fails to meet the Feb. 21 deadline. One addition could be holding Iran in violation of prohibitions of harboring terrorists, The Washington Post reports, because of several key Al Qaeda members officially held under "house arrest" in Iran since late 2001.

But there are growing signals in Iran, too, that pragmatic conservatives – and even Iran's supreme religious leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who refused a meeting requested by Ahmadinejad two weeks ago – have been trying to rein in the president on foreign policy issues.

Ahmedinejad may be more isolated

Ahmadinejad has been further weakened by the failure of his allies in December municipal and Experts Assembly elections. Conservative newspapers have criticized him for bringing Iran closer to war, and more than 100 parliament deputies last week took him to task for foreign policy adventures.

"A lot of [Iranians] think the new sanctions on Iran and the new rising tension between Iran and the US is mainly because of Mr. Ahmadinejad's statements about the Holocaust and so on," says Saeed Laylaz, a political analyst in Tehran. "Everyone thinks the situation is more sensitive than before, and that they should be careful about their statements.... You can see that [Ahmadinejad] these days is more silent."

But a modest muting of such rhetoric does not mean that Iran's nuclear program has lost its popularity, or its utility to Iran's theocratic regime. A placard bearing Ayatollah Khamenei's image at the rally Sunday read: "Achieving indigenous nuclear science is an epochmaking and civilization-building move."

"If the US does not want to give the [Islamic] system security guarantees [that it won't attack Iran], they have no other choice in Tehran but to be as strong as possible," says Mr. Laylaz. "They are going to protect themselves by providing this [nuclear] shield."

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