Is Iran trying to develop a missile that could reach America?

An Iranian missile under construction, caught up in a mysterious blast in November, had a range of 6,000 miles, a senior Israeli official said Thursday in a speech outside Tel Aviv.

|
Hamed Jafarnejad/Fars News Agency/AP/File
In this undated file photo, a Ghader missile is launched at the shore of sea of Oman during Iran's navy drill. A missile under construction at an Iranian research-and-development facility, which was damaged by a mysterious explosion in November, was a long-range missile prototype with a range of 6,000 miles.

Is Iran trying to develop a missile that could reach the "Great Satan"?

The missile under construction at an Iranian research-and-development facility, which was damaged by a mysterious explosion in November, was a long-range missile prototype with a range of 6,000 miles – enough to hit the United States, a senior Israeli official said Thursday in a speech to a defense and security forum.

At the time of the Nov. 12 explosion at a facility some 30 miles outside Tehran, Iranian officials insisted that the suspicious blast was an accident. It occurred, they said, during experimentation on a medium-range missile – one capable of reaching Israel.

But on Thursday, Moshe Yaalon, Israel’s vice prime minister and minister of strategic affairs, said in a speech outside Tel Aviv that the missile under development actually had a range closer to 6,000 miles.

“That’s the Great Satan,” Mr. Yaalon said, using the well-known pejorative term that Iranian officials have used for the US. “It was aimed at America, not at us.”

If true, Yaalon’s claim would put Iran’s missile development program into a new league. Until now, most arms analysts have estimated that the range of Iranian missiles is limited to about 1,500 miles – enough, to be sure, to reach Israel and parts of Europe. But analysts have speculated very little on research into or development of a longer-range missile.

One Washington weapons research organization, the Institute for Science and International Security, did conclude in a late November report on the Iranian facility explosion that the blast occurred just as Iran had achieved “a major milestone in the development of a new missile.”

The institute said its investigation revealed that the explosion took place during a tricky and volatile procedure involving a missile engine. Postexplosion speculation had centered on sabotage that might have been part of what many experts assume is a covert war against Iran’s nuclear and weapons programs, being carried out by Israel, the US, and perhaps other Western countries.

But the claim issued by Yaalon, who just last week was in Washington to confer with US officials on Iran’s nuclear program, may also have been aimed at convincing the US that Iran poses a dangerous and growing threat – not just to Israel and the Middle East region, but also to countries farther afield.

Yaalon said in his speech that the West does not yet realize how much of a threat is posed by Iran, which he called “a nightmare for the free world.” In reality, he said, Israel in the Iranian regime’s eyes is only the “little Satan,” while America, as leader of the West, is “the larger Satan.”

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

QR Code to Is Iran trying to develop a missile that could reach America?
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Foreign-Policy/2012/0202/Is-Iran-trying-to-develop-a-missile-that-could-reach-America
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe