From the ArcaMax Publishing, News & Features Newsletter:
http://www.arcamax.com/news/newsheadlines/s-390575-529160
WASHINGTON (UPI) -- A military strike against Iran's nuclear
facilities likely would do little more than delay its development of
nuclear weapons, weapons experts warned Friday.
Further, the Institute for Science and International Security said in
a report, a surprise attack could strengthen Tehran's resolve to
acquire the nuclear arms, the Washington Post reported.
The analysis said it found Iran's uranium facilities too widely
scattered and protected to be effectively destroyed by warplanes and
any damage could be quickly repaired.
"Following an attack, Iran could quickly rebuild its centrifuge
program in small, easily hidden facilities focused on making
weapon-grade uranium for nuclear weapons," principal author David
Albright, ISIS president and a former U.N. weapons inspector, said.
The study is set for release Friday. It says comparisons between a
possible Iran airstrike and the Israeli destruction of Saddam
Hussein's Osirak reactor in 1981 aren't valid. The 1981 incident dealt
a crippling blow to Iraq's nuclear hopes, but, it said, the Iranian
program is much better protected and wouldn't be vulnerable to
elimination in a single blow, the Post said.
Despite heavy fortification, the huge, subterranean Natanz uranium
enrichment plant, the core of Iran's program, could be heavily damaged
in an airstrike but the centrifuges could be replaced rapidly, perhaps
in hidden underground facilities, the report said.
"Iran would likely launch a 'crash' program to quickly obtain nuclear
weapons," Albright told the Post in an interview.