Don't be comforted by this offer by Iran:
Iran has more enriched uranium than it needs and plans to use that as a bargaining chip at nuclear talks in Geneva next week, Iranian Parliament Speaker Ali Larijani said Wednesday.
I explained the ploy recently:
Uranium enrichment can be manipulated to change the time frame. If Iran wants to appear farther away, they use some of their stockpile for nuclear fuel purposes. For Iran, they get to look farther away from a bomb by reducing the on hand nuclear bomb material while increasing their production capacity to quickly enrich Uranium.
And keep in mind that Iran needs long-range missiles and a warhead to go along with their bomb material. They don't have a nuclear weapon until they have all three, so getting all programs to cross the finish line at the same time is ideal. And the bomb material stockpile is the most visible indicator.
So if Iran draws down that stockpile it is likely because the other legs of their weapons program are not keeping up.
In a story that is a test of whether you believe diplomacy is possible or a ruse, I fear that the Iranians sincerely mean this:
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani has said the country is determined to resolve the nuclear dispute in a "short period of time".
After decades of seeking nuclear weapons, does this mean Iran will quickly end their program or that they expect to go nuclear and "resolve" the dispute by going nuclear--as they've insisted is their "right?"
I fear the latter and don't see any reasonable way to hope for the latter.
So while we pursue of deal that isn't possible with Iran, our ally and foe of Iran worries what deal we will cut with Iran at their expense:
The real focus of Saudi anger is the Shi'ite Muslim clerics who have preached Islamic revolution since coming to power in Tehran 34 years ago, and whose hands Riyadh sees orchestrating political foes in half a dozen Arab countries.
Already aghast at U.S. reluctance to back rebels fighting Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, Tehran's strongest Arab friend, Saudi princes were horrified to see Washington reaching out to Hassan Rouhani, the new Iranian president, last month.
In what world does it make sense that our diplomacy consists of worrying friends and reassuring enemies?
And it isn't just Saudi Arabia:
An unmistakable sense of unease is growing in global capitals as the U.S. government from afar looks increasingly befuddled. America is shirking from a military confrontation in Syria, stymied at home by a gridlocked Congress and in danger of defaulting on sovereign debt, which could plunge the world's financial system into chaos.
While each may be unrelated to the direct exercise of U.S. foreign policy, taken together they give some allies the sense that Washington is not as firm as it used to be in its resolve and its financial capacity, providing an opening for China or Russia to fill the void, an Asian foreign minister told a group of journalists in New York this past week.
At this rate, just who do we expect to lead from behind?
UPDATE: I'll also repeat what I've often noted. The Iranians know we look at their stock of enriched Uranium to judge how far Iran is from going nuclear. If I was Iran, I'd appear far from building home-grown nukes and quietly prepare to deploy nuclear weapons using non-local sources so that America and Israel would be caught by surprise by an announcement that Iran has a nuclear deterrent.
Would either of us attack if we thought we couldn't guarantee knocking out all tne nuclear missiles Iran might have?
Hey! Guess who has enough nuclear material for ten nuclear bombs? North Korea:
The North has defied international warnings not to build nuclear and long-range missiles and is believed to have enough fissile material to build up to 10 nuclear bombs.
North Korea can't mount them on a missile yet. So why wouldn't North Korea sell half of that to Iran who may have a usable nuclear warhead design supplied by Pakistan's rogue nuclear scientist before we pressured Pakistan to shut down his private proliferation network?
