The Islamic Republic of Iran is now in possession of enough weapons-grade uranium to build its first nuclear warhead in less than a week, according to a new report from the Institute for Science and International Security. The nuclear watchdog group further reports that Tehran has the capacity to expand its arsenal to six warheads within a single month, posing an “extreme danger” to the West as conflicts escalate across the Middle East.
As first reported by the Washington Free Beacon, the Institute’s dire assessment issued on Monday warned that the threat of a nuclear-armed Iran has “increased dramatically” since May 2023. The October 7th Hamas attacks on Israel, Israel’s military response, and the conflict between Western powers and Houthi militants in Yemen have only increased the danger.
“The volatile situation in the region is providing Iran with a unique opportunity and increased internal justification for building nuclear weapons while the United States and Israel’s resources to detect and deter Iran from succeeding are stretched thin,” the group wrote. “Iran’s nuclear weapons capabilities are more dangerous than they have ever been, while its relations with the West are at a low point.”
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These findings led the Institute to issue an “extreme danger” assessment—the first time such a declaration has been made since the group began monitoring Tehran’s nuclear progress in October 2022.
The report’s most alarming revelation was Iran’s shockingly brief nuclear breakout time, or the time required to convert uranium enriched for energy into weapons-grade materials.
“If Iran wanted to further enrich its 60 percent enriched uranium up to 90 percent weapon-grade uranium (WGU), used in Iran’s known nuclear weapons designs from the Amad Plan, it could do so quickly,” the report said. “It can break out and produce enough weapon-grade enriched uranium for a nuclear weapon in a week, using only a fraction of its 60 percent enriched uranium. This breakout could be difficult for inspectors to detect promptly if Iran took steps to delay inspectors’ access.”
The Institute further indicated that Tehran’s additional stock of 20 percent enriched uranium could be converted into another six warheads in one month, “and after five months of producing weapon-grade uranium, it could have enough for twelve.”
In recent years, Iran has gone to great lengths to conceal its nuclear enrichment programs from international inspectors, moving most of its contested facilities deep underground where American “bunker buster” bombs may not be able to reach them.
Related: US Launches Retaliatory Strikes on Iranian Proxies in Syria and Iraq
The reassessment of Iran’s threat to the West came just after the Biden administration launched a series of strikes against Iranian proxy groups responsible for a bombing that killed three American soldiers in Jordan late last month. In this “sharp escalation” of the years-long standoff between the US and Iran, targets linked to the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corp (IRGC) Quds Forces were eliminated with drone and missile strikes. Other strikes destroyed command centers and weapons depots. President Joe Biden has promised additional reprisals but has not committed to a strategy that involves strikes within Iran itself.
The full report from the Institute for Science and International Security can be read below:
Iran-Threat-Geiger-Counter_January-2024.docx-Iran-Threat-Geiger-Counter_January-2024.docx-2Download
Connor Walcott is a staff writer for Valuetainment.com. Follow Connor on X and look for him on VT’s “The Unusual Suspects.”
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