Iran has good drones. We know they evaded patriots in Saudi. We also know that their air defence shot down an airliner full or iranians. So I can predict that when facing a large advanced military, Iran are in deep deep trouble when it comes to Air defence.
Turkey lost 2 Bayraktar in armenian occupied lands. Russian air defence was totally useless. Not so different form patriots in Saudi Arabia. I think these weapons exports that america makes are just there to milk their lesser allies. The Air defence USA gives to israel is free. The air defence Russia gives to Armenia is free.
From the Is conclude that Patriots in Israel probably work pretty good. but s300 anywhere are useless as they failed in Armenia.
Tor-M1 mistakenly shot down the Ukrainian airliner because it lacked optical sensors at the time. It has been equipped with optical sensors since then.
Turkey lost dozens of Bayraktar drones in the Turkish-Syrian clashes. As I said, Armenia had only outdated versions of S300 and it wasn't Armenia itself, but it was Artsakh. Penetrating through layers of air defense is something totally different. Even S500 is useless if it is not used in a network of air defenses.
Turkey would not be able to reassemble a disintegrated bomb. They would have to collect the plutonium scattered around the room after the bomb is blown up by the safety mechanism (sub critical explosion of course). Refine the plutonium it in some sort of a milling process. construct their own implosion device and they would have a bomb.
Naturally, Turkey would develop an implosion device before they took such a drastic step.
You don't steal nukes form the US without a pretty good plan first.
US would invade in about 2-3 weeks with everything they have. I think turkey would have a nuke by then. or they better have a nuke by then or they are totally FUBAR.
Constructing the implosion device and the neutron detonator are not things that Turkey is currently known to be capable of. There is no doubt that Turkey like any other nation can go that way, provided that it invests in that area. But there's no evidence to support that Turkey has done research in that respect, which makes them years away from producing a plutonium bomb, even if they have access to reprocessed plutonium.
Interesting calculations. I trust them. so one bomb in 6 weeks? without installing additional centrifuges. That would be an atomic bomb? gun type A bomb.
Without new centrifuges, how many could they build in the next 3 months?
No, one bomb every 6 weeks with 19,000 SWU UF6 Kg/year. Using Iran's current stockpile of uranium, Iran can produce 3 bombs. Now Iran can reach that enrichment capacity almost instantly either by re-installing IR-1 and IR-2 centrifuges that it had before the JCPOA, or by adding other types of centrifuges. We know that Iran can produce 60 IR-6 centrifuge machines at the ICAC. That will add 300 SWU to Iran's capacity each day. Also, Iran has been working on isotope separation with laser since two decades ago. Iran can go that path again if it pulls out of the JCPOA completely. Laser isotope separation is suitable for clandestine programs.
Without additional centrifuges, assuming an initial feed of 2,500 kilograms of UF6 (which has been confirmed by the latest IAEA report in November), and an enrichment capacity of 7651 SWU (Iran's enrichment capacity is about 9,000 SWU at the moment), Iran can produce about 40 kilograms of 90% enriched uranium in 3 months. Definitely enough for a gun-type bomb.
If Bushehr becomes a breeder reactor, and they find out, it will be gone the same day they discover this fact. i promise you.
so I say iran has 0 kg of plutonium. give or take a few micrograms, right now. Am I wrong or an i right? If I am wrong, how many kilograms do you say they have right now?
They cannot attack an operational nuclear reactor without a regional disaster. The chance of a nuclear leak will be extremely high. Then the direction of wind will take the nuclear leak to the Arab countries in the Persian Gulf region, including Saudi Arabia, making those countries contaminated, resulting in an energy chaos affecting the world economy. There is not even a single case of attacking an operational nuclear reactor in history. Do you think Arabs will accept a Chernobyl right next to them?
No matter how much Saudi Arabia hates Iran, the idea of nuclear contamination does not really sound pleasant to them. I am certain about that.
You said fissile material, including uranium. As
@sha ah said, the latest IAEA report in November estimates Iran's uranium stockpile (4.5% enriched uranium) at 2,442.9 kilograms. (almost 1,000 kilograms less than what I had considered in my calculations before)
Historically, the Little Boy had only 64 kilograms of enriched uranium, of which only a few kilograms of it had been enriched to 90%. The rest of it had been enriched to different percentages ranging from 50% to 90%. The average was about 80%. Also, only a small percentage of the uranium went under fission during the explosion over Hiroshima. Also, you cannot really compare 1940s with now. A gun-type bomb is much easier to build today, and it can achieve a much higher yield.
Also, the recent binding resolution passed by the Iranian parliament will significantly reduce the breakout time in my calculations. If Iran starts producing HALEU (20% enriched uranium), then Iran's breakout time will be much shorter. The JCPOA was designed to increase Iran's breakout time to 1 year. By the JCPOA, Iran's nuclear stockpile was capped at 300 kilograms of 3.5% enriched uranium stockpiled as UF6 and Iran's number of centrifuges was fixed to be about 5060 centrifuges, mostly of the IR-1 type. These limits have been violated by Iran since last year. And Iran has increased the enrichment level to 4.5% instead of 3.5%, which makes a huge difference. (enriching uranium in low percentages is extremely more difficult than in high percentages)
I personally don't think that the West will attack Iran militarily. If they wanted to attack Iran, they would've done it in early 2000s when the world was ready for it (after 9/11) and Iran had a clandestine program. Iran's military power was much weaker than now, having suffered from huge losses in the Iraq-Iran war recently. We didn't have even Shahab-3 missiles back then. Our nuclear program was focused only at few sites on the ground, and the Bushehr nuclear reactor was still under construction by the Russians. Attacking Iran today is extremely more difficult than back in 2000s.
