'Time running out for Iran strike'


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Yaakov Katz, THE JERUSALEM POST  Jul. 10, 2007 

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Predicting that sanctions will ultimately fail to stop Teheran's nuclear
program, Brig.-Gen. (res.) Yossi Kuperwasser, former head of Military
Intelligence's Research Division, told The Jerusalem Post on Monday that
time to launch an effective military strike against Iran's nuclear
installations was running out. 

According to Kuperwasser, who stepped down from his post last year, Iran
is "very close" to the point that it will cross the technological
threshold and have the capability to enrich uranium at an industrial
level. Once they master the technology, the Iranians will have the ability
to manufacture a nuclear device within two to three years, he added. 

"The program's vulnerability to a military operation is diminishing as
time passes," Kuperwasser said, "and they are very close to the point that
they will be able to enrich uranium at an industrial level." 


Report: Iranian general providing top intel. to US 
In an article entitled "Halting Iran's Nuclear Weapons Program: Iranian
Vulnerabilities and Western Policy Options" published this week by the
Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs - run by former Israeli ambassador to
the UN Dr. Dore Gold - Kuperwasser spells out what he believes is the only
course of action that will stop Iran's race to nuclear power. 

Thanks to technological sophistication, advances in producing raw
materials as well as intermediate products and the improvement in
protection of the program's components, the Western world is beginning to
find it difficult to plan an effective strike against Iran's nuclear
facilities, he said. 

On Monday, The Washington Post revealed new satellite photos of Iran's
enrichment facility at Natanz which showed the digging of a tunnel that
analysts said could be used to hide and protect key nuclear components. 

Iran, Kuperwasser said, was working on two parallel tracks - one at Natanz
to enrich uranium and the plutogenic track being worked on at the Arak
heavy water facility. 

As long as Russia was not aligned with the United States, Kuperwasser said
sanctions would not work on their own to stop Iran. 

"For significant sanctions to be effective the world needs to at the same
time threaten the use of military force," he said. "Iran needs to be made
to understand that if the sanctions won't work, the world is prepared to
use military force to stop the nuclear program." 

He said Iran was preparing for the possibility of war, but that deep down
the Islamic leadership did not believe that either the United States or
Israel were in a position of strength that would enable them to launch
such a complicated military operation. Iran, he said, was purchasing
Russian air defense systems and was fortifying its nuclear facilities and
moving key elements to underground bunkers in preparation for the
possibility that its assessments were wrong and it would in the end be
attacked. 

"The Iranians are working around the clock on improving military
capabilities and they are also moving centrifuges to underground
facilities," he said. 

Kuperwasser said that a real threat of military action - backed up by
credible threats by world leaders as well as the deployment of a large
military force to the region - could have the right effect in deterring
Iranian leaders from continuing with their nuclear program. 

A credible military threat combined with economic leverage had a chance at
preventing the need for a future clash with a nuclear Iran and perhaps
could also make it unnecessary to deal today with an Iran that is close to
nuclearization, he said.



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