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A Company’s Discretion Detects Large Iranian Valve Orders
January 28, 2009

In this case, a company used its knowledge about its products’ end uses as well as its expertise in identifying suspicious equipment requests to detect Iranian attempts to procure a… Read More ›

Has Iran painted itself into a corner?
January 24, 2009

A piece in today’s Times (UK) suggests that Iran has depleted much of its yellowcake stockpile, most of it procured from South Africa in… Read More ›

Nuclear Iran: Not Inevitable
January 23, 2009

Few foreign policy and national security issues have dominated debate in the United States and abroad as Iran’s nuclear program has.  Is its declared civil uranium enrichment program a cover… Read More ›

India’s Reliance to halt gasoline exports to Iran
January 10, 2009

Reliance Industries, an Indian company which operates the world’s largest oil refinery at Jamnagar, on the west coast of India, announced this week that it would halt exports of gasoline… Read More ›

January 28, 2009
A Company’s Discretion Detects Large Iranian Valve Orders

In this case, a company used its knowledge about its products’ end uses as well as its expertise in identifying suspicious equipment requests to detect Iranian attempts to procure a large number of valves for its gas centrifuge program. The illicit procurement agents requested items not on international control lists of dual-use items, hoping to evade detection while still obtaining equipment adequate for use in a gas centrifuge uranium enrichment plant.

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January 21, 2009
Nuclear Iran:  Not Inevitable

Few foreign policy and national security issues have dominated debate in the United States and abroad as Iran’s nuclear program has.  Is its declared civil uranium enrichment program a cover for an effort to secretly build nuclear weapons?  What should be done to stop Iran from developing a capability to build nuclear weapons?  The Obama administration faces a formidable and urgent challenge to sculpt a policy that can convince Iran to abandon or defer a nuclear weapons capability.  This report seeks to answer several key questions about how much Iran has achieved.  It also offers a roadmap for resolving the nuclear issue both peacefully and in a manner that would redirect Iran away from proliferation-sensitive parts of the fuel cycle, in particular uranium enrichment, while strengthening international monitoring of its nuclear capabilities.  Part I of this report contains an overview of Iran’s uranium enrichment program with an emphasis on questions related to Iran’s nuclear weapons capability, including when it might achieve such a capability and the state of evidence suggesting research and development of a weapons program.  Part II looks to the recent nuclear histories of Pakistan and South Africa as possible futures for Iran’s nuclear program and draws out key lessons from those experiences.  Part III offers a detailed set of recommendations and specific steps that the incoming administration should consider as it seeks to confront the specific challenges posed by Iran’s nuclear program in a wider context of competing regional political and security concerns.

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