April 11, 2006: Dancing with Uranium

By Laura Mansfield with assistance from analyst JBean

Birthdays are a milestone – a day to recognize the symbolic passage from one age to the next.

It is especially notable that today, the day which Muslims throughout the world celebrate the birthday of the Prophet Mohamed, is the date when Iran’s President has selected to announce the entry of Iran into the “International Nuclear Power Club’.

Coming on the heels of the “Blessed Prophet” war games, where Iran showed off its new weapons, including a missile capable of carrying nuclear warheads, it is obvious that the selection of the date is intentional.

Iran has announced that it has crossed the threshold into the nuclear zone because it is now able to enrich its own uranium. True, enriched uranium can be used for peaceful purposes. But despite verbal claims from Iran’s leaders that its intent is to not develop nuclear weapons, their actions and their words in Farsi indicate otherwise.

Iran has a long and rich history; western civilization owes much to early Persian history.

But Iran has not demonstrated to the world community that it has the maturity to handle such a power. Allowing Iran to have nuclear weapons makes about as much since as giving a 15 year old boy a Ferrari as his first car. Sure, he wants it. But there’s a very high probability that he will wreck the car, and with a car that powerful, it’s likely that someone is going to die.

During the ceremony when Iran’s President announced that the enrichment milestone had been met, there were dancers on stage celebrating the announcement. The dancers performed beautifully, but according to state-run news agency IRNA in their hands they held vials of low grade uranium in their hands.

While the radiation danger was almost certainly negligible, the symbolism was clear.

Nuclear power is not a toy. Radiation is nothing to play with.

A nuclear Iran is frightening. Almost certainly today, in the capitals of Europe and the United States, a frantic discussion was getting underway about what to do in the wake of this latest announcement. Certainly there will be hawks calling for an attack on Iran, to defang its nuclear capability.

I can think of one very good reason for the US and Israel not to attack Iran at this time.

Iran wants us to attack them.

The last people who should be dictating the actions of the US government are the rulers of Iran.

April 11, 2006: Iran's President to announce "good news" re nuclear program; link to watch speech live

According to IRNA, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is to deliver a very important speech on Tuesday night, it was announced on Tuesday.

It's worth noting that today is being widely observed by Muslim's as the anniversary of the Prophet Mohamed's birthday, a holiday known as "Moulid al Nabi".

President's speech is to be broadcast live on IRNA web site (www.irna.ir).

The president is to address the nation on some very significant issues concerning Iran's nuclear program.

Ahmadinejad who is Khorasan Razavi province on his eleventh provincial tour, announced Monday "He is to give some good news on Iran's peaceful nuclear activities soon."

It has been widely speculated that Ahmadinejad will announce that Iran has successfully enriched uranium.

You can watch the speech live at this link.

We'll bring you an update as soon as the speech airs and our translator completes the translation