Harder to tell with Iran as it always has earthquakes. It's probably just coincidence as they're not as advanced as Korea were, they're still some way from making a viable device. The statement itself indicated that they were far in advance of where the IAEA thought they were.
Which at least puts an end to the nonsense claims that Iran is or has been in compliance with the IAEA.Originally Posted by Sync
However I would warrent a guess that Iran has gotten much more nuclear material than anyone outside Iran knows about. Before the rise of the Taliban in Afghanistan there was much alarm about the proliferation of nuclear material coming illegally from Russian sources. Its strange that although the issue has died away, the material which was proven to be on the black market in Afghanistan and Pakistan, was never the subject of much publicised recovery. So where did it go? We know it was out there, but we have no clue how much there was, in what form it was and where it ended up. I would put good money on Iran having gotten it hands on highly refined material during the period when the world turned its back on the region just after the Soviot Unions collapse.
When a Russian officer can sell his entire company into slavery during the first chechen war and entire ex-Soviot tank battalians can go 'missing', whats the likelihood Iran could buy what it wanted on the black market from Russian sources during that period? Very high in my opinion. In terms of 'nuclear related' material Iran could have gotten it hands on an aweful lot of stuff, putting it again far in advance of IAEA estimates.
Iran is only some way off having a viable device by IAEA estimates, which again have fallen short. Will Iran test a bomb in March or any time soon? No, I don't think so. They would want to have an arsenal ready and fitted to rockets in order to stave off any attack aimed at curtailing their nuclear weapons capability.
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