" Spokesman: Fire At Iran's Natanz Nuclear Facility Caused Significant Damage. Reuters (7/5, Hafezi) reports a fire last week at Iran's underground Natanz nuclear facility "caused significant damage that could slow the development of advanced centrifuges used to enrich uranium, an Iranian nuclear offi

rgman, 18.61M) reports that a "Middle Eastern intelligence official with knowledge of the episode said Israel was responsible for the attack on the Natanz nuclear complex on Thursday, using a powerful bomb. A member of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps who was briefed on the matter also said an ex

bercorps" that Iran's military created in 2011 — partly in response to American and Israeli cyberattacks on the Iranian nuclear enrichment plant at Natanz — though there is no hard evidence that the attacks were sanctioned by the Iranian government. The attacks emanating from Iran have inflicted only

ed, and Iran's production capability has recovered. Iran became aware of the attacks in the summer of 2010, when the computer worm escaped from the Natanz plant and was replicated across the globe. The computer industry soon named the escaped weapon Stuxnet. Iran announced last year that it had begun

't building redundant enrichment facilities. There is a chance, of course, that EFTA00663304 Iran already has secret nuclear facilities (both the Natanz facility and the Fordo facility were carefully hidden from prying eyes for several years before they were discovered), so redundancy might be an in

ee that the Arak reactor is not functional. Fordow would be closed, and all Iranian nuclear EFTA00663298 activity would have to be carried out at Natanz. Last, the transformation to fuel rods would be done outside of Iran to ensure that the Iranians won't ever be able to use the enriched uranium for

eling capabilities. Israeli jets would then have to circumvent Iranian air defenses and drop hundreds of precision-guided munitions on the hardened Natanz enrichment facility, the Fordow enrichment site deep in a mountain near Q(n, the Isfahan uranium-conversion facility, the heavy-water production pl

n plant and plutonium reactor under construction at Arak, and multiple centrifuge production facilities in and around populated areas of Tehran and Natanz. These same aircraft would not be able to reengage any missed targets — they would need to race back to defend Israel against retaliation by Iran a

of malware designed to specifically infect industrial controllers after Stuxnet, which was used to destroy uranium enrichment centrifuges at Iran's Natanz nuclear plant in 2010. EFTA00162783 • Schneider is developing a security enhancement for the Tricon controllers, a tool to detect the malware's p

h of 20 percent enriched uranium (the Fordow facility accounted for 9.5 pounds of this total). The Iranian regime had 8,800 centrifuges spinning at Natanz and 696 at Fordow. Once the Islamic Republic can produce 44 pounds of highly enriched uranium per month, which is not that far off given the EFTA0

something that takes the mountain off," the official said. The official said the MOP may be more effective against Iran's main enrichment plant at Natanz but added: "But even that is guesswork." The Pentagon notified Congress in mid-January that it wants to divert around $82 million to refine the MOP

o build a nuclear weapon: i) the Esfahan uranium conversion plant, where yellow cake is turned into uranium oxide and uranium hexafluoride; ii) the Natanz centrifuge complex; iii) the IR-40 heavy water reactor at Arak, which, though yet to be fueled, offers a plutonium pathway to nuclear arms; iv) the

ll not allow Iran to produce fissile fuel for weapons. Since the U.S. has munitions capable of destroying all of Iran's centrifuges above ground at Natanz and sealing off the entrances to its underground facilities at Fordo—plus the Stealth bombers to deliver these knockout punches-Iran would likely lo

International Atomic Energy Agency]. Daily! So we cannot do anything in Fordow. The only difference that Fordow has from the enrichment facility at Natanz is that Fordow cannot be hit. So if you insist that I should dismantle Fordow, or do something with Fordow, that means that somebody has an intenti

red concentration of U-235 is achieved. Finally, the UF6 is converted back to solid uranium. Iran's largest known enrichment facility, the infamous Natanz, was sabotaged for several years by Stuxnet, the most complex and technologically advanced computer virus ever designed. (Technically, Stuxnet is

egotiation have a long pedigree. They began in 2003, after the revelation that Iran had been secretly constructing a uranium-enrichment facility at Natanz and a heavy-water reactor at Arak. They have continued on and off in different permutations, with the Geneva negotiations the most recent and fulle

2 kilos of uranium enriched to 20%, which is close to bomb- grade. Last month, Iran declared that it would install 3,000 advanced centrifuges at its Natanz facility, which can enrich uranium at two to three times its current rate. As for the sanctions, they may hurt ordinary Iranians but this regime is

for more responsible countries? How could the United States cast greater legitimacy on the previously clandestine centrifuge facilities in Qom and Natanz than on those that would be aboveboard from the outset? Inevitably, multiple countries, including some rogue states, would insist on their own enri

vy water plutonium production reactor of Iran's military nuclear program, and possibly as an alternative to the Iranian uranium enrichment plant in Natanz in the event that it is dismantled. While the Iranian heavy water plutonium production reactor differed from the NK gas-graphite reactor, the urani

pons program. Launching strikes just a few hundred miles away from several likely targets — such as the Isfaham uranium conversion facility and the Natanz uranium enrichment plant — rather than having to attack from domestic airfields would give Israel both enormous tactical surprise and a critical leg

w weapon, dropped over Hiroshima and Nagasaki. That was deliberate overstatement, of course: the United States crashed a few hundred centrifuges at Natanz, it did not vaporize the place. But his point that we are entering a new era in cyberattacks is one the administration itself is trying to make as

months now, Israel has been preparing governments around the world, as well as the international public, for a bombing of the nuclear facilities at Natanz, Fordu and Isfahan using cutting-edge conventional, bunker-busting weapons. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his Defense Minister Ehud Barak a

ling capabilities. Israeli jets would then have to circumvent Iranian air defenses and drop hundreds of precision-guided munitions on the hardened Natanz enrichment facility, the Fordow enrichment site deep in a mountain near Qom, the Isfahan uranium- conversion facility, the heavy-water production pl

-- Exactly ten years ago today the Iranian opposition group, Mujahideen al-Khalq (MeK), revealed the full details of a uranium enrichment plant at Natanz and a heavy water plant at Arak in Iran. Since then Iran and the international community- since 2006, the P5+1 (the U.S., Russia, China, the UK, F