Moon of Alabama Brecht quote
May 13, 2012

AP Presents SketchUp Of Nanodiamond Chamber As Nuclear Issue

Do you remember those rather infamous drawings of mobile bio-weapon laboratories Colin Powell presented to the United Nations Security Council as "proof" for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq?

The guy who drew those is back:

An image said to come from inside an Iranian military site shows an explosives containment chamber of the type needed for nuclear arms-related tests that U.N. inspectors suspect Tehran has conducted at the site. Iran denies such testing and has neither confirmed nor denied the existence of such a chamber.

The image was provided to The Associated Press by an official of a country tracking Iran’s nuclear program who said the drawing proves the structure exists, despite Tehran’s refusal to acknowledge it.

The official said he could not discuss the drawing’s origins beyond that it was based on information from a person who had seen the chamber at the Parchin military site, adding that going into detail would endanger the life of that informant. His country, a member of the International Atomic Energy Agency, is severely critical of Iran’s assertions that its nuclear activities are peaceful and asserts they are a springboard for making atomic arms.

A former senior IAEA official said he believes the drawing is accurate. Olli Heinonen, until last year the U.N. nuclear agency’s deputy director general in charge of the Iran file, said it was “very similar” to a photo he recently saw that he believes to be the pressure chamber the IAEA suspects is at Parchin.

Yeah! sure! But that image the AP's dubious anti-Iranian sources delivered looks like a fifteen minutes training exercise for Google SketchUp newbies and I can easly provide a better and more real one.


This is a detonation tank to create nanodiamonds, not a nuclear device.

In the late 1990s the Iranians had a contract with an Ukrainian scientist who had earlier worked at a Soviet research facility that was also involved with nuclear weapons. But that scientist, Vyacheslav Danilenko, is a lifelong expert in creating nano-diamonds by detonations in closed, bus-sized water filled explosion chambers. He is NOT a nuclear scientist.

In a recent write up on Iran's nuclear program even the prestigious CSIS analyst Anthony H. Cordesman admits that much:

The [IAEA] Agency has been able to verify through three separate routes, including the expert himself, that this person was in Iran from about 1996 to about 2002, ostensibly to assist Iran in the development of a facility and techniques for making ultra-dispersed diamonds (“UDDs” or “nanodiamonds”), where he also lectured on explosion physics and its applications.

Furthermore, the Agency has received information from two Member States that, after 2003, Iran engaged in experimental research involving a scaled down version of the hemispherical initiation system and high explosive charge referred to in paragraph 43 above, albeit in connection with non-nuclear applications. This work, together with other studies made known to the Agency in which the same initiation system is used in cylindrical geometry, could also be relevant to improving and optimizing the multipoint initiation design concept relevant to nuclear applications.

There are civilian applications for nearly all technological fields one needs to build nuclear weapons. Many things could be used in a nuclear weapons program and that includes knifes and forks. That means that any decently industrialized country is likely to have all these technologies available. It is therefore then "nuclear capable" which means that it could make nuclear weapons if it wanted to. That is the case for the Netherlands just as much as it is for Brazil and Japan and Poland and Iran and several dozen other countries.

Instead of that SketchUp exercise of some junior Israeli disinformation agent AP should just publish the picture of the detonation chamber Danilenko build for his own Ukrainian company to create nano diamonds. We are pretty sure that it is much more similar to the one in Parchim, Iran, than that rough computer graphic the AP is using here to spread disinformation onto the public.

Posted by b on May 13, 2012 at 19:41 UTC | Permalink

Comments

in less than 45 minutes...

Posted by: ralphieboy | May 13 2012 19:43 utc | 1

It seems someone wants to throw a monkey wrench into the upcoming P5 + 1 talks..Where's Colin Powell when you need him?

I mean, If they really wanted to scared the people, they could've hired a better computer graphic designer to come up with a better drawing. What next? A drawing of an exploding Iranian nuke? This is what passes for evidence these days. lol

Funny how the real perpetrators hide behind the MEK to give this latest bogus hit piece some weight.This is purely a Mossad disinformation campaign using the MEK as a front. Of course the MEK get their cut by receiving huge sums of US tax dollars given to Israel by the US and some political cover in some EU capitals and Washington.

Think about it. What excuse will Israel have to demonize Iran when the P5 + 1 manage reach a deal with Iran in Baghdad? Looks like the US is tired of going round in circles in the Iranian nuclear saga and want a way out. Same goes for the other actors involved. Israel's feeling really isolated right now.

Posted by: Zico | May 13 2012 21:23 utc | 2

There's a Fukushima angle here: while the world waits for disasters, the international agency tasked with overseeing "peaceful" nuclear development, headed by a veteran of the cartel responsible for Fukushima, is involved in promoting Mossad fabrications in order to earn brownie points from a US political class which talks of offering leadership while it pursues aims so sordid and idiotic (raising funds for TV ads) that posterity will marvel at the fact that none of those concerned is ever likely to be punished.
As war looms and environmental catastrophe looks certain, America, watched admiringly by Europe, considers the critical question of whether persons similarly furnished with genitalia should be allowed to marry.

Posted by: bevin | May 13 2012 21:36 utc | 3

But of course they use that for nuke research. Albright even found puddles just outside the building.

I'm thinking that AP will get specially leaked Taiwanese animation of the blast chamber next...

Posted by: Jim White | May 13 2012 21:43 utc | 4

well, the truth is that any technologically-advanced society can build nukes. it's not that hard once you figure out enrichment. stuff like nanodiamonds research only makes you more efficient at it. because you build up a knowledge base of how to do computer modeling of the wavefronts, better at chemistry, etc. you could just as well use that knowledge base for making better demolitions, shape charges for conventional warfare like tank busters, etc. the secrets of nature simply can't be hidden from inquisitive minds. all these things and more will be theirs.

and that's really the rub here. they want more of a Saudi model, which is a bunch of rubes buying toys from us that they themselves don't know how to create, and which we ourselves can still overpower. they don't want an independent Iran, but a dependency that still manages to recover a great many oil dollars. not to mention maintaining the image of savages so backwards as to be incapable of detonating explosives that aren't attached to them.

education is an empire threat. Japan after all is considered only a "screwdriver's turn" away from assembling its own nuke arsenal. and they've got space capability, so they can lob ICBMs, as well. (waiting to see how brian will choose to interpret this).

Posted by: Proton Soup | May 14 2012 0:44 utc | 5

Like all good comedy the secret is the timing.

And look at the pitch-perfect timing for this crayon-sketched nonsense i.e. just when Iran is supposed to be meeting with the IAEA and then with the P5+1.

But what's the point? Nobody who makes any difference is going to take this "scoop" seriously.
Certainly not the Iranians - why should they? - and certainly not the P5+1, who all know this was sketched up at Mossad-HQ.

The IAEA? Heck, I wouldn't be surprised at anything where Amano is concerned.

But so what? Amano takes orders, he doesn't bark 'em out.

Posted by: Johnboy | May 14 2012 1:37 utc | 6

I do love the part attributed to Olli Heinonen: "it was 'very similar' to a photo he recently saw that he believes to be the pressure chamber the IAEA suspects is at Parchin. He said even the colors of the computer-generated drawing matched that of the photo he had but declined to go into the origins of the photo to protect his source."

No shit, heh, Olli?

It is pretty obvious that the "source" who provided the photo to Heinonen is the same "source" who provided that u-beaut computer graphic to AP, in which case it would be most surprising if the colors DIDN'T match.

After all, if the graphic artist was working from the same photo that Ol' Olli had then the colors are going to match unless, of course, Mossad hires colorblind graphic artists.

Here's a hint, Olli: if your source and AP's source are one and the same then that computer graphic IS NOT an independent confirmation of that color photo that you have in your possession, precisely because *this* computer graphic was actually generated from *that* color photo.


Here's another tip, Olli: if YOU have a photo of that implosion chamber then why don't YOU release it? That way everyone can marvel at how close the computer graphic is to that photo. You know, even down to the angle and the elevation.

Posted by: Johnboy | May 14 2012 1:51 utc | 7

Some quick points regarding the AP article itself.
1) Both the "senior diplomat" and Heinonen confirm that the chamber was built in Arak by Azar AB Industries.

Conclusion: that appears to be a solid fact.

2) Only the "senior diplomat" has quoted the dimensions i.e. neither Heinonen nor did anyone else will confirm it.

Conclusion: those dimensions are questionable.

3) Not even the "senior diplomat" will confirm the presence of neutron detectors, saying only that they would "make sense".

Conclusion: that ain't no "fact" at all, being mere conjecture.

4) That "senior diplomat" insists that tests were done in 2003, 2005 and 2006, while the AMERICANS don't believe the 2005/2006 dates.

Conclusion: the "senior diplomat" isn't American, which means he is Israeli.

5) Albright and Fitzpatrick's assertion that Iran is meticulously scouring Parchim by hosing it down and letting the residue run out onto the ground is - let's be honest here - self-contradictory.

Conclusion: Complete and utter nonsense.

6) Fitzpatrick's assertion that Iran has "learnt" from past experience and can now scrub down a contaminated site in such a way as to defeat the IAEA tests appears to be based upon.... nothing. Nothing at all.

Conclusion: Fitzie is making his excuses for when the IAEA goes to Parchim and can not detect anything.

Putting it all together:
An Israeli "diplomat" has fed this information to AP, and the only confirmation the reporter has been able to get is that both Olli and Mossad are in agreement about when this chamber was made and who made it.

As to the core questions of:
"What is it used for?"
and
"When was it in use?"
the reporter has nothing to go on EXCEPT what that Israeli "diplomat" has just told him.

Posted by: Johnboy | May 14 2012 2:24 utc | 8

One final comment comparing that computer graphic to the text.....

The dimensions of that implosion chamber is quoted as being:
"Volume: 300 cubic meters, or about 10,600 feet. Diameter: 4.6 meters, or 15.09 feet. Length: 18. 8 meters, or 61.68 feet."

Those are pretty precise measurements, claimed to be accurate down to decimal-points.

I'll note that the photo at Alit claims that their implosion chamber is 100 cubic meters i.e. considerably smaller.
There is no indication of the volume nor the dimensions of the chamber shown at ISL in France.

The questions I'm asking are this:
Q1) Is a volume of 300 cubic meters incompatible with a claim that this chamber is used to produce nano-diamonds?
Q2) Is a volume of 300 cubic meters compatible with a claim that it is used to test the "triggering a nuclear explosion"?
and finally
Q3) Are those dimensions compatible with the computer graphic supplied to AP by Mossad? (note the door, which is the only thing giving any indication of scale)

Posted by: Johnboy | May 14 2012 2:51 utc | 9

Awww, look, one last comment.....

AP: "That official said the image is based on information from a person who had seen the chamber at the Parchin military site,"......

Got that? This is ROCK-SOLID human intel, gleaned first-hand from A Dude Who Was There And Saw It With His Own Eyes.

AP: ....."and a neutron detection system outside the explosion chamber to measure neutron emissions."

Got that? Our ROCK-SOLID, first-hand, seen-it-with-my-own-eyes source tells us that there is a neutron detector bolted to the outside of that implosion chamber.

AP: ..."The senior diplomat said these features would make sense for such testing, but could not verify they existed,"....

Whaaaaaaat the f**k?!?!?!?!

You've just claimed that you had a ROCK-SOLID, first-hand, seen-it-with-my-own-eyes source staring straight at that chamber.

Now,
a) DID HE see a neutron detector bolted onto the back of it, or
b) DIDN'T HE see a neutron detector bolted onto the back?

AP: "suggesting they may have been added after the Iranians put up the superstructure shielding the chamber from satellite surveillance."

Whaaaaaaat the f**k?!?!?!?!?!

You spent the entire article claiming that your information has come from a ROCK-SOLID, first-hand, seen-it-with-my-own-eyes source from INSIDE the building, yet now you are refusing to confirm anything that happened after that roof was put on i.e. after the satellites went blind.

Now, color me sceptical, but did do you glean any intel from inside that building, or didn't you?

Because if you did then you'd be able to confirm some stuff from after the roofing of that building, yet here you are unwilling/unable to confirm anything that happened after your satellites went blind.

This ROCK-SOLID, first-hand, seen-it-with-my-own-eyes source doesn't ACTUALLY exist, does he......

Posted by: Johnboy | May 14 2012 3:56 utc | 10

Isn't lying to their citizens an impeachable offense?
We need a bushel basket for our serial liars peaches of speeches.
This sh*t is gettin old,man.
Ron Paul 2012!

Posted by: dahoit | May 14 2012 14:09 utc | 11

Politicians and telling the truth -- I vaguely recall a study which showed that politicians tend to tell the truth to other pols, whether foreign or their own nation's, but they tend to lie to their own people.

Now, I have no recollection of where I read that...in left blogistan somewhere.

Anyone remember this? With more precision than my memory of it?

It just made so much sense to me, albeit one would hope for the opposite: Pols should be truthful with their own people; if they lie, it would seen they would lie to foreign governments....

Posted by: jawbone | May 14 2012 15:48 utc | 12

Haaretz was surprisingly forthright today, basically admitting that Israel is behind the leaks because its afraid there might actually be a deal:

http://www.haaretz.com/blogs/diplomania/israel-fears-nuclear-deal-between-iran-world-powers-1.430423

Posted by: Bill | May 14 2012 15:57 utc | 13

Re 13

In the end, it's probably all a trick. Israel is not going to attack Iran. If they were going to do so, they would have done it already.

Posted by: alexno | May 14 2012 20:54 utc | 14

Yeah, they just want to be the dominant force in the ME. If Israel can't be a civiliced society, then every country around it has to be kept backwards and underdeveloped too.

Posted by: Alexander | May 14 2012 21:03 utc | 15

dahoit @ 11, your boy Ron Paul needs to explain how he plans to regulate the private militias which will flourish as federal support for the army wanes.

Posted by: ruralito | May 14 2012 22:25 utc | 16

Haaretz was surprisingly forthright today, basically admitting that Israel is behind the leaks because its afraid ... there might actually be a deal:

On the other hand, what are the odds that surprisingly forthright Haaretz is afraid that people might stop having inane conversations about Iran and start discussing the fact that Jews have already Wiped (most of) Palestine Off The Map, by killing Palestinians and stealing their land?

Posted by: Hoarsewhisperer | May 15 2012 1:55 utc | 17

"Iran wants to wipe Israel off the map" is just another example of Jews accusing others of crimes they're committing themselves and calling it Jewish humour.
Whining incessantly about one Holocaust while perpetrating another in Palestine is another example of Jewish humout.

Posted by: Hoarsewhisperer | May 15 2012 2:20 utc | 18

One needs to be careful of how that statement was translated. He meant "eradicating the Zionist state of Israel", not eliminating all the people living there. There is a significant distinction there.

Posted by: ralphieboy | May 15 2012 11:40 utc | 19

PNAC nut job David Wurmser raises his head after a long silence in google alerts. Expecting an Israeli attack on Iran by Summers end.

Israel Is Using American Stealth Choppers To Ferry Iranian Spies Into Iraq

http://www.businessinsider.com/israel-is-using-american-black-ops-choppers-to-ferry-iranian-spies-into-iraq-2012-5

Posted by: Eureka Springs | May 15 2012 14:42 utc | 20

This (incredible expanding) map didn't come from Ha'aretz. Nor is it ever likely to appear in an Ha'aretz article. But only because it's illegal to even THINK about the Nakba in Jewish Occupied Palestine, let alone talk or publish pictures about it.
http://www.norwichpsc.org.uk/palestine_map_1948_eng.jpg

The "Israelis" should learn to mind their own business the way Iranians have for the past 400+ years.

Posted by: Hoarsewhisperer | May 15 2012 14:47 utc | 21

Here's the Incredible Shrinking Palestine (1946 to 2011).
http://hellaheaven-ana.blogspot.com.au/2011/10/palestine-map-of-loss-land-1946-to-2011.html

Posted by: Hoarsewhisperer | May 15 2012 15:09 utc | 22

Looks like a cucumber with a fungal infection.

Posted by: Alexander | May 15 2012 15:20 utc | 23

Israel Is Using American Stealth Choppers To Ferry Iranian Spies Into Iraq

The problem the spineless "Israelis" have is the same one the spineless, hardware-obsessed Yankees won't/can't face...

Mechanical hardware is no substitute for biological hardware aka cajones.
Just ask Nasrallah ... or the Afghans.

Posted by: Hoarsewhisperer | May 15 2012 16:42 utc | 24

Hoarsewhisperer, You're just too informed to engage. Who would want to argue with someone like you who's right fer crissakes? Your posts can only earn you silence. Approving Silence.

Posted by: arthurdecco | May 21 2012 0:19 utc | 25

Thanks for the compliment.
But don't forget (even for a moment) that no-one's got a monopoly on brains.

Posted by: Hoarsewhisperer | May 24 2012 5:51 utc | 26

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