CONFRONTING A NUCLEAR IRAN
Testimony before the U.S. House of Representatives
Committee on Armed Services
February 1, 2006
Ilan Berman
Vice President for Policy
American Foreign Policy Council
Chairman Hunter, distinguished members of the Committee:
Thank you for affording me the opportunity to testify before you today regarding the
threat posed by a nuclear Iran, and policy options available to the United States.
Since August 2002, when a controversial Iranian opposition group disclosed
previously unknown details of Iran’s clandestine efforts to develop a nuclear
capability, the world has been jolted awake to a new threat: the frightening specter of
a nuclear Iran. Three-and-a-half years on, much is still unknown about the Islamic
Republic’s atomic endeavor. However, all the available evidence points to an
ambitious, complex and diffuse national program that is geared toward providing the
Iranian regime with the capacity to field a nuclear arsenal.
Estimates of exactly when the Islamic Republic will be capable of doing so vary
wildly. In the past, the U.S. intelligence community has assessed that a nuclear Iran is
unlikely until substantially later this decade.1 More recently, it appears to have
softened even these projections; according to leaked accounts of the intelligence
community’s most recent National Intelligence Estimate, Iran is now judged to be ten
years away from developing an indigenous nuclear capability.2
By contrast, other nations believe such a capability will emerge dramatically sooner.
This past December, Lt. Gen. Dan Halutz, the chief of staff of the Israeli defense
forces, told a Knesset parliamentary committee that Iran will reach the “point of no
return” in acquiring the knowledge to build a nuclear weapon by March 2006.3 Based
on such calculations, Israeli intelligence officials now believe an Iranian bomb could
emerge by 2007.4
But, while there may be disagreement regarding the exact timing, there is an
emerging global consensus o