Does Iran Already Have Nuclear Weapons?

When people talk about the seemingly endless foreign policy and national security disasters of the Biden administration, they usually couch the conversation in terms of what Donald Trump will have to fix if he comes to office in 2024. Not all such mistakes can be corrected, however. Some damage is permanent.

Assuming Iran acquires nuclear weapons while Biden is in office, there is no realistic possibility that we will ever get Tehran to give up its nuclear capability. We and the world will be living in a world in which the mad ayatollahs have the ability to vaporize Tel Aviv, Riyadh, Cairo, and all the other major cities of the region.

So, how close to having the bomb are the Iranians? Are we sure they don’t have it?

According to one Iranian lawmaker, the Iranians already have operational nuclear weapons.

“In my opinion, we have achieved nuclear weapons, but we do not announce it. It means our policy is to possess nuclear bombs, but our declared policy is currently within the framework of the JCPOA. The reason is that when countries want to confront others, their capabilities must be compatible, and Iran's compatibility with America and Israel means that Iran must have nuclear weapons.”

Ahmad Bakhshayesh Ardestani, member of the Iranian Parliament.

“In a climate where Russia has attacked Ukraine and Israel has attacked Gaza, and Iran is a staunch supporter of the Resistance Front, it is natural for the containment system to require that Iran possess nuclear bombs. However, whether Iran declares it is another matter,” Ardestani added.

Other Iranian officials have not gone this far but they have stated that Iran may change its supposed policy of not acquiring nuclear weapons if it deems it necessary. For years Iran claimed it had no nuclear weapons program. That pretense has now been abandoned. Now Tehran is almost routinely making references to acquiring and using nuclear weapons.

A senior IRGC commander warned recently that Tehran could change its nuclear policies if Israel continues to threaten to attack Iran’s nuclear sites, suggesting no cooperation with world bodies and building a nuclear bomb.

“If the fake Zionist regime wants to use the threat of attacking nuclear sites to put pressure on Iran, it is possible and conceivable for the Islamic Republic to revise its nuclear doctrine and policies, and deviate from its past declared considerations,” said Ahmad Haghtalab, who is in charge of the security of Iran’s nuclear sites.

A top aide to Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, told Al Jazeera television network on Wednesday that Iran holds the capability to produce nuclear weapons and will have "no choice" but to change the current doctrine should its "existence" come under threat.

"If the Zionist regime [Israel] dares to damage Iran's nuclear facilities, our deterrence will be different," said Kamal Kharrazi, the former foreign minister and policy advisor to Supreme Leader Khamenei.  

In February of this year, Ali Akbar Salehi, the former Iranian Atomic Energy chief proclaimed Iran’s ability to rapidly produce adequate amounts of fissile material to weaponize warheads and also stated that Iran had already manufactured all the parts required for the integration of weaponizable fissile material along with the requisite fuses, warheads, and missiles. In short, what Salehi said was that Iran was prepared to weaponize its nuclear program in a very short period of time.

Now we hear that the Iranian regime is calling for the expulsion of all International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) inspectors from Iran. This comes on the heels of the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, Rafael Grossi, warning that Iran was alarmingly close to achieving nuclear weapons capability. Per Grossi, Iran was at most weeks away from having functioning nuclear weapons.

If you are thinking the Biden administration is probably all over this, think again.

Joe’s Special Envoy to Iran, Rob Malley, remains suspended from his job for “mishandling” of classified information. The latest reporting suggests that Malley emailed classified documents to a personal email address and then downloaded them to his personal phone. Where the information went from there remains unclear although there is suspicion it was then passed to Tehran. The FBI has now become involved.

Prior to becoming Joe’s point man on Iran Malley was perhaps best known for his extensive contacts with Hamas. He also has a wide range of contacts in the widespread Iranian influence operation in Washington.

Meanwhile, at the CIA, one of the top criteria for promotion in operations is now your commitment to Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI). How well you do your job, your “tradecraft” is well down the list. The smart money says we have virtually no visibility into the actual state of the Iranian nuclear weapons program and our assessments of its status should more accurately be called guesses.

Do the Iranians already have nuclear weapons? We don’t know, but we may be about to find out.