While trying to prevent nuclear proliferation, USA is unwittingly sponsoring nuclear proliferation in one of countries belonging to the ‘axis of evil’. Unbelievable as it might seem, but current revelations before a US House Committee show that expertise from two Russian nuclear institutes that United States subsidizes is going to the aid of building nuclear capabilities in Iran.
After the end of the cold war and the collapse of the mighty Soviets, a probable danger arose from the transfer of nuclear technologies into the hands of the rogue states trying to enrich their nuclear arsenals. To prevent the newly impoverished nuclear institutes and the scientists working there transfer nuclear technologies to other countries, the US government’s Department of Energy (DOE) decided to fund these institutes by supplementing the salaries of the scientists and paying the overhead costs of these institutions. Both the Russian institutes accused of helping Iran to build its Bushehr reactor are located in Nizhny Novgorod.
Can we conclude that US has mistakenly spent its money on an enemy? The US government always is not the best judge of the situation as we have seen earlier. To expect every country to build a nuclear bomb under the garb of a nuclear power reactor is wishful thinking. Technically, it is cumbersome to recover plutonium from the nuclear fuel of the Bushehr power plant and technically, it is more difficult for Iran to build a long-range missile capable of hurling n-weapons on USA crossing the Atlantic.
As for the Russians, if they are careful and sincere in their motive of preventing nuclear proliferation then there should be no impediment in helping others develop nuclear power plants.
Source: IHT
Image: Energy psu
