What’s worse than Iranian nuclear warheads? If you are a US citizen, you may answer: Iranian nuclear warheads within 1500 miles of US homeland.
No, Iran didn’t move. It’s the warheads that will move, along with ballistic missiles. At least that’s the idea behind recently signed treaties between Iran and Venezuela that go back to at least 2008. Venezuela is another oil-producing nation that sits on more oil than the country can consume in the next 100 years, but is eager to develop a nuclear program – strictly for peaceful purposes, comprende. What else. Venezuela and Iran have a deal that allows Iran to install a missile base in Venezuela, along with strategic weapons (that’s where the nukes come in once that they have them). In turn, Iran helps Venezuela build up a missile and nukes program.
Iran profits double from the deal, since Venezuela also happens to be home of one of the world’s largest Uranium deposits (which is, as indications are, already in the process of being exploited by Iran). The better this deal works out, the less dependent Iran gets from IAEA controlled Russian Uranium supplies. And in the end, Venezuela has nukes and missiles too, along with cash from Uranium sales. That’s what you call a win-win situation.
If you followed the developments of the Iranian ballistic missile program, you will remember that basically, they are working on long-range missiles that, given their low targeting precision, are of little tactical use and seem to be intended to carry weapons of mass destruction.
What does this tell us for our Stuxnet attacker profiling? Something: The US is hardly in a position to accept the risk of Tehran getting the bomb, with the prospect of being in striking range by Iranian ballistic missiles soon. Let’s assume some task force in Langley discovered that early, it could have been reason enough to give operation Myrtus a go.
References:
http://www.welt.de/print/die_welt/politik/article11227502/Gefaehrlicher-Pakt.html (German only)
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2010/10/05/chavez_s_secret_nuclear_program
http://www.cfr.org/publication/20425/irans_ballistic_missile_program.html