(Image source: The New York Times )

 

BY ZACH TOOMBS

 

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu took to American airwaves Sunday to push for a tougher U.S. stance toward Iran and its developing nuclear program. Here he is on NBC’s Meet the Press .

 

“If you’re determined to prevent Iran from getting nuclear weapons, it means you’ll act before they get nuclear weapons.”

“I think a red line, in this case, works to reduce the chances of the need for military action.”

 

And on CNN’s State of the Union :

 

“President Kennedy put a red line before the Soviets on the Cuban Missile Crisis, and he was criticized for it, but it actually pushed back the world from conflict and maybe purchased decades of peace.”

 

So, what’s Netanyahu’s problem with the current U.S. approach? At a news conference last week, he said “diplomacy and sanctions” haven’t worked.

 

Susan Rice, Obama’s ambassador to the United Nations would say otherwise — as she did on Meet the Press Sunday.

 

“There is time and space for the pressure we are mounting, which is unprecedented in terms of sanctions, to still yield results. This is not imminent ... This pressure is, even to use the Iranians’ own words, crippling.”

 

But just how much time and space does Iran need to go nuclear? On Meet the Press, Netanyahu said Iran was six months away from having 90 percent of the enriched uranium needed for an atom bomb. And The Washington Post’s fact checkers say that assessment is “on the right track.”

 

The most recent report from the International Atomic Energy Agency says Iran has enough uranium enriched to 20 percent that could eventually be used for at least one nuclear weapon. But the nation will have to take that enrichment level to 90 percent first. How would it get there?

 

The process relies on centrifuges such as this one — machines that separate highly radioactive Uranium 235 from the useless isotope that makes up the vast majority of the natural element — Uranium 238.        

 

The more the Uranium 235 atoms are isolated from the rest of the element, the higher the level of enrichment. For instance, starting with 100 atoms and only seven radioactive U235 atoms — if Iran removes 65 of them, it brings it to 20 percent enrichment.


Separating another 27 atoms to leave a 7:1 radioactive ratio would create weapons-grade Uranium — enriched beyond 90 percent.

 

Netanyahu’s emergence onto the Sunday talk show circuit with just seven weeks until a presidential election prompted more talk that the prime minister is inserting himself in American politics — possibly encouraging a politically vulnerable President Obama to take a stronger stand on Iran, or maybe just trying to improve electoral odds for his old friend Mitt Romney .

 

For what it’s worth, Netanyahu said Sunday he’s motivated not by the American political calendar but by Iran’s nuclear calendar.