Nuclear facility in Bushehr
Photo: AFP
British reports warns attack on Iran will likely backfire
Oxford researchers say aerial attack will not only fail to hinder nuclear development but also spur Iran's drive for achieving nuclear power
An Oxford University study claims a US attack of Iran's nuclear facilities will backfire – both failing to destroy the centrifuges being used to enrich uranium and lead Iran to step up its push for nuclear power, this according to a report published Monday by British daily The Guardian.
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Oxford Research Group official Dr. Frank Barnaby, a British nuclear weapons scientist, also claims in the report also says that an attack on the Bushehr nuclear facility will likely result in large-scale damage to the surrounding area. According to Barnaby the number of civilian casualties risked in such an attack will be very high since there will be no warning in advance and most will be caught unprepared.
Barnaby wrote in the report that an American attack on Iran would serve to empower extremists in the country and rally the Iranian public behind the nuclear program.
"As soon as you start bombing you unite the population behind the government," Dr Barnaby told The Guardian. "Right now in Iran, there are different opinions about all this, but after an attack you would have a united people and a united scientific community."
'Sleeper cells ready to be unleashed'
The report also says that an attack may lead to Iran quitting the non-proliferation treaty and barring UN inspectors from its facilities. It could also lead to the departure of Russian experts at an Iranian nuclear reactor at Bushehr, leaving a potential source of plutonium unmonitored, the report warned.
On Sunday another British paper, the Sunday Telegraph, reported that Iran has been training secret networks of agents across the Gulf states to attack Western interests and incite civil unrest in the event of a military strike against its nuclear program.
According to Adel Assadinia, a former career diplomat who was Iran's consul-general in Dubai and an adviser to the Iranian Foreign Ministry, spies working as teachers, doctors and nurses at Iranian-owned schools and hospitals have formed sleeper cells ready to be "unleashed" at the first sign of any serious threat to Tehran.
