With Iran, it’s a matter of percentages.

The United States, Britain, France, Russia, China, and Germany have unsuccessfully negotiated with Iran for years regarding its nuclear program.  A new strategy, one that involves a compromise, needs to be implemented.

If you have watched the news at all in the past eight years, you have likely heard about Iran’s controversial nuclear program.  You may be wondering why it is controversial in the first place, what makes Iran so much different from America, China, Pakistan, and all the other nuclear armed countries?

For one reason, Iran’s former leader, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, proclaimed that he wanted Israel wiped off the map, according to an article in The New York Times. It is alarming to hear that a country that has made such controversial statements may have access to a weapon that could kill millions of people at once.  Ahmadinejad has also claimed 9/11 was an inside job and the holocaust was a hoax.

In addition to these outlandish statements, Iran has also been heavily involved in the facilitation of global terrorism, which obviously does not align with the interests of the United States.

According to a report by the U.S. House of Representatives Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, Iran “provides training, funds and weapons to a variety of Shia militias in Iraq that have been linked to assassinations, human rights abuses and the planting of improvised explosive devices designed to maim and kill U.S. troops. The full extent of Iranian support to these militias is unknown, but three groups in particular have received Iranian support.”

For the roughly the past eight years, Iran has dealt with tough economic trade sanctions implemented by the West, including Israel and China. These have had a detrimental effect on the country’s economy and thus it’s populous, according to Knesset Speaker Yuli Edelstein.

While these sanctions have been going on for a long time, they were meant to force Iran into shutting down its nuclear program.  Instead, Iran has continued with its uranium enrichment program.

The International Atomic Energy Agency reported on Feb. 27, 2006, that Iran has produced approximately 85 tons of uranium hexafluoride, or UF6. If enriched through centrifuges to weapons-grade material – a process that Iran is working to master – this amount would be enough to create 12 nuclear bombs.

While these sanctions may have good intentions, it seems that all they have done is increase tensions between Western countries and Iran, along with the rest of the Middle East.

Nuclear fission is a million times greater per unit weight than fossil fuels with regards to creating electricity, so it is understandable why a country would want to invest in this source of energy – whether or not Iran uses this as a front to make nukes is another question.

Next week in Geneva, Western nations along with Iran will sit down to supposedly discuss a potential deal for Iran’s nuclear program. The sanctions will likely appear on the agenda as well as the process Iran would have to go through to have them lifted.  Likely, Western countries will demand that Iran close all of its facilities, but this may be unnecessary.

The purity of uranium that is needed to sustain a nuclear chain reaction for a bomb application is above 20 percent of U-235, or Uranium 235.  Any enrichment below makes it unlikely that a bomb could even work. However, lower grade uranium that is not bomb material can be used to produce power in a reactor.

It would not be ridiculous to strike a deal that includes terms to prevent Iran from producing enriched uranium of more than 15 percent. The U.N. would obviously need to enforce the deal with inspections, but this could be an affective peaceful solution that also helps prevent any further deterioration of U.S.-Iranian relations.

-Mitch Strang is a senior finance major from Bellevue. He can be contacted at 335-2290 or by [email protected]. The opinions expressed in this Column are not necessarily those of the staff of The Daily Evergreen or those of Student Publications.