BICOM

Tehran has not made a decision on whether to proceed with development of an atomic bomb, US Defence Secretary Leon Panetta said yesterday. Panetta and other top US intelligence officials offered insights and observations on the Iranian regime in separate congressional hearings yesterday.

Panetta told the House Appropriations defence subcommittee that US intelligence showed Iran was continuing its uranium enrichment programme, but that Tehran had “not made the decision to proceed with developing a nuclear weapon. That is the red line that would concern us and that would ensure that the international community, hopefully together, would respond,” he said.

Meanwhile, at the Senate Armed Services Committee the Director of National Intelligence James Clapper said “Iran’s technical advancement, particularly in uranium enrichment, strengthens our assessment that Iran has the scientific, technical, and industrial capacity to eventually produce nuclear weapons, making the central issue its political will to do so.”

Lt.-Gen. Ronald Burgess, director of the Defence Intelligence Agency, at the same hearing added that Iran has missiles capable of reaching central Europe and could “attempt to employ terrorist surrogates worldwide.” Both Clapper and Burgess noted, however, that Iran was unlikely to initiate or provoke military conflict, and was “not close” to abandoning its nuclear programme.

The intelligence directors also verified that Iran remains a significant threat on a number of fronts, including its continued support of organisations such as Hezbollah as well as its indirect support of Hamas in the Gaza Strip.