Bingo.
So, if the Iranians haven't proved their program has been disbanded before January 2009, we will see massive air strikes to destroy it, nuclear if necessary. Bush will take the heat and leave office a few days later and leave his successor with a clean slate.
In that scenario, by December 2008, Israel will have been totally irradiated by nuclear-tipped Shahab-3 ballistic missiles.
We're outta time my FRiend.
We don't have the luxury of a timetable even remotely approximate to that projection.
We may be looking at weeks, if not days. Frankly, nothing would surprise me -- not even hours.
It is looking increasingly clear that Iran is in the process of putting the final touches on their arsenal.
You will notice that there was recently a distinct change in their strategy. They engaged in a painfully pointless -- and endless series of "buying time" games, via "let's negotiate...no, let's not...wait, changed my mind -- let's negotiate!...wait, no, don't wanna negotiate anymore...oh, wait -- changed my mind again -- let's negotiate...blahblahblah..."
Then, abracadabra (pardon my arabic), no more are they danglng the "maybe we will negotiate" bait. Suddenly it's "Act Two" of the drama -- in which they are intransigent, arrogant, cocky, promising -- not "threatening", but promising to destroy Israel and the west -- and, asserting that they "have joined the Nuclear Club" (code for "have the bomb", while, with great fanfare, showing off vials of alleged refined uranium.
Even if they do have any refined uranium derived from their short run of their small number of centrifutes, it would be mere milligrams, and, not nearly refined to weapons-grade.
Yet, they present that token quantity of mildly refined uranium as if it was a Doomsday Device.
So, I conclude that their "uranium refinement" program is a charade. They were stalling for time, to fit their ex-sov nukes to their missiles, and now, they want to be able to claim that they were of domestic production ("We made the uranium!") when the launch them.
We are right on the cusp of hell. We need to take this situation VERY seriously!
My FRiend, your analysis is flawless. It's a shame you're not working at the State Department where you might have a shot at knocking some sense into their damn heads and getting those people to wake up and smell the reality.