From the Inbox
In reference to CFR.org’s piece, “Nuclear Questions Aimed at Syria,” reader Dan Yurman writes:
Every nuclear weapon has a radiation signature.
North Korea’s reactors have been inspected by the IAEA and their designs, physical profiles, and nuclear fuel burn-up residuals constitute a specific signature that could be found in any weapons grade materials that came from them.
Nuclear weapons grade materials have specific “signatures” that can indicate which reactor they came from. If the U.S. subsequently matched the signature of the nuclear materials, recovered by Israel from Syria, to a North Korean reactor then the diplomatic world and the six-party talks are in for a rough ride.
It follows that if Israel in fact recovered weapons grade materials from Syria, and submitted it to the U.S. for verification of its own laboratory results, confirmation could have led to political support from the U.S. for Israel to then carry out the bombing raid.
That’s a conjecture at this point, but falls within the realm of a plausible scenario. Another conjecture is that the U.S. would use such “evidence” for diplomatic leverage with North Korea in the Six-Party talks.
–Dan Yurman
http://djysrv.blogspot.com
