Iran Can Make Nuclear Weapon Material in 1-2 Weeks: Blinken

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has stated that Iran's breakout time—the time needed to produce enough weapons-grade material for a nuclear weapon—is now "probably one or two weeks," according to CNN. This assessment comes as Iran has recently increased its production of fissile material. Speaking at the Aspen Security Forum on Friday, Blinken remarked, "Where we are now is not in a good place."

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Blinken explained, "Because the nuclear agreement was thrown out, Iran is now probably one or two weeks away from having the breakout capacity of producing fissile material for a nuclear weapon, instead of being at least a year away." He added, "They haven't produced a weapon itself, but that's something we track very carefully."

Blinken emphasized that US policy is to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon and that the administration aims to stop this through diplomacy. Over a year ago, a top US Defense Department official mentioned that Iran could produce "one bomb's worth of fissile material" in "about 12 days." The Biden administration has engaged in indirect negotiations with Iran for over a year to revive the Iran nuclear deal, which the US withdrew from in 2018 under the Trump administration.

These efforts collapsed in 2022 when the US accused Iran of making "unreasonable" demands regarding an International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) investigation into unexplained uranium traces at undisclosed Iranian sites. Following this, the Biden administration declared the Iran nuclear deal "not on the agenda."

Iran's new president has suggested openness to talks with the West. However, a US State Department official told CNN that they no longer believe a return to the nuclear deal is viable due to Iran's escalatory actions since the talks stopped. "We're in a very different world; a lot of time has elapsed, and Iran has done a lot of things that make a return to JCPOA non-viable," the official said.

The US State Department also stated that there is no expectation that the recent election in Iran will change the country's behavior. Earlier this month, State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said, "We have no expectations that this election will lead to a fundamental change in Iran's direction or its policies."

Miller added, "At the end of the day, it's not the president that has the ultimate say over the future of Iran's policy; it is the supreme leader, and we have seen the direction he has taken Iran in. If the new president had the authority to take steps to curtail Iran's nuclear program, stop funding terrorism, and cease destabilizing activities in the region, those would be steps we would welcome. But we don't expect that to happen."

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