Fuel grade is like 3%. It's exponentially harder to go from 3%-60% (months-years) than 60%-90%(days-weeks). So no, the only reason to enrich that high is to keep your breakout time threateningly short.

Which still, astonishingly, does not make it weapons grade.

True, but can you name a reason to create a stockpile of 60% enriched uranium that doesn't involve weapons?

Yep! Negotiation.

Yes brother you are technically correct about that substring of that comment. “Weapons-grade” was indeed not 100% accurate and therefore, technically , inaccurate. That is true, you are right.

That same comment also said, even led with “flies in the face of”. That was the most important part of the comment: ‘saying that Iran is enriching weapons-grade uranium “flies in the face of” intelligence reports which reported no weapons-grade uranium.’ But that part was not correct: the difference between Iran’s uranium (60% enriched) and weapons-grade uranium, while >0, is not large enough to characterize that assessment “flying in the face of”.

So yes if you focus on that substring of the comment you are right. But why would you? It’s not the point of the comment.

Which makes it nit picking. Which is why you’re getting so much pushback.

The parent comment says it flies in the face of the US IC's holistic assessment of Iran's efforts. Which it does.

The only reason to make 60% is to make a weapon, and it’s actually useful in a weapon.

Saying it’s not weapons grade only means you haven’t finished or intend to use something else for the initial stage.

> only means you haven’t finished or intend to use something else for the initial stage

So in other words it’s not weapons grade?

No, 60% is a weapons grade enrichment level, but does not qualify in specific weapons grade categories.

Reduced fat milk is often specifically referring to 2% milk, but 1% milk is also reduced fat milk.

I don’t think you even believe the words you’re writing.

Everything I just said was factually accurate.

There’s a lot of misunderstanding around this stuff. Technically all you need for a bomb is the ability to go prompt critical on demand which you can do at surprisingly low enrichment levels. What’s a useful weapons grade enrichment to you has a lot to do with your delivery systems not some universal constant. If you’re looking to fit something in a WWII bomber or early generation ICBM that imposes specific limitations.

Being able to produce weapons grade uranium != producing weapons grade uranium. It's not that complicated.

And yes, in an alternative universe where delivery systems also just appear out of nowhere, you could sprinkle a million tons of 1% uranium over a city.

It’s not about delivery systems just appearing, the logistics of tossing around nuclear weapons in the Middle East using modern technology allows for a vastly larger bombs without significant issues.

You can buy a used A380 for a few 10’s of millions. Convert that to a drone is fairly cheap, and you end up with a deleverage system vastly cheaper than the cost of producing a nuclear bomb.

Obviously a subsonic aircraft isn’t ideal, but historic ICBM’s ended up being designed for multiple bombs that’s a lot of leeway if you use the same system to deliver a single bomb. What the US considered weapons grade in the 40’s through the Cold War is based on assumptions that simply don’t apply here.