Inspectors Press Iran On Weapons
O'BRIEN: Welcome back, everybody. Top U.N. nuclear weapons inspectors are in Tehran today. The International Atomic Energy Agency says the priority is that the possible military dimensions of Iran's nuclear program. Iran is claiming that advances in uranium enrichment and also, of course, tensions are rising as Iran has cut off oil exports to European countries in response to sanctions. Joining us this morning to talk about all of that is former U.N. weapons inspector, David Albright. Nice to see you, sir. Thanks for talking with us. We've talked about specific questions that the IAEA needs to get answers from Iran. So, what are those questions exactly?</s>DAVID ALBRIGHT, FMR. U.N. WEAPONS INSPECTOR: Well, the two most important are, did Iran work on the processes and the research and development to build a nuclear weapon itself? There are a lot of steps in building a nuclear weapon, enriching uranium, but it's also necessary to learn how to make the enriched uranium turn into a nuclear explosive, and that's complicated. Another is, did Iran have a military-controlled program to enrich uranium? Was this chrome site that was discovered by western intelligence in 2009 actually part of a program run by the military to produce weapon grade uranium for a nuclear weapon? And so, those two areas are the key wings that the IAEA has been focusing on. And Iran, so far, has refused to cooperate. It started to cooperate in 2007, and then, in 2008, it broke off all cooperation on these two subjects.</s>O'BRIEN: You have said you don't expect cooperation and you don't expect these issues to be resolved unless there is concessions and major concessions from both sides. Spell out what those concessions you think would have to be to make progress.</s>ALBRIGHT: Well, it's a very complicated problem. And I think -- I don't -- what the IAEA is looking for on this visit is some concrete result that shows that Iran plans to open up. The IAEA can't deliver very much to Iran in terms of concessions. So, Iran is going to be looking to the west, particularly, to the United States, to start to make concessions that get to its security concerns. I mean, will the U.S. be willing to say we're not going to try to overthrow the regime? Will the U.S. accept Iran's enrichment program for peaceful uses? These are all very tough concessions, particularly, now when both countries are entering a political season and the threat of war is increasing.</s>KATRINA VANDEN HEUVEL, EDITOR AND PUBLISHER, THE NATION: Mr. Albright, Katrina Vanden Heuvel from "The Nation" magazine. There's a drumbeat for war with Iran in this country in Israel. What is your assessment of the impact of airstrikes on Iran in terms of the viability in terms of dealing with the nuclear program or do you feel that diplomacy has not been adequately used at this stage and there is more to be done, and that the drumbeat should cease while diplomacy continues?</s>ALBRIGHT: I think diplomacy can work. I think Iran has been put under tremendous pressure, and that pressure is starting to pay off. Iran has agreed that they'll enter negotiations. It's dropped its demands for pre-conditions, so I think the negotiations should be given a chance to work. Now, in terms of the airstrikes, we've looked at this at my organization for years. This is not a case like Syria's reactor, which Israel bombed in 2007. This is a highly dispersed advanced gas centrifuge program that cannot be bombed out of existence. And so, the best you get in these kind of airstrikes that are being talked about is a delay in their program. And I've asked Israeli officials, can you give us five years? And they said, no. So, we're really talking about something that's a couple of years at best, and it may back fire. I mean, if Iran is attacked, it may just decide, look, we're going for the bomb. And they're going to accelerate their effort. And then, they end up with the bomb sooner than if we hadn't attacked at all. And so, I think that it is very important at this time to give negotiations a chance and to give Obama the breathing room to try to make those negotiations successful.</s>O'BRIEN: David Albright is a former U.N. weapons inspector. It's nice to have you. Thank you for talking with us. We appreciate it.</s>ALBRIGHT: Thank you.</s>O'BRIEN: Still ahead this morning on STARTING POINT, Newt Gingrich says that President Obama is the most dangerous president in modern American history. We're going to talk about that in just a moment. And our next guess from a Reagan family to marrying a Clinton White House -- there she is. Ali Wentworth, eating in the room. Finish up. We'll get with you in a moment. Don't rush. You're watching STARTING POINT. We're back in a moment.