Seems our old friends the Russians are going ahead with the shipments of nuclear fuel to Iran for the Bushehr power plant.

Russia said Monday it has begun fuel deliveries to an atomic power station in Iran, which is at the center of international concerns that Tehran’s may be developing nuclear weapons.

 Atomstroiexport, Russia’s nuclear power equipment and service export monopoly, completed the first stage of deliveries Sunday, Russian nuclear officials said.

The Russian monopoly is building the $1-billion Bushehr plant under the control of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). The Russian foreign ministry and nuclear officials said the fuel delivery was under full IAEA safeguards.

Construction on the Russian-designed nuclear plant has continued despite pressure from the United States.

I expect things are going to be moving pretty quickly now.  Students of history will no doubt recall the last time a Middle Eastern country on the Israeli shit list tried to bring a nuclear plant online.

Osiraq, (French: Osirak; Iraqi: Tammuz 1), was a 40 MW light-water nuclear materials testing reactor (MTR) in Iraq. It was constructed by the Iraqi government at the Al Tuwaitha Nuclear Research Center, 18 km (11 miles) south-east of Baghdad in 1977. It was crippled by Israeli aircraft in 1981 in a surprise strike, Operation Opera, to prevent the regime of Saddam Hussein from using the reactor for the creation of nuclear weapons. The facility was completely destroyed by American aircraft during the 1991 Gulf War.

The Israelis have been raving since the US NIE on Iran came out that the US is dead wrong and they believe Iran remains a nuclear threat.  So much of a threat, that at this point they are flat out saying war is coming.

Israel’s public security minister warned Saturday that a U.S. intelligence report that said Iran is no longer developing nuclear arms could lead to a regional war that would threaten the Jewish state.

In his remarks — Israel’s harshest criticism yet of the U.S. report — Avi Dichter said the assessment also casts doubt on American intelligence in general, including information about Palestinian security forces’ crackdown on militant groups. The Palestinian action is required as part of a U.S.-backed renewal of peace talks with Israel this month.

Dichter cautioned that a refusal to recognize Iran’s intentions to build weapons of mass destruction could lead to armed conflict in the Middle East.

He compared the possibility of such fighting to a surprise attack on Israel in 1973 by its Arab neighbors, which came to be known in Israel for the Yom Kippur Jewish holy day on which it began.

“The American misconception concerning Iran’s nuclear weapons is liable to lead to a regional Yom Kippur where Israel will be among the countries that are threatened,” Dichter said in a speech in a suburb south of Tel Aviv, according to his spokesman, Mati Gil. “Something went wrong in the American blueprint for analyzing the severity of the Iranian nuclear threat.”

And the clock is ticking.  The Osiraq plant the Israelis attacked in 1981 was done before the plant went live to prevent nuclear fallout from hitting civilians (and to secure Menachem Begin’s election as well).  The Bushehr plant is expected go live sometime this summer.

A statement on the Russian Foreign Ministry’s official Web site Monday said the Iranian side has provided additional written guarantees that the fuel can only be used at and for the Bushehr plant, and that the spent fuel will be returned to Russia for utilization and storage.

“The nuclear fuel is being delivered to Iran about six months ahead of the time when it will be actually used for producing energy, as stipulated by technical requirements,” the statement read.

The fuel deliveries will be made in several stages over two months, Russian nuclear officials said. The first stage was completed Sunday, officials said, when IAEA-certified fuel containers were delivered to a special storage facility, inspected by the IAEA, at the plant.

So, despite the warning from Israel that they will commit acts of war in order to stop nuclear “threats”, the Bushehr plant operation rolls on.  Both the Russians and the Iranians are practically daring Israel and the US to bomb Bushehr.

Bush has repeatedly said that he won’t allow Iran to have “nuke-u-lar technology”.  A working reactor would tend to expose him as a liar, and the Israelis are pissed off.  That plant will be on line in six months.

Will Israel go loose cannon again and attack the plant?  Will the US support the Israeli attack with one of their own?  How will Iran respond politically and militarily?  What about Russia?

Is this the event that will lead to war?