In September 2015, Hans Ruhle, a former Head of the Planning Staff in the German Ministry of Defense, wrote in the National Interest: Given Erdogan's vision of Turkey as a self-confident, assertive and potentially independent regional leader in the Middle East, and given the existence of an established (Israel) and an emerging nuclear power (Iran), Turkey has no real alternative but to acquire nuclear arms as well. If Turkey does not opt for nuclear weapons, it will remain second class-a position that Erdogan cannot and will not accept.
Turkey's motives for rejecting the continuous uranium supply by its Russian and Japanese-French business partners may appear dubious; its rejection to return the spent fuel rods to the supplying countries is outright disastrous, as it allows for only one conclusion: Turkey is bent on producing plutonium for making weapons. While reprocessing would indeed allow the reuse of the spent uranium, such an option is merely theoretical, since fuel rods made from reprocessed material are far more expensive than those made from "new" uranium. It is for this reason that reprocessing of spent uranium is hardly being conducted anymore, Hans Ruhle said adding:
"With its rejection to return the spent fuel rods, Turkey is embarking on the pathway to the bomb. The common counterargument, according to which the separation of the "dirty" plutonium would require a sophisticated reprocessing plant that currently does not exist in Turkey, remains unconvincing. Studies have shown that such a plant can be built within half a year and would be the size of a regular office building.
"The assumption that Turkey is aiming for nuclear weapons is also supported by the country's activities towards creating the entire nuclear fuel cycle. As has been revealed by a well-connected information service, German intelligence reported that as far back as May 2010, Prime Minister Erdogan had demanded to secretly start preparing for the construction of sites to enrich uranium.
"Accordingly, Turkey has started to produce Yellowcake, a chemically compressed uranium ore. Yellowcake is converted to gas, which is then enriched in centrifuges. To date, nothing is publicly known about a conversion plant in Turkey, yet according to the German Intelligence Service (Bundesnachrichtendienst - BND) , Turkey is already in possession of enriched uranium originating from a former Soviet republic and smuggled via Kosovo and Bosnia and Herzegovina with the help of the Mafia."
"In 1998, then Pakistani prime minister Nawaz Sharif offered Turkey a "nuclear partnership" on nuclear research. Moreover, there is still an organic partnership between both countries dating back to Turkey's support for Pakistan's nuclear program. Back then, many of the components that Pakistan could not acquire openly were shipped via Turkey to Pakistan. With this backdrop, it does not come as a surprise when intelligence services report that to this day there is a dynamic scientific exchange between both countries."
Hans Ruhle quoted unnamed sources as saying that Israeli prime minister Netanyahu informed then Greek prime minister Papandreou on March 15, 2010 that Turkey could become a nuclear power any time it wanted to.
Turkey's ambassador to the United States, Namik Tan,was quoted as saying in August 2011: "We cannot tolerate that Iran obtains nuclear weapons." This position was made more concrete two years later by President Abdullah Gul. In an interview with the journal Foreign Affairs, Gul said that "Turkey will not allow that a neighboring country has weapons that Turkey itself does not have."
(Article changed on January 8, 2021 at 18:04)
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