In a most fascinating example of irony the National Security Archives in September 2007 (the Al Kibar bombing was in Sept 2007) published a series of declassified documents on the Es Salam nuclear reactor built by Algeria with assistance from China.

There is more than a little sense of deja vu here given the Syrian situation. Recall that US officials are absolutely categorical that Al Kibar equates to a Syrian bomb programme.

Hardliners in the first Bush administration made the same allegation with respect to Algeria and the Es Salam reactor. The key evidence centered on the largish cooling towers for Es Salem said to be able to support the operation of a 50MWt reactor. Yongbyon is about 25-30MWt (assuming 5MWe this breaks the rule of thumb for converting MWe to MWt) and the Iranian IR-40 is 40MWt.

Notice that there was no cooling tower at Al Kibar.

But notice also from the documents that the State Department labeled the whole Algerian episode as the “great Algerian nuclear weapons scare.”

The State position was based on analysis suggesting that Es Salam, despite the cooling tower intelligence, was a low enriched uranium fueled 15 MWt reactor and therefore not of proliferation concern given the low output of plutonium.

That’s just about the estimate for the power level of Al Kibar (natural uranium fueled) based on the fuel channel information.

So, why are we so categorical this time around?