It has been announced that Russia is going to fuel up the Bushehr Nuclear Power Plant in Iran on Aug 21st, 2010. That has also fueled speculation by some that Israel or even the U.S. will attack the reactor within the next eight days because after it goes operational nobody would dare attack this reactor because radiation would be spread over a large area of the Middle East. Attacking it after it has become operational for a while would even be worse, because it would spread the Plutonium that is generated in the fuel rods and wherever this Plutonium dust might spread would become radioactive and uninhabitable for human life for many thousands of  years.

Here is a perspective on Bushehr that quotes statements from former U.N. Ambassador John R. Bolton. It is  probably as good an analysis as your going to find on the Bushehr reactor situation.

Many say the Bushehr reactor is not a danger to Israel and the world because Russia will be providing the enriched Uranium fuel and will be taking back the spent fuel rods. So the claim is, that Iran will not be able to use the Plutonium that the reactor produces as a byproduct in the rods, to build nuclear weapons. Yet, who in this world should trust Russia or Iran to keep their word? N. Korea got its Plutonium reactor from Soviet Russia so it is not as if there is no precedence for Russia spreading nuclear reactor capabilities that were later used to make nuclear bombs. Besides, it frees up Iran’s own enriched fuel for other purposes like making nuclear bombs.

My view is contrary to what I have been hearing from some others in Bible prophecy since this fueling date was announced. I personally do not think the bombing of the Bushehr Nuclear Power Plant is going to happen any time soon. I do not think Israel would just allow Russia to complete the plant only to kill Russians at the last minute before it goes operational. If Israel really intended to take this reactor out I think they would have done it long before now. Iran will be on high alert from now until the plant goes operational. So from a military strategy point of view it would be pretty stupid for Israel to put themselves in a position where there is no element of surprise.

I think Israel and the U.S. are resigned to the fact that this reactor will go operational. They probably have contingency plans in place to shut it down if Iran ever starts using the spent rods for Plutonium based weapons. They obviously cannot bomb it after it goes operational but they could send in special forces from the sea to shut it down and make the plant inoperable. In fact, that is a more likely option than bombing, even if they do something within the next eight days.

I also wonder why anyone announced the fueling date of this plant? What advantage is there into announcing it if you had any intelligence that would indicate that this action would risk Israel taking it out? I think it is obvious that Russia got the word from someone that the Bushehr Nuclear Plant is off the table.

Nuclear reactors become one scary thing in a war. Just one blown up nuclear reactor could kill millions and it could make hundreds of square miles of land totally uninhabitable by man for thousands of years. Now you might know why Bible prophecy says the land of Babylon will never be occupied by man, at least until the New Earth becomes a reality. Bushehr is on the Persian Gulf coast and if the reactor exploded or burned when there was a southerly wind blowing it would spread Plutonium dust up the whole mountain locked valley of South Central Iraq (Babylon). So someone might bomb the Bushehr reactor but that is more likely to happen during the destruction of Babylon near the end of the tribulation.

Sure, other reactors might be built that also could accomplish this but considering that it usually takes about 20 years to build a large reactor from the planning stage to the operational stage we are running out of time if Jesus is coming in the next twenty to thirty years. By the way, what is described in Isaiah chapter 13 and 34 and Jeremiah chapter 50 about the land of Babylon not being inhabited by humans probably could not be explained by a nuclear weapons exchange since that would not make the land uninhabitable for very long. Almost all of the nuclear fuel is consumed in the fission and/or fusion. Any radioactivity left has a relatively short half life. However, Plutonium dust from burnt fuel rods would have a half life of 24,000 years.