Iran Nuclear Claims Exaggerated

Despite the wild and threatening claims of its hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Iran may not be as close to building nuclear weapons as the world may think.

So says John Negroponte, U.S. National Intelligence Director, who thinks Iran would likely obtain nuclear weapons long before they had the ability to create their own.

Negroponte, in an interview with NBC News, shared his opinion of Iran's nuclear threat and an assessment of what it would take to neutralize an escalating threat in that region.

"According to the experts that I consult, achieving � getting 164 centrifuges to work is still a long way from having the capacity to manufacture sufficient fissile material for a nuclear weapon," Negroponte said. "It could still be a matter of years. ... In fact our assessment is that the prospects of an Iranian weapon are still a number of years off, and probably into the next decade."

Does that mean the United States is not taking Iran's nuclear threat seriously? Hardly.

"It's conceivable that they are exaggerating their progress, but I don't have any knowledge to confirm that," Negroponte said of Iran's boasts of growing nuclear strength. " ... This is a very, very high priority, acquiring information about their nuclear program."