As I said, question the article of faith by suggesting common sense that Iraq stumped Iran back in 2003 and you’re barking blasphemy.

For more on what we thought we knew about Syria see this review. I doubt that Israel would take the action it did to blow up a small unfinished research reactor and risk a war. Intelligence understands that if the Syrians are telling the truth, why admit the attack and then say it never happened while observations from space show their cover-up?

You dismiss most of my post. The release wasn’t political? There is no connection between Iraq and Iran’s change in nuclear strategy? Did Armscontrolwonk even admit Iran was ever building a bomb? Again, just look at the first explanations he posted over the “dubious” Israeli attack on Syria. How many sites does Wonk say exist in Iran and Syria?

If Iran has no secret facilities then why not invite the IAEA to investigate all suspect sites? How is what Iran is doing now not seriously connected to an eventual bomb? One can rant about Bush lying, but does this come close to the activities of the Iranian government or do you dismiss killing Jews in Argentina and opposition in Europe harmelss fun? Supplying weapons to Shiites AND Sunnis to use against the US is brotherly love? Isn’t their twenty-year secret program lying? I forgot, Bush is in a higher set of lying.

I suggest some courses outside of Denial University. Being a Liberal I witness it every day. I’m sure Iranian and North Korean scientists were on a picnic trip in Syria. I’m sure Iran without even Russian Tor systems wasn’t worried about an American strike.

Again did Armscontrolwonk dismiss the yields of NK nuke tests as failures? Does the NIE know where all NK nuclear sites are? Has the AQ Khan distribution network been completely uncovered? Are we certain of where all the equipment of Khan is?

The success rate of NIE Reports should not be questioned?

Of course, the brilliant strategy of the NIE declassification which begs questioning is this: NIE explains how pressure and sanctions are the only thing keeping Iran from advancing faster on the bomb (never threat of force). (Yes, they still advance now, or do you have something else to put in nukes besides what Iran is presently attemping to manufacture?) Then release the report as the US tries to bring together the powers for more sanctions. Now that is what I call real intelligence.

The political fallout of said intelligence may result in the fallout of another kind one day. I must question the sanity of those who consider the dangers of being wrong about Iran less than the dangers of being right about Bush.

As far as the price of oil… I actually had a lot written about the economy in the above post but decided it was getting off topic and too long. I didn’t bring up the price of oil, though. Essentially what I said is that with Bush freed up on Iran, he can concentrate on helping the Repubs keep the WH. One way to do that is to support populist programs which help improve (or appear to help improve) the average American’s economic situation. Bush was able to gain a lot of support on his tax cuts from people whose didn’t even benefit from them.

I don’t know what Bush’s next move is but it will interesting. BTW- the price oil isn’t going anywhere soon so Bush won’t concentrate on that. I think as long as oil doesn’t increase much more then Americans can live with the current levels. I actually think it will decline by $15/bbl by the election- because the bluster on Iran is toned down and I think part of the current price of oil includes the “Iran attack premium” (in other words about $15/bbl).

How about going to the source instead?

A list of Iranian violations of it’s CSA:

In the comprehensive report of the Director General to the Board of Governors dated
15 November 2004 (GOV/2004/83), it was concluded, on the basis of all information available to the
Agency as of that date, that Iran had failed in a number of instances over an extended period of time to
meet its obligations under its Safeguards Agreement with respect to the reporting of nuclear material,
its processing and its use, as well as the declaration of facilities where such material had been
processed and stored. In that report, these failures, as assessed in the light of the available information,
were summarized as follows:
a. Failure to report:
(i) the import of natural uranium in 1991, and its subsequent transfer for further
processing;
(ii) the activities involving the subsequent processing and use of the imported natural
uranium, including the production and loss of nuclear material where appropriate,
and the production and transfer of waste resulting therefrom;
(iii) the use of imported natural UF6 for the testing of centrifuges at the Kalaye Electric
Company workshop in 1999 and 2002, and the consequent production of enriched
and depleted uranium (DU);
(iv) the import of natural uranium metal in 1993 and its subsequent transfer for use in
laser enrichment experiments, including the production of enriched uranium, the
loss of nuclear material during these operations and the production and transfer of
resulting waste;
(v) the production of UO2, UO3, UF4, UF6 and ammonium uranyl carbonate (AUC)
from imported depleted UO2, depleted U3O8 and natural U3O8, and the production
and transfer of resulting wastes; and
(vi) the production of natural and depleted UO2 targets at the Esfahan Nuclear
Technology Centre (ENTC) and their irradiation in the Tehran Research Reactor
(TRR), the subsequent processing of those targets, including the separation of
plutonium, the production and transfer of resulting waste, and the storage of
unprocessed irradiated targets at the Tehran Nuclear Research Centre (TNRC).
b. Failure to declare:
(i) the pilot enrichment facility at the Kalaye Electric Company workshop; and
(ii) the laser enrichment plants at TNRC and the pilot uranium laser enrichment plant
at Lashkar Ab’ad.
c. Failure to provide design information, or updated design information, for:
(i) the facilities where the natural uranium imported in 1991 (including wastes
generated) was received, stored and processed (the Jabr Ibn Hayan Multipurpose
Laboratories at TNRC (JHL); TRR; ENTC; waste storage facility at Esfahan and
Anarak);
(ii) the facilities at ENTC and TNRC where UO2, UO3, UF4, UF6 and AUC from
imported depleted UO2, depleted U3O8 and natural U3O8 had been produced;
(iii) the waste storages at Esfahan and at Anarak, in a timely manner;
(iv) the pilot enrichment facility at the Kalaye Electric Company workshop;
(v) the laser enrichment plants at TNRC and Lashkar Ab’ad, and locations where
resulting wastes had been processed and stored, including the waste storage facility
at Karaj; and
(vi) TRR, with respect to the irradiation of uranium targets, and the facility at TNRC
where plutonium separation had taken place, as well as the waste handling facility
at TNRC.
d. Failure on many occasions to cooperate to facilitate the implementation of safeguards, as
evidenced by extensive concealment activities.

Sorry, but Prather doesn’t really know what he’s talking about….

Additionally some people are posting old information. Originally, the DNI said an unclassified key judgments would not be released. However, one WAS released yesterday, and the reasons for it are explained in the ancillary piece by Dr. Kerr.

Also, we have to remember that in an age when the middle class is struggling, the price of a barrel of oil has increased by a factor of 4 during the Bush presidency. They promised cheaper oil, but the price has skyrocketed, largely because of increased demand from India and China and destabilization of the ME because of conflicts with Iraq and Iran.

Remember in the run-up to the war Bush claimed Iraq had a WMD program and Iraq claimed they didn’t. In fact Bush wouldn’t even let the UN weapons inspectors finish their jobs before he invaded. Bush has said the same about Iran- they had a nuclear weapons’ program while Ahmedinejad claims they did not. The only difference is that Bush hasn’t invaded Iran yet. He knew he wouldn’t be in office to contain any potential fall-out if he had invaded Iran.

Look, the truth is that Bush had nowhere to go with Iran. He blustered all he wanted and realized that he couldn’t win (I think he used Iraq as a diversion from his other problems). Had he attacked Iran he would not have gotten much support (international or domestic) simply because a year from now Iran would still not be close to creating nuke weapons even if they did have an active program. No one wants a repeat of the Iraq fiasco. I think Bush backed himself into a corner and by releasing this report he can back down. In fact he will use the report as proof that his strong position forced Iran to stop it’s nuclear weapons program (which is bull since the program hasn’t been active in years). Besides where did Bush think he would get the troops to invade Iran from?

I have a few thoughts on this, from the original posting:

Change the nature of the debate about Iran in the president campaign and undercut the Republican candidates who have endorsed a military strikes.

I disagree with this. I think this “revelation” that Iran doesn’t have nukes will actually help the Republicans. Iraq is such an unpopular war. If Bush had continued his Iran rhetoric, the threat cloud hanging over the election just risked reminding the war-weary public that the Bush Administration got us into the Iraq war and is (was) gunning for another adventure. The Republican candidates are mostly behind Bush on the Iraq war, even though it is unpopular. They are not best served by having comparisons drawn between the Iraq folly and “potential” WMDs as a reason to attack Iran. I think this NIE report actually helps the Republican candidates because they can say they supported President Bush and Iran backed down. In as much as the NIE report helps the Republicans it hurts the Dems because one of the most important issues to voters (Iraq war) has just been “won” by the Republicans. Whatever happens in Iraq in the next 11 months the Repubs will say that the situation has improved. And it’s because they are strong (and stood resolute when times were hard) on national security and the Dems are weak because they wanted to cut and run. This also helps explain Rove’s comments about the Dems wanting to rush into the Iraq war…. Bush can now say that he didn’t rush to war and Iran backed down. Even though Rove’s comments are outright lies, they are part of the public record and interesting enough anything that is part of the public record has a way of gaining credibility and some truth. Even if that truth is just enough to cast a shadow of doubt on what really happened (in this case the shadow of doubt is on the Dems).

I don’t trust the Iranians as far as I can throw them and Ahmedinejad is really scary. Yes, he poses a threat to the US with his support of various terrorists groups/factions. However cynical I may be about Bush and the NIE report, I’m relieved that Bush isn’t going to pick a fight with Iran (hopefully the next Prez won’t either). Bush needs to contain the terrorist groups Iran supports by being smart and not by warmongering.

1. NIE said they would not declassify reports anymore because of the political manipulations yet after making a strong case for sanctions, they release, as the US is deeply involved in sanction negotiations with China.

2. Having worked on building a bomb since the 80′s (yes lefties please listen) NIE concludes they halted their effort for reasons other than US troops in Afghanistan and a much larger force invading Saddamville. No connection to Iraq is made, yet Gaddafi blinks. I’ll get back to this later.

3. Where was US Intel on the facility Israel bombed in Syria? Any explanation why Syria leveled the site and poured massive concrete over a large area? Some experts conclude it was destined to be a bomb making facility courtesy NK and Iran. In addition, any NIE on whether past NK nuke tests were small yield because NK was testing small warheads, also in conjunction with Iranian scientists? The point here is question Intel on other events and see what the actual record of NIE is. Pakistan, Iraq, China, NK, India, Israel? One can argue the record is mixed at best and Iran was and is a difficult country to penetrate for secret facilities and decades of a head start.

4.Only a moderate confidence Iran has stopped ALL nuclear weapon activities. Please note enrichment is a dual use activity as well as heavy water plant, more deep bunkers. And how certain are the 16 agencies that Iran does not have other secret facilities? Why do they refuse South African-style full disclosure? The group that first alerted the US (not our own Intel) claims many more secret sites.

5. As I said, the Report makes the case for sanctions yet the release is certain to dampen US effort for sanctions. Now that’s really Intelligent.

6. It also intimates that without sanctions the Iranian government is likely to continue effort. In light of this why release as Iran is certainly crash-programming delivery systems including silent subs, cruise missiles, drones and other goodies complete with fingerprint wipes that would be useful in false-flag operations (the most likely use of Iranian WMD). No one really thinks Iran will launch a few nukes by ballistic missiles at Allied targets.

7. I’m not sue we would be smart to really release the details of Intel on Iran. I doubt the declassified version above replicates Mossad’s version. I wonder how US Intel could be much better than Israeli Intel given the need for legs on the ground. Common sense would suggest that Iran needs to complete their technical problems involving enrichment, build more air defense and deeper bunkers. Again, given the track record and Chinese and Russian help, I’m not certain how the NIE can yield high confidence that while Iran is stalling and doing the dual use work, they are not working on warhead designs, delivery systems and shell games….oh they are…LOL

8. Given the degree Iran supports various terror groups, threatens Israel and oppresses it’s people, why would Democrats spin this report to diss sanctions? Clinton voted to sanction Quds because they are a terror group, not because they are building a bomb. Was NIE INTELligent enough to understand this, or was it to keep Cheney from pushing the button? Doesn’t seem we were planning on attacking Iran next week. This does smack of politics.

9. Back to the Iraq connection. IAEA looking through your window? I think it is a stretch having seen the Taliban and Saddam fall, Iran didn’t understand the range of US power. There were no Russian air defense yet and Iran was virtually naked. Gaddaif blinked. I do not understand why one would discount our force in Iraq. When we nailed Saddam in a hole, the threat of Iraq was over for the Mullahs. Perhaps the discounting of Iraq is because for many, it completely shakes the articles of faith that Iraq was a huge mistake. Many argue Iraq was meant to send a message to regimes that the WMD/terror nexus would be pre-empted. If this is true and one makes the connection about the Iranian halt (slow-down off actual weaponizing) of their nuke program, the mission was accomplished to a significant degree. I suggest Democrats should be careful in spinning this NIE in regards to sanctions and the role of Iraq.

Page 1 of 2
Spooks refuse to toe Cheney’s line on Iran
By Gareth Porter

It was also reported on several cable shows on MSNBC. Hadley, of course, isn’t going to come out with this version. This is typical of why I can’t trust anything that comes out of this WH- the credibility gap is too large.

(snip)

“Procedures for the safeguards required by this article shall be followed with respect to source or special fissionable material whether it is being produced, processed or used in any principal nuclear facility or is outside any such facility.”

And, insofar as Iran’s basic Safeguards Agreement is concerned, Iran was under no obligation to tell the IAEA about activity – such as buying or trying to produce gas-centrifuges – until six months before those activities actually involved the chemical or physical transformation of certain proscribed materials.

However, since November, 2003, Director-General ElBaradei has also been reporting on his activities with respect to several other related – but not NPT associated – sets of investigations.

Not NPT associated!

First, there is the Additional Protocol to the Iran’s NPT-IAEA Safeguards Agreement, which Iran voluntarily signed in December, 2003, and immediately began to adhere to in advance of its ratification.

“The essence of the additional protocol is to reshape the IAEA’s safeguards regime from a quantitative system focused on accounting for known quantities of materials and monitoring declared activities to a qualitative system gathering a comprehensive picture of a state’s nuclear and nuclear-related activities, including nuclear-related imports and exports. ”

Then, there are additional “confidence-building measures” that go beyond even the Additional Protocol, voluntarily taken by Iran for the duration of the 2004 Paris Accord negotiations with the Gang of Three [Brits, French, Germans], ostensibly acting on behalf of the European Union.

Although the IAEA was asked under the Paris Accord to verify Iranian compliance with some of these measures – such as the voluntary suspension of uranium-enrichment activities – the Paris Accord negotiations themselves were none of the IAEA’s business.

If this report is accurate then why would Iran halt their wmd program? Did Bush’s action in Iraq scare the daylights out of Iran? If so it would seem Bush unwittling slowed the flow of wmd.

No, I think the implication is that Iran’s clandestine activities were discovered, and the spotlight of attention on those activities forced Iran to reconsider its course of action. Moving forward with a weapons program would be very risky with the world’s intelligence services and IAEA knocking on your door and peering through your bedroom windows….

Israeli strike on Iran

As for Israel, it would be difficult for them to conduct such a strike on Iran

Too much distance.

If you want more reading about an Israeli strike on Iran, may I suggest this. Also look here (you may recognize Francona’s name), and this.

No, I don’t think we should attack at this time and I still would not support one even if the assessment was the Iran’s program was still progressing.

As for Israel, it would be difficult for them to conduct such a strike on Iran and they could not do so without US approval since they would have to fly through airspace we essentially control.

Weren’t Bush and Cheney aware of this report’s basic findings last year? I thought this was the NIE whose public release was blocked by the WH because it didn’t match Cheney’s hardline rhetoric.

No, the NIE was only recently finished:

Director of National Intelligence Mike McConnell said yesterday that a long-awaited intelligence estimate covering Iran’s nuclear program will be finished by the end of this month, attributing the delay to new information collected in late spring that caused a reconsideration of some elements of the assessment.

And the public release was obviously not blocked….

Rudi nailed it. The real threat is Hezbollah and Hamas.

Not in the Persian Gulf (not limited to the Strait of Hormuz) and in Saudi Arabia and among the Gulf states and their oil infrastructures. Not even so much in Iraq. Yes, in Lebanon and in the Territories.

(If we conducted air strikes on Iran, what would Iran do? Hamas and Hezbollah would attack Israel, of course, but is that what we’d be concerned about? Is that what the Gulf states and the Saudis would be concerned about? Or instead about mining the Strait, mining other locations in the Gulf, attacks on shipping in the Gulf, air and missile strikes on US bases in Iran and on oil installations and other sites in the Gulf states and Saudi Arabia? I say the latter. And what if the Iranians had a nuclear weapon and there were some — as there have been been in Pakistan — willing to use it and start a worse war they know they’d likely lose?)