Norman Podhoretz takes note of some questions about it:
…I entertain an even darker suspicion. It is that the intelligence community, which has for some years now been leaking material calculated to undermine George W. Bush, is doing it again. This time the purpose is to head off the possibility that the President may order air strikes on the Iranian nuclear installations. As the intelligence community must know, if he were to do so, it would be as a last resort, only after it had become undeniable that neither negotiations nor sanctions could prevent Iran from getting the bomb, and only after being convinced that it was very close to succeeding. How better, then, to stop Bush in his tracks than by telling him and the world that such pressures have already been effective and that keeping them up could well bring about “a halt to Iran’s entire nuclear weapons program”—especially if the negotiations and sanctions were combined with a goodly dose of appeasement or, in the NIE’s own euphemistic formulation, “with opportunities for Iran to achieve its security, prestige, and goals for regional influence in other ways.”
Me, too; I haven’t read the actual NIE, but it is reported that while the NIE is highly confident that Iran stopped its nuclear weapons program in 2003, Iran continues to enrich a sort of uranium which is really only useful in a nuclear weapons program. In technical terms, to say something like that is known as bullsh**. Its like saying that the illegals have stopped trying to cross the border, but are still digging that tunnel under the fence…
Someone at State and/or CIA is merely trying to undercut the President’s stated policy of not allowing Iran to obtain nuclear weapons. Yet another lesson in the absolute necessity of any future GOP Administration to fire each and every person hired or promoted by a previous Democratic Administration. Aside from that, I don’t think this NIE will amount to a hill of beans as far as President Bush is concerned – it won’t be an NIE which decides what to do about Iran, but President Bush after carefully weighing all the available data.
Blogs For Victory 
Okay, let’s cue President Bush this morning:
And…
And…
And…
Thank you, Mr. President.
(Source: http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2007/12/20071204-4.html)
Now, do any of the stab-in-the-back theorists here have any questions for the President of the United States?
Come on now Diana, it’s long been suspected that the president is part of the government conspiracy against Bush.
Seriously though, it appears that Israel isn’t so sure that Iran has halted their nuclear weapons program. And it should also be noted that Iran has consistently claimed that they had no nuclear program. If there is any international concensus, it is that at some point Iran was lying, whether or not they are now. There’s no question that Iran could become a danger in years to come. But a pee-your-pants, WWIII level of danger? I’ve always been a bit skeptical about that. As demonstrated in North Korea, even if they get to, or even cross the threshold, there are ways of dealing with them. Of course there is also the question of whether they will transfer their technology to some other country. But a Sunni-dominated country? Seems unlikely. Anyway, in that regard there are bigger worries than Iran — namely, North Korea and Pakistan.
But…but…but… Diana… what about all the underground bunkers?
But…but…but… if this is true, how can we attack them???
Maybe we can attack Syria instead since all of Iraq’s WMDs were brought there and hidden.
You’ve GOT to be kidding. 16 intelligence agencies conspired together to LIE about a nuclear weapons program being developed by an Islamic Middle Eastern nation because they don’t like Bush?
Whatever you guys are on, cut the dose.
Ricorun,
It’s interesting that there is so little concern expressed anywhere, least of all by those obsessing over Iran, over the fact that we have an unstable nuclear-armed Muslim state, Pakistan, with a history of warfare with its neighbor, the nuclear-armed nation of India. If someone were trying to make a rational case for preemptive military action to prevent the use of nuclear weapons, then Pakistan is ground-zero, not Iran. I am not making that case because I believe that there is a reason that a nuclear exchange between India and Pakistan has not happened. It is that both sides, even (surprise!) the Muslims, realize that they there will be no winners if they engage in thermonuclear war.
This is priceless. You cannot satirize these people, they do it themselves.
“it won’t be an NIE which decides what to do about Iran, but President Bush after carefully weighing all the available data.”
Sure, when I think Triumphs of Empirical Thinking, I do think of Bush, except I am a little bit troubled by his telling us that the DNI told him that they had some new information on Iran for him, but that they didn’t tell him what it was. And he didn’t ask.
BUSH: I was made aware of the NIE last week. In August, I think it was John — Mike McConnell came in and said, We have some new information. He didn’t tell me what the information was. He did tell me it was going to take a while to analyze.
Later, when a reporter followed-up on this statement, Bush asserted no one ever told him to stop ratcheting up the rhetoric against Iran:
REPORTER: Are you saying at no point while the rhetoric was escalating, as World War III was making it into conversation — at no point, nobody from your intelligence team or your administration was saying, Maybe you want to back it down a little bit?
BUSH: No — I’ve never — nobody ever told me that.
It’s one of life’s chicken and egg imponderables, are they more incompetent or more malicious? Personally, I go back and forth. Frequently, I think “malicious” combined with an incredible faith in the idiocy of the American public that they might actually *believe* this crap, but then I take note of the fact that they are going to lose every election higher than dogcatcher in 2008 and it’s hard not to swing back to “incompetent”.
Welllll, did our intelligence agencies know about the Pakistan bomb? Or the Russian bomb? The Chinese bomb?
The actual wording of the NIE says “plausible but unlikely”. I wish it was a little more specific.
But I don’t think it’s a conspiracy. Intelligence is not perfect. Not now and not when we went into Iraq.
You lefties really need to address the substance here rather than just pretending that I said something I didn’t say…an NIE says there is high confidence that Iran halted its program in 2003 even though a 2005 NIE said there was high confidence that Iran had NOT halted its program…and, meanwhile, even this NIE says that Iran continues to enrich uranium which is generally only useful for a weapons program…in other words, they are highly confident that it has been stopped AND highly confident that it is ongoing…the undercut part of the report is whomever put this out as an “Iran stopped its nuke program” report. That is, plain and simple, BS…the NIE itself denies what the NIE is saying.
This is yet another version of the Downing Street Memo where someone makes out that a document says the opposite of what it says…for you on the left this works like a charm because you will uncritically accept ANYTHING said which works against Bush Administration policy.
Diana,
President Bush long ago learned not to argue with an MSM “memo o’ the day” – the MSM is saying its a report proving Iran has stopped its nuke program, and President Bush isn’t going to try and shout over that noise…so, “good job, boys and girls, and I thank you for your efforts”…meanwhile, the real issue is actually beign addressed by adults in the Bush Administration who just don’t care what the MSM is saying.
Just remember that in Foreign Affairs and in many speeches and on the Senate floor one person in particular has accused Bush of being too weak on Iran and of not taking the threat seriously enough.
That person is……. Hillary Clinton.
“… and growing tension with Iran as it seeks to acquire nuclear weapons.”
“…The case in point is Iran. Iran poses a long-term strategic challenge to the United States, our NATO allies, and Israel. It is the country that most practices state-sponsored terrorism, and it uses its surrogates to supply explosives that kill U.S. troops in Iraq. The Bush administration refuses to talk to Iran about its nuclear program, preferring to ignore bad behavior rather than challenge it. Meanwhile, Iran has enhanced its nuclear-enrichment capabilities, armed Iraqi Shiite militias, funneled arms to Hezbollah, and subsidized Hamas, even as the government continues to hurt its own citizens by mismanaging the economy and increasing political and social repression.”
“… Iran must conform to its nonproliferation obligations and must not be permitted to build or acquire nuclear weapons. If Iran does not comply with its own commitments and the will of the international community, all options must remain on the table.”
http://www.foreignaffairs.org/20071101faessay86601/hillary-rodham-clinton/security-and-opportunity-for-the-twenty-first-century.html
What a she-hawk!
Kahn,
Okay, so you’re the President. What do you do? Since “intelligence is not perfect”, despite President Bush speaking in very positive terms about the reforms of the intelligence community he instituted, what do you do in the face of all this uncertainty? Do you bomb a sovereign country because you’re “uncertain” that they might be building a weapon that, given the example of Pakistan and North Korea, might well just sit unused until its components decay so much that you can’t even be certain that it will detonate anymore? What’s your advice to the President of the United States at this point? At what point does uncertainty justify bombing another country?
Mark,
Do, please. You’re capable of rational debate. Spare me the incredibly patronizing “adults in the Bush Administration” meme which, of course, translates into the “all you little people just need to trust the Government, they Know Things, they are Good and they are here to Protect Us“. This is an especially egregious example of self-hating behavior when it comes from the same people who sanctified President Reagan who famously said, “Government is not the solution to our problem. Government is the problem.”
Kahn,
Good call! Unfortunately, in the growing convergence between the two parties, Hillary Clinton has demonstrated in multiple instances that she is willing to start unprovoked wars over nebulous “threats to our interests”. Hence, I have little desire in seeing her get the nomination.
Diana, but we haven’t bombed Iran. Sabre rattling is in fact diplomacy. Looks like it worked.
According to the NIE, it appears that going into Iraq stopped the nuke programs in Libya and Iran! Though Libya admitted it because they wanted to come back into the community – Iran didn’t because they’re making a power play.
You’re welcome.
Or maybe Bush is trying to cover his a$$ because Cheney’s energy task force plan to get American oil companies in so they can profit off the oil fields in Iraq and Iran is failing. And people are calling them on their lies. Not enough people are calling them on the root of the issue. Oil.
I know, I know. Oil has nothing to do with it. It’s all those nucular weapons that don’t exist.
markaspicion:
i just skimmed/read the posts
about your agreement with the suspicious conspiracy theory?
you should read what you wrote back to yourself
really……
you earthlings are bringing the crazy
one more time….
congrats
Kahn,
Has it ever occurred to you that “saber rattling”, as in the endless cheer leading in the media in 2002 that preceded our invasion of a sovereign nation which had not attacked us, might have reasonably allowed those Iranians who favor seeking nuclear weapons to argue against logical resistance to that idea by saying, “We need something big to protect us.” Logically, the Iranians have no practical basis for possessing nuclear warheads. They are, as much as anything else, self-deterring.
“We judge with high confidence that in fall 2003, Tehran halted its nuclear weapons program.”
Gee moonbats, exactly what happened around that time to make them stop???
Wasn’t this about the same time that Libya decided that they really didn’t want a nuclear program???
Thank you President Bush for your decisive action.
“we also assess with moderate-to-high confidence that Tehran at a minimum is keeping open the option to develop nuclear weapons.”
Gee what do you suppose could convince them to start again?? Could it have anything to do the the defeatocrats beating the drums that we’ve lost, we’re in a quagmire, let’s cut and run?
Thanks defeatocrats for undermining the foreign policy efforts of the Executive Branch and providing aid and comfort to our enemies.
I love how you moonbats are always so animated about anything which you perceive to be damaging to the adminstration. That seems to be more important to all of you than actually defeating our enemies and protecting our borders.
Bravo Diana,
Take a lesson Almiranta.
phnx: Wasn’t this about the same time that Libya decided that they really didn’t want a nuclear program???
I’m sure that had a lot to do with it. A very good analysis of the sequence of events can be found here. Basically, when the Italians seized a German ship carrying 1,000 centrifuges headed for Libya, the Khan network quickly unraveled like an old sweater. Was the invasion of Iraq a factor? Maybe. Ghadaffi claims it wasn’t, but who believes Ghadaffi? Was it either a necessary or sufficient factor? Well, certainly not sufficient. As for necessary, I guess people will debate that forever. It really does depend on what you want to believe, and it’s impossible to say what would have happened in the absence of the Iraq invasion. But definitely that ship seizure was an essential component. And that wouldn’t have happened without the Proliferation Security Initiative, signed by 11 developed countries to stop and search vessels in their territories suspected of carrying banned weapons or technology. That initiative has been paying all kinds of dividends. The Libyan intercept is certainly the biggie. But other notable intercepts are the ballistic missile shipments from North Korea to Yemen in Dec 2003 and the shipments of European munitions to Iraq (presumably) through Malta last year.
what im confused about is….
the iranians were digging HUGE underground complexes and scattering thier programs all over the country to prevent the loss of the technology from one massive air strike
So how did the NIE get into all thier underground bunkers and figure out that the Iranians were not trying to develope a bomb?
And even more so…what logistic program do they use to determine that the Ruskies are not helping them hide it? Certainly, they still have no clue what the Ruskies goals in Iraq were with Saddam, let alone how to account for all the WMD that multiple nations intelligence agencies concede existed.
You want conspiracy? I’ll give you conspiracy.
Do you honestly believe that Mr. Decider was given this information LAST WEEK?
Here’s the kicker, he’s going to review it again for accuracy.
I hope, pray, what ever words it takes, that Mr. CIC somehow, someway, gets information as important as this a wee bit sooner?
LAST WEEK?
Cut the crap. I’ll give you conspiracy. I have full confidence that Mr. McFlightsuit KNEW long, long ago.
You know what’s sad? NO ONE, believes a damn word out of his mouth anymore.
NO ONE.
Not me. Not most of America, and the entire world.
Only here, at Blogs for Victory.
Well, yes Dianna it occurred to me. But I rejected the idea as wrong. Libya stopped (a major item overlooked by many) and at about the same time so did Iran. Lesson THEY learned, the USA has an awesome military and is serious about this nuke crap. Lesson WE learned – there may not have been nukes in Iraq like we thought there were, but going there helped end programs in Libya and Iran. A victory – yes?
Agent – He just didn’t want to brag. I mean Libya, North Korea, AND Iran stopping their weapons programs?
You think about THAT, OK? Sounds objectively like whatever the hell Bush has done, we’re safer because of it.
Oh, whine and bitch if you must. I know that hate substitutes for facts on your side. Truth is, that makes THREE nuclear programs stopped.
That seems to be more important to all of you than actually defeating our enemies and protecting our borders.
phnx, President Bush IS their enemy. Their only enemy.
Mrk, what I find funny about this is the way the DBDM is reporting that Iran has terminated its nuclear weapons program, when in fact, the program, if not still ongoing, is merely suspended. More media bias, for sure.
Remember, with the exception of the U.S., all nations that acquired/developed nukes, did so under the cloud of secrecy…