I think that Podhoretz’s reading is fair. The second article linked on Yahoo (AP) was:
Like Iraq, US intel on Iran faulty
with little tidbits like:
“While key facts have changed, the administration’s strategy has not.
The White House says it will continue to try to build pressure on Iran to prevent it from ever acquiring nuclear bombs. ”
Wow...talk about a bombshell!! In the face of a breifing last Wednesday, Bush continues to presure Iran...unforgivable.
And this:
“It’s a good thing that we caught this before we marched headlong into another military conflict,” said Jon Wolfsthal, senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington. “This isn’t the timebomb the administration made it out to be for the last several years.”
Wolfsthal said the conclusion that international pressure prompted Iran to halt its program “is the piece of information that we missed in Iraq” where Bush believed that Iraq’s pursuit of WMD was continuing despite sanctions. He said the administration did not appear inclined to change its strategy toward Iran. He said that “suggests they can’t take yes for an answer.”
Honestly, it seems that most people agree that there are 4 branches of goverment, the forth being the intellegence community which is there to keep the administration honest.
Too many Democrats in the intelligence industry to use the word honesty in reference thereto -other than satirically. Until such time as Democratic party affiliation is a bar to service in the American intelligence industry, its judgments will not be trustworthy.
I further assess with high confidence that we should ignore the CIA’s assessment of Iran’s nuclear program (has it ever been correct about the status of a secretive foreign power’s weapons program?) and defer to Israeli intelligence.
I get a warm, cozy feeling knowing the security of my country is in the hands of such competent people. After all, they have been so correct on every crisis over the past 50 years. Haven’t they? Oh wait, my bad.
Why don’t we just turn the intelligence operation over to Larry, Moe & Curly. Or perhaps the Marx Brothers. Even though they are, with high confidence, dead, they would still do a better job.
Maybe Iran stopped their program in 2003 because they already had everything they needed to make ‘the bomb’ - except enriched plutonium which they continue to pursue.
Why don’t we just clear this up once and for all by asking Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. We could trust his word with moderate to high confidence.
Wouldn’t that be just as good to go on, as compared to the latest… when we thought they were, they really weren’t, but now they are, so we have until 2015 instead of the previously thought deadline of 2009?
Maybe Iran stopped their program in 2003 because they already had everything they needed to make ‘the bomb’ - except enriched plutonium which they continue to pursue.
I just finished Tim Weiner’s history of the CIA, “A Legacy of Ashes”. The CIA’s lack of competence and its total lack of credible intelligence on both Iraq and Iran is frightening. In contrast to the mindless liberal rant, “Bush lied, soldiers died”, Weiner notes that the CIA, under pressure from both the Bush Administration and Congress, basically manufactured reports about weapons of mass destruction out of whole cloth. Their only source was an untrustworthly Iraqi defector code named “Curveball”. And in Iran, a stupid mistake by somebody at CIA headquarters exposed the roughly 10 CIA sources in Iran, all of whom were subsequently arrested and executed by the mullahs.
Would we all be better off if we did a top to bottom house cleaning in the CIA, and then put all of those that were replaced in a building somewhere. Because of the civil service rules, I am sure we would have to continuing paying their salaries and benefits. They could be set to work hand copying the contents of the Library of Congress to keep them out of mischief. Any who would not work could then be fired.
Anyone saying that the cost would be prohibitive should think about the cost of policy errors due to faulty intelligence.
I would like very much to know when the NIE, or its conclusions, got into the hands of the President. I am certain that the administration has been sitting on this for some time. At his press conference this morning GWB said he just recently learned what it said. I flat out don’t believe that. Here is a month-old link to what appears to be a lefty site that asserts that the NIE is a year old. That may or may not be true, but it’s clear it is at least a MONTH old.
http://tinyurl.com/34j2uv
Is it even remotely possible that GWB was just informed about the conclusions? Naw, that’s a lie.
I would also very much like to know why it was finally released, even in its redacted version. I am not as paranoid as Podhoretz, but I still look over my shoulder now and then. My guess is that the administration would have NEVER let this see the light of day except that they knew that too many people knew about it, and that if if got leaked, it would be a scandal of epic proportions that they had been holding it back. This way, at least, they could try to control the spin.
I further assess with high confidence that we should ignore the CIA’s assessment of Iran’s nuclear program (has it ever been correct about the status of a secretive foreign power’s weapons program?) and defer to Israeli intelligence.
Works for me
What “works for me” IS ...
What a man SAYS. MOST people, when accosted on a dark street late at night by a scary looking thug who says, “Gimme your wallet, I have a gun”, will do WHAT? Reach for their wallet while begging for their lives that’s what. What will YOU do / say:
What does it even mean to say that they have halted their nuclear weapons program, given that they are still enriching uranium? Somebody seems to be playing with words here.
Judging from the gleeful way Harry Reid jumped all over this news, I also suspect that the leftwing peaceniks in the CIA have once again gained the upper hand and are distorting intel to undercut the Bush administration. As John says, let’s see what the Israelis say.


Yesterday, the always-astute Charles Krauthammer on Fox (he should have his own show!) pointed out that there are three milestones on the path to building deliverable atomic bombs: (1) adequate quantities of enriched uranium; (2) long-range missile capability; (3) bomb-assembly technology. The Iranians are working on (1) and (2) without pause. It doesn’t take much time to jump to (3), especially when you can get clandestine help from places like Pakistan and North Korea.


But this NIE release will have the effect of undercutting Administration efforts to keep Iran from (3). President Bush had to spend a lot of time this morning in his press conference, in defense of keeping the pressure on Iran.
Do we know for sure that the Iranians are not currently developing bomb technology in secret? Do we have agents on the ground in Iran?
What this probably means is that the Israelis will have to go in alone if they decide to take out Iran’s bomb-making capability. And they will. There will be no choice.
With this “new intelligence” one must ask the question - Could this simply be members of the CIA or other “intelligence” agencies playing games with the information, solely to embarrass President Bush?
There is no doubt that a number of upper echelon personnel in the State Dept, the CIA and other agencies are working at cross purposes to President Bush and his Administration. By “creating” new intelligence information that provides a “new perspective” on the Iran situation, it gives the impression that Bush was acting without just cause for concern.
It is incomprehensible, the number of people in high positions in this nation that will distort, twist and lie about information provided to President Bush for the sole purpose of creating a negative impression, here in the US and abroad. But, the facts are there. Too many of these individuals were appointed or achieved their positions under a democrat and will do all in their power to ensure that a Republican President will look bad.
For decades we’ve heard from England the phrase, “GOD save the Queen”. What we need in the US is a phrase and the actions, “GOD save the USA from democrats.”
