Bloodless Coup

"Pentagon sources yesterday indicated that fresh intelligence had been gleaned from an analysis of TV pictures showing the uranium enrichment facility at Natanz — which Iran has always claimed is developing nuclear energy rather than weapons.

"The US has also had information from the interrogation of the defector Ali Rez Asgari, a member of the Revolutionary Guard who disappeared recently on a visit to Turkey."

So, basically the CIA thinks that the word of a former member of Iran's Revolutionary Guard is good enough evidence upon which to conclude not just that there's no weapons program at Natanz, but also to extend that to the point that there's no weapons program in a parallel nuclear enrichment facilty. And we should trust them because this isn't Desert Storm in which we found out the CIA estimate that Iraq was five or ten years from a weapon was wrong, and that they were at the time only twelve to eighteen months away from a nuclear weapon.

Let's see, no harm here. What's wrong with believing this defector (for sake of argument, let's call him "curveball") and trusting what he says? Wait a moment! Curveball! That's the name of the Iraqi defector who provided faulty intelligence to Powell that was delivered by Powell as a pretext to Operation Iraqi Freedom. Of course, another Iranian defector actually said that:

"Al-Qaida had extensive contacts with Iran's Ministry of Intelligence and Security, as well as with an elite military unit which helped the terrorists train and plot attacks against Americans, according to a former intelligence officer who recently fled Iran."

But wait, we all know Cheney took out insurance on the World Trade Center, and we know popular science is a bunch of apologists for Bush who actually orchestrated the attacks as captured in the documentary loose change.

Well, it's not like they're building mysterious missile projects shrouded in secrecy capable of reaching America in 2008, right?

"Available information suggests that Iran has, at most 1-2 prototype Shahab-4s (one of which may be an SLV) and possibly a preliminary engineering mock-up of the Shahab-5. If development continues and these systems are deployed, they would be capable of being armed with conventional high explosive, submunition, chemical, and radiological dispersion warheads. As with the Shahab-3, given continued development and a favorable environment, a nuclear capability for these systems could be achieved by 2008."

So apparently Morris thinks he knows everything the NIE is based on, and appears to think he has more and better intelligence than the entire US Intelligence Community. Hmmm - maybe he'll join the cast of Heroes for season 3?

Right, because the NIE's never been wrong before. Do you even realize that if the NIE from 2005 and the NIE from 2007 drew two different conclusions, then one of them must be wrong. Of course, just because the Israelis' intelliegence was good enough to know that there was a parallel processing facility in Syria (good enough intelligence they could blow it up), and the Israelis believe there's another parallel processing facility in Iraq, why believe the Jews? They always have paranoid fantasies, like they had about that Austrian guy, you know, the painter with the moustache. But if you ask me, they have a better track record.

Godwin's Law! You lose. ;)

Well whether or not they have a better track record is an empirical question - and one that neither you nor I can answer (given that we don't have the access/security clearances necessaru to do so). And do tell us (whip out the ouija board or whatever) which NIE's have been "wrong". What do you think the Intel Community does all day - sits around with their ginger ale and Redbook and just makes these things up at the end of the day? Of course intelligence being intelligence there will be hits and misses. But what's remarkable about this one is the degree to which the IC is united in their views on this one - something not true of, for example, the pre-war NIE on Iraq.

And by the way, why do you think that the sources of Israel's intelligence re: Syria are different from the sources we are using?

My sources? How about the Hindu, India's national newspaper. That's like Ganesh, the Krishna, and Vishnu all riding together:

"The U-turn on Iran by U.S. spy agencies, the biggest since the Iraq debacle five years ago, is the result of “physical” intelligence, probably a defector, according to various diplomatic and security sources in Washington."

Realistically, it just doesn't fit. Why would they be developing ICBMs? You don't build those to hold conventional weapons. Why would they rule out stopping their nuclear enrichment? Are you telling me there's no incentive which could equal the power they could get from Why did they lie and not disclose their original facility in Natanz? And what, did all this just disappear?

"Aside from a small IAEA-safeguarded "zero-power" research reactor located at the Esfahan Nuclear Technology Center, Iran has no known heavy water reactor and no need for an indigenous source of heavy water. Iran's only nuclear power reactor expected to become operational within the next decade is the light-water reactor under construction with Russian help at Bushehr. This raised questions about Iran's intentions in constructing an industrial-scale heavy water production plant at Arak. Heavy-water moderated reactors are better suited for plutonium production than are light water reactors. The US believed Iran's true intent is to develop the capability to produce fissile material for nuclear weapons, using both the plutonium route (supported ultimately by a heavy-water research reactor) and the highly enriched uranium route (supported by a gas centrifuge enrichment plant). The Arak heavy water plant only makes sense if it is paired with a plutonium production reactor."

"On 26 August 2006 Iranian President Mahmud Ahmadinejad opened the heavy-water plant."

"The reactor, which could produce plutonium for use in making nuclear weapons, is scheduled to be opened in 2009."

"A single nuclear weapon might require 4 or 5 kilograms of plutonium, so the reactor could produce two or three atomic bombs each year."

Why build Natanz 75 feet deep, under several meters of reinforced concrete?

"At a 13 December 2002 briefing, State Department spokesman Richard Boucher told reporters the facility was being built partially underground, and as such is inconsistent with Iran's claims that its nuclear intentions are peaceful: "It appears from the imagery that a service road, several small structures, and perhaps three large structures are being build below grade, and some of these are already being covered with earth. Iran clearly intended to harden and bury that facility. That facility was probably never intended by Iran to be a declared component of the peaceful program. Instead Iran has been caught constructing a secret underground site where it could produce fissile material." Based upon what Boucher termed "hard evidence," Iran appears to be constructing a uranium enrichment plant at Nantaz, as well as a heavy water plant. 'The suspect uranium-enrichment plant ... could be used to produce highly-enriched uranium for weapons. The heavy-water plant could support a reactor for producing weapons-grade plutonium. These facilities are not justified by the needs of Iran's civilian nuclear program,' he said."

ah, plainly the CIA should have looked at the Hindu. or asked Morris.

"And what, did all this just disappear?"

um, it wouldn't be the first time.

What Moon said. I'm guessing the IC has better sources than Morris.

And (shocking as this may be for Morris to believe) Iran's actions and plans in 2002 don't necessarily equal Iran's actions in plans in 2007 - you know, what the NIE says.

"I'm guessing the IC has better sources than Morris."

See, we're not going to know much until people with clearance actually read the "intelligence" and report back on its summary. My guess is that the White House did this, yet somehow you give more credence to the NIE report than it gave to itself:

"We use phrases such as judge, assess, and estimate – and probabilistic terms such as probably and likely—to convey analytical assessments and judgments. Such statements are not facts, proof, or knowledge."

The trouble is, once they've got the plutonium, we can't do much to stop them. It's a lot easier to stop the larger facilities from producing it than it is to stop a few nuclear physicists from coming into Iran and finding a way to make it go boom. So even if they're not working on weaponizing it this year, that means little, because once they have their own plutonium, they can weaponize it anytime they want. Look at North Korea; they denied having a second uranium enrichment program in October 2002. In February of the next year, they turned on their primary reactor full blast. By July, they had enough enriched uranium to make several weapons. By October 2006, they had tested a nuclear weapon. This is the model that the Iranians are following. It only took the North Koreans three years to figure out how to make it go boom. And Iran is building the missiles to carry the big boom, just like the North Koreans did.

"See, we're not going to know much until people with clearance actually read the "intelligence" and report back on its summary."

Ummm, Morris, just what is it that you think the IC is, does, has been doing ... ? They've got the clearances, they've read the intelligence, studied it, and this is their conclusion. Whether they are 95% sure instead of 100% sure they are reasonably sure.

And how on Earth are Iran and North Korea similar? Both before the new NIE and in the new NIE the reporting (from the DNI) was that Iran wouldn't have the ability to build a bomb for at least 5 years and that it could well take them a lot longer. North Korea already had masses of fuel rods and the appropriate equipment to process them. So when they opened up the seals and started reprocessing (while George Bush, ever so strong on national defense, stood by and did nothing while a charter member of the Axis of Evil went nuclear) it was relatively easy for them to do so and to assemble a weapon (albeit perhaps a weapon that didn't work right). Iran simply doesn't have that capability.

Bro,
You're looking at this three dimensionally. You have to add time. Right now, Iran doens't have that capability. In a few years, Iran will have that capability with its facilities at Arak, Natanz, and anywhere else we have yet to find. At that time, there's nothing we could do to stop them from having a weapon in that moment's near future.

Silly me for reading the 2007 NIE as applying to what's known in 2007. But understandably they are working off today's intelligence/ B/c, you know, that's what actually exists. And the people who've studied this say Iran might have nuclear weapons eventually, but not in a few years.

Now at some point in the future might Iran have them? Sure. And at some point in the future Cartman and the Sea Otters might be carrying out adventures. But all that's apparently sufficiently far away that it's not something we need to launch an aggressive war tomorrow to fix. There is apparently time to deal with this matter through less costly means. It is not the imminent threat the White House made it out to be. Which actually isn't that surprising as that's what the DNI and previous intelligence estimates have been saying about Iran for some time.