How I love that word, "demand" in this article!
Now, if these sanctions are to be passed by the Security Council, which unfortunate member of the Knesset gets to make those trips to Beijing and Moscow to get China and Russia to go along with further sanctions?
No one.
Because Israel knows that Russia and China will not change their positions on further sanctions.
How this may shake out is with Israel declaring the UN "irrelevant", which they will use as a justification for unilateral action.
Israel, of course, has one little, tiny problem which is not addressed in this article
Russian officials have stated that any attack against Iran will be considered an attack against Russia.
War with Russia, anyone?
I would like to hope that the policy makers in Israel are weighing this very heavily in terms of what their next actions will be if no further UN sanctions come about.
Now, if these sanctions are to be passed by the Security Council, which unfortunate member of the Knesset gets to make those trips to Beijing and Moscow to get China and Russia to go along with further sanctions?
No one.
Because Israel knows that Russia and China will not change their positions on further sanctions.
How this may shake out is with Israel declaring the UN "irrelevant", which they will use as a justification for unilateral action.
Israel, of course, has one little, tiny problem which is not addressed in this article
Russian officials have stated that any attack against Iran will be considered an attack against Russia.
War with Russia, anyone?
I would like to hope that the policy makers in Israel are weighing this very heavily in terms of what their next actions will be if no further UN sanctions come about.
State official: Act against Tehran before it's too late
Roni Sofer
Ynet learns Israel intends to demand UN Security Council assemble to debate third round of sanctions against Iran after release of IAEA report. ''We hope IAEA is aware of the price the entire world may end up paying for its lenient approach towards Iran,' says top Jerusalem official
(What price will be paid if Israel starts yet another illegal war for no real reason? Israel has no evidence to support their empty allegations, reminiscent of the LIES which led to the invasion of Iraq. The world knows this, and that's why all that's happened is that Israel's Extremists have been exposed as dangerous warmongers.)
Israel will seek to call a session of the United Nations Security Council to demand the tightening of sanctions against Iran – Ynet learned on Thursday. The request to convene the council will be made after the release of an additional report on Tehran's nuclear program authored by International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Director-General Dr. Mohammad ElBaradei.
(This entire debate is rather ironic, as Israel is the only state in the region with covert programs of nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons, not to mention the largest military in the ME.)
A senior State official told Ynet that the report is expected to see light this coming weekend or early next week.
"We hope the IAEA is aware of the price the entire world may end up paying for its lenient approach towards Iran," said the official.
(Yeah, we know. You don't think the 'smoking gun' should come in the form of a mushroom cloud ... We've heard it all before. Look at the price that's been paid for these LIES.)
"Israel believes that there is an urgent need for a third round of sanctions against Iran, and it has directed its actions in accordance with this belief for the past several months. The UN Security Council must be convened as soon as possible so that such sanctions will be authorized."
(No they won't.)
The official said that recent statements made by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and General Mohammad Ali Jaafari, commander of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards, "are testament to the nature of the dangerous, irresponsible and racist regime currently ruling Tehran. Iran poses a danger not only to Israel but to the entire world. We must act before it is too late; before Iran's motivations are caught up by its abilities."
(The Iranians were responding to the provocation of Israel's ruling Extremists, who are the real dangerous, irresponsible and racist Regime here. What they're engaged in is called "Projecting". It's the practice of accusing your opponent of what you're actually guilty of, before anyone can say it about you. Iran poses no threat. These Zionist Extremists and their thirst for war does.)
Foreign Affairs Minister Tzipi Livni's office is preparing for the release of the IAEA report under an atmosphere of tense anticipation. The Foreign Ministry estimates that, as has been the case with previous reports, the agency will go easy on Iran.
(What this really means is that the report will be accurate, and refute the unfounded claims being made by those trying to start a war.)
Alongside ongoing diplomatic efforts to promote its position, Israel is also maintaining continuous contact with the six nations that will eventually vote on the implementation of new sanctions against Iran (Germany and the five permanent members of Security Council – the US, Russia, China, France and the UK). Russia and China are reluctant to authorize further sanctions.
(Russian has also stated that any attack on Iran will be viewed as an attack on Russia ...)
Olmert to brief Tokyo on situation
Meanwhile Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is expected to leave for Japan on Sunday, where he will update top officials, as well as Emperor Akihito, on the Iranian threat.
(Which doesn't really exist ...)
According to intelligence information gathered by Israel, Iran is pursuing military nuclear capabilities, despite the Islamic Republic's claim that it is seeking nuclear power for civilian purposes only.
(Riiiight. Just like the 'intelligence information' it had that showed Saddam had the same program ... If this was true, then Israel would simply release this to the IAEA.)
Olmert is expected to tell the Japanese that Iran is developing missiles capable of reaching every country in the world and is also working to enrich uranium.
(But then again, Olmert has LIED throughout his term, so why should we be suprised that he's doing more of the same? LYING to foreign Governments only builds animosity towards Israel, and its citizens should keep this in mind.)
The Israeli leader will tell Japanese officials that Israel remains in favor of exhausting the diplomatic efforts aimed at thwarting Iran's nuclear aspirations, despite having said recently that the Jewish state retained the right
to respond with whatever means necessary to protect its citizens.
(This entire 'crisis' is about trying to leverage the 'legal' justification for a war these Extremists have plotted for years, and view as an inevitability. It has nothing to do with 'thwarting' anything ... except, perhaps, peace.)
"We are working with other countries to encourage a comprehensive effort on the part of the international community aimed at blocking Iran's attempt to obtain nuclear capabilities," Olmert told German Chancellor Angela Merkel in Berlin about two weeks ago.
Meanwhile, diplomats said that for the second time in recent weeks, Washington has given the International Atomic Energy Agency information on what it says were Tehran's attempts to make nuclear weapons, but added that much of it is of doubtful value.
The diplomats also told The Associated Press that after handing over a large file last Friday, the US agreed to allow the Iranians to look at some of the material so they could respond to the allegations but Tehran has shown no interest in examining the information.
Associated Press contributed to the report
www.ynetnews.com/Ext/Comp/ArticleLayout/CdaArticlePrintPreview/1,2506,L-
Israel, US to set up joint committees on Iran: report
http://rawstory.com /news/afp/Israel_US_to_set_up_joint.com mittee_11092007.html
Note the willingness of the original source to repeat the long-refuted LIE that Ahmadinejad threatened to 'wipe Israel off the map', the result of a mistranslation from Farsi to English, which was corrected the same week it was made.
It's ironic that we're supposed to support a war, based on this lie, yet ignore the fact that Israel and the US are actually plotting to attack this sovereign country.
Israel, US meet to discuss common Middle East strategy
Minister Shaul Mofaz speaks about possible future sanctions on Iran, replacing current director of IAEA
http://www..net news.com /Ext/Comp/ArticleLayout/CdaArticlePrintPreview/1,2506,L-3469447,00.html
Israel urges ElBaradei removal
Thu, 08 Nov 2007
Israel has mockingly called for the removal of IAEA chief from his post, claiming he has turned a blind eye to Iran's nuclear progress.
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=30268
IAEA Leader's Phone Tapped
U.S. Pores Over Transcripts to Try to Oust Nuclear Chief
http://www.washingtonpost.com /ac2/wp-dyn/A57928-2004Dec11?language=printer
Olmert: ElBaradei 'no fan of Israel'
Israel intensifies its criticism (slander) of IAEA, prime minister says its chief does not harbor positive feelings towards Israel. 'His lethargic and irresponsible conduct should have led to his dismissal,' says cabinet minister
http://www..net news.com /articles/0,7340,L-3469118,00.html
Memo to Prime Minister Olmert: the only thing for which the Head of the IAEA, Mohamed El Baradei should be "a fan" is simply this: the truth.
And he seems to be. That's why the Neo-Fascists want to replace him with someone more 'pliable' ...
What is happening here is, as Yogi Berra used to say. "deja vu all over again". We are again witnessing the personal smearing and crafted innuendos against the man who has stated very clearly that Iran has no weapons program.
Iran is simply building a power plant, nothing more.
Does anyone remember what happened, right before the run-up to the invasion of Iraq, when Hans Blix stated that Iraq absolutely had no weapons of mass destruction?
Blix: I was smeared by the Pentagon
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,,974998,00.html
This is precisely the same thing.
Now, we can only wait to find out precisely when the US and Israel will declare the UN "irrelevant" again, and go in with guns blazing.
Given the plot for another Act of Aggression in the oil-producing region of the world, I thought this was rather timely:
Govt. plans to divert oil into reserve
By H. JOSEF HEBERT
WASHINGTON - Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman on Thursday defended plans to divert oil into the federal emergency reserve, although he acknowledged that tight supplies likely are one reason for surging crude oil prices.
The Energy Department announced it has awarded contracts to three companies — Shell Trading Co., Sunoco Logistics and BP North America — for 12.3 million barrels of oil to go into the government's Strategic Petroleum Reserve, beginning in January.
Deliveries are scheduled at a rate of 70,000 barrels a day for six months.
http://news.yahoo.com /s/ap/20071109/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/bodman_oil_3
Spooks refuse to toe Cheney's line on Iran
By Gareth Porter
WASHINGTON - The US National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) on Iran has been held up for more than a year in an effort to force the intelligence community to remove dissenting judgments on the Iranian nuclear program. The aim is to make the document more supportive of Vice President Dick Cheney's militarily aggressive policy toward Iran, according to accounts provided by participants in the NIE process to two former Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) officers.
But this pressure on intelligence analysts, obviously instigated by Cheney himself, has not produced a draft estimate without those dissenting views, these sources say. The White House has now apparently decided to release the "unsatisfactory" draft NIE, but without making its key findings public.
A NIE coordinates the judgments of the US's 16 intelligence agencies on a specific country or issue.
A former CIA intelligence officer who has asked not to be identified told Inter Press Service (IPS) that an official involved in the NIE process says the Iran estimate was ready to be published a year ago but has been delayed because the director of national intelligence wanted a draft reflecting a consensus on key conclusions - particularly on Iran's nuclear program.
There is a split in the intelligence community on how much of a threat the Iranian nuclear program poses, according to the intelligence official's account. Some analysts who are less independent are willing to give the benefit of the doubt to the alarmist view coming from Cheney's office, but others have rejected that view.
The draft NIE, first completed a year ago, which had included the dissenting views, was not acceptable to the White House, according to the former intelligence officer. "They refused to come out with a version that had dissenting views in it," he says.
As recently as early October, the official involved in the process was said to be unclear about whether a NIE would be circulated and, if so, what it would say.
Former CIA officer Philip Giraldi provided a similar account, based on his own sources in the intelligence community. He told IPS that intelligence analysts have had to review and rewrite their findings three times, because of pressure from the White House.
"The White House wants a document that it can use as evidence for its Iran policy," says Giraldi. Despite pressures on them to change their dissenting conclusions, however, Giraldi says some analysts have refused to go along with conclusions that they believe are not supported by the evidence.
In October 2006, Giraldi wrote in The American Conservative that the NIE on Iran had already been completed, but that Cheney's office had objected to its findings on both the Iranian nuclear program and Iran's role in Iraq. The draft NIE did not conclude that there was confirming evidence that Iran was arming Shi'ite insurgents in Iraq, according to Giraldi.
Giraldi said the White House had decided to postpone any decision on the internal release of the NIE until after the November 2006 congressional elections.
Cheney's desire for a "clean" NIE that could be used to support his aggressive policy toward Iran was apparently a major factor in the replacement of John Negroponte as director of national intelligence in early 2007. Negroponte had angered neo-conservatives in the administration by telling the press in April 2006 that the intelligence community believed that it would still be "a number of years off" before Iran would be "likely to have enough fissile material to assemble into or to put into a nuclear weapon, perhaps into the next decade".
Neo-conservatives immediately attacked Negroponte for the statement, which merely reflected the existing NIE on Iran issued in spring 2005. Robert G Joseph, the under secretary of state for arms control and an ally of Cheney, contradicted Negroponte the following day. He suggested that Iran's nuclear program was nearing the "point of no return" - an Israeli concept referring to the mastery of industrial-scale uranium enrichment.
Frank J Gaffney, a protege of neo-conservative heavyweight Richard Perle, complained that Negroponte was "absurdly declaring the Iranian regime to be years away from having nuclear weapons".
This January 5, President George W Bush announced the nomination of retired Vice Admiral John Michael "Mike" McConnell to be director of national intelligence. McConnell was approached by Cheney himself about accepting the position, according to Newsweek.
McConnell was far more amenable to White House influence than his predecessor. On February 27, one week after his confirmation, he told the Senate Armed Services Committee he was "comfortable saying it's probable" that the alleged export of explosively formed penetrators to Shi'ite insurgents in Iraq was linked to the highest leadership in Iran.
Cheney had been making that charge, but Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, as well as Negroponte, have opposed it.
A public event last spring indicated that the White House had ordered a reconsideration of the draft NIE's conclusion on how many years it would take Iran to produce a nuclear weapon. The previous Iran estimate completed in the spring of 2005 had estimated it at five to 10 years.
Two weeks after Iranian President Mahmud Ahmadinejad announced in mid-April that Iran would begin producing nuclear fuel on an industrial scale, the chairman of the National Intelligence Council, Thomas Fingar, said in an interview with National Public Radio that the completion of the NIE on Iran had been delayed while the intelligence community determined whether its judgment on the time frame within which Iran might produce a nuclear weapon needed to be amended.
Fingar said the estimate "might change", citing "new reporting" from the International Atomic Energy Agency as well as "some other new information we have". And then he added, "We are serious about reexamining old evidence."
That extraordinary revelation about the NIE process, which was obviously ordered by McConnell, was an unsubtle signal to the intelligence community that the White House was determined to obtain a more alarmist conclusion on the Iranian nuclear program.
A decision announced in late October indicated, however, that Cheney did not get the consensus findings on the nuclear program and Iran's role in Iraq that he had wanted. On October 27, David Shedd, a deputy to McConnell, told a congressional briefing that McConnell had issued a directive making it more difficult to declassify the key judgments of national intelligence estimates.
That reversed a Bush administration practice of releasing summaries of key judgments in NIEs that began when the White House made public the key judgments from the controversial 2002 NIE on Iraq's alleged weapons of mass destruction program in July 2003.
The decision to withhold key judgments on Iran from the public was apparently part of a White House strategy for reducing the potential damage of publishing the estimate with the inclusion of dissenting views.
As of early October, officials involved in the NIE were "throwing their hands up in frustration" over the refusal of the administration to allow the estimate to be released, according to the former intelligence officer. But the Iran NIE is now expected to be circulated within the administration in late November, says Ray McGovern, former CIA analyst and founder of the anti-war group Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity.
The release of the Iran NIE will certainly intensify the bureaucratic political struggle over Iran policy. If the NIE includes both dissenting views on key issues, a campaign of selective leaking to news media of language from the NIE that supports Cheney's line on Iran will soon follow, as well as leaks of the dissenting views by his opponents.
Both sides may be anticipating another effort by Cheney to win Bush's approval of a significant escalation of military pressure on Iran in early 2008.
Gareth Porter is a historian and national-security policy analyst. His latest book, Perils of Dominance: Imbalance of Power and the Road to War in Vietnam, was published in June 2005.
(Inter Press Service)
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/IK10Ak01.html
No doubt the intelligence community recalls how they were made a scapegoat to Bush/PNAC's LIES about Iraq.
Roni Sofer
Ynet learns Israel intends to demand UN Security Council assemble to debate third round of sanctions against Iran after release of IAEA report. ''We hope IAEA is aware of the price the entire world may end up paying for its lenient approach towards Iran,' says top Jerusalem official
(What price will be paid if Israel starts yet another illegal war for no real reason? Israel has no evidence to support their empty allegations, reminiscent of the LIES which led to the invasion of Iraq. The world knows this, and that's why all that's happened is that Israel's Extremists have been exposed as dangerous warmongers.)
Israel will seek to call a session of the United Nations Security Council to demand the tightening of sanctions against Iran – Ynet learned on Thursday. The request to convene the council will be made after the release of an additional report on Tehran's nuclear program authored by International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Director-General Dr. Mohammad ElBaradei.
(This entire debate is rather ironic, as Israel is the only state in the region with covert programs of nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons, not to mention the largest military in the ME.)
A senior State official told Ynet that the report is expected to see light this coming weekend or early next week.
"We hope the IAEA is aware of the price the entire world may end up paying for its lenient approach towards Iran," said the official.
(Yeah, we know. You don't think the 'smoking gun' should come in the form of a mushroom cloud ... We've heard it all before. Look at the price that's been paid for these LIES.)
"Israel believes that there is an urgent need for a third round of sanctions against Iran, and it has directed its actions in accordance with this belief for the past several months. The UN Security Council must be convened as soon as possible so that such sanctions will be authorized."
(No they won't.)
The official said that recent statements made by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and General Mohammad Ali Jaafari, commander of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards, "are testament to the nature of the dangerous, irresponsible and racist regime currently ruling Tehran. Iran poses a danger not only to Israel but to the entire world. We must act before it is too late; before Iran's motivations are caught up by its abilities."
(The Iranians were responding to the provocation of Israel's ruling Extremists, who are the real dangerous, irresponsible and racist Regime here. What they're engaged in is called "Projecting". It's the practice of accusing your opponent of what you're actually guilty of, before anyone can say it about you. Iran poses no threat. These Zionist Extremists and their thirst for war does.)
Foreign Affairs Minister Tzipi Livni's office is preparing for the release of the IAEA report under an atmosphere of tense anticipation. The Foreign Ministry estimates that, as has been the case with previous reports, the agency will go easy on Iran.
(What this really means is that the report will be accurate, and refute the unfounded claims being made by those trying to start a war.)
Alongside ongoing diplomatic efforts to promote its position, Israel is also maintaining continuous contact with the six nations that will eventually vote on the implementation of new sanctions against Iran (Germany and the five permanent members of Security Council – the US, Russia, China, France and the UK). Russia and China are reluctant to authorize further sanctions.
(Russian has also stated that any attack on Iran will be viewed as an attack on Russia ...)
Olmert to brief Tokyo on situation
Meanwhile Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is expected to leave for Japan on Sunday, where he will update top officials, as well as Emperor Akihito, on the Iranian threat.
(Which doesn't really exist ...)
According to intelligence information gathered by Israel, Iran is pursuing military nuclear capabilities, despite the Islamic Republic's claim that it is seeking nuclear power for civilian purposes only.
(Riiiight. Just like the 'intelligence information' it had that showed Saddam had the same program ... If this was true, then Israel would simply release this to the IAEA.)
Olmert is expected to tell the Japanese that Iran is developing missiles capable of reaching every country in the world and is also working to enrich uranium.
(But then again, Olmert has LIED throughout his term, so why should we be suprised that he's doing more of the same? LYING to foreign Governments only builds animosity towards Israel, and its citizens should keep this in mind.)
The Israeli leader will tell Japanese officials that Israel remains in favor of exhausting the diplomatic efforts aimed at thwarting Iran's nuclear aspirations, despite having said recently that the Jewish state retained the right
to respond with whatever means necessary to protect its citizens.
(This entire 'crisis' is about trying to leverage the 'legal' justification for a war these Extremists have plotted for years, and view as an inevitability. It has nothing to do with 'thwarting' anything ... except, perhaps, peace.)
"We are working with other countries to encourage a comprehensive effort on the part of the international community aimed at blocking Iran's attempt to obtain nuclear capabilities," Olmert told German Chancellor Angela Merkel in Berlin about two weeks ago.
Meanwhile, diplomats said that for the second time in recent weeks, Washington has given the International Atomic Energy Agency information on what it says were Tehran's attempts to make nuclear weapons, but added that much of it is of doubtful value.
The diplomats also told The Associated Press that after handing over a large file last Friday, the US agreed to allow the Iranians to look at some of the material so they could respond to the allegations but Tehran has shown no interest in examining the information.
Associated Press contributed to the report
www.ynetnews.com/Ext/Comp/ArticleLayout/CdaArticlePrintPreview/1,2506,L-
Israel, US to set up joint committees on Iran: report
http://rawstory.com /news/afp/Israel_US_to_set_up_joint.com mittee_11092007.html Note the willingness of the original source to repeat the long-refuted LIE that Ahmadinejad threatened to 'wipe Israel off the map', the result of a mistranslation from Farsi to English, which was corrected the same week it was made.
It's ironic that we're supposed to support a war, based on this lie, yet ignore the fact that Israel and the US are actually plotting to attack this sovereign country.
Israel, US meet to discuss common Middle East strategy
Minister Shaul Mofaz speaks about possible future sanctions on Iran, replacing current director of IAEA
http://www..net news.com /Ext/Comp/ArticleLayout/CdaArticlePrintPreview/1,2506,L-3469447,00.html Israel urges ElBaradei removal
Thu, 08 Nov 2007
Israel has mockingly called for the removal of IAEA chief from his post, claiming he has turned a blind eye to Iran's nuclear progress.
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=30268 IAEA Leader's Phone Tapped
U.S. Pores Over Transcripts to Try to Oust Nuclear Chief
http://www.washingtonpost.com /ac2/wp-dyn/A57928-2004Dec11?language=printer Olmert: ElBaradei 'no fan of Israel'
Israel intensifies its criticism (slander) of IAEA, prime minister says its chief does not harbor positive feelings towards Israel. 'His lethargic and irresponsible conduct should have led to his dismissal,' says cabinet minister
http://www..net news.com /articles/0,7340,L-3469118,00.html Memo to Prime Minister Olmert: the only thing for which the Head of the IAEA, Mohamed El Baradei should be "a fan" is simply this: the truth.
And he seems to be. That's why the Neo-Fascists want to replace him with someone more 'pliable' ...
What is happening here is, as Yogi Berra used to say. "deja vu all over again". We are again witnessing the personal smearing and crafted innuendos against the man who has stated very clearly that Iran has no weapons program.
Iran is simply building a power plant, nothing more.
Does anyone remember what happened, right before the run-up to the invasion of Iraq, when Hans Blix stated that Iraq absolutely had no weapons of mass destruction?
Blix: I was smeared by the Pentagon
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,,974998,00.html This is precisely the same thing.
Now, we can only wait to find out precisely when the US and Israel will declare the UN "irrelevant" again, and go in with guns blazing.
Given the plot for another Act of Aggression in the oil-producing region of the world, I thought this was rather timely:
Govt. plans to divert oil into reserve
By H. JOSEF HEBERT
WASHINGTON - Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman on Thursday defended plans to divert oil into the federal emergency reserve, although he acknowledged that tight supplies likely are one reason for surging crude oil prices.
The Energy Department announced it has awarded contracts to three companies — Shell Trading Co., Sunoco Logistics and BP North America — for 12.3 million barrels of oil to go into the government's Strategic Petroleum Reserve, beginning in January.
Deliveries are scheduled at a rate of 70,000 barrels a day for six months.
http://news.yahoo.com /s/ap/20071109/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/bodman_oil_3 Spooks refuse to toe Cheney's line on Iran
By Gareth Porter
WASHINGTON - The US National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) on Iran has been held up for more than a year in an effort to force the intelligence community to remove dissenting judgments on the Iranian nuclear program. The aim is to make the document more supportive of Vice President Dick Cheney's militarily aggressive policy toward Iran, according to accounts provided by participants in the NIE process to two former Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) officers.
But this pressure on intelligence analysts, obviously instigated by Cheney himself, has not produced a draft estimate without those dissenting views, these sources say. The White House has now apparently decided to release the "unsatisfactory" draft NIE, but without making its key findings public.
A NIE coordinates the judgments of the US's 16 intelligence agencies on a specific country or issue.
A former CIA intelligence officer who has asked not to be identified told Inter Press Service (IPS) that an official involved in the NIE process says the Iran estimate was ready to be published a year ago but has been delayed because the director of national intelligence wanted a draft reflecting a consensus on key conclusions - particularly on Iran's nuclear program.
There is a split in the intelligence community on how much of a threat the Iranian nuclear program poses, according to the intelligence official's account. Some analysts who are less independent are willing to give the benefit of the doubt to the alarmist view coming from Cheney's office, but others have rejected that view.
The draft NIE, first completed a year ago, which had included the dissenting views, was not acceptable to the White House, according to the former intelligence officer. "They refused to come out with a version that had dissenting views in it," he says.
As recently as early October, the official involved in the process was said to be unclear about whether a NIE would be circulated and, if so, what it would say.
Former CIA officer Philip Giraldi provided a similar account, based on his own sources in the intelligence community. He told IPS that intelligence analysts have had to review and rewrite their findings three times, because of pressure from the White House.
"The White House wants a document that it can use as evidence for its Iran policy," says Giraldi. Despite pressures on them to change their dissenting conclusions, however, Giraldi says some analysts have refused to go along with conclusions that they believe are not supported by the evidence.
In October 2006, Giraldi wrote in The American Conservative that the NIE on Iran had already been completed, but that Cheney's office had objected to its findings on both the Iranian nuclear program and Iran's role in Iraq. The draft NIE did not conclude that there was confirming evidence that Iran was arming Shi'ite insurgents in Iraq, according to Giraldi.
Giraldi said the White House had decided to postpone any decision on the internal release of the NIE until after the November 2006 congressional elections.
Cheney's desire for a "clean" NIE that could be used to support his aggressive policy toward Iran was apparently a major factor in the replacement of John Negroponte as director of national intelligence in early 2007. Negroponte had angered neo-conservatives in the administration by telling the press in April 2006 that the intelligence community believed that it would still be "a number of years off" before Iran would be "likely to have enough fissile material to assemble into or to put into a nuclear weapon, perhaps into the next decade".
Neo-conservatives immediately attacked Negroponte for the statement, which merely reflected the existing NIE on Iran issued in spring 2005. Robert G Joseph, the under secretary of state for arms control and an ally of Cheney, contradicted Negroponte the following day. He suggested that Iran's nuclear program was nearing the "point of no return" - an Israeli concept referring to the mastery of industrial-scale uranium enrichment.
Frank J Gaffney, a protege of neo-conservative heavyweight Richard Perle, complained that Negroponte was "absurdly declaring the Iranian regime to be years away from having nuclear weapons".
This January 5, President George W Bush announced the nomination of retired Vice Admiral John Michael "Mike" McConnell to be director of national intelligence. McConnell was approached by Cheney himself about accepting the position, according to Newsweek.
McConnell was far more amenable to White House influence than his predecessor. On February 27, one week after his confirmation, he told the Senate Armed Services Committee he was "comfortable saying it's probable" that the alleged export of explosively formed penetrators to Shi'ite insurgents in Iraq was linked to the highest leadership in Iran.
Cheney had been making that charge, but Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, as well as Negroponte, have opposed it.
A public event last spring indicated that the White House had ordered a reconsideration of the draft NIE's conclusion on how many years it would take Iran to produce a nuclear weapon. The previous Iran estimate completed in the spring of 2005 had estimated it at five to 10 years.
Two weeks after Iranian President Mahmud Ahmadinejad announced in mid-April that Iran would begin producing nuclear fuel on an industrial scale, the chairman of the National Intelligence Council, Thomas Fingar, said in an interview with National Public Radio that the completion of the NIE on Iran had been delayed while the intelligence community determined whether its judgment on the time frame within which Iran might produce a nuclear weapon needed to be amended.
Fingar said the estimate "might change", citing "new reporting" from the International Atomic Energy Agency as well as "some other new information we have". And then he added, "We are serious about reexamining old evidence."
That extraordinary revelation about the NIE process, which was obviously ordered by McConnell, was an unsubtle signal to the intelligence community that the White House was determined to obtain a more alarmist conclusion on the Iranian nuclear program.
A decision announced in late October indicated, however, that Cheney did not get the consensus findings on the nuclear program and Iran's role in Iraq that he had wanted. On October 27, David Shedd, a deputy to McConnell, told a congressional briefing that McConnell had issued a directive making it more difficult to declassify the key judgments of national intelligence estimates.
That reversed a Bush administration practice of releasing summaries of key judgments in NIEs that began when the White House made public the key judgments from the controversial 2002 NIE on Iraq's alleged weapons of mass destruction program in July 2003.
The decision to withhold key judgments on Iran from the public was apparently part of a White House strategy for reducing the potential damage of publishing the estimate with the inclusion of dissenting views.
As of early October, officials involved in the NIE were "throwing their hands up in frustration" over the refusal of the administration to allow the estimate to be released, according to the former intelligence officer. But the Iran NIE is now expected to be circulated within the administration in late November, says Ray McGovern, former CIA analyst and founder of the anti-war group Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity.
The release of the Iran NIE will certainly intensify the bureaucratic political struggle over Iran policy. If the NIE includes both dissenting views on key issues, a campaign of selective leaking to news media of language from the NIE that supports Cheney's line on Iran will soon follow, as well as leaks of the dissenting views by his opponents.
Both sides may be anticipating another effort by Cheney to win Bush's approval of a significant escalation of military pressure on Iran in early 2008.
Gareth Porter is a historian and national-security policy analyst. His latest book, Perils of Dominance: Imbalance of Power and the Road to War in Vietnam, was published in June 2005.
(Inter Press Service)
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/IK10Ak01.html No doubt the intelligence community recalls how they were made a scapegoat to Bush/PNAC's LIES about Iraq.
