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Journalist (Seymour Hersh): U.S. planning for possible attack on Iran.
CNN ^ | Jan. 16, 2005 | CNN

Posted on 01/16/2005 8:17:42 PM PST by FairOpinion

The Bush administration has been carrying out secret reconnaissance missions to learn about nuclear, chemical and missile sites in Iran in preparation for possible airstrikes there, journalist Seymour Hersh said Sunday.

The effort has been under way at least since last summer, Hersh said on CNN's "Late Edition."

In an interview on the same program, White House Communications Director Dan Bartlett said the story was "riddled with inaccuracies."

"I don't believe that some of the conclusions he's drawing are based on fact," Bartlett said.

He said his information on Iran came from "inside" sources who divulged it in the hope that publicity would force the administration to reconsider.

(Excerpt) Read more at cnn.com ...


TOPICS: Front Page News; News/Current Events; War on Terror
KEYWORDS: abughraib; asia; bartlett; bleedingheartattack; bush; cheney; cia; danbartlett; dickcheney; donaldrumsfeld; dougfeith; feith; goss; hersh; intelligenceanalysts; iran; jamimiscik; johnmclaughlin; kerrykissup; mclaughlin; middleeast; miscik; newyorker; next; nuclearplant; paulwolfowitz; pentagon; portergoss; purge; resignations; rummy; rumsfeld; seymourhersh; southasia; thenewyorker; uprising; wellduuuuh; wmd; wolfie; wolfowitz
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To: FairOpinion

Actually, I hope old Seymour is correct. Poor guy's just trying to make a scoop out of the obvious.

We have contingency plans for just about everything. It wouldn't be prudent if we didn't. One doesn't know where the next hotspot will be, and you can't wait for it to happen and then start working up all the details needed to get your forces in place.

Plans for these contingencies are at various levels of preparedness, very detailed for foreseeable trouble spots (Israel, Korea), very general for less obvious areas (Bolivia, Timor). Three years before it happened, could you foresee us going into Panama, Grenada, Libya, Kuwait? No, but we still had some kind of plan in place for all of them - staging bases, supply lines, targeting.

Instaed of getting mad at old Seymour, we should be saying "Well, Doh!"


21 posted on 01/16/2005 8:46:48 PM PST by oldbill
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To: FairOpinion

I agree with you.


22 posted on 01/16/2005 8:48:09 PM PST by Quix (HAVING A FORM of GODLINESS but DENYING IT'S POWER. 2 TIM 3:5)
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To: FairOpinion

Seymour Hersh is the pre-internet precursor of DEBKA.


23 posted on 01/16/2005 8:50:49 PM PST by A Balrog of Morgoth (With fire, sword, and stinging whip I drive the Rats in terror before me.)
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To: Williams
Those "inside" sources who leaked this story in order to try and force the administration to "reconsider" its plans for Iran should be dragged out and hanged from the highest pine tree available. Of course our special ops folks are scoping out Iran, but by making a story of it, Hersh has endangered their lives and their missions. He needs to just shut up and keep his traitorous stories to himself!
24 posted on 01/16/2005 8:56:35 PM PST by Virginia Ridgerunner ("Si vis pacem para bellum")
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To: FairOpinion; Howlin
The Bush administration has been carrying out secret reconnaissance missions to learn about nuclear, chemical and missile sites in Iran in preparation for possible airstrikes there, journalist Seymour Hersh said Sunday

If true .. how did he find this infomation out

25 posted on 01/16/2005 8:57:50 PM PST by Mo1 (Does the distinguished Sen from VT wish to act as our treaty rep. for negotiations with Al Queda?)
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To: Perdogg
Hersh carrys the water for the lefty Washington establishment who has found at home at the CIA.

Wasn't Hersh the one who first reported on the prison mess?

So who is leaking this stuff to him?

26 posted on 01/16/2005 9:00:30 PM PST by Mo1 (Does the distinguished Sen from VT wish to act as our treaty rep. for negotiations with Al Queda?)
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To: Texas_Jarhead
Sounds traitorous to me.

Shy should he change now? He's made a career of sedition.

27 posted on 01/16/2005 9:03:39 PM PST by absalom01
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To: piasa; Shermy; philman_36; windchime; Cindy

Hersh-is-at-it-again ping.


28 posted on 01/16/2005 9:04:04 PM PST by Fedora
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To: A_perfect_lady
Personally, I hope this twit is right.


Make it so!

29 posted on 01/16/2005 9:07:15 PM PST by Paleo Conservative (Hey! Hey! Ho! Ho! Andrew Heyward's got to go!)
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To: FairOpinion
>>>If this is true, people who leak this type of info, should be prosecuted and locked up<<<

First let me stipulate that Hersh is a leftie dumbsquat.

On the other hand, he may be serving a useful purpose for the Bush administration in throwing a scare into the mullahs in Iran.

Yep an attack is a high possibility; anyone looking at the situation with their illegal clandestine nuclear development can't possibly help but think that either the Israelis or the US will, sooner or later, take care of business.

So why leak bluff and bluster? Perhaps this is timed to help increase the anti-theocratic students and population in Iran that want a democratic revolution. We are told on several Iranian websites that the population is fed up sith the mullahs and is ripe for revolution. Indeed, pitched battles between the government and students with democracy seeking citizens at their side have taken place.

Perhaps, just perhaps, Hersh is unwittingly helping bring about a democratic Iran.

I'm not placing bets, but Seymore Hersh could be a useful idiot. It's not a big step from being an idiot to start with!

30 posted on 01/16/2005 9:09:09 PM PST by HardStarboard (PASS)
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To: Virginia Ridgerunner

I agree.

If someone on the inside blabbed this (for whatever their motivation was), they should absolutely be hung out to dry.


31 posted on 01/16/2005 9:10:50 PM PST by MplsSteve
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To: HardStarboard

Useful idiot?

Heck, let's celebrate the big promotion, then.

He was always a useless idiot before. About time he paid his share of the freight.


32 posted on 01/16/2005 9:12:14 PM PST by A Balrog of Morgoth (With fire, sword, and stinging whip I drive the Rats in terror before me.)
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To: FairOpinion
Give the information to Israel and let them take care of business. After all, a nuclear Iran will be a greater threat to Israel than us.
33 posted on 01/16/2005 9:13:48 PM PST by Fishing-guy
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To: FairOpinion

Syria first, THEN Iran.


34 posted on 01/16/2005 9:16:31 PM PST by fish hawk
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To: Mo1

Leftovers from clinton administration - a lot of do-nothings like their leader was which is why we got 9/11. They know it and so do we. Their spider holes are being revealed - they are cornered rats.


35 posted on 01/16/2005 9:27:04 PM PST by daybreakcoming
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To: FairOpinion

so?
does anybody do something about these traitors?
no....


36 posted on 01/16/2005 9:34:53 PM PST by injin
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To: bahblahbah

I really cannot conceive of invasion or occupation. Remember Reagan and Khadafi? Khadafi refused to heed warnings and just got h@## bombed out of his palace. The Israelis took out Saddam's nearly competed nuclear facilities twenty-something years ago. Even Clinton used the bombing facilities of hostile areas without UN permission or warning. If Iran keeps messing around, surely all that would be considered would be a strategic bomb run or two or three.

As per some other posts, I, too, am past ready to see some retribution for peope giving out security info.

vaudine


37 posted on 01/16/2005 9:36:23 PM PST by vaudine
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To: FairOpinion

Imagine now that this report is NOT true, and considering all the usual "unnamed" sources, I won't be surprised if that is the case. All it will achieve is more anti-american resentment over yet another rumour, a big nothing. Somehow though, I think that anti-American sentiment is exactly what Seymour Hersch is after.


38 posted on 01/16/2005 9:45:24 PM PST by Trippin
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To: Trippin

Iran is almost as bad as Iraq, I say a clean nuclear strike against the barbarian regime using what we know from Iraq to make the post war occupation much easier. Keep the military in place and declare martial law until democratic elections.


39 posted on 01/16/2005 9:57:56 PM PST by grizzly84
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To: FairOpinion

I like journalists that know everything there is to know about military operations. Where's Geraldo Rivera when you need him?


40 posted on 01/16/2005 10:11:47 PM PST by Dallas59 ("A weak peace is worse than war" - Tacitcus)
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