Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

Dark Suspicions about the NIE
Commentary ^ | December 3, 2007 | Norman Podhoretz

Posted on 12/04/2007 8:44:58 AM PST by West Coast Conservative

A new National Intelligence Estimate (NIE), entitled “Iran: Nuclear Intentions and Capabilities,” has just dealt a serious blow to the argument some of us have been making that Iran is intent on building nuclear weapons and that neither diplomacy nor sanctions can prevent it from succeeding. Thus, this latest NIE “judges with high confidence that in fall 2003 Tehran halted its nuclear weapons program”; it “judges with high confidence that the halt was directed primarily in response to increasing international scrutiny and pressure resulting from exposure of Iran’s previously undeclared nuclear work”; it “assesses with moderate confidence that Tehran had not restarted its nuclear weapons program as of mid-2007”; it assesses, also with only “moderate confidence that the halt to those activities represents a halt to Iran’s entire nuclear weapons program”; but even if not, it judges “with high confidence that Iran will not be technically capable of producing and reprocessing enough plutonium for a weapon before about 2015.”

These findings are startling, not least because in key respects they represent a 180-degree turn from the conclusions of the last NIE on Iran’s nuclear program. For that one, issued in May 2005, assessed “with high confidence that Iran currently is determined to develop nuclear weapons” and to press on “despite its international obligations and international pressure.”

In other words, a full two years after Iran supposedly called a halt to its nuclear program, the intelligence community was still as sure as it ever is about anything that Iran was determined to build a nuclear arsenal. Why then should we believe it when it now tells us, and with the same “high confidence,” that Iran had already called a halt to its nuclear-weapons program in 2003? Similarly with the intelligence community’s reversal on the effectiveness of international pressure. In 2005, the NIE was highly confident that international pressure had not lessened Iran’s determination to develop nuclear weapons, and yet now, in 2007, the intelligence community is just as confident that international pressure had already done the trick by 2003.

It is worth remembering that in 2002, one of the conclusions offered by the NIE, also with “high confidence,” was that “Iraq is continuing, and in some areas expanding its chemical, biological, nuclear, and missile programs contrary to UN resolutions.” And another conclusion, offered with high confidence too, was that “Iraq could make a nuclear weapon in months to a year once it acquires sufficient weapons-grade fissile material.”

I must confess to suspecting that the intelligence community, having been excoriated for supporting the then universal belief that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction, is now bending over backward to counter what has up to now been a similarly universal view (including as is evident from the 2005 NIE, within the intelligence community itself) that Iran is hell-bent on developing nuclear weapons. I also suspect that, having been excoriated as well for minimizing the time it would take Saddam to add nuclear weapons to his arsenal, the intelligence community is now bending over backward to maximize the time it will take Iran to reach the same goal.

But 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.”

If this is what lies behind the release of the new NIE, its authors can take satisfaction in the response it has elicited from the White House. Quoth Stephen Hadley, George W. Bush’s National Security Adviser: “The estimate offers grounds for hope that the problem can be solved diplomatically—without the use of force—as the administration has been trying to do.”

I should add that I offer these assessments and judgments with no more than “moderate confidence.”


TOPICS: Foreign Affairs; Government; News/Current Events; War on Terror
KEYWORDS: bush; hadley; intelligence; iran; iraniannukes; nie; podhoretz
Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first 1-2021-4041-43 next last

1 posted on 12/04/2007 8:44:59 AM PST by West Coast Conservative
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | View Replies]

To: West Coast Conservative
But 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.

I think that is a grand slam and correct.

2 posted on 12/04/2007 8:48:14 AM PST by MaestroLC ("Let him who wants peace prepare for war."--Vegetius, A.D. Fourth Century)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: West Coast Conservative

Unfortunately, regardless of the motivations and conclusions of this NIE, it further undermines the credibility of any findings from the CIA.


3 posted on 12/04/2007 8:50:17 AM PST by Truth29
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: West Coast Conservative

Norman Podhoretz nails it! We have every right to be suspicious. A great essay.


4 posted on 12/04/2007 8:51:05 AM PST by AZhardliner
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: AZhardliner

Does anyone have a link to the actual text of the NIE??


5 posted on 12/04/2007 8:55:41 AM PST by Frobenius
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 4 | View Replies]

To: West Coast Conservative

They were lying then. Are they lying now?

If they’re lying now, were they lying then?


6 posted on 12/04/2007 8:57:00 AM PST by Lexington Green (Not one dime to Hollywood traitors)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: MaestroLC

Same view here.


7 posted on 12/04/2007 8:58:20 AM PST by Badeye (Free Willie!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: Frobenius
http://www.dni.gov/press_releases/20071203_release.pdf
8 posted on 12/04/2007 8:59:03 AM PST by West Coast Conservative (Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 5 | View Replies]

To: West Coast Conservative

But we know with high confidence that these officials are the experts, the people who successfully predicted the Indian nukes and the Pakistani nukes, right? </sarcasm>


9 posted on 12/04/2007 9:01:35 AM PST by omega4412 (Multiculturalism kills. 9/11, Beslan, Madrid, London, Salt Lake City)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: MaestroLC

Agree totally.

With 3,000 centrifuges running, they are up to something. And it won’t take until 2015 either.

Zero confidence in their report.


10 posted on 12/04/2007 9:03:59 AM PST by exit82 (How do you handle Hillary? You Huma her.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: MaestroLC
I agree. Now suppose this little game works and then Iran tests a functional nuke in a year or so. Who do you think will be blamed? The left will excorciate Bush for not destroying their nuclear facilities and for sitting around talking when action was needed. Bush needs to keep this NIE as 'exhibit A' in case this scenario occurs.

As an aside, we don't know what Israel will do yet if they think Iran is about to test a nuke.

11 posted on 12/04/2007 9:06:49 AM PST by 17th Miss Regt
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: West Coast Conservative
I have to state, I do not understand The flip on the North Korea and Iran Nuclear plants!
12 posted on 12/04/2007 9:07:33 AM PST by HuntsvilleTxVeteran (Rudy,Romney,McCain, Huckabee will send a self-abused stomped elephant to the DRNC.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: omega4412

riiigghhhhtt....


13 posted on 12/04/2007 9:26:50 AM PST by maica
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 9 | View Replies]

To: West Coast Conservative
In other words, a full two years after Iran supposedly called a halt to its nuclear program, the intelligence community was still as sure as it ever is about anything that Iran was determined to build a nuclear arsenal. Why then should we believe it when it now tells us, and with the same “high confidence,” that Iran had already called a halt to its nuclear-weapons program in 2003?

Precisely why I don't believe a word of it. This is an attempt to tie the President's hands...nothing else.

14 posted on 12/04/2007 9:27:40 AM PST by pgkdan (Tolerance is the virtue of the man without convictions - G.K. Chesterton)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: West Coast Conservative
Anyone who knows anything about Iran knows that they are dead set on getting nuclear weapons, and will stop at nothing to get them. They all want to return Iran to world power status, even those who oppose this regime. This regime needs it to stay in power, and its ideology will allow it to use nukes.

Meanwhile, they are killing Americans in Iraq.

Bush should have taken out Syria's regime in 2003 or 2004, and worked to topple Iran from outside ever since. Instead, he has diddled while Iran learned.

15 posted on 12/04/2007 9:32:07 AM PST by Defiant (Huckabee puts the goober back in gubernatorial.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: West Coast Conservative

Yellowcake.


16 posted on 12/04/2007 9:32:19 AM PST by taxed2death (A few billion here, a few trillion there...we're all friends right?)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: West Coast Conservative

This estimate virtually assures the world that Israel will act unilaterally...perhaps with nukes.


17 posted on 12/04/2007 9:49:25 AM PST by Mariner
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: MaestroLC
"I think that is a grand slam and correct."

It is a very peculiar turnaround, to say the least, and couched in very equivocal, CYA language. I think suspician is very much warranted.
18 posted on 12/04/2007 9:49:33 AM PST by Steve_Seattle ("Above all, shake your bum at Burton.")
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: West Coast Conservative
But 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 is pretty much what I just said on an earlier thread. The CIA and the FBI are stuffed full of clintonoids. George Tenet pushed this line while he was CIA director, and there are plenty more like him still in the agency.

Regretably, Bush has failed to weed them out. So it is pretty certain that the folks who wrote this "intelligence estimate" are working for hillary. STILL working for hillary, since she and bill put them there in the first place.

19 posted on 12/04/2007 9:51:41 AM PST by Cicero (Marcus Tullius)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Lexington Green

They not only know nothing, they suspect nothing.


20 posted on 12/04/2007 9:51:42 AM PST by Eric in the Ozarks (ENERGY CRISIS made in Washington D. C.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 6 | View Replies]


Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first 1-2021-4041-43 next last

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson