Posted on 12/05/2007 12:47:20 PM PST by HD1200
As many recognize, the latest NIE on Iran’s nuclear weapons program directly contradicts what the U.S. Intelligence Community was saying just two years previously. And it appears that this about-face was very recent. How recent?
Consider that on July 11, 2007, roughly four or so months prior to the most recent NIE’s publication, Deputy Director of Analysis Thomas Fingar gave the following testimony before the House Armed Services Committee (emphasis added):
Iran and North Korea are the states of most concern to us. The United States’ concerns about Iran are shared by many nations, including many of Iran’s neighbors. Iran is continuing to pursue uranium enrichment and has shown more interest in protracting negotiations and working to delay and diminish the impact of UNSC sanctions than in reaching an acceptable diplomatic solution. We assess that Tehran is determined to develop nuclear weapons--despite its international obligations and international pressure. This is a grave concern to the other countries in the region whose security would be threatened should Iran acquire nuclear weapons.
This paragraph appeared under the subheading: "Iran Assessed As Determined to Develop Nuclear Weapons." And the entirety of Fingar’s 22-page testimony was labeled "Information as of July 11, 2007." No part of it is consistent with the latest NIE, in which our spooks tell us Iran suspended its covert nuclear weapons program in 2003 "primarily in response to international pressure" and they "do not know whether (Iran) currently intends to develop nuclear weapons."
The inconsistencies are more troubling when we realize that, according to the Wall Street Journal, Thomas Fingar is one of the three officials who were responsible for crafting the latest NIE. The Journal cites "an intelligence source" as describing Fingar and his two colleagues as "hyper-partisan anti-Bush officials."
(Excerpt) Read more at weeklystandard.com ...
Bush made a terrible mistake by not cleaning house when first elected. The rat sympathizers inside the administration have sabotaged his policies at every opportunity. Bush took himself too seriously: “uniter not a divider.” All rats should be considered as traitors. The only way to deal with them is all out war. This report does not pass the smell test. Iran must be laughing hysterically.
Bush, unfortunately, is the wimp we have come to know so well.
Bush urges Iran to 'come clean' on nuclear work ( ie...prove the NIE is true )
Condi’s DEPUTY is Nicholas Burns...a HUGE LIBERAL! Condi is a big disappointment.
Thanks for the ping!
The Van Diepen Demarche --(more on the Iran NIE and the Nukes pursuit)
As the political Left consistently demonstrates, they care first and foremost about the reacquisition of power -- national defense/security is way down on their list of priorities.
Agreed.If the leftist scum couldn't be fired, he should have reassigned them to some desolate outpost. The State Department is infested with the most anti-American parasites in our government. It is more revolting when you realize that these evil parasites are earning stealing themselves a big fat pension, paid for with our hard earned money.
Sounded like she was somebody who has been in the biz.
I’ve done intelligence collection and analysis in the private sector. The biggest difference about the private sector is that if you are wrong like this you get fired. The executives don’t give a crap about your politics or your opinions about what they should do. They want data and conclusions about what is happening and what is GOING to happen so that they can make decisions correctly.
If anybody knows the political beliefs or leanings of an analyst, the analyst is a fraud. There is no place for ‘beliefs’ or ‘objectives’ in analysis. You either see the facts or conclusions in the raw data or you don’t. You don’t come up with a plan first and then craft the intelligence data to fit your plan.
How about the possibility it may have been outsourced to say..Syria, and that was what was blown up in September by Israel?
One of the interesting suggestions from this caller was that we should look at the part that presents the conclusions. Does it really say that Iran is/was not doing this, or does it sort of imply it? Furthermore, the conclusions are apparently publicly available, while the information upon which they are based are classified and only the Senate Intelligence Committee and a few others could have access to them.
She suggested that the Senate Intelligence Committee demand access to the information that led to the (real or implied) conclusion.
He can't. It is way too late. The time to prevent this kind of malfeasance was in early 2001, when a president normally would have had the sense to rinse the trolls and moles out of sensitive positions throughout the executive branch. Leaving the network of Clintonoid operatives largely intact within the government may have been the single worst error of the Bush administration.
Yes that's it, they're all out to 'get' George. It's all a vile left wing conspiracy theory!! With the help of Gates and Condi Rice they're looking to turn the West over to the 'Islamofascists'. The world's at risk!! OMG, hide under the beds and get the duct tape stat!!
Sheesh, talk about buying into conspiracy theories. Let Bush finally get shut down on random military action and Bill Kristol is out there looking for boogeymen in the grass. The data was wrong, just like it was wrong on Iraq. But don't let that stop the Weekly Weird Standard from tossing out its view, even though it doesn't mesh with anything symbolizing reality. No, Bush has a few diehards left and unfortunately for Dick (fortunately for us not in Republican world) he most likely won't get his war with Iran. Most of his buddies have left offices within the administration. Sorry.
Although it will be interesting to see how the 'frontrunners' try to spin this. Especially St. Rudy of 9/11 whose entire campaign has now boiled down to not much more than bomb Iran. Of course with Podhoretz as an advisor what would one expect?
Clearly either the NIE of 2005/Fingar’s July statement/Bush’s bomb Iran campaign were bogus or this recent NIE is bogus. I don’t see Bush calling the recent NIE bogus, he said he’s concerned that Iran could start the program again. Bolton said the report should never have gone public, and he’s concerned that despite “high confidence” in the findings, the consequences of them being wrong are too great. And various pundits have been saying that it proves that the campaign against Iran nukes worked because Iran didn’t develop such weapons.
Since this went out aimdst the Anapolis talks and Israel and its US loyalists are talking about policy betrayals, and its content has been reportedly known to administration insiders for months, it looks to me that it represents capitulation on the facts of the matter within the administration to whatever groups within the intelligence community that contributed to the report. You can call them Democrats or people who want Islamic world domination or whatever, but apparently they weren’t going to let the predetermined military action against Iran be attributed after-the-fact to a presumption of intelligence that doesn’t actually exist—they learned their lesson from the post-Iraq fallout.
Don’t get me wrong—Iran is obviously beavering away at nuclear technology—but it leaves a sour taste in one’s mouth when it turns out that a cause, even a good one, is being promoted by deception. Specifically that intelligence indicated imminent Iranian nuke deployment when intelligence actually said the opposite, reportedly for many months. That’s what Bush/Cheney/et al stand accused of now and their statements since have been the equivalent of Clinton’s technically-true-but-misleading “I did not have sex with that woman”.
There was a time a year or two ago (and he may still be there) when one of the analysts who helped prepare the daily intel briefings for the White House was an out and out anti-Bush member of the CIA and would Email a very liberal Democrat friend of his crowing about how he had slanted the presentation.
The friend sent me this, also crowing how the left wingers, anti-Bushies of the Democratic party had influence on the White House intel!!!
NIE is just another such biased presentation with no real connection to reality. The one source is a former Islamic Iran Defense Minister who defected and “disappeared” in Turkey. This single source (not usually enough for an intel assessment) was LONG RETIRED and not up to date on what was happening under Ahmadi-Nejad.
He was talking about 2003 when he was in the loop and this was extrapolated or falsely stated to still be the case in 2007!!
The defector, also a Revolutionary Guards Commander like the “new” President appears to have been an excellent plant, who had enough information to get refuge in the West but who still had an ex-wife and family back in Iran and the Mullahs were able to leverage his disinforming us.
NOTHING in 2003 continued to be valid or a basis for an assessment after August 2005 when Ahmadi-Nejad was “annointed” not elected as President of the Islamic Republic of Iran.
EVERY piece of info I have received since 2005 has indicated the nuclear weapons effort is in full swing. On an UPswing to be more precise.
As a Freeper pointed out, the nuclear war heads derived from old Ukraine fission material in North Korean nose cones in the early 90’s will have deteriorated and the new refined uranium would be used to revitalized the six to a dozen nuclear warheads Iran presently has on Shahab 3 missiles.
Singel source intel is looked upon with great disbelief or at best with extreme caution, yet the NIE built a whole weird, incredible, anti-Bush case on it. And did not release it through the White House, and Commander in Chief and technically their Boss.
What a bunch of crock and an endangerment of our country.
It's comforting in knowing that at least some see it and are comfortable enough to be pragmatic with this issue.
This is very disturbing FARS. Someone may be recklessly gambling with the lives to tens of millions of people. If President Bush has counter information, and I believe he would, he needs to stand firm and find a way to decimate the liberals from the Intel Community.
The President of the U.S. will protect this country regardless what Congress thinks, or the left in this country says or does. President Bush will authorize a military strike on Persia if he thinks it's in the best interest of the United States, period.
Oh, and btw, we have been at war with Iran since 4 November 1979. I don't care what the NIE says happened in 2003. It's payback time.
5.56mm
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