Iran: how far from the bomb? That was one of the key
questions asked of newly confirmed Director of National
Intelligence Michael McConnell Tuesday at a Senate Armed
Forces Committee hearing.
By Ray McGovern -- Information Clearing House
Feb. 28, 2007 -- Iran: how far from the bomb? That was one of the key
questions asked of newly confirmed Director of National
Intelligence Michael McConnell Tuesday at a Senate Armed
Forces Committee hearing. McConnell had avoided this
front-burner issue in his prepared remarks. But when asked, he
repeated the hazy forecast given by his predecessor, John
Negroponte [and in the process demonstrated that he has mastered
the stilted jargon introduced into national intelligence
estimates (NIEs) in recent years]. McConnell had these two
sentences committed to memory:
We assess that Iran seeks to develop a nuclear weapon. The
information is incomplete, but we assess that Iran could develop
a nuclear weapon early-to-mid-next decade.
At that point McConnell received gratuitous reinforcement from
Lt. Gen. Michael Maples, head of the Defense Intelligence
Agency. With something of a flourish, Maples emphasized that it
was “with high confidence” that DIA “assesses that Iran remains
determined to develop nuclear weapons.”
After the judgments in the Oct. 1, 2002 estimate assessing
weapons-of-mass-destruction in Iraq -- judgments stated with “high
confidence” -- turned out to be wrong, the National Intelligence
Council saw a need to define what is meant by “assess.” The
council included a glossary in its recent NIE on Iraq:
When we use words such as "we assess," we are trying to convey
an analytical assessment or judgment. These assessments, which
are based on incomplete or at times fragmentary information are
not a fact, proof, or knowledge. Some analytical judgments are
based directly on collected information; others rest on previous
judgments, which serve as building blocks. In either type of
judgment, we do not have "evidence" that shows something to be a
fact.
So caveat emptor. Beware the verisimilitude conveyed by “we
assess.” It can have a lemming effect, as evidenced yesterday by
the automatic head bobbing that greeted Sen. Lindsay Graham’s,
R-S.C., clever courtroom-style summary argument at the hearing,
“We all agree, then, that the Iranians are trying to get nuclear
weapons.”
Quick, someone, please give Sen. Graham the National
Intelligence Council’s definition of “we assess.”
Shoddy Record on Iran
Iran is a difficult intelligence target. Understood. Even so,
U.S. intelligence performance “assessing” Iran’s progress toward
a nuclear capability does not inspire confidence. The only
virtue readily observable is the foolish consistency described
by Emerson as “the hobgoblin of little minds.” In 1995, U.S.
intelligence started consistently “assessing” that Iran was
“within five years” of reaching a nuclear weapons capability. In
2005, however, when the most recent NIE was issued (and then
leaked to the Washington Post), the timeline was extended and
given still more margin for error. Basically, the timeline was
moved 10 years out to 2015, but a fit of caution yielded the
words “early-to-mid next decade.”
Small wonder that the commission picked by President George W.
Bush to investigate the intelligence community’s performance on
weapons of mass destruction complained that U.S. intelligence
knows “disturbingly little” about Iran. Shortly after the most
recent estimate was completed in June 2005, Robert G. Joseph,
the neoconservative who succeeded John Bolton as undersecretary
of state for arms control, was asked whether Iran had a nuclear
effort under way. He replied:
I don’t know quite how to answer that because we don’t have
perfect information or perfect understanding. But the Iranian
record, plus what the Iranian leaders have said ... lead us to
conclude that we have to be highly skeptical.
A fresh national intelligence estimate on Iran has been in
preparation for several months -- far too leisurely a pace in the
circumstances, in my opinion. One would have thought that
President Bush would await those intelligence findings before
sending two aircraft carrier strike groups to the Persian Gulf
area and dispatching Vice President Dick Cheney to throw a scare
into folks in Asia. But it is not at all uncommon in this
administration for the intelligence to lag critical decisions.
After all, the decision to attack Iraq was made many months
before “intelligence” was ginned up to support it. And the
decision to send 21,500 additional troops into Iraq predated the
latest NIE on Iraq by two months.
And so, Tuesday’s Senate Armed Forces Committee hearing and
all the puzzling over intelligence on Iran almost seemed
divorced from the reality -- from the “new history” that Bush’s
neocon advisers may be preparing to create. Yet, the hearing was
extremely well conducted and homed in on some key issues, should
any policymakers wish to listen.
The Good News: There’s Time
If anything leaps out of all this, it is that there is time to
address, in a sensible way, whatever concerns may be driving
Iran to seek nuclear weapons -- Cheney’s claim of a “fairly robust
new nuclear program” in Iran, his blustering, and his itchy
trigger finger notwithstanding. A year and a half after the 2005
estimate that Iran was five to 10 years away from building a
nuclear weapon, NPR’s Robert Siegel did the math and asked
former national intelligence director Negroponte, “Sometime
between four and 10 years from now you would assume they could
achieve a nuclear weapon?”
"Five to 10 years from now,” Negroponte answered. He then
gingerly raised the possibility -- avoided like the plague by
neocons in good standing -- that diplomacy might help. A former
diplomat, he may have thought he would be forgiven, but he was
relieved and sent back to the State Department a few months
later. This is what he dared to say: "I think that the pace of
Iran’s program gives us time, and international diplomacy can
work."
Asked by Siegel to explain why the Israelis have suggested a
much shorter timeline for Iran to acquire a nuclear weapon,
Negroponte stated the obvious with bluntness uncommon for a
diplomat. “I think that sometimes what the Israelis will do [is]
give you the worst-case assessment.” At yesterday’s hearing,
Sen. Graham asked McConnell the same question; did he know why
the Israelis had a different view? McConnell appeared puzzled,
noting that U.S. intelligence discusses these things with the
Israelis.
Why Would Tehran Want Nukes?
In his introductory remarks Armed Forces Committee Chair, Sen.
Carl Levin, D-Mich., expressed a desire to “assess the
circumstances in which Iran might give up its nuclear [weapons]
plans.” Assuming Iran has such plans, or at least intends to
leave that option open for later decision when it has mastered
the enrichment process, it makes sense to try to figure out what
drives Tehran to that course.
McConnell yesterday chose to adopt Negroponte’s refreshingly
candid approach and reject the cry-wolf rhetoric of Cheney and
the neocons that Iran’s ultimate aim must be to destroy Israel.
McConnell noted that Iran would like to dominate the Gulf region
and deter potential adversaries. An integral part of Iran’s
strategy is to deter and, if necessary, retaliate against forces
in the region -- including U.S. forces. Similarly, he indicated
that Tehran considers its ability to conduct terrorist
operations abroad as a key element of its determination to
protect Iran by deterring U.S. or Israeli attacks. These
sentiments dovetail with those offered by Defense Secretary
Robert Gates at his confirmation hearing in December. Gates put
it this way:
While they [the Iranians] are certainly pressing, in my opinion,
for a nuclear capability, I think they would see it in the first
instance as a deterrent. They are surrounded by powers with
nuclear weapons -- Pakistan to their east, the Russians to the
north, the Israelis to the west, and us in the Persian Gulf.
Deterrence? Both Sen. Levin and ranking member John Warner, R-Va.,
picked up on this, to the dismay of Sen. Graham, who sounded as
if he had just come from a briefing by the Israeli extreme right
who, with Cheney, are pushing hard for a U.S. strike on Iran’s
nuclear facilities. Graham said he thought economic sanctions
could work and that they were “the only thing left short of
military action.” For Graham it was very simple. Iranian
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has denied the Holocaust and, if
Iran got nuclear weapons, it could use them against Israel. The
clear implication was that we should bomb the Iranians if
sanctions don’t bring them to heel.
Seldom have I heard an American senator so openly press the United States
to mount an attack on a major country simply because it could be
perceived as a threat to Israel. There was no mention of
Israel’s own arsenal of some 200 to 300 nuclear weapons and
multiple delivery systems. Nor did anyone allude to French
President Jacques Chirac’s recent comment that, with one or two
nuclear weapons Iran would pose no big danger, because launching
a nuclear weapon against Israel would inevitably lay waste
Tehran.
John Warner objected strongly to the notion that, if sanctions
against Iran failed, the next step had to be military action.
With support from Levin, Warner alluded time and again to the
effectiveness of mutual deterrence after WWII, stressing that
deterrence is a far better course than to let slip the dogs of
war. He referred to his own role in ensuring that the Soviet
Union was deterred. It seemed as though he was about to cry out
from exasperation, "Why don’t we talk to the Iranians! ... like
I talked to the Russians," but then he thought better of it and
decided to hew to the party line and not even think of
negotiating with “bad guys.”
Better To Jaw-Jaw Than War-War
Did you notice? While Cheney was abroad, others persuaded the
president to send representatives next month to a conference in
Baghdad, in which representatives of Syria and Iran also are
expected to participate to discuss the situation in Iraq. In
addition, foreign ministers of the same countries plan to meet
in early April.
If Cheney does not sabotage such talks when he gets home, they
could lead to direct negotiations with Iran on the nuclear
question. It makes no sense at all to refuse to talk with Iran,
which has as many historical grievances against the U.S. as vice
versa. (Someone please tell the president.) With Cheney playing
the heavy, it has not been possible to penetrate the praetorian
guard for candid discussions with the president. The sooner that
can be done the better. Hurry! Before Cheney gets home.
The ultimate aim, in my view, should be a Middle East free of
nuclear weapons. That, I am confident, would stop whatever plans
the Iranians have to develop nuclear weapons. And please do not
tell me that, because Israel would not agree, we cannot move in
this direction. The United States and others can provide the necessary
guarantees of the security of Israel. And Israeli intransigence
on this issue is not a viable middle- or long-term strategy that
serves Israel’s interest or the interest of justice and peace.
Ray McGovern works with Tell the Word, the publishing
ministry of the ecumenical Church of the Saviour in Washington,
DC. He was a CIA analyst for 27 years and now serves on the
Steering Group of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity
(VIPS).
This article was first published at TomPaine.com
LINK: Information Clearing House