- This week's dramatic consensus analysis by all 16 US
intelligence agencies claiming that Iran abandoned its nuclear weapons
program in 2003 is not what it seems. The National Intelligence Estimate
(NIE) has always been more of a political document to justify administration
threat policies than honest intelligence analysis. This one has all the
signs of serving multiple political purposes. First, its conclusions exonerating
Iran may or may not be true (probably not). Second, this issue is outside
the purview of at least half of the supposed 16 separate intelligence agencies,
leading us to believe that there was enforced political unanimity rather
than real consensus. In real life, the 16 agencies never fully agree on
anything, and only the top 3 or 4 are consulted on major issues like this.
Third, the leaking of information on source documents justifying these
conclusions is never done in legitimate intelligence summaries unless the
administration is trying hard to convince the public of something devious.
Fourth, the current NIE is a total contradiction of the 2005 NIE. One or
both, are therefore suspect. This week, I'll tell my readers what I think
the globalists are up to by appearing to cut the rug out from under their
own interventionist policies.
-
- President Bush's reaction to this "new" intelligence
bordered on an outright fib, bolstering my belief that this whole dramatic
revelation is a carefully crafted deception. Bush told the world, "I
was made aware of the NIE last week. In August, I think it was Mike McConnell
[Director of National Intelligence] came in and said, 'we have some new
information.' He didn't tell me what the information was; he did tell me
it was going to take a while to analyze."
-
- Nonsense. My reaction to that was identical to former
CIA analyst Ray McGovern who said, "The notion that the head of National
Intelligence whispered in Bush's ear 'I've got a surprise for you and it's
really important, but I'm not going to tell you about it until we check
it out' -- The whole thing is preposterous!" --especially when the
DNI knows that Bush is making a fool of himself every week decrying Iran's
nuclear program. He would at least have told him to hold off on the nuclear
claims until we check this out. This story is a complete fabrication by
Bush to both save face and obscure the months of devious planning that
went into this new NIE.
-
- The previous 2005 NIE which claimed Iran had an active
nuclear weapons program was just as flawed as it relied on the discovery
of a single laptop computer obtained from an Iranian engineer. The documents
on the laptop described two programs, termed L-101 and L-102 which "appeared
to be related to weapons work." --Clearly, a less than definitive
statement on the evidence.
-
- Contrast this with the current intelligence estimate
which has been devastating to this administration's strident campaign to
vilify Iran and build the case for military intervention--failing to do
so, according to Bush, would "lead to World War III." Using military
force on Iran, for now, is politically unjustifiable. That's the BIG change.
Iran is trumpeting its vindication to the world--still denying that it
ever had a weapons program, but the president's European allies are defying
their own public opinion and calling for increased pressure on Iran. As
Kaveh L Afrasiabi pointed out in Asia times, "instead of factoring
in the sea-change caused by this report, French President Nicolas Sarkozy,
German Chancellor Angela Merkel and British Prime Minister Gordon Brown
have joined hands in a desperate
- show of unity, calling for staying the course and initiating
new sanctions if Tehran continues to defy 'the will of the international
community.'"
-
- I believe Iran does have a nuclear weapons program, and
I think the US knows it-despite the NIE's new claims. It would be stupid
for Iran not to seek to have one. Iran knows it is being targeted by the
globalists for military intervention and control. But, my objection to
the administration's warmongering agenda is not because Iran is innocent
of the charges, but because the intent of the globalists is an even greater
evil. It is NOT to ensure our safety, Israel's safety or that of anyone
else--the intent is to manage and create conflict that will eventually
result in global war, out of which they can justify more global reorganization
and control. If Iran is a threat it a limited one, and mostly concerns
Israel which is fully capable of defending itself.
-
- Israel, having built up a large media campaign against
Iran still insists that Iran has an active nuclear weapons program, and
if anyone knows, they do. They have the best spies in the world. This,
in itself, is interesting because almost all of US intelligence in this
area comes from Israeli sources within Iran. How could the US claim one
thing and its primary source another? To bolster its case and counter the
NIE, Israeli intends to brief the Joint Chief's Admiral Michael Mullen
who will travel to Israel Sunday. He will be meeting with IDF Chief of
General Staff Lt.-Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi, and Defense Minister Ehud Barak.
-
- According to the NY Times (the recipients of this convenient
leak about the original sources), "American intelligence agencies
reversed their view about the status of Iran's nuclear weapons program
after they obtained notes last summer from the deliberations of Iranian
military officials involved in the weapons development program." The
key piece of disinformation here is that they only became aware "last
summer." Even if they do have such intercepts the timing of the claim
is nonsense. The NIE was already written by last summer, and supposedly
suppressed by the administration for more than a year because it failed
to support the Bush/Cheney attack plans for Iran. Thus the "new intercept
notes" could not have appeared only last summer. It takes months to
analyze new and contradictory intelligence, let alone explain how this
sudden change gets enacted so quickly into an NIE that takes almost two
years to prepare and vet through the various intelligence communities.
-
- By the way, the 16 government entities with intelligence
units mentioned in the NIE are: Air Force Intelligence, Army Intelligence,
Central Intelligence Agency, Coast Guard Intelligence, Defense Intelligence
Agency, Department of Energy (even I wasn't aware of this one), Department
of Homeland Security, Department of State, Department of the Treasury,
Drug Enforcement Administration, Federal Bureau of Investigation, Marine
Corps Intelligence, National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, National Reconnaissance
Office, National Security Agency, and Navy Intelligence.
-
- According to Sanger and Myers in the NY Times, "The
notes included conversations and deliberations in which some of the [Iranian]
military officials complained bitterly about what they termed a decision
by their superiors in late 2003 to shut down a complex engineering effort
to design nuclear weapons, including a warhead that could fit atop Iranian
missiles." This is hardly definitive evidence.
-
- In any major "reversal" of intelligence assessments,
the new intelligence would have to overcome the weight of all the prior
intelligence that establishes claims to the contrary. That isn't done easily
unless the previous intel was flimsy (which is close to the truth). A totally
new direction can almost never be justified based on one or two intercepts
of notes passed between Iranian officials-especially concerning a claim
as easy to falsify as "frustration about shutting down a program."
One of the most common tactics of deception (straight out of Counter-Intel
101) is to create one or more phony conversations or letters and allow
them to be intercepted. Every nation does this. No honest intel officer
is going to buy this kind of intercept, claiming "we are shutting
down our nuclear program" as legitimate without a lot of corroboration--which,
in this case is very difficult, if not impossible, to confirm.
-
- The leaks to the NY Times even addressed this issue:
"But they said that the Central Intelligence Agency and other agencies
had organized a "red team" to determine if the new information
might have been part of an elaborate disinformation campaign mounted by
Iran to derail the effort to impose sanctions against it." Naturally,
"In the end, American intelligence officials rejected that theory."
They don't tell us why.
-
- Despite all these anomalies, the media and public are
all too willing to accept the new NIE as fact. It's what most people want
to hear. After all, the Bush/Cheney justifications for attacking Iran were
looked upon with almost universal suspicion, though repeated without question
by the media. Only the most devoted lackeys of President Bush in the US
Senate are calling for an investigation to challenge this new assessment.
-
- What is telling is that president Bush still insists
that Iran remains a threat. While touting the virtues of continued diplomacy,
his rhetoric is just as antagonistic as before. The administration denies
no error in judgment, and even went so far as to say the NIE bolstered
their own opinions. On the day the NIE was finally released, National Security
advisor Stephen J. Hadley gave this predictable interpretation:
-
- "It confirms that we were right to be worried about
Iran seeking to develop nuclear weapons.... It tells us that we have made
progress in trying to ensure that this does not happen. But the intelligence
also tells us that the risk of Iran acquiring a nuclear weapon remains
a very serious problem... it concludes with 'moderate confidence' that
the program had not restarted as of mid-2007."
-
- That "moderate confidence" statement is all
that is needed to give the impression of risk--enough to justify continued
hostile demands toward Iran. That is the script Bush seems to be following--demanding
that Iran "come clean" and reveal all about past programs. So,
while the military option is temporarily off the table, the antagonization
strategy continues in full force. Bush is demanding another round of economic
and military sanctions against Iran.
-
- Here's what the NIE really does:
-
- 1) It affirms in the public's eye that the Bush/Cheney
team was right about Iran's weapons program (without having to rigorously
justify this to the public). The writers knew that the public's eagerness
to believe the weapons program had stopped would negate any further pressure
to justify the former claim that Iran's nuclear weapons program actually
existed in the first place. Slick.
-
- 2) It gives the Bush administration a reason to back
down from the attack on Iran (for now).
-
- 3) It still guarantees an open-ended threat from Iran:
i.e., "If they had a program once, they could have it again."
-
- Matthew Rothschild wrote yesterday, "The risk of
Bush attacking Iran is not yet over. When the National Intelligence Estimate
on Iran came out earlier this week, a lot of people jumped to the conclusion
that Cheney and the hardliners have lost, and so we can all breathe a sigh
of relief. Well, I'm not exhaling at the moment--because I still believe
Bush and Cheney are going to do the deed.
-
- "First, let's examine what Bush said at his Tuesday
press conference: 'Iran was dangerous, Iran is dangerous, and Iran will
be dangerous if they have the knowledge necessary to make a nuclear weapon.'
Note well that he didn't say Iran will be dangerous when it acquires such
a weapon, but prior to that, when it acquires the knowledge to make one.
That's a big difference, and it shortens the timetable laid out in the
NIE, which doubted Iran would have such a weapon until 2015.
-
- "Bush's new definition allows him to denounce Iran
at almost any time on the nuclear issue. He reiterated that 'Iran needs
to be taken seriously as a threat to peace,' adding: 'My opinion hasn't
changed.' And he remained as macho as ever in boasting that he wouldn't
allow Iran to acquire such a weapon while he's around. 'If Iran shows up
with a nuclear weapon at some point in time, the world is going to say,
what happened to them in 2007? How come they couldn't see the impending
danger?' He added five more similar rhetorical questions, and concluded
by saying: 'It's not going to happen on my watch.' He also said yet again
that 'the best diplomacy' is when 'all options are on the table.'"
-
- MY ANALYSIS: First, let me be very clear. The globalists
have not repented of their ultimate intentions of antagonize the world
sufficient to cause a massive nuclear retaliation against the country (by
Russia and China). That's the real threat we need to be worried about--the
next World War they are planning. They may well be postponing this Iran
attack date to 2015 to form one of the actual trigger events, much as they
have also been giving cover to North Korea's aggressive preparations all
these years--because of NK's potential use as a trigger to start a war
in the Far East. We will probably see the use of two trigger events, on
both sides of the world at different times, as they did in WWII.
-
- But clearly the Bush globalists were planning on attacking
Iran now, and that has changed. They were unsuccessful at provoking Iran
into a pre-emptive strike, and they had way too many people watching for
a US-instigated provocation of Iran. This entire NIE process was done,
in my opinion, including all the hype about the supposed infighting between
"hawks and realists," merely to give the Bush administration
an excuse to back out of the current attack plan--because they wanted to.
The big question is WHY?
-
- There are several possibilities, but here is what I think
looms largest: While it is the globalists' plan to continue militarily
intervention around the world (in the name of democracy and fighting terror)
they can only continue this antagonization of the world if the American
public remains stupid enough and compliant enough to believe in the phony
excuses fed them by the media--by daily interviewing or parroting statements
by government officials and neocon shills within the media. It's this latter
part of the scheme--keeping the public believing in the intervention agenda--that
is failing, and failing rapidly. American's fatigue with war, if not outright
anti-war sentiment is growing. It is especially high about Iraq, despite
recent claims of success. But, American tolerance for a broad-ranging attack
on Iran is simply not there.
-
- I believe the globalist neocons running the Bush administration
saw that a perceived unjustified attack on Iran threatened to arouse a
major rebellion among Americans that could potentially and radically alter
who America would choose in the upcoming presidential primaries. The PTB
see this period leading up to the primaries, as a period when their abilities
to manipulate public opinion toward their favored globalist candidates
(Giuliani and Clinton) are most at risk of failure. An Iran attack would
have exacerbated that risk.
-
- First, the public wasn't buying the justifications. They'd
had too much of that in Iraq. Second, increasingly, huge numbers of thinking
men and women in the military were becoming critical of this warmongering
agenda and actively expressing those opinions on the internet (and donating
to Ron Paul's campaign). Even normally supportive yesman Generals in the
various services were balking and there was a not-so-minor revolt brewing
in the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
-
- Third, the surge in support of Ron Paul has them worried,
even though they are still confident they can deny him the nomination.
They fear that the one way to guarantee an even higher level of support
for Paul is to attack Iran, which would have proved Ron Paul right: The
price of oil would go shooting up toward $200 a barrel, the public deficit
would become even more astronomical, and more hatred against America would
result.
-
- Economically, I also think the PTB are very worried.
The economy is right on the edge of a major collapse despite appearances
on the street. Certainly, higher fuel costs to consumers will continue
to syphon off public buying power, as well.
-
- There has been a run on Florida's state investment pool
by participating municipalities, fearing that the state's investments in
risky subprime mortgages and derivatives will soon become insolvent. That
could easily happen in other states as well. Florida has halted further
withdrawals from the pool to make sure they don't have to start liquidating
investments that might have no real value--exposing how bad things really
are.
-
- The only thing keeping a cascade of investment, mortgage
and bank failures from happening is the continued massive injection of
liquidity by the fed into favored banks and brokerage houses--countering
downward market forces with options plays and more spending. They can't
keep this up forever without exacerbating effects on the dollar. In fact,
the dollar would be falling more than it is if it weren't for the fact
that international holders of dollar reserves are afraid of unloading large
blocks of dollars at any one time lest the remaining value of their reserves
collapses. The big holders have little choice but to continue holding dollars
and/or try to invest them in something of value priced in dollars. That's
why the Saudis are buying large stakes in US companies. In short, I believe
the PTB may have decided that the fragile state of economic affairs cannot
tolerate another oil/war shock right now.
-
- Nevertheless, the attack is merely postponed, not cancelled.
It could be a short postponement trying to get past this presidential primary
or they could wait for the ultimate war scenario, in the next decade. The
specter of Iran's nuclear weapons program can be resurrected as quickly
as the NIE put it to rest. Worse, no new NIE will have to justify Iran's
weapon's culpability--which was already established by presumption in this
latest edition. All they will have to claim is that the weapons program
"has been restarted", or worse, that "Iran never did shut
it down" Intel of this sort is easy to create when you have access
to black operations worldwide.
-
- There is another possibility. Israel could play the role
of rebellious sibling and attack Iran on its own. This is still a very
real possibility. Iran would then retaliate against both Israel and nearby
US troops and the US could then enter the war "reluctantly" and
avoid blame in the eyes of the American people. In any case, my analysis
is that this is merely a tactical postponement, not a victory for the opposition
nor a reason to drop our guard.
-
-
-
- World Affairs Brief - Commentary and Insights on a Troubled
World
-
- Copyright 2007 Joel Skousen - All Rights Reserved
-
- Partial quotations with attribution permitted. Cite source
as Joel Skousen's World Affairs Brief
-
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