Stupid Intelligence

The recent national intelligence estimate that concluded that Iran halted its nuclear weapons program in 2003 is just about the stupidest intelligence assessment I have ever read. It falls hook, line and sinker for a transparent bait and switch tactic employed not only by Iran, but by several other nuclear powers in the past. The tactic is obvious and well-known to all intelligence officials with an IQ above room temperature. It goes like this: There are two tracks to making nuclear weapons: One is to conduct research and develop technology directly related to military use. That is what the United States did when it developed the atomic bomb during the Manhattan Project. The second track is to develop nuclear technology for civilian use and then to use the civilian technology for military purposes.

What every intelligence agency knows is that the most difficult part of developing weapons corresponds precisely to the second track, namely civilian use. In other words, it is relatively simple to move from track 2 to track 1 in a short period of time. As Valerie Lincy and Gary Milhollin, both experts on nuclear arms control, put it in a New York Times op-ed on December 6, 2007:

"During the past year, a period when Iran's weapons program was supposedly halted, the government has been busy installing some 3,000 gas centrifuges at its plant at Natanz. These machines could, if operated continuously for about a year, create enough enriched uranium to provide fuel for a bomb. In addition, they have no plausible purpose in Iran's civilian nuclear effort. All of Iran's needs for enriched uranium for its energy programs are covered by a contract with Russia.

"Iran is also building a heavy water reactor at its research center at Arak. This reactor is ideal for producing plutonium for nuclear bombs, but is of little use in an energy program like Iran's, which does not use plutonium for reactor fuel. India, Israel and Pakistan have all built similar reactors -- all with the purpose of fueling nuclear weapons. And why, by the way, does Iran even want a nuclear energy program, when it is sitting on an enormous pool of oil that is now skyrocketing in value? And why is Iran developing long-range Shahab missiles, which make no military sense without nuclear warheads to put on them?

"...the halting of its secret enrichment and weapon design efforts in 2003 proves only that Iran made a tactical move. It suspended work that, if discovered, would unambiguously reveal intent to build a weapon. It has continued other work, crucial to the ability to make a bomb, that it can pass off as having civilian applications."

Duh! What then can explain so obvious an intelligence gaffe. One explanation could lie in the old saw that "military intelligence is to intelligence as military music is to music." But I simply don't believe that our intelligence agencies are populated by the kind of nincompoops who would fall for so obvious an Iranian ploy. The more likely explanation is that there is an agenda hiding in the report. What then might that agenda be? To find a hidden agenda one should always look for the beneficiaries. Who wins from this deeply flawed report? Well, certainly Iran does, but it is unlikely that Iranian interests could drive any American agenda. Lincy and Milhollin surmise that:

"We should be suspicious of any document that suddenly gives the Bush administration a pass on a big national security problem it won't solve during its remaining year in office. Is the administration just washing its hands of the intractable Iranian nuclear issue by saying, '[i]f we can't fix it, it ain't broke?'"

My own view is that the authors of the report were fighting the last war. No, not the war in Iraq, but rather what they believe was Vice President Cheney's efforts to go to war with Iran. This report surely takes the wind out of those sails. But that was last year's unfought war. Nobody in Washington has seriously considered attacking Iran since Condolleezza Rice and Robert Gates replaced Cheney as the foreign policy power behind the throne.

Whatever the agenda and whatever the motive this report may well go down in history as one of the most dangerous, misguided and counterproductive intelligence assessments in history. It may well encourage the Iranians to move even more quickly in developing nuclear weapons. If the report is correct in arguing that the only way of discouraging Iran from developing nuclear weapons is to maintain international pressure, then the authors of the report must surely know that they have single-handedly reduced any incentive by the international community to keep the pressure up.

If Neville Chamberlain weren't long dead I would wonder whether he had a hand in writing this "peace in our time" intelligence fiasco.

I wish the intelligence assessment were correct. So does most of the media, which accepted its naïve conclusion with uncritical enthusiasm. The world would be a far safer place if Iran had indeed ended its efforts to develop deliverable nuclear weapons. But wishing for a desirable outcome does not make it so. Pretending that a desirable outcome is happening, when the best information indicates that it's not, only encourages the worst outcome.

The authors of this perverse report, which is influencing policy so immediately and negatively, will have much to answer for if their assessment results in a reduction of pressure on Iran -- which is the only nation actually to threaten to use nuclear weapons to attack its enemies -- to stop its obvious march toward becoming the world's most dangerous nuclear military power.

Comments

[noam4prez]

"...Iran -- which is the only nation actually to threaten to use nuclear weapons to attack its enemies...­"

I guess you don't consider the U.S. a nation? Or Israel?

" -- to stop its obvious march toward becoming the world's most dangerous nuclear military power."

Except for the only nation that ever used nuclear weapons, murdering hundreds of thousands of civilians. The nation that continues to keep "all options on the table".

[FogBelter]

Mr. Dershowitz, the hallmark of a great jurist is the ability to argue passionately on both sides of a given issue.

We have seen your take on this NIE report and recognize your contempt for it. Okay, now if you were to look at it from the otherside ... what can you say?

That those responsible for 16 US Intelligence Agencies, that have had their Agencies' credibility undermined by keeping silent when the data they provided was misused by this Adminstration in the case of Iraq to further a political agenda that was not in the best interests of the United States, wanted to restore the credibility of their profession and honor their responsibility to their country with their evaluation of Iran?

That upon finding no valid evidence that Iran was engaged in Nuclear Weapons Production to the level that proved an imminent threat to the United States that these 16 Agencies felt it incumbent upon them, in light of the Administration's desire for War with Iran based upon its perceived threat level, to send an unambiguous message that the threat isn't currently there for extreme response?

That far from taking an adversarial position to the Bush Administration with their NIE report they simply wanted to perform their function as responsibly and professionally as possible?

I'm not a Jurist, Mr Dershowitz, but certainly you sir, as accomplished as you are in the Law, can mount a defense of this NIE Report as vigorous and passionate as your case against it.

[MufsMom]

The Right Wing gets really bent out of shape when their wars are pulled out from under them, don't they?

[calguy]

Posted before, but flagged?

Mr. Dershowitz, two points:

One, do you have an inside track on the intelligence? Otherwise how are you so certain it is perverse?

Two, please stop the allusions to 1938. Iran does not equal Nazi Germany- they differ substantially in military might, economic power, and aggressive intentions. The Iranian president who has arguably (the translations are controversial as you must know) called for the destruction of Israel is not the Iranian commander in chief and has no power to do what he calls for. He is disgusting, and his conference on holocaust denial was execrable. But he is not Hitler. No comparison.

And see my other post.

[johnnydajogger]

Dersh is heart broken that WWIII has been postponed for now. Maybe sometime in the future we can actually continue to fight Israel's battles for it and invade another Arab country but for now it looks like the cat is out of the bag. No more war for the time being. Merry Christmas.

[lisakaz]

Sounds like sour grapes that you're not getting a pretext for war here. Why, praytell, should ANYONE trust neocons given the pisspoor track record on Iraq?

[Kane]

A major problem with the National Intelligence Estimate on pre-war Iraq is that it was written in stone despite being overwhelmingly vague and riddled with caveats. It easily allowed the individual reader to cherry-pick information and to paint their own interpretation. One person's "slam dunk" was another person's faulty evidence.

This recent assessment on Iran may prove to be a shifting of realities in Washington and in the intelligence agencies in how information is gathered, read, and shared within the entire intelligence community. To be sure, reports that the NIE was delayed at least three times by Dick Cheney is proof that necessary improvements to repair the system remain. However, this recent report provides some hope that the intelligence community is moving in the right direction.

[Mantix]

I'm heartened to see that most commenters see through yet another attempt of yours to scare us into attacking Iran.

The consensus of all American intelligence agencies agree-- Iran halted its nuclear weapons program 5 years ago.

But even if they didn't, what right do we have to stop a sovereign nation from trying to protect themselves, when ISRAEL has an illegal arsenal of nuclear weapons pointing straight at them?

The balance of power is way, way off in the Middle East. I'd prefer it be fixed by de-arming Israel and all other nuclear countries. Until it's restored, we shouldn't be surprised by the continuing violence.

[ajax2]

Time Aug. 2007
Reports that the Bush Administration will put Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps on the terrorism list can be read in one of two ways: it's either more bluster or, ominously, a wind-up for a strike on Iran. Officials I talk to in Washington vote for a hit on the IRGC, maybe within the next six months

[GuiltyByStander]

Professor Dershowitz wrote:

"Pretending that a desirable outcome is happening, when the best information indicates that it's not, only encourages the worst outcome."

What is the "best information" and where did you find it?

[fourex]

Dershowitz, "Nobody in Washington has seriously considered attacking Iran since Condolleezza Rice and Robert Gates replaced Cheney as the foreign policy power behind the throne."

What is your basis for this statement?

[calguy]

PS: you suggest this may go down as one of the most dangerous reports ever written. Hogwash. It may go down as the report which finally brought a screeching halt to the Bush/Cheney adventurism.

[fourex]

Deshowitz, "The authors of this perverse report, which is influencing policy so immediately and negatively, will have much to answer for if their assessment results in a reduction of pressure on Iran..."
Why is the report perverse? Was there 'much to answer for' when cherry picked
intelligence, not perverse but deadly, killed 650,000 Iraqis? No there were promotions and bonuses.

[MO-Mike]

Mr. Dershowitz, your argument here is specious. I don't think anyone is arguing that the United States go off into a corner and ignore Iran. What people ARE arguing is that the actions of the Bush administration and its push towards yet another war have the same value as their arguments about Iraq and their threat of WMD's, which is none.

As Keith Olberman pointed out, the group that was so sure of the intentions of the Germans in 1938 was Chamberlin's. In that regard, this administration and yourself, are putting yourselves in the place not of a Churchill who pushed for continued vigilance and preparation, but of a Vincent Auriol who thought the solution in Vietnam was to maintain the French colony there.

The current course in Iran should be a diplomatic one, yet that is exactly what you are arguing against here. This is not a court of law where there are only two possible outcomes, it is the real world where there are a multitude of them. Your wrong paradigm has led to a vastly wrong answer.

[JShankel]

Um, if our national intelligence apparatus is so manifestly incompetent, how can we expect to prevail in any confrontation with Iran? Don't we depend on reliable intelligence in the conduct of warfare?

You can't have it both ways. Either we can trust our intelligence agencies, in which case Iran poses no immediate military threat.

Or you can't trust our intelligence agencies, in which case you have no reason to believe you can successfully prosecute a war.