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

[EmperorNoClothes]

This is the same Alan Dershowitz who was so sure there were "Weapons of Mass Destruction" in Iraq. Right.

[sashal]

Of course, in Iran’s case there is a real possibility of using a civil nuclear program to create a weapons program, and Iran has strategic interests that make acquiring these weapons understandable and even, in a sense, rational. They might, like Pakistan did, be playing the world for fools, buying time and waiting for the moment to unveil their nuke program. But what is so amazing about the entire debate going on in the West is that none of us–including the government that supposedly “knows more than we do” as the delightfully servile phrase has it–has any reliable information to confirm this theory, except that we think their President is looney, our government despises theirs and many of us actually believe that Iranians–and we’re talking about Iranians here–are some set of wild-eyed, suicidal maniacs who will just as soon annihilate themselves in some kamikaze nuclear war as look at us. In just the same way that the government railroaded the country into a war in Iraq on premises that were always preposterous, the administration and a sizeable part of the population of this country are once again positive that they know what Iran intends, when we are merely supposing and guessing–just as we did with Iraq. In fact, what is going on is the making of policy based in paranoia and fear, which is by definition not all together rational or well considered.

[JackTar]

Ok, readers, who are you going to believe? A staunch pro-Israeli pundit who name-calls an independent NIE report as "perverse"? Or a beefed-up national intelligence apparatus that since 2005 no longer allows shoddy and politically influenced information to lead us into embarrassing, unnecessary, immoral wars?

[BeerNotWar]

The point about oil is a huge red herring. Oil is Iran's major source of revenue and every barrel they use, they cannot sell. The more expensive the oil on the world market, the bigger the disincentive for Iran to burn it domestically rather than sell it. The U.S. understood this and helped Iran start its nuclear energy program in the 80's.
Iran is not a threat to the U.S. as any attack on U.S. soil with a nuclear weapon from Iran would result in the annihilation of Iran. Even if brought here by a third party, the origin of the weapon would be discovered and Iran would suffer immeasurably. Iran IS plausibly a threat to Israel, but we should not destroy our own security and economy for Israel, in my opinion. I can't support a preemptive strike on Iran unless and until they are a clear threat to the U.S.

[tecumseh80]

In all honesty - when is this going to end???

Iran's government is a theocracy - a brutal form of authoritarianism that no one can deny. Its current President might truly delusional, but is that the entire story?

The revolution occurred with other groups involved - namely nationalists and radicals, and those groups have not merely died off in this new regime. The theocratic government is hardly uniform in its approach - Ahmedinijad and the Ayatollah often disagree to the point of possible government fracture. Iran's youth are overwhelmingly for political reform. The nation's Ulema are strongly divided over the path Iran has taken. In short - Iran is currently seized by internal political divides...often the result of an economy that has proven to be absolutely incapable of providing stable growth.

Professor Dershowitz argues that we cannot take lightly that Iran wants nuclear weapons and has expressed an interest in using them - fair enough. Yet, those statements come from the President and his allies, who are not the final word in Iranian politics (as anyone who does research can tell you). Ulemas for reform have actually convinced the current Supreme Leader that nuclear war is against Islam and a disastrous for the nation in any exercise.

Why this bloodlust? I have never understood it. For we all know if war is unleashed against the Persians, then that ends, effectively, all prospects of reform anytime in the near future.

Why can we not fight this battle further with economics - using pressure on Russia and China not to trade? You may not mean to say, Professor, that we have to attack Iran because it may one day use weapons, but you are allowing such an argument remain part of our public sphere. You are welcome to your opinions and valuable they are, but stop portraying those who want another path and express such opinions as misguided, naive, or foolish. Last time I checked, mystics who can predict the future are fairy tales, and the track record of people with your particular strand of foreign policy have a very low success rate...

[HeevenSteven]

Didn't you think Iraq had WMD? You see what you want to see.

Anyway, the Nuke genie is out of the bottle; and bombing the world into submission is even stupider than the Stupidest Intellegence.

[Mark D]

So let me get this straight:

When the old NIE said that Iran was going after nukes, it was accurate in the eyes of those on the right. Same when Bush says unequivocally pretty much tee same thing.

But when the 16 intelligence agencies get new info, create their "Red Team" to question every conclusion as hard as they can to ensure it's correct, and come up with something that differs from your narrow world view, suddenly they're all incompetent boobs with an agenda.

Um ... maybe it's just me, but does anyone else see the disconnect here?

After all, I'll bet $100 that if the NIE has come out and said, "We must bomb Iran NOW!!" Alan here would be singing the praises of the intelligence community.

But since it didn't, now he and his pals must denounce it at all costs and with all manner of wild conspiracy theories.

Stunning. Truly stunning.

[joebaggadonuts]

The intelligence apparatus of this nation is a farce, an embarrassment, and a misused tool of presidents from the time it started. By exposing Brewster Jennings when they outed Valerie Plame, the CIA lost the ability to know what is going on in Iran anyway. I don't believe this estimate nor any other. I was at University in the US when the Shah was overthrown. There was no NIE on the danger of that happening, but from my befriending an Iranian student who had NO involvement but who heard through the grapevine that every Iranian student knew, I understood it would happen, months before it did. The CIA? They had a recruiting operation on that campus and a presence there. They knew nothing until after it happened. It was a surprise to the US because of poor administration and subversion of the intelligence apparatus to step-n-fetch-it status. They will make up and do any thing the President wants. This is fundamentally wrong and anti-Const­itutional.

What I am saying is that the mechanism of government intelligence is broken and has been ever since I can remember. Just because this NIE pretends to not be in line with the President's wishes only means there's a deeper cover than we know.

[wldnswmmr]

Wow. I don't even have to go to Powerline anymore to read John Bolton's theories of the "CIA cabal" determined to undermine Bush. Are you bucking for an adjoining office at the American Enterprise Institute? But your diatribe does raise an interesting question. Iran is a signatory to the Nonproliferation Treaty, and they have the right to enrich uranium to 3% U-235 for civilian reactors. As for the oil under Iran, maybe Iran, which signed the Kyoto Protocol, also takes global warming seriously, unlike the United States, which refuses to sign. But back to the NPT: Israel has not signed, of course, nor have Pakistan and India, to whom the United States sells nuclear technology. Shouldn't we therefore just get rid of the NPT since its nonobservance by Israel, Pakistan, India and the United States makes a mockery of the regime? The standard which you want is that no country of which we disapprove should be allowed to develop enriched uranium, period. Since this isn't what the NPT says, we need an explicit change in policy.
As for your concurrence in the cabal theory, it would seem that the IAEA is in on it too. It would be helpful if you could explain how the cabal got el-Baradei to go along.

[seaape]

I wonder what Dershowitz is getting at here. Is he calling for an attack or invasion of Iran?

As to Iran being "the only nation actually to threaten to use nuclear weapons to attack its enemies," what could he be thinking?

[realitytrumpsbull]

Maybe, someday, someone will write a book, and
call it: Iraq, The Mother Of All Bullshit Stories: How Americans Got Led Down The Garden
Path For A Barrel Of Oil.

God knows if we were REALLY smart, then we
would have shut the gas pumps off seven years
ago instead of putting Exxon in the Big Chair...