.that we don’t? Read today’s Drudge Report: the israelis claim that the US is ignoring the “truth” about Iran’s nuclear weapons-and it is comparable to ignoring the WWII holocaust. My question: if the Israelis have such good intelligence (proving that Iran is close to haveing nuclear bombs)-then why haven’t they revealed it?
As a secondary question: how likely is it that Israeli intelligence might have high-level moles inside the iranian nuclear effort?
Is this possible?
It sounds like the Israelis are hell-bent on war with Iran: I say, “go ahead”-just leave me out.
At least, starting now my new thing is to say everything that annoys me is comparable to the holocaust
here’s a link
It sounds to me like the wording used is the language of propaganda.
Step 1. Instill shame and self doubt by invoking the holocost.
Step 2. Instill more shame and self doubt by invoking self referencing memes.
Step 3. Cap it off by emasculating the leader of the western world (ok, so this step is not so hard)
Step 4. Sit back and wait. If the west attacks Iran and finds no evidence of nukes then it is the west’s fault for not waiting for / listening to more reliable intelligence. If the west does not attack Iran and Iran attacks Israel then it is the west’s fault for ignoring or minimizing the situation in the first place.
If Israel has information it is not sharing then it should share, if not then it should not try to incite public reaction and support based on heresay and memes.
The israelis use the Holocaust-card again
At the risk of pointing out the obvious, Cohen =/= Shas, Cohen =/= Israel, Israel =/= Shas.
A Shas politician made some statements. Do not confuse them with “Israel does thus and such” any more than any time Trent Lott said something it would be accurate to say “America has said thus and such”
It would be interesting to see who in which governments, and especially who in which intelligence services has been saying/believing/thinking/finding what. And what they’re shared. For instance there is now talk that certain “British spy chiefs” may agree to a certain extend with some of Israel’s intelligence agents.
These opinions may or may not be shared by some in the US intelligence community, as well.
Finding out who, exactly, has been saying what would help much more than just talking about “The British” “The Americans” or “The Israelis.”
Point taken. Allow me then to slightly modify my last statement:
As an American, this version may be more correct but somehow seems more hypocritical than the first version.
Somehow, I don’t think we have to worry about the Israelis having intelligence about Iran’s nuclear weapons program and not sharing it with the US.
At the risk of *stressing * the obvious, Cohen and Yishai are basically Falwell and Robertson in funny hats.
As for Iran… I’m waiting to hear what the Mossad has to say, because frankly, I trust them more than I trust the CIA. They’ve made their share of mistakes in the past, of course, but they still have a better track record, and if they’re biased then at least they’re not biased against me.
Oh, so you mean they represent a demographically significant and politically powerful segment of the population?
Unfortunately, yes. Roughly 8%, numerically, and while their constituency isn’t all that politically powerful in and of itself, they are.
Yeah. One problem with democracies is its the nuts who are the most motivated.
Well an Israeli did. Close though.
It is not a “card” if it is actually relevant.
Is it now no longer possible to invoke the Holocaust in any context outside the Holocaust Museum or a history class? I am being only partly facetious here.
Sure it is. Mark Furmann made overt racist statements during the OJ trial making the integrity of his testimony racially relevant and Cochran used “The race card”.
Saying America, Great Brittan, The Vatican whomever dropped the ball on the Holocaust is not going to change what happened. Invoking the Holocaust as a means to insite guilt and shame as opposed to using actual intelligence and evidence to call to action is as facetious as refering to every bad person in the world as Hitler.
I guess I’d like to know what ACTUALLY is known about Iran’s nuclear program. Knowing the CIA’s tendency to lie, I don’t trust their accounts. I also don’t trust GWB-his track record of veracity doesn’t impress me. Now, we are told that Iran halted its weapons program 4 years ago. Now, the IAEA (Dr. El Baradei) says that Iran has no active weapons program. Who to believe? Do we have any hard evidence of any of this? or is this all speculation, by those who want a war with Iran?
Actually… the NIE said that, on the judgment that Iran had stopped its nuclear weapons program in 2003 and that the halt lasted at least several years, that they could render a judgment that was “based on high-quality information, and/or that the nature of the issue makes it possible to render a solid judgment.”
On the count that Iran still had its nuclear weapons program under suspension, the NIE said that judgment was “credibly sourced and plausible but not of sufficient quality or corroborated sufficiently to warrant a higher level of confidence.”
So, specifically with the NIE: that Iran suspended its nuclear weapons program in 2003, and that freeze lasted at least a few years? Solid judgment. That Iran still has its nuclear program under suspension? Plausible judgment but the intel isn’t of a sufficent quality or corroborated sufficiently to warrant a higher level of confidence. That is, that Iran still has its nuclear weapons program suspended is not a solid judgment.
Likewise, the IAEA has stated in a recent report that [
](| IAEA)
In other words, the IAEA can certify that nothing that Iran has shown them has been diverted to weaponization programs, but they cannot certify that Iran doesn’t have any such programs, because Iran has not been cooperating fully. By implementing the Additional Protocol. Specifically, by implementing the AP, the IAEA would be able to confirm the scope and nature of Iran’s nuclear program (ie. totally peaceful or not) as well as being able to confirm that there was no undeclared nuclear program.
So neither the IAEA nor the NIE have said that Iran does not have an active weapons program. Both have said that there isn’t any evidence that there is such a program, but due to Iran’s actions, gaps in our knowledge have made it impossible to fully verify the state of Iran’s current nuclear program.
The IAEA, for its part, certainly has hard evidence that its inspections haven’t turned up anything actionable. They also know their job, and know that without the AP they cannot certify Iran’s nuclear program as being totally peaceful, but that with it, they can. IIRC, the IAEA was supposed to have gathered more evidence by November 22nd, but either they haven’t been able to gather it or it’s taking them some time to write up a report. Hopefully in the next few weeks they’ll have more info for us.
The NIE’s report, most likely, if the Telegraph article is accurate, is based on “human sources, wireless intercepts and evidence from an Iranian defector”. Whether or not that rises to the level of hard evidence is probably a subjective call.
But even going from the Telegraph article, the only real objections from British and Israeli intelligence sources are that they too simply aren’t sure, and they think that Iran may have fed the CIA disinformation.
So, it all boils down to “we don’t know.” The IAEA has been thorough and professional, but cannot complete their analysis without Iran’s cooperation. The global intelligence community seems to be divided and even the NIE only stated that Iran having its nuclear program remain suspended to mid 2007 was plausible but not well enough supported to be a solid judgment. Personally, I would suggest that as long as one pays attention to the caveats and qualifiers, there’s no real contradiction between much of the intel data and no real reason to ask who we should believe. All the intel agencies, right now, are saying that they’re not certain, while some believe that it is at best plausible but not solid that Iran isn’t working on nuclear weapons at the present.
As long as you’re comfortable with ambiguity and uncertainty, there’s really not much of an issue.
But if the the CIA, and/or MI6 and/or Mossad are playing politics game with intel? Fuck it, all bets are off.
Jack Shaw [of the “Iraqi WMD were moved to Syria (and Lebanon)” fame] maintains that the DIA accused Israelis [none specifically] of disseminating disinformation re Iraqs WMD. Shaw mentioned that some of the info came to him from his “British contacts” and “London”
Something to keep in mind.
It seems awfully odd to me that people still consider the combination of “we don’t really know” and “everybody thinks one way” to equal “everybody knows”.
Didn’t we just go through this with Iraq? We didn’t really have any convincing evidence, but everyone “knew” they had WMD. Look where that thinking got us.
If the President is going to send Americans to die and American dollars to be spent, I want more than a conspiracy theory. And that’s what Iranian WMD programs are right now - a conspiracy theory. We have no evidence, but cite the lack of evidence as evidence.