12/04/2007
NIE Report Contradicts White House 'World War III' Iran Rhetoric
A recently released intelligent assessment on Iran's nuclear weapons program concludes that it was halted in 2003, the New York Times reports:
"The conclusions of the new assessment are likely to reshape the final year of the Bush administration, which has made halting Iran’s nuclear program a cornerstone of its foreign policy. The assessment, a National Intelligence Estimate that represents the consensus view of all 16 American spy agencies, states that Tehran is likely keeping its options open with respect to building a weapon, but that intelligence agencies 'do not know whether it currently intends to develop nuclear weapons.'"
The video above, via AmericaBlog, shows Bush warning the media about the prospects of World War III should Iran acquire the ability to develop nuclear weapons. Problem is, that press conference was held months after Bush had already been told of the NIE report referenced above.
Here are a few responses from Democratic leaders.
Today at a press conference, Bush backtracked on the World War III comments, saying "nobody ever told me" to back down with the rhetoric, and denied that he had details of the report.
Said Bush: "I was made aware of the NIE last week. In August, I think it was John — Mike McConnell 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."
Writes Think Progress: "Yesterday, National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley said, 'when the President was told that we had some additional information, he was basically told: stand down; needs to be evaluated; we’ll come to you and tell you what we think it means.' Later in the briefing, Hadley reversed course and said, 'In terms of stand down, they did not tell the President to stand down and stop talking about Iran’s nuclear program.' White House officials are obfuscating on what they knew and when they knew it because the answer has the potential of further damaging the credibility of what they have asserted about Iran in the past few months."
Bush said there would be no change in the U.S. policy toward Iran as a result of the report.
U.S. Says Iran Ended Atomic Arms Work [nyt]
An Assessment Jars a Foreign Policy Debate About Iran [nyt]
A Blow to Bush's Tehran Policy [washington post]
Bush: DNI Told Me ‘We Have Some New Information, He Didn’t Tell Me What The Information Was’ [think progress]
Mainstream media gives Bush a pass on Iran lie, they're all one big happy club [americablog]
Posted 12:01 PM EST by Andy Towle in George W. Bush, Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, News | Permalink
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Oh the mendacity!!!!!!
Posted by: busytimmy | Dec 4, 2007 12:13:33 PM
Gee, what could have happened in 2003 to have convinced Iran to change it's policy?
Posted by: Cassius | Dec 4, 2007 12:21:19 PM
monger
Posted by: aaron | Dec 4, 2007 12:31:19 PM
That man should be tried at the Hague as sure as I'm sitting here.
Posted by: Brian | Dec 4, 2007 12:34:04 PM
Well Cassius some say the thing that changed Iran's policy was the Iraq invasion. Whatever the reason, I'm happy they don't have a nuclear weapon.
Posted by: Matt | Dec 4, 2007 1:05:50 PM
sadly, this is only a speedbump on the U.S. warpath to Iran.
Posted by: A.J. | Dec 4, 2007 1:11:44 PM
Everything he's told us about the Iran nuclear program is a lie, a lie told to lead us to yet another war, he's been caught in the lie yet says nothing has changed. Isn't there something in the Bible about lying?
Posted by: sam | Dec 4, 2007 1:11:54 PM
The only saving grace here is that Congress must approve any action against Iraq and, at this point, the Democrats are in control of Congress and, more importantly, Bush has no credibility.
Posted by: peterparker | Dec 4, 2007 2:14:00 PM
Why y'all haven't marched on Washington demanding his resignation/impeachment is beyond me.
Posted by: secretagentman | Dec 4, 2007 2:17:58 PM
Jesus Christ.
Why this sudden urge to begin humming the tune to "Sheep May Safely Graze?"
Posted by: Princess Superstar | Dec 4, 2007 3:00:48 PM
yet another example of the pathological inabilty of the shrub administration to tell the truth. thank god there is only one year left of this tawdry, reckless, dangerous, cabal of neo-con half-wits who hold the world's future in their bumbling, incompetent hands.
after that, we can all take a hot shower and vigorousley scrub ourselves clean of the offal that this repug abomination has forced us to wallow in.
matt: get a clue.
Posted by: nic | Dec 4, 2007 5:18:33 PM
i'm 3/4 sorry matt. i was reacting more to CASSIUS than to you.
Posted by: nic | Dec 4, 2007 5:27:58 PM
It's fine Nic. I was just re quoting what I heard on the MSNBC this morning. I'm sure we are going to argue when Huckabee is president too.
Posted by: Matt | Dec 4, 2007 8:44:28 PM
In a speech before the American Legion in August Bush said “I have authorized our military commanders in Iraq to confront Tehran’s murderous activities” by which he meant the growing alliance between Iranian and Iraqi Shiites.
He was tacitly admitting even then that his rabid claims and the “Wolf!”cries of the zionists that Iran was about to go nuclear were seen as lies by most of the world.
The NIE indicates that powerful parts of the US government, including the ‘intelligence community’ (read spies and torturers) and the Pentagon (read mass murderers of civilians) are overextended and are wary of an attack on Iran, whatever the pretest. Also, they’re aware that as Zbigniew Brzezinski said that Iran would react “by intensifying the conflict in Iraq and Afghanistan, their neighbors, and that could draw in Pakistan. We will be stuck in a regional war for twenty years.”
Most of the EU states and Russia are very much afraid of a war against Iran, especially since Bush and his congressional backers are most willing to use the nuclear option. US war plans are continuing apace and today’s NIE may not stop them, just cause them to use a different excuse. “They’re moving everybody to the Iran desk,” one recently retired C.I.A. official said. “They’re dragging in a lot of analysts and ramping up everything. It’s just like the fall of 2002”—the months before the invasion of Iraq…”
Bush’s war plans are vastly aided by the Senates passage, 76-22, of the Lieberman-Kyl amendment, a terrorist measure which threatens to “combat, contain and [stop]” Iran via “military instruments.” Even Democratic Senator Webb of Virginia says the Lieberman-Kyl amendment is “Cheney’s fondest pipe dream” and that it could be “read as a backdoor method of gaining Congressional validation for military action.” Most Republicans and about two thirds of the Democrats supported it, including right-wingers like Hillary Clinton, Harry Reid and Dianne Feinstein. By even larger majorities both parties continue to fund the war in Iraq, building permanent bases and a huge 36 building embassy to extract the oil and run their new colony.
The NIE has certainly taken some of the wind out his sails but he attacked Iraq in 2003 with the same disregard for public and world opinion and the same dangerous disregard for military and political reality.
This attack on Iraq is part of the oil wars that began with Bush1 and continued by Bill Clinton and Bush2. They’re going to be the booby prize that will break the back of whoever wins the White house in 2008. There is really no solution except total and unconditional pullout. None of the major candidates are for that and the war will go on until the US is defeated, by some combination of the same factors that defeated the criminal aggression of Democrat LBJ and Republican Nixon in Vietnam.
http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2007/10/08/071008fa_fact_hersh?currentPage=2
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/tag/lieberman-kyl
http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/wireStory?id=3808592
http://www.yaledailynews.com/articles/view/21825
Posted by: Bill Perdue, RainbowRED | Dec 4, 2007 10:18:55 PM
Lets not lose sight. Islamic Fascism declared war against the U.S. and all non-Islamic nations. The truth is the truth. Further, deception is a tenet of their religion to non-believers. Why would any free human want to suppress this? http://tinyurl.com/2znnvl
Posted by: Dr Coles | Dec 5, 2007 12:14:44 PM
Lets not lose sight. Islamic Fascism declared war against the U.S. and all non-Islamic nations. The truth is the truth. Further, deception is a tenet of their religion to non-believers. Why would any free human want to suppress this? http://tinyurl.com/2znnvl
Posted by: Dr Coles | Dec 5, 2007 12:14:53 PM