On January 13, 2006, Bush said the following about Iran:
"Countries such as ours have a great obligation to step up, working together to send a message to the Iranians that their behavior, trying to clandestinely develop a nuclear weapon, or using the guise of a civilian nuclear program to attain a nuclear weapon, is unacceptable."
The latest NIE on Iran now tells us that Iran suspended the pursuit of nuclear weapons in 2003, the same year that Iran approached the U.S. about opening a dialogue, which the Bush administration rebuffed.
Oh, but the Bushies will protest that at the beginning of 2006, Bush was merely acting on info in the 2005 Iran NIE, which suggested with "high confidence" that Iran was "determined to develop nuclear weapons." So Bush wasn't really lying, Bushies will say, because he was being told that Iran had a rabid desire to get nuclear weapons.
There are several problems with this line of thinking. One, Iran is a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, unlike our good buddies Israel and India--both of which do in fact have nuclear weapons. In fact, Iran has been a signatory to the NNPT for as long as the U.S. has, since July 1, 1968. Iran ratified the treaty a month sooner than the U.S. did. So technically, Iran agreed to the NNPT before the U.S.
As fellow signatories and earlier ratifiers of the NNPT, Iran is entitled to production of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes. Ever since being elected president of Iran, Ahmadinejad has maintained that Iran's nuclear program was for peaceful purposes:
"Iran's peaceful technology is the outcome of the scientific achievements of Iran's youth. We need the peaceful nuclear technology for energy, medical and agricultural purposes and our scientific progress. We will continue this," the ultraconservative Ahmadinejad said."
The above quote is from August 2005, several months before Bush openly declared Iran to be pursuing a nuclear weapon.
So here we have at least two major indications that Iran doesn't want a nuclear weapon, but Bush chooses to be a bully.
"A Long History In Fabricating Evidence"
Ahmadinejad also pointed out that the United States has "a long history in fabricating evidence." He was correct about that even before the release of this new Iran NIE, but the new NIE just proves his point that much more. The 2005 Iran NIE was basically an attempt to give the neocons what they wanted--the 2005 NIE, as noted above, declared with "high confidence" that Iran was "determined to develop nuclear weapons"--and what the neocons wanted was an excuse to attack Iran. The 2005 NIE also tried to downplay the Iranian "threat," pointing out that it would be at least a decade or so before Iran was able to develop nukes. But the 2005 NIE was, at its heart, another twisted chapter in our "long history in fabricating evidence."
So, Ahmadinejad told the truth about Iran's nuclear program. And Bush lied about it. Unfortunately, that state of affairs is no more remarkable than the sun coming up every day.
False-flag operation likely?
But the neocons still want their war with Iran. Now that the "threat" of Iranian nukes has been obliterated, how will they try to sell us on war with Iran? I'm guessing a staged terror attack of some sort, or maybe a video that will purport to show Iranians attacking U.S. troops in Iraq. Something like that. Of course, it will all be fabricated evidence, because as we've just seen, that's what we do. That's how we roll.
Of course, there's still the matter of the EFPs that Iran is supposedly supplying to Iraqi insurgents. The neocons could try to beat that dead horse some more. Or maybe try to blow up one of the American ships in the aircraft carrier groups we have in the Persian Gulf and blame it on the Iranians.
Whatever they decide to do, don't count the neocons out just because they've been proven dead wrong. Remember, they think they create reality and all we get to do is study it "judiciously" and try to keep up with them.
And there's many a slip 'twixt the cup and the lip...so we have to keep our eyes on those bastard neocons...
2 comments:
Hey Clinton,
The NIE report that just came out never says anything about the intentions of Iran on whether they "intend or intended" to pursue a nuclear weapons program. Furthermore, this NIE report says Iran stopped proceeding with their nuclear weapons program in the Fall of 2003, but the report doesn't say why...was it maybe because of Bush's cowboy policies that scared Iran into halting their program.
One more thing, there is a previous report by different authors with the National Intelligence Council who contradict the authors of this current NIE report. Is one group of authors lying or is there an intelligence failure "again"!?! If this current NIE report is correct then it means that Iran had halted its nuclear weapons program fully two years before publication of the National Intelligence Council's 2005 Estimate on this same subject, which concluded "with high confidence that Iran currently is determined to develop nuclear weapons."
Either report you look at they say that Iran was indeed secretly pursuing a nuclear weapons program, which is in blatant violation of the NNPT which Iran signed. This means that Iran was lying all along about having a nuclear weapons program. The only logical and sane conclusion is that Iran must be confronted about this violation of the NNPT and must fully cooperate in showing that they do NOT intend to pursue a nuclear weapons program in the future. In other words, they need to honor their signed treaty of the NNPT or their word as a nation is no better than ours.
Another thought Clinton, if the U.S. has a history of fabricating evidence, then how do you know that the current NIE report is not anymore a fabrication than any other NIE report? How can you believe the current NIE report over any other one?
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