Israel Plans to Lobby Washington For an Attack on Iran

Laura Rozen says that the hard sell will start to happen over the next two weeks:

While the Israeli government considers the Bush administration highly sympathetic and sensitive to its security concerns, there are growing signs that Washington and Jerusalem may be diverging in their analysis of the urgency of the threat posed by Iran's nuclear program and its defensive military preparations for countering a possible strike, and their subsequent prospective timelines for considering possible military action against Iran. While Israeli national security experts say that Israel would not act without coordinating with the US, and there are other significant factors weighing against prospective Israeli military action on Iran before the Bush term ends, there are also emerging differences between the US and Israel on the accepted intelligence over when Iran would be considered to have a nuclear breakthrough, as well as what would constitute a "redline" that would prompt military action, Washington analysts say. In addition, the US, unlike Israel, feels more deeply constrained by the considerable investment it has made in blood and treasure in stabilizing Iraq, which could be risked by the tumult that could follow military action on Iran.

"My sense is the Pentagon would be worried or opposed to an Israeli attack," says David Wurmser, former Middle East adviser to Vice President Dick Cheney, who left the White House job late last summer. "They are afraid it would inflame the situation in Iraq, which could undermine the US position there.

It's refreshing to hear Wurmser speaking a little more sensibly these days, but let's not forget that this "genius" and this "strategist" once joined Douglas Feith, Richard Perle and others to come up with a nearly ingeniuous plan to destabilize the entire Middle East based on assumptions that were wrong and ideas that dissipated into nothing when actually put in play by the Bush Administration.

So I don't know what Wurmser adds--an attack on Iran proper would legitimize the Iranian regime and cause the price of oil to skyrocket--thanks to the fact that it's already headed that way anyway. Every time someone beats the war drums, oil goes up a notch. The oil needed by the industrialized world is now transferring unprecedented wealth to the Middle East. Pretty soon, they'll be able to buy armies and protection anyway, so maybe attacking them now isn't so crazy.

Except that it is.

--WS

Scott Ritter Goes After David Albright

Just who is, and who is not, an expert anyway?

Scott Ritter takes after the credentials of US Nuclear Analyst David Albright:

This is, of course, the problem when someone who is not an expert on a given subject attempts to portray himself as just that. Lacking in the foundation of knowledge and experience which generally is expected of a genuine expert, the false “expert” commits error after error, not only of the factual sort but also in judgment. Had Albright in fact been a true nuclear expert, especially one fortified with firsthand experience as a former U.N. weapons inspector, he would not have had any association with Khidir Hamza, the disgraced Iraqi defector who claimed to have firsthand knowledge of Saddam Hussein’s nuclear program. A true nuclear expert would have recognized the technical impossibilities and inconsistencies in Hamza’s fabrications. And a genuine former U.N. weapons inspector would have known that Hamza had been fingered as a fraud by the IAEA and UNSCOM. David Albright instead employed Hamza as an analyst with ISIS from 1997 until 1999.

Albright likewise facilitated the story of former Iraqi nuclear scientist Mahdi Obeidi being told to the world. As a “former U.N. weapons inspector,” Albright had a passing knowledge of Obeidi; the Iraqi was among the scientists that the IAEA team Albright served on questioned in June 1996 (Albright himself claims to have personally questioned Obeidi). Albright helped sell Obeidi’s story about buried uranium centrifuge parts to the media, even though a true nuclear expert would have known that what Obeidi claims to have hidden possessed absolutely no value in the field of nuclear enrichment, and any former U.N. weapons inspector worth his or her salt would have recognized the inconsistencies and improbabilities in the Obeidi story.

David Albright has a history of being used by those who seek to gain media attention for their respective claims. In addition to the Hamza and Obeidi fiascos, Albright and his organization, ISIS, have served as the conduit for other agencies gaining publicity about the alleged Iranian nuclear weapons program, the alleged Syrian nuclear reactor, and most recently the alleged Swiss computer containing sensitive nuclear design information. On each occasion, Albright is fed sensitive information from a third party, and then packages it in a manner that is consumable by the media. The media, engrossed with Albright’s misleading résumé ("former U.N. weapons inspector,” “Doctor,” “physicist” and “nuclear expert"), give Albright a full hearing, during which time the particulars the third-party source wanted made public are broadcast or printed for all the world to see. More often than not, it turns out that the core of the story pushed by Albright is, in fact, wrong.

While Iran did indeed possess uranium enrichment capability at Natanz and a heavy water plant (under construction) at Arak (as reported by Albright thanks to information provided by the Iranian opposition group MEK, most probably with the help of Israeli intelligence), Albright’s wild speculation about weapons-grade plutonium and highly enriched uranium proved to be wrong. There was indeed a building in Syria that was bombed by Israel. But Albright’s expert opinion, derived from his interpretation of photographs, consists of nothing more than simplistic observation ("The tall building in the image may house a reactor under construction and the pump station along the river may have been intended to supply cooling water to the reactor") combined with unfocused questions that assumed much, but were in fact based on little ("How far along was the reactor construction project when it was bombed? What was the extent of nuclear assistance from North Korea? Which reactor components did Syria obtain from North Korea or elsewhere, and where are they now?"). And, most recently, we have Albright commenting about the contents of a computer he hasn’t even laid eyes on, though he feels confident enough to raise the specter of global nuclear catastrophe ("How will authorities learn if Iran, North Korea, or even terrorists bought these designs?” Albright asks when referring to the contents of the Swiss computer).

If it seems a little bitchy, perhaps it is. But Ritter's article reminds me, at least, that we need to be careful who we cite and who we believe.

Oh, and Ritter has this to say:

In that he never has designed or worked in a nuclear reactor, never has designed or worked on nuclear weapons, in fact never has done anything of a practical, hands-on nature in the nuclear field, to call Albright an expert is a disservice to the term and, again, misleading in the extreme. It is not a sin to merely be informed, or to possess a specialty. But informed specialists are a dime a dozen. There is a reason mainstream media do not turn to bloggers when seeking out expert opinion. And yet, when they turn to “Dr. Albright, former U.N. weapons inspector,” they are getting little more than a well-funded, well-connected blogger. If one takes a closer look at the ISIS Report published by Albright on June 16 and widely quoted in the press since then, one will realize that there simply isn’t any substance to the allegations. Albright’s sole source seems to be a single, unnamed IAEA official, bringing to mind Bob Kelley and his role in facilitating Albright’s “access” to the IAEA in the 1990s. The remainder of the report comprises information already available to the general public, or sheer speculation.

Well, certain bloggers are actually more professional and more knowledgeable than the media--anyone who remembers the shilling Judith Miller and Michael Gordon have done will remember that.

h/t Arms Control Wonk, one of those bloggers, you know...

Empty Handed?

Are the IAEA inspectors going to leave Syria empty-handed?

U.N. nuclear investigators will wrap up a four-day visit to Syria on Wednesday, but, thus far, there has been absolutely no indication that they've even managed to scratch the surface of the mystery surrounding a remote Syrian building bombed by Israel in September.

U.S. officials and - off the record - Israel, claim it was a plutonium-producing reactor in the works.

Syrian authorities, who have fervently denied the allegations, have shrouded the visit by International Atomic Energy Agency visit in secrecy. No great surprise: It could well determine the fate of Damascus on the international stage.

There wasn't even official confirmation that IAEA chief inspector Olli Heinonen and his aids were in the country, as the government banned all Arab and foreign journalists from obtaining entry visas.

Just one privately owned daily, Al-Watan - which, like all Syrian media, is close to the government - made any mention of the inspection mission by the U.N. nuclear watchdog. Al-Watan only carried a commentary published by the Russian news agency RIA Novosti, highlighting Syria's strong denial of ever possessing a reactor.

A senior diplomat familiar with the Vienna-based IAEA said the visit by the three senior inspectors, which included a trip to the al-Kibar site flattened by Israeli war planes, went "well," but he declined to elaborate.

[SNIP]

IAEA director Mohamed ElBaradei said last week there was no evidence that Syria had the skills or fuel to run a major nuclear complex. Syria's only declared nuclear facility is an ageing research reactor long under the watchful eye of IAEA monitors.

Under its inspection agreement with the IAEA, Damascus has an obligation to report nuclear projects at the planning stage. Israel refuses to sign the agreement.

Analysts believe Damascus opened its doors to the inspectors in hopes of preventing Iran-like global sanctions, and keeping up dramatic diplomatic gains that have come from a recent thawing of relations between Damascus and the West.

Good luck selling that to the wingnuts. The same is true of Iran--it's difficult to say whether or not they'll ever come close to building a nuclear weapon because they don't have the resources to get them over the top--as in, the skills and the fuel to run a large enough operation to make a run at it. In the rush to drop bombs and start a war, is there anyone left who has the credibility to explain the contingencies to the American people? Or are we going to be bullshitted and told a bunch of lies over and over again?

Someone Help Mr. Bolton From the Stage...

Sheer ridiculous wankery from John Bolton...

I don’t think you’d hear the Arab states say this publicly, but they would be delighted if the United States or Israel destroyed the Iranian nuclear weapons capability.

It's hard to count just how many ways that Bolton is wrong when he speaks like this in public. No credible news organization should look to him for analysis or commentary, at least not the ones who value what they put out as far as content is concerned. Bolton reads and sounds like the last Neocon standing, a relic of 2003 that simply can't find anyone to take him seriously anymore.

His statement is wrong on so many different levels--but yes, it would technically be true to say that many Arab nations would like to see Israel "disarm" Iran and "destroy their nuclear weapons capability." Except that there are a whole host of other reasons they would be horrified and would react accordingly against it--namely, I don't think OPEC would sit there and do nothing. I don't think Jordan and Syria would allow their airspace to be used for any kind of overflight, at least not without serious protest or military force. The fledgling Iraqi government would likely collapse into hysterics over such a thing.

Does anyone seriously think Israel could do such a thing? Well, no, because, for starters, Iran doesn't have a nuclear weapons capability--hence, the disconnect in Bolton's logic. He knows they don't have one, but he cannot make his case if he has to sit there and patiently explain just how far away they are from having one. They have a series of initiatives and programs headed in that direction, and there's a good chance they could get there in five to ten years with a massive effort and an influx of money, and with support and technology they don't currently possess. However, there are at least a handful of other nations around the world that you could say the same thing about. But no one talks about Algeria or Taiwan like this, do they? No one talks about the fact that Brazil, South Africa, Argentina, Spain, Romania, or South Korea could probably beat the Iranians in the race to get a weapon if they put forth that same herculean effort. How seriously do you take a country like Iran when they're largely incapable of doing anything other than talking and repressing their own people?

So we're to believe that Arab countries would celebrate an aggressive projection of Israeli military force into a distant country, one that "succeeded" in destroying dozens of facilities, and left Iran defenseless? Because in order for Israel to destroy Iran's nuclear program, it would involve sending thousands and thousands of sorties over hostile territory into hostile territory, it would involve systematically destroying the Iranian air defense systems which use some fairly modern SAMs and SAM systems, and it would take months. Months of attacks, months of assessing damage, and months of determining what the end state of the situation was. As in, did we get it all? Did we get everything?

All while expecting Iran to do nothing in response to this.

Last time I looked into this, Iran was a founding member OPEC. They're not the end all, be all, but they're part of an organization which is running the table right now on energy prices. When was the last time anyone stood up and said, "you know, Iran is part of OPEC." Why do we never hear anyone point that out? We hear the likes of Bolton, we hear the proxies and the shills, and they always conveniently fail to point out that Iran is a member of OPEC.

So is Bolton being ridiculous? Yes, of course. Should Israel do nothing? Of course not--but how do you explain this to the Neocons? They're not totally wiped out, unfortunately. They're like the last shithouse rat looking to bite someone just to see if they can still pull it off.

Until we are rid of them, we are cursed with their presence in the media.

--WS

AQ Khan Resurfaces

It's never a good thing when AQ Khan is back in the news--and what is the difference between him and Scott McClellan, anyway?

Four years ago Dr. Abdul Qadeer Khan confessed to sharing nuclear secrets with some of the world's most notorious dictatorships.

Today he did a complete about-face.

“I was not involved in any nuclear proliferation,” he told CBS News by telephone from his home in Islamabad.

Dr Kahn has been under house arrest for the four years since his televised confession in 2004.

On February 4, that year, he appeared on Pakistani national television after a government investigation into his role in transferring nuclear technology to Iran, Libya and North Korea.

“I was confronted with the evidence," Khan said, "and I have voluntarily admitted that much of it is true and accurate.”

A metallurgical engineer, he had been awarded a gold medal by the Pakistani government after the country's successful nuclear tests in 1998.

There has clearly been some shift, politically, socially, or otherwise, that has allowed Khan to speak out in this way and drop one of the biggest bombshells about proliferation in years. The first question--is he telling the truth?--is the hardest to answer. It's entirely possible that Khan is tired of being detained at home and wants some time in the spotlight. Speaking this way indicates he has no fear. Somehow, someone was able to pressure him into either lying or telling the truth in 2004 and now that pressure is gone.

Today, though, Khan told CBS News that he had not written that confession, but merely read a document put in front of him “because of the promises that were made.”

Back in 2004, Khan was never charged with any crime, and was given a full pardon by the Pakistani government a day after his television appearance.

Asked today whether he had had anything to do with the Libyan or Iranian nuclear programs, Khan said no.

“I have never put my foot on Iranian soil, I never met any Iranians..” he said. "And I never put my foot on the Libyan soil.”

“When they asked my assistance, I told them, ‘Go to the people in Dubai who supplied us.’”

Khan is now claiming that the parts necessary for a nuclear program are available for the asking from open suppliers in Dubai - a claim that, he feels, absolves him from any responsibility.

It’s also a claim that is contradicted by solid evidence collected by the International Atomic Energy Agency, and the Pakistani, U.S. and Dutch governments.

Sort of makes the most recent NIE on Iran's nuclear weapons program look a little more interesting, doesn't it?

If Khan is telling the truth, then someone somewhere has been perpetrating some very serious lies.

The long, hot summer is underway

John McCain gave a speech on nuclear proliferation today at the University of Denver and was heckled by protesters of the Iraq war. (Video below the jump)

He was interrupted three times.

His support of a hugely unpopular war, coupled with his fealty to a feckless, officious, draft-dodging, coke-snorting deserter who punked him hard in 2000 is hanging around his skinny, aged wattle and even the media can't, tho they try with all their might, foist him upon us.

We hate this war, and we hate George Bush and John McCain is too closely allied with both, and he is, inexplicably, on the wrong side of veterans issues.

And then there is the fact that he is either senile of deliberately lying his ass off about efforts to stop the spread of nuclear armaments.

“Many believe all we need to do to end the nuclear programs of hostile governments is have our president talk with leaders in Pyongyang and Tehran, as if we haven’t tried talking to these governments repeatedly over the past two decades.”

Say what?

They didn't get anywhere with North Korea until the let Christopher Hill go to Pyongyang and start talking.

And I have no idea where he got the notion that we have "tried to talk to" Iran! We have not had diplomatic relations with Iran since April of 1980!

Now, I could deconstruct his speech, but I don't have to. Jon Woflsthal, an actual non-proliferation expert (I'm just a cold war Brat) already has, and he did a better job than I could.

John McCain’s speech on nuclear weapons seems to adopt the narrowest of lenses in dealing with nuclear weapons. Moreover, his proposals – many of which might sound good – don’t match up with other things he has said on nuclear weapons, on Russia, on Iran and suggests he doesn’t really get the complexity of these issues. Lastly, the tone may be better, but many of the proposals—not to mention his language choices—are right out of George W. Bush’s play book. This may be a wolf in sheep’s clothing, but it is still a wolf.

1. He wants to work with Russia on arms control and tactical nuclear weapons, but he also wants to kick Russia out of the G-8. Not sure how you get them to play nice on nukes after you kick them in the teeth. Also, Bush adopted a loose standard on counting nuclear weapons and verification. Will McCain (who is now working with John Bolton – father of Bush arms control dogma) be any better?
2. I applaud his desire to get tactical nuclear weapons out of Europe, but if we pull nuclear weapons out of Turkey as Iran advances its nuclear program, they are not going to have increased confidence in NATO and the US. This speech, and the references to it, will send shock waves through Europe and and a McCain Administration would start in a hole.
3. He does not walk away from the new “reliable replacement warhead” being pitched by the Bush administration. Lots of wiggle room for him, left there on purpose, I would guess.
4. Why is only the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) going to review nuclear policy? Where are the experts on nonproliferation, diplomacy, history, etc? This is the same line the Bush administration gave. In May of 2000, standing in front of Secretary Kissinger and other republican heavy-weights, then-candidate Bush said he would reduce nuclear weapons to the lowest number consistent with U.S. security. Sound familiar? McCain’s statement is almost an exact quote. The JCS has set the current floor on reductions. The President sets the war guidance for the level of nuclear weapons, and leaving it to the JCS is a recipe for the status quo.
5. Did anyone else notice that McCain did not repudiate the policy of regime change? I know why Iran and North Korea want nuclear weapons. Reducing ours will not get them to change their course. Of course, singing “bomb bomb Iran” to the tune of “Barbara Ann” won’t do it either. Is McCain really suggesting cutting our nukes will lead others to reduce theirs? It’s the broader policy that needs changing, not just the number of nukes.
6. Coming out of left field (or from pander-ville) is the remark about international nuclear storage. It is possible that Russia might build a storage facility for countries in East Asia, but McCain seems to be suggesting some other country is going to accept our huge (the world’s largest) stock of spent fuel and that this might be a way to avoid opening the spent fuel repository in Yucca Mountain, Nevada. Talk about pandering. Who does he think is going to take our nuclear waste? Even if someone would take it off our hands, the stuff contains about 100,000 weapons worth of plutonium that must be dealt with. Does McCain really want to export that to a country poor enough to want into the nuclear waste storage business?
7. Either you are for the ban on nuclear testing or you are not. The Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty is the most studied arms control agreement in history. It has been verifiable since the 1960s. McCain voted against it. To play the “let’s study it again” dance is too cute by half. If the President does not support it, it is not going to happen. Also, McCain seems to be suggesting we should re-open the agreement for new modifications. That is the fastest way to kill it. He also talks about limiting testing. We want to ban testing. We have more nuclear expertise than anyone – why we would want to make the world safe for others to test nuclear weapons is unclear. Obama and Clinton have said they are for the CTBT and plan to fight for its ratification. McCain has not. The rest of the world – including the states we need on our side to deal with Iran and North Korea – are embarrassed that we have not ratified it.

McCain’s speech is a feeble attempt to try to tie all Republicans and Democrats into the failures of the Bush administration nuclear policies. Before 2000, the US was on the right track. The regime needed work, but was sound – more states had given up nuclear weapons and weapon programs in the 1980s and 90s than had begun them. Now that track record lies in ashes – because of the Bush Administration approach, backed by a Republican Congress that killed the CTBT and sought to restrict funding for nuclear security efforts during 2000-2004. McCain is promising more of the same.

I admit that what I heard sent me to the same place - his speech was an attempt to spread the malicious, craven disregard for policy and process that define this administration over every administration from the advent of the cold war forward!

If he is lacking cognitive ability to process and analyze the reality, that is bad enough. If he is deliberately lying, that is worse. And can I just say that the spectacle of McCain, floundering desperately, is heartbreaking. I don't think I have winced this much in 20 years - since I watched my late grandfather trying to get the VCR to stop flashing 12:00.

Here is that video I promised. If this is what is in store for him on a regular basis, his famous temper is going to erupt sooner or later...probably sooner.

Scott Ritter Predicts...

Scott Ritter recently appeared on Democracy Now! and these are some of his remarks. Amy Goodman conducted this interview.

RITTER: Well, first of all, we have to be concerned about the evidence. We have interior photographs and exterior shots and nothing that links the two. And so, on the surface, I would say that if you’re bringing this evidence to a court of law—it’s a strange dimension, the rule of law, when we speak of American foreign policy lately—you would have trouble having anybody say yes, this is definitive evidence that links the allegations to this specific site in question.

But let’s just assume for a second that the data is in fact accurate. I have to take exception with the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff when he says that the alleged activities are against international conventions. Actually, they’re not. If Syria had in fact been constructing the reactor they’ve been accused of, they were in total conformity with international law. The nonproliferation treaty, Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, of which Syria is a signatory, requires that facilities be declared to the IAEA only when nuclear materials are to be introduced to these facilities, that a facility under construction is not a declarable item. And so, it’s absurd to sit there and say that just because Syria and North Korea were pouring concrete that they are somehow breaking the law.

And this notion that the reactor was on the verge of becoming operational, again, is absurd. You know, there would have to be literally thousands of pounds of pure graphite that would have to be introduced to this facility, and there’s no evidence in the destruction. You know, there were a number of reporters who went to the site after it was blown up. If it had been bombed and there was graphite introduced, you would have a signature all over the area of destroyed graphite blocks. There would be graphite lying around, etc. This was not the case.

I don’t know what was going on at this site. If the images are accurate, it appears that Syria was producing a very, very small research reactor. But it is not a reactor usable in a nuclear weapons program. Syria was not violating the law.

And if there were concerns over this reactor, a simple referring of the material, these photographs, to the International Atomic Energy Agency would have produced an insistence on special inspections that would have had the inspectors on the site actually determining what was going on and a peaceful resolution of the problem. This shows that the United States and Israel have a wanton disregard for the rule of law. And this is especially critical when the United States is holding up the Non-Proliferation Treaty as a standard in which we hold Iran and North Korea accountable to.

Ritter also talked about US intentions towards Iran:

There’s no doubt in my mind that the United States is planning right now, as we speak, a military strike against Iran. The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and almost every senior US military official has pretty much acknowledged the same. They speak of the need to punish Iran and deter Iran from continuing to provide material assistance to Iraqi groups, these so-called “special groups” that operate, according to the United States, outside of the umbrella of the Mahdi Army. And they speak of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Command as being a rogue organization within the Iranian government that provides this support. The United States Senate, through the Kyl-Lieberman resolution, has pretty much given a target list blessing to the US military by passing a resolution that labels the Revolutionary Guard Command as a terrorist organization. And the Bush administration, of course, is engaged in a global war on terror backed by two congressional war powers resolutions.

We take a look at the military buildup, we take a look at the rhetoric, we take a look at the diplomatic posturing, and I would say that it’s a virtual guarantee that there will be a limited aerial strike against Iran in the not-so-near future—or not-so-distant future, that focuses on the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Command. And if this situation spins further out of control, you would see these aerial strikes expanding to include Iran’s nuclear infrastructure and some significant command and control targets.

This is all just one more indication that, if the American people don't start paying attention, there WILL be a third war on their hands very soon.

Oh, what I wouldn't give to have a functioning and capable State Department

I don't presume to speak for anyone else, but I would rather have the Secretary of State dealing with issues like this instead of hurling schoolyard taunts at Moqtada al-Sadr.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Members of Congress will be told this week about intelligence suggesting that North Korea was helping Syria build a nuclear reactor similar to one it has constructed, a government official familiar with the matter said Tuesday.

The Senate and House intelligence committees were scheduled to be briefed on Thursday, and several other panels such as the Senate Armed Services Committee were expected to be briefed as well.

North Korea has been suspected of helping Syria with a secret nuclear program, but both countries deny it. Pyongyang says it has never spread its nuclear expertise beyond its borders.

Israeli warplanes bombed a site in Syria on Sept. 6 that private analysts say appears to have been the site of a reactor, based on commercial satellite imagery taken after the raid. The site later was razed and wiped clean.

Evidence will be presented to the Congress that North Korea has helped Syria construct a reactor modeled on their facility at Yongbyon, which has, in the past, yielded plutonium in sufficient quantity to create a nuclear weapon.

An official inside the Bush administration, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that the intelligence community had been inundated with requests for information on North Korea and Syria since the Israeli airstrike against a suspected reactor on September 6 of last year. and that now seemed like the right time to brief the lawmakers. It is a tenuous proposition - talks are ongoing with the North Koreans and leaks could jeopardize their prospects.

At the same time, those who pay attention to the Middle East are concerned that timing the briefing for this week runs the risk of upstaging visits this week by Jordanian King Abdullah II and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and hurt the negotiations for an Arab-Israeli peace settlement with allegations of nefarious activity by an Arab nation with the aid of North Korea flying around, the official said.

Speculation has run wild in recent weeks, especially in the Israeli media, that the briefing of the Congress will include intel gathered by Israel and that the Israeli government has signed off on the information sharing. Another official, invoking anonymity, said that the impending briefing would present intelligence gathered by various sources and methods and synthesized into a coherent package after carefully being analyzed over a period of several months.

Under the agreement reached in the Six Party Talks last year, the North Koreans are obligated to give a full account of it's nuclear programs, including whether or not it has been a party to the proliferation of nuclear technology.

North Korea claims that it has complied with the declaration it presented last November, but the U.S. says that the North has not provided a "complete and correct" assessment.

The briefing is scheduled to take place one say before a U.S. delegation that went to North Korea to press for details of the North's nuclear programs is scheduled to report back.

The U.S. recently has stepped back from its push for a detailed declaration addressing the North's alleged secret uranium enrichment program and nuclear cooperation with Syria. Now, the U.S. says it wants the North to simply acknowledge the concerns and then set up a system to verify the country doesn't continue such activity in the future.

President Bush defended the plans over the weekend during a meeting with new South Korean President Lee Myung-bak, saying North Korea had the burden of proof under the agreements.

The Wall Street Journal first reported Tuesday that U.S. intelligence officials would tell the committees that North Korea was helping Syria build a plutonium-fueled reactor.

This is just one more issue that has been mismanaged and fumbled by this inept and ineffectual administration. Here is hoping the other parties to the talks can keep it together until January, when we can send competent representation to the table.

Update I - Pale Rider

Here's where it would be fairly obvious to state that a US State Department, run by the likes of Bill Richardson, would definitely be an improvement.

China Reacts

The Chinese reaction is somewhat mild, to be honest.

(CBS/AP) China on Wednesday strongly protested the U.S. military's mistaken delivery to Taiwan of intercontinental ballistic missile electrical fuses, demanding an investigation and steps to "eliminate the negative effects and disastrous consequences."

In a statement posted on the ministry's Web site, Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang said China had brought a "serious representation" to Washington and expressed "strong displeasure" over the error.
The U.S. Defense Department said Tuesday that the Air Force had mistakenly shipped to Taiwan four electrical fuses designed for use on intercontinental ballistic missiles. The fuses have since been recovered and an investigation launched.

At the Pentagon, CBS News National Security correspondent David Martin reports that although the U.S. is constantly wringing its hands about the nightmare scenario of loose nuclear weapons falling into the hands of terrorists, this was another egregious case of the Pentagon not being able to keep track of its own nuclear weapons.

While the shipment did not include nuclear materials, the error is particularly sensitive because Beijing vehemently opposes U.S. arms sales to Taiwan, the self-governed island that China considers its own territory. Four of the cone-shaped fuses were shipped to Taiwanese officials in fall 2006 instead of the helicopter batteries they had ordered.

Hey, at least we're getting to the bottom of these things in a timely manner. And I don't know how you confuse these things with helicopter batteries, but whatever. They were obviously sent to Taiwan to avoid detection with a built-in plausible deniability story concocted to make it all seem innocent. These items were obviously sent through a reverse engineering process, whereby the Taiwanese could quietly study and develop their own versions, if not set up something where they could make these things for us. Money changed hands, the transfer of the technology was done, and they'll probably get away with this.

The bottom line is, someone needs to sweep out the God boys and restore trust in the leadership of the United States Air Force.

Sibel Edmonds calls out the FBI

Where the hell is the American foreign policy press beat? (That's a rhetorical question. I know where they are - the useless idiots are wagging their cocktail weenies at Washington gatherings and hob-nobbing with the jackals they are supposed to be keeping in check...)

It is detestable that they have totally abdicated their responsibilities and completely ignored the allegations leveled by former FBI translator-turned-whistleblower Sibel Edmonds. I am not one to go rushing off in a big hurry to be one of the first to leap to a conclusion. I like independent corroboration. The thing is, Sibel Edmonds has it. An Inspector General even found that she was fired for being outspoken about, you know, how it's wrong for the State Department to trade in nuclear secrets with other countries - especially when they are less than concerned with US interests.

The woman is simply not playing the game the way our useless media prefers. She is not making it easy to dismiss her as a crackpot. God help 'em - there seems to be some "there" there, if you know what I mean. And the chattering classes are struck dumb.

Fortunately, there is the foreign press, and we have the internet...

One of the documents relating to the case was marked 203A-WF-210023. Last week, however, the FBI responded to a freedom of information request for a file of exactly the same number by claiming that it did not exist. But The Sunday Times has obtained a document signed by an FBI official showing the existence of the file. (emphasis added)

Edmonds believes the crucial file is being deliberately covered up by the FBI because its contents are explosive. She accuses the agency of an “outright lie”.

“I can tell you that that file and the operations it refers to did exist from 1996 to February 2002. The file refers to the counterintelligence programme that the Department of Justice has declared to be a state secret to protect sensitive diplomatic relations,” she said.

The freedom of information request had not been initiated by Edmonds. It was made quite separately by an American human rights group called the Liberty Coalition, acting on a tip-off it received from an anonymous correspondent.

The letter says: “You may wish to request pertinent audio tapes and documents under FOIA from the Department of Justice, FBI-HQ and the FBI Washington field office.”

It then makes a series of allegations about the contents of the file – many of which corroborate the information that Edmonds later made public.

Edmonds had told this newspaper that members of the Turkish political and diplomatic community in the US had been actively acquiring nuclear secrets. They often acted as a conduit, she said, for Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), Pakistan’s spy agency, because they attracted less suspicion.

She claimed corrupt government officials helped the network, and venues such as the American-Turkish Council (ATC) in Washington were used as drop-off points.

The anonymous letter in the possession of the Sunday Times provides the name of a high-level government official who is alleged to have been secretly recorded speaking to a high Turkish official at the Turkish embassy in the last half of 2001. The letter maintains that the government official warned a Turkish member of the network that they should refuse dealings with a company called Brewster Jennings because it was a CIA front, working in counter proliferation. Remember Brewster Jennings? That was Valerie Plame's cover company. Where she battled to keep nukes out of the wrong hands, and put her life on the line to do so, until she was treasonously outed for political reasons. (And if we had a functioning press corps, that little tidbit right there, all by itself, would set them off like a pack of baying bloodhounds. But we have a bunch of complacent, utterly worthless lap-dogs instead. Sickening. Absolutely sickening...)

Edmonds, meantime is not giving up, in spite of being encumbered by numerous state secret gag-orders to prevent her from talking further about the investigations she provided translative services for, is not giving up. So she is beating the drum and repeating whats on the record and helping to connect the various and disparate dots as best she can within the confines of the strictures placed upon her. “I cannot discuss the details considering the gag orders,” she said, “but I reported all these activities to the US Congress, the inspector general of the justice department and the 9/11 commission. I told them all about what was contained in this case file number, which the FBI is now denying exists. This gag was invoked not to protect sensitive diplomatic relations but criminal activities involving US officials who were endangering US national security.” (emphasis mine)

I dunno about you, but I would rather see the press concentrate on this story than the hour-by-hour progress reports on Britney's most recent downward spiral.

I wonder if George saw a hint of this when he looked into Pootie-Poot's soul?

The Bush administration lost a big one on Monday when Russia announced that it had delivered a shipment of nuclear fuel rods to Iran to be used in a reactor that is to be used for power generation. Russia stressed that the fuel rods are in Iran, but will be under the control of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) , the United Nations agency that monitors nuclear material across the globe.

Back in Washington, aWol nearly strained something as he struggled mightily to construct a sentence and make a comment that wouldn't do any further damage to the fragile relationship the United States currently has with Russia. He managed to not only tamp down his urge to criticize, but also to offer something along the lines of praise...“If the Russians are willing to do that, which I support, then the Iranians do not need to learn how to enrich,” President Bush said Monday. “If the Iranians accept that uranium for a civilian nuclear power plant, then there’s no need for them to learn how to enrich.”

The timing could not have been worse. Just two weeks ago, the intelligence shops released their NIE that revealed that the Iranians stopped their weapons program in 2003. That NIE cut the legs from under aWol and Cheney, and has dampened the call for war with Iran.

Even thought the administration has moved to keep the pressure on the Iranian government, the release of the NIE has served to embolden Iran, and it has made it highly unlikely that China and Russia will be on board for the next round of sanctions by the United Nations Security Council.

The delivery of the fuel rods to the Iranian facility will certainly embolden them further.

As for Bush administration officials, their public comments were one thing, and their private comments were another thing entirely. “There is no doubt that Russia and the rest of the world want to keep Iran from getting a nuclear weapon,” was the public comment made by White House spokesman, Gordon D. Johndroe. “And today’s announcement provides one more avenue for the Iranians to make a strategic choice to suspend enrichment.”

In private, however, they lamented the fact that the Russians didn't stall on the delivery, and project an image of a united front that was hanging together and toeing a hard line. “We for many years tried to stop it, and for the last year we’ve known there was no way to stop it, and that it was coming, and we held our breath on the timing,” a senior administration official said.

All that breath-holding was for naught.

Two weeks ago, Russia alerted the Bush administration that the details had been worked out, including the placement of safeguards that would allow for greater international inspections at Bushehr, and that the shipment would proceed.

The U.S. had already agreed, in principle, that Russia could provide the fuel rods, so long as safeguards were in place to handle the spent fuel. With that position clarified, there was no choice for the U.S. to make - the Bush administration had to accept that they had no grounds to keep pressuring Russia to delay the shipment.

So the shipment went forward. Now the question remains - was it purely economics? Or was there a subtle, hidden message? Is this muscle flexing by Russia routine, or something that we should be concerned about?

I'm gonna hazard a guess, and say it's probably the latter.

Heckuva job, there, George. Heckuva job.

Dershowitz Caught With His Pants Around His Ankles...

This is the kind of article or column that I expected--wingnuts and uninformed people are going to claim there's a bias in the intel community.

Alan Dershowitz claims bias and fraud. And he claims to know what is going on in the intelligence field. And then he goes on to claim there’s some sort of bias within the intelligence community against going to war against Iran. Uh, no. The possiblity that unfiltered bias could once again get through was removed through institutional changes. Those cherry-picked mistakes, you know--the ones that embarrassed Colin Powell at the UN--were there because the White House, which is run by Dick Cheney, suppressed all of the dissenting views that should have gone into that NIE. The intel community just wants to get it right.

And I can’t emphasize this one salient point enough—if there WAS dissent, it would be heard. If there WAS a credible piece of intelligence that pointed to a credible Iranian threat to the United States, Israel, or any other country, the intelligence community would get behind that piece of information and stand behind it. Dershowitz and his ilk cannot fathom this point.
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Dershowitz:
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.
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I had no idea that this was the preferred activity and field of expertise of Alan Dershowitz—reading the intelligence products that have been declassified for public consumption produced by our intelligence agencies. And to cite the “Manhattan Project” in a discussion about modern nuclear weapons proliferation is to demonstrate complete ignorance of what the likes of what Abdul Qadeer Khan have been doing for years. Khan claims he has been supplying Iran with knowledge. The NIE deals with that information accordingly. Nowhere does Dershowitz deal with the issue of what Khan has or has not been doing with Iran.

Here’s a takedown of the involvement of AQ Khan from 2005, and it is extremely prescient and details exactly why Dershowitz is completely rabid and wildly mistaken in virtually all of his opinions:

This raises an interesting question: In a post-AQ Khan world, is uranium conversion the chokepoint for would-be bombmakers? Alex Montgomery…argues that converting uranium is a difficult technical barrier for entrants into the nuclear club:

Although A.Q. Khan supplied both plans and parts, it appears that without the tacit knowledge required to develop nuclear weapons, successfully developing a capability requires much trial and error. ... Iran is building a yellowcake-to-UF6 (uranium hexafluoride) conversion plant at Isfahan based on Chinese blueprints. Yet Iran has had difficulties producing high quality UF4 (uranium tetrafluoride) and turning it into UF6. Although less evidence is available from Libya’s program, the lags in time and difficulties seem to indicate that similar problems were encountered there.

If you want to enrich uranium with a centrifuge, you have to convert uranium yellowcake into uranium hexafluoride (UF6) gas, a process that requires the element fluorine. Fluorine is not user friendly.

Dr. Khan’s nuclear Wal-Mart sold finished UF6 gas, but not the uranium conversion facility (UCF) for the hardcore DIY bombmaker. Libya’s experiments were apparently unsuccessful. Libya attempted to buy secretly a modular UCF (from Japan), but never received all the modules. Ultimately, Tripoli just bought UF6 from Khan.

Iran, we now know, has also had a tough time. US nonproliferation policy probably deserves much of the credit for creating the technical problems that Iran is experiencing in attempting to create uranim hexafloride.

Woo hoo! We got SOMETHING right! But, sadly and without shame, Dershowitz goes on:
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"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."
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First of all--oil. Iran's oil industry is collapsing, not prospering:

At first glance, Iran looks like an energy superpower. It is the second largest oil producer in the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC). It owns 11 percent of the world's conventional oil reserves, second only to Saudi Arabia. It also sits on 16 percent of the world's gas reserves, the largest reserve after Russia. With rising oil prices, Iran's oil export revenues have increased steadily, from $32 billion in 2004, to $47 billion in 2006. Finally, its geographic position on the world's most important energy corridor, the Strait of Hormuz, through which 40 percent of the world's oil traffic passes, gives Iran the ability to disrupt the flow of oil to global markets.

A closer look, however, reveals that Iran's energy sector is a house of cards. It is neglected, crumbling and underinvested. Many of its oil and gas fields are in dire need of foreign technical expertise to help reverse their natural decline. An analysis published last year in Proceedings, a journal of the National Academy of Sciences, asserts that, "Iran is suffering a staggering decline in revenue from its oil exports, and if the trend continues, income could virtually disappear by 2015." Iran's deputy oil minister, Mohammed Hadi Nejad-Hosseinian, confirmed recently that, "if the projects for increasing the capacity of the oil and protection of the oil wells will not happen, within ten years there will not be any oil for export."

Oil may be Iran's greatest strength, but it is also Iran's greatest weakness. As such, the debate in the West on how to prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons should focus less on the risky military option, or the seemingly ineffective diplomatic option, and more on a comprehensive economic warfare strategy that targets Iran's energy sector. With oil exports accounting for half the government's budget and around 80 to 90 percent of total export earnings, the surest strategy to bring down Tehran's Islamic regime is to break its economic backbone.

Here’s what Fox News had to say in 2005 about the facility at Arak, and maybe you can pick up on what Dershowitz is saying (and maybe who he gets his misinformation from):

PARIS — A heavy water reactor in central Iran should be able to produce enough plutonium for a nuclear bomb by 2007 — years ahead of its official completion date, an exiled Iranian opposition group claimed Thursday.
The National Council of Resistance said the site near Arak was already producing heavy water. Nuclear experts consider heavy water reactors a danger because they provide for a simpler way of producing bomb fuel than units using light water.
Mohammed Mohaddessin, head of the group's foreign affairs committee, said work on a 40-megawatt heavy water reactor is "near an end" and should be ready in 2006 or 2007. When that reactor is completed, the Arak facility will capable of producing up to 22 pounds of plutonium, enough for a nuclear bomb, he said.
Heavy water is used in nuclear power plants and can be used to produce plutonium for weapons.
Iran informed the International Atomic Energy Agency that the reactor near Arak would be finished in 2014.
"The Iranian regime is engaged in an all-out race against time" to finish construction, Mohaddessin told a news conference in Paris. The objective is "to obtain plutonium to build a nuclear bomb," he claimed.

Doesn't that perfectly encapsulate how wrong these people have been? Since 2005, at least, they have been lying, whining, and spreading disinformation around in order to further some other agenda. That small snippet from the Fake News site is a crystal clear and perfect example of your Republican Crime Syndicate at work. Arak won’t be operational until 2009, at the earliest, by the way. Some say it won’t be ready for many years after that. The IAEA is now allowed to inspect it and monitor it. But who are you going to believe? Reality or the hysterical cries of so-called resistance movements (see Curveball) and Alan Dershowitz, who has apparently bought this line of reasoning hook, line and sinker?

If you get into the details, you find that the people who want war are usually the ones who can’t be bothered to deal with the details. And that’s why this country is so fucked up right now—no one pays attention to detail. But they damned sure pay too much attention to Fox News.

A Deal on North Korean Nukes

A year after North Korea popped off their fizzler, a deal has been reached to rein in the NorK nuclear program that gets them off the “Axis of Evil” list of nations that are state sponsors of terrorism. The move is symbolic in the western world, but certain to throw a wet blanket on the relationship between the U.S. and Japan, which still wants answers about the kidnapping of Japanese Citizens by North Korean agents . .

Under the new agreement, reached under the “Six Party Talks” consortium of nations, and involving a side-deal between the NorK’s and the United States, the U.S. is accepting a more limited action than originally bargained for, with one facility being mothballed instead of three. North Korea is in exchange disclosing the extent of it’s weapons program – how much fissile material do they have, and how much was used in last years test?

According to the text of the document, released by China's official Xinhua news agency, North Korea agreed to disable the 5 megawatt experimental reactor at Yongbyon, a fuel reprocessing plant, and a nuclear fuel rod facility by Dec. 31. The work will be paid for and overseen by the U.S. Alongside that commitment, the document says that the U.S. will "begin the process of removing" North Korea as a state sponsor of terrorism and lifting trade sanctions.

The actions outlined by the document are "a major step towards the goal of achieving the verifiable denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula" and would "effectively end" North Korea's production of plutonium, said White House National Security Council spokesman Gordon Johndroe, the Associated Press reported.

Under the agreement, North Korea also will allow nuclear experts from Russia, China and the United States to examine aluminum tubes procured from Russia that could have been used in a uranium-enrichment program, diplomats said.

Lest anyone rush to pat the Bush administration on the back for getting something right, lets do a reality check:

• The North Koreans kicked inspectors out of the country after the Bush administration cited solid intelligence that the North Koreans were cheating on the Agreed Framework. Par for the course, the Bushies had to fess up later that their intel was not all that and a bag of chips. You could even call it phony.

• When Bush took office, North Korea had minuscule amounts of fissile material, if any at all. Now it has conducted a nuclear test and has enough weapons grade material for up to a dozen nuclear bombs. Even the most conservative estimates peg it at enough for 6-8 weapons.

So don’t get in a big toot to congratulate the chimperor for putting out a fire, when he struck the match and dropped it in a puddle of gasoline in the first damned place.

Sure would be nice to have Valerie Plame on the job about now...

MOSCOW - Russia test-launched a new intercontinental ballistic missile Tuesday capable of carrying multiple independent warheads, the Russian Space Forces said.

The missile, called the RS-24, had not yet reached its designated target, a space forces spokesman said, declining to give further information.

Russian news reports said the missile is seen as eventually replacing the aging RS-18s and RS-20s that are the backbone of the country's missile forces.

Yes – You read that right. This morning the Russians tested a new MRV. For the uninitiated a MRV is a Multiple Reentry Vehicle. In layman's terms, one missile goes up, and multiple guided warheads fall back to earth. MRV’s are prominent players in my cold-war-steeped nightmares. Remember this bit about MRV's: some warheads can be set to “air burst” and kill a lot of people, and others can be set to “ground burst” for the purpose of destroying infrastructure. With a MRV, you don’t have to choose! Do both!

So much for that view of Pooty-Poot’s soul that the Useless Tool™ famously took a gander at.

Seriously – this is really bad, people. Bad to the point that my husband, upon hearing the news, poured a shot of whiskey in his coffee this morning, and he doesn’t drink. The country that could actually represent a clear and present danger to the American way of life is now in the catbirds seat, and we are suckin’ hind tit.

We are buried under a mountain of Chinese debt, accrued to finance a vanity war that was launched on lies. A war that didn't need to be fought against a third rate dictator which was run by a second rate wannabe dictator who doesn't have a single first-rate person serving in his government. How serious are these people? They had to go find a war czar. They've ignored the Iraq study group--now they're paying attention to it. They stand in front of row after row of uniformed soldiers because that's all they have left--they have to stand in front of people who face punishment if they criticize the government or speak out. They are a captive audience, forced to obey. Tell me again that we don't have an authoritarian in charge. Tell me again that Rudy Guiliani doesn't give these people their throbbing war woody because he's exactly the type of authoritarian they love...

And a real threat looms, reemerging from the nooks and crannies of the Kremlin, and brings with it more danger than we need have faced.

In a week, Scooter Libby will be sentenced.

Scooter Libby committed a treason against this nation when he “outed” Valerie Plame Wilson, our number one intelligence asset on the issue of nuclear proliferation.

I do hope that at his sentencing, this action on the part of the Russians is taken into consideration by the judge, because the actions of Libby damaged irreparably the intelligence program that confronted issues like the advent of entire new Russian MRV IBCM systems.

[Cross-posted from Watching Those We Chose]