{news} Fw: USGP-INT Iran countdown: mixed signals, cooked intelligence (Prorev.com)

[Justine McCabe]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Scott McLarty" <scottmclarty at yahoo.com>
To: <usgp-media at gp-us.org>; <usgp-int at gp-us.org>
Sent: Sunday, July 06, 2008 7:25 PM
Subject: USGP-INT Iran countdown: mixed signals,cooked intelligence 
(Prorev.com)


> UNDERNEWS
> July 6, 2008
>
> FROM THE PROGRESSIVE REVIEW
> Washington's Most Unofficial Source
> Editor: Sam Smith
> REVIEW INDEX http://prorev.com/
> UNDERNEWS http://prorev.com/indexa.htm
>
>
> IRAN COUNTDOWN
>
>
> Gareth Porter, Antiwar (http://www.antiwar.com/porter/?articleid=13085)  A 
> senior Iranian official reportedly told members of the Iranian parliament 
> that Iran has agreed to freeze its enrichment program for six weeks and 
> begin negotiations with the P5+1 group of states as early as next week, 
> according to reports of that decision by the Iranian Student News Agency 
> and by a Farsi-language website in Iran. Remarks by Iranian Foreign 
> Minister Manoucher Mottaki and a top adviser to Supreme Leader Ayatollah 
> Ali Khamenei Tuesday also seemed to indicate that decision to accept a 
> "freeze for freeze" proposal from the P5+1 to begin at least preliminary 
> negotiations.
>
>
> Think Progress 
> (http://thinkprogress.org/2008/07/01/hersh-cheney-privately-says-he-would-prefer-the-us-not-israel-strike-iran/) 
> On MSNBC, Andrea Mitchell asked [Seymour] Hersh if the U.S. was "planning 
> military action" against Iran or "planning to support Israeli military 
> action?"
>
> "Oh, you know, how the hell do I know," replied Hersh. "What I can tell 
> you is we're loaded for bear. And we've been looking at it for three 
> years." He then said that Vice President Dick Cheney "privately" is 
> against an Israeli attack because the U.S. will "be blamed anyway". . .
>
> On Jan. 20, 2005, Cheney went on the "Imus in the Morning" show and 
> discussed another Hersh article about U.S. war posture towards Iran. "Why 
> don't we make Israel do it?" asked Imus. "We don't want a war in the 
> Middle East, if we can avoid it," replied Cheney. But, he said, "Israel 
> might do it without being asked," leaving the world to clean up "the 
> diplomatic mess afterwards". . .
>
> Asked by Mitchell if it was "possible this would happen before the 
> election," Hersh said he didn't think so, but that what he thinks "means 
> nothing" because "this could happen tomorrow, the president could have a 
> bad hair day and say, ‘to hell with it, let's go.'"
>
>
> Peter Spiegel, LA Times 
> (http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-usiran3-2008jul03,0,2674505.story) 
> Despite Iran's official public positions, the country's leadership fears 
> both a possible military attack and heightened sanctions and isolation, 
> many analysts say. In recent days, Iran has rolled out a diplomatic 
> initiative meant to ease U.S. pressure by currying favor with other world 
> powers. Iran is considering a package of economic and political incentives 
> being offered by Western diplomats to pave the way for wide-ranging talks 
> if it halts its uranium enrichment program. Diplomats have also suggested 
> a less formal "freeze-for-freeze" package, a six-week period of 
> preliminary talks during which Iran would stop adding new 
> uranium-enrichment capability while the West stops pushing for sanctions.
>
> Many Iranian political heavyweights have sought to change the popular 
> Western view that the country is run by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, 
> whose remarks calling for the destruction of Israel have been cited as 
> evidence of Iran's ultimate intentions.
>
> In an unusual article published Wednesday in the French daily Liberation, 
> a powerful Iranian foreign policy official emphasized the role of supreme 
> leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, not Ahmadinejad, as the ultimate authority 
> in Iran.
>
> "In key strategic issues, it's the supreme leader that the Constitution, 
> approved by universal suffrage, [says] has the final decision," wrote Ali 
> Akbar Velayati, a highly placed advisor to Khamenei and a former foreign 
> minister who appears on Iran's political scene during peak crisis moments.
>
> He urged readers to look at Khamenei's track record to "predict the future 
> course" of Iran's diplomacy.
>
> "A compromise could be made using concerns common to Iran and other 
> states," Velayati said.
>
>
> Paul Reynolds BBC 
> (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/7486971.stm) The warning by 
> the senior US military commander Adm Mike Mullen that an attack on Iran 
> would be "extremely stressful" for US forces must lessen the chances of 
> the US taking part in any strike against Iran. But the admiral, who is 
> chairman of the joint chiefs of staff and who has just visited Israel, 
> spoke of Israel's vulnerability to "very real threats".
>
> So the possibility remains that Israel might undertake an operation 
> against Iran by itself. Recent large-scale Israeli air force exercises 
> have strengthened this possibility, according to military observers.
>
> Nor does Adm Mullen's intervention resolve the ambiguity of the Bush 
> administration's position that "all options" are on the table. But his 
> views do indicate that the body of US military opinion is that they have 
> their hands full in Iraq and Afghanistan.
>
> Adm Mullen's opinion echoes what the then head of Central Command, Adm 
> William Fallon, said last November, that an attack on Iran was not "in the 
> offing". . .
>
> While Adm Mullen did not diverge from the Bush administration's line that 
> the military option remains for the US and also said that in his view Iran 
> was working to develop nuclear weapons, he stressed that "the solution 
> still lies in using... diplomatic, financial and international pressure". 
> . .
>
> An Israeli cabinet minister and former chief of staff, Shaul Mofaz, has 
> said that an attack on Iran is "unavoidable" if it "continues with its 
> nuclear program".
>
>
> Washington Post 
> (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/07/02/AR2008070202010.html) 
> Navy Adm. Michael G. Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said 
> insurgent Taliban and extremist forces in Afghanistan have become "a very 
> complex problem," one that is tied to the extensive drug trade, a 
> faltering economy and the porous border with Pakistan. Violence in 
> Afghanistan has increased markedly over recent weeks, with June the 
> deadliest month for U.S. troops since the war began in 2001. "I don't have 
> troops I can reach for, brigades I can reach, to send into Afghanistan 
> until I have a reduced requirement in Iraq," Mullen told reporters at the 
> Pentagon. "Afghanistan has been and remains an economy-of-force campaign, 
> which by definition means we need more forces there.". . .
>
> Mullen and President Bush also addressed the possibility of a conflict 
> with Iran in separate appearances yesterday, with both saying they favor 
> diplomacy over the use of military force. Asked directly about the 
> possibility of an Israeli strike against Iran, Bush, in an appearance in 
> the White House Rose Garden, said: "I have made it very clear to all 
> parties that the first option ought to be solve this problem 
> diplomatically." But he refused to rule out the use of force in the 
> standoff over Iran's effort to develop nuclear weapons.
>
>
> Washington Post 
> (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/06/30/AR2008063001940_pf.html) 
>  - [A] onetime undercover agent, who has been barred by the CIA from using 
> his real name, filed a motion in federal court asking the government to 
> declassify legal documents describing what he says was a deliberate 
> suppression of findings on Iran that were contrary to agency views at the 
> time.
>
> The former operative alleged in a 2004 lawsuit that the CIA fired him 
> after he repeatedly clashed with senior managers over his attempts to file 
> reports that challenged the conventional wisdom about weapons of mass 
> destruction in the Middle East. Key details of his claim have not been 
> made public because they describe events the CIA deems secret.
>
> The consensus view on Iran's nuclear program shifted dramatically last 
> December with the release of a landmark intelligence report that concluded 
> that Iran halted work on nuclear weapons design in 2003. The publication 
> of the National Intelligence Estimate on Iran undermined the CIA's 
> rationale for censoring the former officer's lawsuit, said his attorney, 
> Roy Krieger. "On five occasions he was ordered to either falsify his 
> reporting on WMD in the Near East, or not to file his reports at all," 
> Krieger said in an interview.
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
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