I feel embarassed by hypocrisy of this phony crisis. Here we are, bullying Iran because of events long in the past, cowering to North Korea and supplicating India over the same damned issue! Well, not exactly the same, because India is not an NPT signatory, much less volunteering to abide by additional protocols! Yes, it saps my pride to see people who claim to represent me strutting around and dictating to every country how much their citizens' lives are worth and what they are allowed to learn about our world.

Maybe I'm wrong, but wasn't the US formed to liberate us from a tyrant king?

Steve, I really wish you could persuade these people to play fair with Iran. This hooey about "They lied before!" is unbecoming a nation of our stature, and was rendered moot the first time the US reneged on a treaty and expected things to just be alright.

Is this part of the fallout of the Bolton bomb?

Considering the state of the Middle East, even without our screwing up Iraq, nuclear parity is essential to counterbalance Israel. We need to make that happen, because if any nation is going to use a nuclear weapon besides us, it is THEM. Maybe the people you know in their government can reassure you on this, but us common folk see Israel as the bully who needs to be in a penitentiary for what it has done so far, and are afraid of what will happen in the future if it's parents don't disclipline it soon and often.

Good to know. I appreciate the additional info.

We'll see.

But waayy too much reliance on "feeling" all the way around. Fallows and Cole as you cite, but also in terms of anyone's estimation of the actual thought process and outlook within the Bush bubble and within Iran's leadership and in Iran generally. Not good.

Hersh reportedly has hard sources, which may NOT be indicative of what eventually comes to pass. His sources are nervous -- but they may not know either.

I'm not surprised at your discovery, Steve, aobut Israel's actual posture. It tells us something about ourselves...

Also good to know (irony and not irony) that America's intel & covert ops are just as effective/competent as in the past. A U.S. "counter-intelligence effort ... delivered to Iran's delegation ... nearly perfect plans for a Russian trigger device for a nuclear warhead."

And: "America's network of human intelligence operatives and collaborators inside Iran were rolled up after an electronics mistake from CIA headquarters 'outed' everyone in the network."

In short, our efforts at curbing WMD proliferation and heightening our intel has had the opposite effect. It's too cute: not the work of our best & brightest.

Hard to know what to make of that -- what with implications all over the place. Read somewhere that Valerie Plame ran her network in Iran, and worked on WMD issues in that country. I haven't seen any verification.

Thanks for all the great work on these recent posts, Steve. Haven't absorbed the last few on Belllinger.

One cautionary note: if it's your word or Juan Cole's, I don't know, in cautioning against "hyperventilating." But it's not quite an appropriate or accurate use of the word, given the circumstances.

Given Bush's track record leading up to and in Iraq, and given Bush's attitude towards his obligations to the American people, it's certainly fair for citizens to make absolutely sure they're heard this time around. I'm sure some will do so with some passion.

But "hyperventilating" implies they're swooning, and without cause. What we DO know indicates there's reason to be concerned, if only based on our past experience w/Bush, leaving aside Iran itself. I agree wholeheartedly that we need all the information we can get. It needs to be studied coolly, without fevered or speculative spasm, without panicked conclusions. However, I submit respectfully that the shoe is on the other foot. Our government is obligated to trust the country with adequate information with which to have a debate and make a decision, and not vice versa. The last few years have shown precisely why this country is legally structured as it is.

This is simply not a matter reserved for policy insiders operating where the air is thin and everybody knows each other. Quite the opposite: we all have a stake in what happens, and this is fundamentally a political question. There's a Constitutional process for going to war, and this time every last one of it has a stake in seeing that it's followed -- including you. Re Iraq, I'd been saying that if not for a pre-emptive war, then when would a formal Declaration of War be required? Having learned our lesson, it's worth pressing the point. And the time for objecting is before this happens -- not after we glacially gather mountains of information and have it all analyzed in the cool corridors of Policyville.

Again, Steve, I really do agree with you. I maintain aplomb with the best of them, and do so now. But it's fair to say those who do object passionately, are not "hyperventilating." They do so based on cold, hard, facts.

Thanks again. You have my respect.

Steve,

Re/ your declaration to Al Franken that the Israeli Mossad with whom you met are opposed to an American invasion of Iran....why do I find this so hard to believe?

Frank -- I found it hard to believe as well, and I don't know how to "poll" the national security establishment in Israel regarding Iran. Sy Hersh quotes the head of the Mossad -- but does so in a way that I think doesn't tell the whole story. When I was in Israel, I met a former head of the Mossad and former Deputy Chief of the Mossad -- as well as some current Mossad officials. But more important, I met serious Iran watchers in Israel's Ministry of Foreign Affairs and talked with several close advisors to Ehud Olmert. I just assumed that they would be applauding Cheney's and John Bolton's anti-Iran strident AIPAC speeches. They weren't.

My point about the Israel stuff is that I had a pre-established bias that just assumed that Israel was more hawkish than we about Iran, but that simply is not true. There may be genuine 'hit Iran now' hawks in Israel, but I had a very tough time finding them in what was mostly a center-right roster of meetings I had.

I wanted to take your question seriously and give you some detail as to why I hold what seems to many to be a counter-intuitive view...

best,

Steve Clemons

It's Bush that needs to be brought into line more than Iran. Bush will do what Bush pleases with regards to Iran, and that is the problem.
Without a Congress that is independent of the White House, our government cannot function properly.
The ONLY way out of this impasse is to elect a Democratic majority in the fall.

Steve, I think I understand your goals and methods, for the most part, but I note that you focus mostly on the executive branch.
In principle, that is not a problem, except for the following: the GOP is full of intelligent people such as Gred D. of Belgravia Dispatch who have an irrational attachment to their party.
These people told themselves all kind of fairy tales about what a disaster Kerry would have been, and how Bush's 2nd term could turn out alright if the right cabinet changes were made.
These people are ripe to vote Democratic in the fall, holding their noses just this once for love of country over party loyalty.
The problem is that it would be ever so easy for them to drift back to the GOP in the fall if they believed that some "sensible" shake-up of the Bush cabinet was being made.
Such thinking is 100 times as delusional now as it was in 2000 when these people believed that a good cabinet would make Bush a good President, and yet it persists.

Your talk of the strong, ethical up and comers in the State Department, and your praise of Rice, runs the risk of convincing the wobbly Republicans to stay with Bush and the GOP in the fall. If you don't think that would be a bad outcome---fine, but I would like to see you address the issue.

What do you think of the talk that Iran's plans to create a new oil bourse encouraging world banks to sell off reserve US dollars has anything to do with Iran policy?

The people that bring this up also point out the correlation of Iraq selling off dollars and moving to the Euro and the stepped up plans to invade the country.

Russia and many other countries seem to be selling off dollars or threatening to sell off dollars.

With Hu Jintao visiting the US and our $202 trade deficit with them I wonder if defending the strength of the dollar doesn't figure into things somehwere. Some weakness would be good, but a run of sales would be disconcerting.

My heart sank when i read this post Steve. Once more into the breech, and once more lead by well meaning people cautioning others not to overeact. Once more assuring us that general discussions concerning the first strike use of tact nukes is a normal thing. I just throw up my hands. The Dems are starting to fold already.

Lets just say I sure hope you are correct. But I think you are flat out wrong. And at some point, not yet, but at some point, this kind of wishful thinking will be viewed, in the cold light of history as, simply aiding and abetting the worst within our govt.

i believe the war has already started; i believe some military attack on iran is inevitable this year, prior to the mid-terms. inexorable.

Your hope for avoiding a Iranian showdown seems to partially lie on the fact that we don't have solid intelligence in that country. Let me the 2,559th person to remind you that intelligence, or lack thereof, didn't seem to affect our whims for warmongering in Iraq. In fact, it naturally becomes the fall-guy; the CIA takes all the blame, always.

I am appalled that the use of NUCLEAR weapons, especially in fabricated crisis, does not disgust the participants of this blog. Should we also revive "fire bombing" with napalm, and other methods of maximum killing and suffering of civilians? Should any and all atrocities be part of our game plan? Is George Stephanopoulos the only person who thinks rattling nuclear sabres is insane?

At what point are we willing to consider what equivalent spending shifted from the Department of War to a Department of Peace might return?

Are we advocating "Team B" thinking on this blog, where the concern is "how peole feel"? and not how they act? Do we now, as a Nation, respond to behavior we don't like by purely punative means? Or just when we can't "get our way" by positive incentives? Can we live in a world we can't fully control?

Does it matter what Israel thinks? (Didn't "Israel" oppose the Iraq invasion?) What the public,or military leaders think? Are military decisions really made as a popular vote, or primarily by Cheney and Rumsfeld? If they did not think the US can still be THE dominate power in the world, wouldn't our troops be out of Iraq?

Does anyone really believe Congess has the courage to uphold the Constitution and exercise its responsibility (Article 1. Section 8. Clause 14): "To Make Rules for the Government and Regulation of the land and naval forces"? That it will REALLY balance the power of the Pretzeldent, even when flagran

I see no evidence that the resolve is not still there to move forward, and little evidence to suggest that timing an event for the fall elections might not be beneficial.

I'm quite skeptical that the Israelis you spoke to were honestly reflecting their views. It's against Israeli policy to discuss military options re Iran.

Ask Lt Gen Moshe Yaalon (former IDF chief of staff) what happened at home when reports surfaced of his straying from that dictum at the Hudson Institute last month.

Despite the fact that Yaalon revealed no Israeli military secrets, he was widely denounced for his frank remarks about Israel's capabilities/options.

Steve, you seem mostly concerned that Hersch “does not get it right”.

My concerns are that :

a) We are not OUTRAGED that the NUCLEAR option is on the table to achieve purely economic and political goals. By leaving it on the table we are, in effect, signaling that this is a fight to the finish, no holds bared, ala Iraq? Why should Iran want to act otherwise, and opt only for that which increases its security?

b) That we have been snookered into starting WWIII, and Congress is unwilling to set limits as expected under the Constitution, Article 1. Section 8. Clause 14 :

“To make Rules for the Government and Regulation of the land and naval Forces.”

c) It does not matter what anyone other than Cheney (and his NG supporters) thinks. Was “Israel” not opposed to the invasion of Iraq? A good share of the military?

d) Private and public costs and benefits are widely divergent, and only private decision maker concerns are relevant. Hopefully the military will recognize and exercise its rights as suggested by Hersch. But then, thanks to the necons, it HAS had a 30 year history of considering a first strike if the opportunity to establish itself as the sole dominant power ever presented itself.

e) THIS administration has been the first to openly elevate nuclear weapons and war crimes in general as options, and in such a way as to avoid domestic revolt. This is where we lose traction on the slipery slope.

Changing "Iranian" for "American" in a DDE quote results in:

"If all that Iranians want is security, they can go to prison. They’ll have enough to eat, a bed and a roof over their heads. But if an Iranian wants to preserve his dignity and his equality as a human being, he must not bow his neck to any dictatorial government." (5) DDE As president of Columbia University, speech to luncheon clubs, Galveston, Texas, December 8, 1949

"Stephen Seymour, of full age, being sworn on the Holy Evangelists this 4th day of January, 1776, saith that on Monday evening, the first instant, at the house of Daniel McGiden, he heard Samuel Devine repeatedly drink damnation to the Congress and all the Whigs; that last year was Whig year, but this would be Tory year; and likewise that all the Whigs, would be hanged in the spring; and furthermore called the Whigs a pack of damned rebels; and further saith that he would not obey his officers more than he would a dog."

I have followed the Iran/US controversy for some time. I remember the Shah, Mossedegh, et al, very well, as well as the "student" uprising and what has followed.

Hersch's piece is terribly unsettling and downright scary. However, Hersch, I think, has let his dislike and distrust of Bush color his reporting. I dislike, distrust, and despise him also. But I must also remember the state of the nation now vs 2002 or 2003. I also have kept up on what the Israeli's are saying - and agree with much of the above. Furthermore, there is appears to be scientific conviction that Iran is some years away from the actual bomb. Some say 10 years. Cut that in half - and five years is a long time in politics.

Now, I also think that Bush is quite capable of instigating a bombing campaign. And I also think he wishes to do so - perhaps with nuclear weapons. I am afraid that he will do so! And that will mean we are all toast one way or another.

I have seen a nuclear explosion and the result. I was about 3 miles away from one at Desert Rock, NV, in May, 1953, as part of a test. I hope and pray that such weapons are never used. I do not want Iran to have "the bomb" either, but, how many are now in the nuclear club? So far we have all been careful.

It seems to me that part of the Iran problem - from what we've heard from individuals inside - that were it not for Bush, the current PM might not have been elected. Take away thei names but juxtapose their commemts and is there a diference?

Robert

On the other side of the mirror (and no, Steve, I'm not gonna keep posting other people's work):

Many Arabs favor nuclear Iran (from Yahoo)
By Jonathan Wright Tue Apr 18, 11:58 AM ET
CAIRO (Reuters) - The United States found little support in the Arab world when it invaded Iraq in 2003.

In a military confrontation with Tehran over Iran's nuclear program, it should not expect any more.

Some Arabs, mainly outside the Gulf, are positively enthusiastic about Iran's program, even if it acquires nuclear weapons, if only because it would be a poke in the eye or a counterweight to Israel and the United States.

Others, especially in countries closest to Iran, are wary of any threat to the status quo and the instability it might bring.

Most in the Arab world see the U.S. and European campaign against Iran as hypocritical, while Israel refuses to allow international nuclear inspections and is thought to have some 200 nuclear warheads.

"I want the whole region free of all nuclear weapons but if the West continues its double-standard approach on this issue then Iran has the right (to have them)," said Abdel-Rahman Za'za', a 29-year-old Lebanese engineer.

"This could provide some balance against Israel and help the Palestinians in their negotiations. We have to take our rights because they are not going to be given to us," he added.

The Muslim Brotherhood, Egypt's largest opposition group, said this week it saw no harm in Iran developing nuclear arms.

"That would create a kind of equilibrium between the two sides -- the Arab and Islamic side on one side and Israel on the other," said deputy Brotherhood leader Mohamed Habib.

Arab League chief Amr Moussa said on Tuesday policies toward nuclear programs in the region needed thorough review.

"These policies which are based on double standards will blow up and escalate this issue and this escalation will not include only Iran and Israel," he said. The Arab League represents 22 Arab governments, from Morocco to the Gulf.

Iran says it has no intention of making nuclear bombs and wants enriched uranium only to generate electricity. The United States says it does not believe it.

Analysts said they detected a surprising level of sympathy and support for Iran in the region.

WOUNDED DIGNITY

"It's amazing how encouraging people are of the whole thing. Some think the Iranians are on the way to acquiring it (nuclear weapons capability) and are quite excited," said Hesham Kassem, editor of the independent Cairo newspaper Al Masry Al Youm.

"There doesn't seem to be any awareness that it might be a calamity," added Kassem, who said he personally was afraid of an arms race bringing in Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Turkey.

Mohamed el-Sayed Said, deputy director of the Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies, a Cairo think tank, said: "People are very very warm about it (Iran's nuclear program)."

"Anyone who challenges the United States will find a great deal of support. That's a very profitable enterprise in public opinion terms," he added.

"Even if it takes an arms race, people don't mind. What we have here is wounded dignity and revulsion about the lack of fairness and double standards."

Most Arab governments have called for a peaceful solution to the confrontation with Iran, in the hope that diplomacy will enable it to develop nuclear energy under U.N. supervision.

If they speak about nuclear weapons, they say the whole Middle East should be nuclear-free, implicitly including Israel. U.S. officials say they can only deal with Israel's nuclear activities after a comprehensive Middle East peace.

Analysts in the Gulf raised special concerns. "Gulf states are legitimately concerned about Iran joining the nuclear club," said Abdel-Khaleq Abdullah, a professor of political science in the United Arab Emirates.

"The possibility of a fourth Gulf war is just beyond our ability to manage. We don't want it. It will just make life miserable and hell," he added.

Saudi analyst Dawoud al-Sharayan said an Iranian nuclear bomb could give the United States a pretext to maintain its military forces in the Gulf and add to the tension.

Saudi Arabia would then have the right to think about having its own nuclear weapon, he added.

(Additional reporting by Mohammed Abbas in Cairo, Alaa Shahine in Beirut, Miral Fahmy in Dubai and Andrew Hammond in Saudi Arabia)

I've gotta agree with jonst above. The stakes are too high to hope for the best while the attack plan rolls on. I assume you've seen the letter from the physics professors to George Bush.

For what it is worth, the "feelings" I have gotten from the last couple week's columns by Bill Arkin of the Wahington Post is that Arkin is practically begging Iran to "blink", because Bush won't.

Yeah, I think that the Hersh article was just to scare Iran that we are really crazy serious about all this, so that they back down and say they really don't want nuklur powah after all. I'm sure gald the Iranians don't know that we are trying to scare them cause then they wouldn't be scared. That President they got is on the brink of getting really scared of us cause we're crazy wild bang bang shootem up Oh Yeah! We bad!

And in the end, we gonna tell'em if they ever use that nuklur weapon we's gonna wipe'em off the face of the Earth, by God! Now that should scare'em harem.

Can a whole nation flush themselves down the martyrdom glory hole unto God and be bombed back to the 12th century.

Maybe Hersh is a true patriot and wants people to "hyperventilate". God knows something has to get Americans off their ass re the US using "premptive" nukes on another country.

Second, although some in Israel may be rational about Iran, I wouldn't believe anything Israel says offically or otherwise, they have an entire history of lying about everything they do...need I list them all? Besides which, as we all know, it is the Israeli hyphen Americans who make up US/Isr decisions regarding Israel in this country.

Whatever...I didn't believe we would strike Iraq "premptively" either on such iffy evidence, thought it was just saber rattling....now I do not doubt for a second the insanity of the neo's who control our country.

I use to think the pattern of conflicting statements from this offical and that offical within both the US and Israel was a disaray within the ranks, then I thought it was a deliberate game of confusion, now I think it is a game within a game.

I stopped respecting Israel after I read about the USS Liberty.