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More Thoughts On Iran: In No Particular Order
My email has been overflowing today with comments and reactions about what I have written and said in a number of radio interviews about Iran. The comments on TWN and emails have been very helpful.

Some commenters despair that I'm urging some caution about Sy Hersh's general conclusions -- based on the fact that James Fallows and Juan Cole are not in sync with Hersh's assertion that Bush is set on war with Iran. I'm not sure that it matters all that much -- this difference -- because it is essential that people are vigilant about inspecting and overseeing everything this White House does.

And anyone who has read this blog knows that long before most began writing about the possibility of an Iran invasion -- I was doing so. I wrote that John Bolton was installed in the UN primarily to manage an expected collision in the Security Council over Iran.

I wrote that despite America getting stuck and showing serious limits in Iraq, that some around the President would not be rational calculators of costs and opportunities and would try to push on to Iran. That's all in this blog.

My point about Hersh's excellent and provocative piece is that when one talks to many other insiders, the stories don't all sync. They just don't. One of my worries is that Bush's team is attempting to negotiate with Iran indirectly through the media -- demonstrating resolve and willingness to do the unthinkable, even unleashing tactical nukes, as a way to compel Iran to stand down. Iran won't step down in my view unless we engage in direct negotiations -- which according to a former senior national security official who worked close to Bush, "Bush is loathe to do."

Some other thoughts to keep in mind about Iran.

First of all, those intelligence-blind war planners who are advocating a hot action against Iran (particularly in the Air Force and VP Cheney's office) need to consider what will most likely be the most damaging outcome of such a bombing action: there will be a very high probability that China and Russia will exploit America's action against Iran as a way to generate a Russia-China-Middle East Oil Nation Block that is designed to constrain American power and choices.

Secondly, there are many options between war and appeasement. One of these involves a calculation of whether Iran will eventually acquire nukes if it really, really wants them. If one believes that despite the course of action Sy Hersh has written about that Iran will one day end up with nukes -- then a pissed-off, hostile-to-America, democratically legitimate, nuclear weapons nation is the worst outcome. What are some of the better outcomes?

One is to consider figuring out how much of a nuclear program in Iran we can live with -- and offer normalization of relations as one of many other integration tactics to get Iran off of a rogue track and on to a normal nation track. Japan has a nuclear power capacity that is also based on a full fuel cycle system. Perhaps we organize Iran to get that far -- and then stop. Iran could be a nuclear warhead generating nation with such capacity -- just like Japan could be today -- but perhaps that is better than a covert weapons program. My proposal may be naive but these kinds of options need to be discussed.

I have also written on TWN in the past that Ahmadinejad is not Bush; he doesn't have the kind of relatively unchecked executive power that Bush has acquired. It's dangerous to portray Iran's President as someone who has the same kinds of executive decision making authority of the U.S. President. This tendency to mirror image presidential powers here with those abroad can cause serious miscalculation. In fact, as I said on Al Franken's show today, the first thing that happens after we drop bombs on Iran is that Ahmadinejad becomes the hero of the Middle East. Any groups that might be either distancing themselves from him in Iran -- or perhaps even working to undermine him politically -- are neutralized. If we bomb Iran, we empower Ahmadinejad in a way he simply is not empowered today.

I think some in the adminstration do want some semblance of a political collision with Iran. I think that they want to wreck the United Nations in the process and to further enhance the stature of neo-Jesse Helmsianism that runs through the veins of players like Vice President Cheney, John Bolton, David Addington, and others.

I think that there is a serious chance of miscalculation that could lead to a hot conflict with Iran -- but I don't see all of the pieces that need to be in place for that sort of "conscious decision" for conflict in place. I just don't. But we could stumble into a conflict.

As one former senior level intelligence official told me recently:

We could go to war with Iran. It could happen, but the chances are still very low -- because at the end of the day, that sort of action would require incredible imprudence.
Even George Bush -- yes, even Bush -- would probably be forced to weigh the nasty forces he would unleash against America's future strategic interests with such imprudent action, and that I think -- combined with a lot of Generals who would resign and revolt -- will tip the balance against those advocating war.


Iran is pushing its nuclear agenda right now because it perceives American weakness -- and that is a huge problem. It means that Iran is pushing its agenda aggressively and the U.S. President has incentives to try and "prove" he and the country are not tied down in Iraq. That is why we need negotiations, direct negotiations.

General Wesley Clark has been calling for direct negotiations since a speech he gave last year at a conference I helped organize in September. Richard Lugar and many others have joined the chorus calling for the same.

Bush does not want to negotiate directly with Iran -- he wants the Europeans to do it. But America has to -- and every Democratic official and every moderate Republican should be pounding on the White House to get the President out of "loathe to do it" stance.

That's what the Sy Hersh article should be compelling national leaders, particularly Democrats, to do. That would be constructive and would give the Democrats some way to differentiate themselves in the White House-dominated marketplace on Iran.

-- Steve Clemons


Comments and Uncertainty about "The Iran Plans"
Seymour Hersh's article on Bush's plan for war with Iran has helped confirm the worst suspicions of those on the left scared of another neocon-like and neocon-led war in the Middle East and has bolstered some on the far right who were afraid that the White House had become too weak to take on the next nation in Bush's Axis of Evil roster.

I'm not going to argue directly with what Hersh has laid out. He's a brilliant investigative reporter, and I have reported some elements of this story in the past. For one, we have known for some time of a classified Air Force bombing study that has been gathering adherents more quickly over the last six months.

Hersh states that there have been no 'formal' briefings of Democratic leaders about our potential war plans with Iran. I have heard differently -- though the level of "formality" may be debatable. I have heard that certain Democratic Congressional leaders have received a classified briefing on our military options with Iran.

But here is what concerns me.

First, it is not surprising that America would have a bunch of war plans and targeting options -- even including tactical nukes -- in the cabinet. And given the considerable rise in tensions, it would not be surprising that the U.S. was working hard to update and enhance target rosters.

But having such war plans in hand does not mean that war is likely, or a decided course by the President.

Now, in the Iraq War, it is clear that Bush had decided very early -- and before diplomacy had really moved very far -- that he was going to take Saddam Hussein out, and I fear that many neocons and operators around Cheney and Rumsfeld have been using an Iraq "re-tread" strategy with Iran. But what is strange about this build-up is that many of the voices on the inside are not as unified as they were in the Iraq case.

And other thoughtful commentators with stellar reputations disagree with Hersh's ultimate assessment.

James Fallows has told me privately that he was sure in 2002 we were going to war against Iraq and that he has no such feeling now.

Juan Cole has also counseled many on the left not to hyperventilate too much about the Hersh piece -- suggesting that what the administration is cleverly doing is building up the hype to add credibility to America's threat to Iran if it doesn't step down.

I need to reprint sections of the Jim Risen book, State of War, which outlines how 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. We have been flying blind in some ways on what is going on inside Iran.

Secondly, Risen points out that in a botched counter-intelligence effort, America delivered to Iran's delegation to the IAEA in Vienna nearly perfect plans for a Russian trigger device for a nuclear warhead. We hoped to embed in the plans a few mistakes that would take Iran down a course that would waste several years and a lot of research -- but the defector we used actually told the Iranians about some of the defects in the plan.

Another thing that is inconsistent between what I learned recently in Israel and Hersh's article is that he seems to paint a picture of a completely hawkish Israel and Mossad when it comes to Iran. That is simply not the case.

There may be die-hard "invade Iran" hawks in Israel's national security circles, but they are in the minority right now. I had the same exact bias about Israel probably trying to prompt America to take action in Iran -- but had by bias corrected by working hard to have my bias confirmed and finding instead that the Israeli national security establishment was far better informed and had more confidence many other strategies short of war to deal with Iran.

I spent significant time with Mossad officials in Israel and also the equivalent of Iran-watching State Department INR types -- who work in Israel's Ministry of Foreign Affairs. They simply aren't as nervous about Iran as we are -- not because they don't think that Iran won't be a threat down the road but because they know the problem is not imminent and because they seem to have confidence that Ahmadinejad is being deserted by many on the Iranian right who are embarrassed by his brand of populism.

The right strategy might be to act as if the Bush administration is getting wound up for a hot war with Iran -- and perhaps a dynamic will be triggered that helps get things on a more rational track. In other words, some irrationality could help.

I just think it's important to note that there is a split among insiders, whereas most of these same people were on the same page about Bush's plans before the Iraq invasion.

More later.

-- Steve Clemons