Add Gary Sick to Emanuele Ottolenghi and Amir Taheri proposing that it may remain very much in Iran’s interest to extend the crisis – pre-crisis?, pseudo-crisis? – indefinitely, escalating very gradually, rather than move to actual weaponization. This possibility would also explain a lot of things – including why Iran barks more loudly than seems on the surface in its interest.
I know I’m, like, way behind the times, but I still think there was WMD in Iraq. I remember reading in the Wall Street Journal about a cache of stuff they found in Jordan that appeared to have been secreted out in one of the many convoys that left the country between the time we told them we were coming in and the time we actually did come in. Am I hallucinating?
@Barbara — Barbara, if you’re hallucinating, I share your hallucination. It is almost a certainty than some of Iraq’s WMD were shipped over the border to Syria. I used to have links to documentation. See if I can dredge up some new links.
What difference would it make what I said, JED? I’m not sure I get your point other than that the world wants to be deceived – not just about the specific question about what questions it should be asking – and so likely will be deceived.
As far as I know, Iran is believed to possess, at a minimum, small quantities of bio- and chem-weapons, a considerable breakout capacity, including equipment and expertise, and some experience with the latter going back to the Iran-Iraq war. There has been some reporting (can’t assess the credibility) that Iran might even have shared or been intending to share chemical weapons with Hez – which would at least mean that those particular WMD were no longer in Iran!
Altogether, it probably qualifies as proof that the world isn’t fair, especially if you were an Iraqi Baathist.
Barbara — just don’t let fuster hear you. Of course there were WMD in Iraq. That’s what sarin, ricin, and VX chemical weapons are: WMD. We also found the ballistic missile programs, scientists, blueprints, program outlines, and budget line items (several of which were still getting money from the Oil-for-Food program right up to February 2003) that constitute a WMD program — or would in any other nation on earth.
But the left will never let go of this “no WMD” mantra because it underlies the narrative that we never should have gone into Iraq. The right, meanwhile, benefited from it for years because it made the intel community look bad. For many pundits on the right, that was a plus, during the years when intel community leakers were busy trying to knock the supports out from under Bush’s policies.
Of course, the NYT piece invokes Colin Powell’s UN speech in its opening paragraphs. That speech is what everyone remembers. The ironic thing is that no one in the intel community can remember it without also recalling how he cringed at the time, because of the exaggeration in Powell’s imagery of how far along Saddam was on his programs. What Powell spoke of was possible, if Saddam’s programs were not interdicted, but it wasn’t imminent.
People will have to decide for themselves the answer to two questions:
1. Most important: is it only “correct” to interdict WMD programs when the mushroom clouds are “imminent”?
2. Why was Powell’s speech over the top, in terms of what was imminent in February 2003? The NYT editorial board says it was Bush done it, him and that cowboy-fascist Cheney and all them Neoconzzz. I think the explanation is more complicated than that, and maps back to the leakers in the intel community who were even then trying to deflect Bush from his policy intention.
The intel community, in the supreme irony, did deserve to take lumps. Just not for the baseline estimate on Iraqi WMD — the one the military used to plan the invasion, which turned out to be about 90% valid. Whether the US deserves to take the lumps we are now taking from the permanent doubt cast on all our national intel estimates is another story.
As JED points out, it’s all a question of what you consider “imminent.” I propose this test: If America and its allies show distinct signs of being afraid of interdicting a program declared illegal by the UN and opposed by their own long-standing policies, then the threat is imminent.
By this test, the threat of Nazi Germany was imminent when Germany took back the Rhineland unopposed by France and England.
@Margo – I have a much easier test, but it’s less nuanced: perfect for the “student of history,” BO. If the leader of a country says, “Hey, look: we want to wipe [pick an American ally] off the map and are advancing the means to do it HERE [points to Qum]” then we accurately assess this as an invitation to bring them back to the community of nations the hard way.
Comments 17
Add Gary Sick to Emanuele Ottolenghi and Amir Taheri proposing that it may remain very much in Iran’s interest to extend the crisis – pre-crisis?, pseudo-crisis? – indefinitely, escalating very gradually, rather than move to actual weaponization. This possibility would also explain a lot of things – including why Iran barks more loudly than seems on the surface in its interest.
September 30th, 2009 at 12:42 pm
So… what you’re saying is, there are no WMD in Iran.
September 30th, 2009 at 12:43 pm
I know I’m, like, way behind the times, but I still think there was WMD in Iraq. I remember reading in the Wall Street Journal about a cache of stuff they found in Jordan that appeared to have been secreted out in one of the many convoys that left the country between the time we told them we were coming in and the time we actually did come in. Am I hallucinating?
September 30th, 2009 at 1:05 pm
Anyway, I think we should make a new hole for the 12th Mahdi to come out of.
September 30th, 2009 at 1:06 pm
@Barbara — Barbara, if you’re hallucinating, I share your hallucination. It is almost a certainty than some of Iraq’s WMD were shipped over the border to Syria. I used to have links to documentation. See if I can dredge up some new links.
September 30th, 2009 at 1:12 pm
What difference would it make what I said, JED? I’m not sure I get your point other than that the world wants to be deceived – not just about the specific question about what questions it should be asking – and so likely will be deceived.
As far as I know, Iran is believed to possess, at a minimum, small quantities of bio- and chem-weapons, a considerable breakout capacity, including equipment and expertise, and some experience with the latter going back to the Iran-Iraq war. There has been some reporting (can’t assess the credibility) that Iran might even have shared or been intending to share chemical weapons with Hez – which would at least mean that those particular WMD were no longer in Iran!
Altogether, it probably qualifies as proof that the world isn’t fair, especially if you were an Iraqi Baathist.
September 30th, 2009 at 1:14 pm
– No straight lines, please.
September 30th, 2009 at 1:18 pm
Barbara — just don’t let fuster hear you. Of course there were WMD in Iraq. That’s what sarin, ricin, and VX chemical weapons are: WMD. We also found the ballistic missile programs, scientists, blueprints, program outlines, and budget line items (several of which were still getting money from the Oil-for-Food program right up to February 2003) that constitute a WMD program — or would in any other nation on earth.
But the left will never let go of this “no WMD” mantra because it underlies the narrative that we never should have gone into Iraq. The right, meanwhile, benefited from it for years because it made the intel community look bad. For many pundits on the right, that was a plus, during the years when intel community leakers were busy trying to knock the supports out from under Bush’s policies.
Of course, the NYT piece invokes Colin Powell’s UN speech in its opening paragraphs. That speech is what everyone remembers. The ironic thing is that no one in the intel community can remember it without also recalling how he cringed at the time, because of the exaggeration in Powell’s imagery of how far along Saddam was on his programs. What Powell spoke of was possible, if Saddam’s programs were not interdicted, but it wasn’t imminent.
People will have to decide for themselves the answer to two questions:
1. Most important: is it only “correct” to interdict WMD programs when the mushroom clouds are “imminent”?
2. Why was Powell’s speech over the top, in terms of what was imminent in February 2003? The NYT editorial board says it was Bush done it, him and that cowboy-fascist Cheney and all them Neoconzzz. I think the explanation is more complicated than that, and maps back to the leakers in the intel community who were even then trying to deflect Bush from his policy intention.
The intel community, in the supreme irony, did deserve to take lumps. Just not for the baseline estimate on Iraqi WMD — the one the military used to plan the invasion, which turned out to be about 90% valid. Whether the US deserves to take the lumps we are now taking from the permanent doubt cast on all our national intel estimates is another story.
September 30th, 2009 at 1:20 pm
@J.E. Dyer – Oh, OK. For a second there I entered into the Twilight Zone where all good Lefties go to suck there thumbs in denial.
Anyway, I thought he was referring to his reluctance to flunk another drunk test.
September 30th, 2009 at 1:23 pm
@J.E. Dyer – Well, when you play pinocchio about the A in ABC, bad things happen.
As ol’ man fuster used to tell me, “He who sh*ts on the road meets flies on his return.”
September 30th, 2009 at 1:25 pm
And CKM, I say again: There are no WMD in Iran.
September 30th, 2009 at 1:25 pm
As JED points out, it’s all a question of what you consider “imminent.” I propose this test: If America and its allies show distinct signs of being afraid of interdicting a program declared illegal by the UN and opposed by their own long-standing policies, then the threat is imminent.
By this test, the threat of Nazi Germany was imminent when Germany took back the Rhineland unopposed by France and England.
September 30th, 2009 at 1:43 pm
@fuster —
Ol’ man fuster sounds a little like ol’ man Portnoy.
September 30th, 2009 at 2:27 pm
@Margo – I have a much easier test, but it’s less nuanced: perfect for the “student of history,” BO. If the leader of a country says, “Hey, look: we want to wipe [pick an American ally] off the map and are advancing the means to do it HERE [points to Qum]” then we accurately assess this as an invitation to bring them back to the community of nations the hard way.
September 30th, 2009 at 3:22 pm
@Barbara – Amen!
September 30th, 2009 at 3:54 pm
@Barbara –
That sounds plenty nuanced to me Barbara.
September 30th, 2009 at 9:33 pm
Well, I try.
September 30th, 2009 at 9:39 pm