Footnotes for 'Analysis: Iran's Nuclear Leap Forward'

April 11, 2006 -- -- For the article, click here.

[i] Dafna Linzer, "Iran Is Judged 10 Years From Nuclear Bomb," The Washington Post, August 2, 2005, p. A01.

[ii] Earlier unclassified CIA reports on problems like the ballistic missile threat often projected alternative levels of current and future capability. The qualifications and possible futures are far less well defined in more recent reports. For example, see CIA, Unclassified Summary of a National Intelligence Estimate, Foreign Missile Developments and the Ballistic Missile Threat Through 2015," National Intelligence Council, December 2001, http://www.cia.gov/nic/pubs/other_products/Unclassifiedballisticmissilefinal.htm.

[iii] There is no way to determine just how much the Special Plans Office team set up within the office of the Secretary of Defense to analyze the threat in Iraq was designed to produce a given conclusion or politicized intelligence. The Department has denied this, and stated that the team created within its policy office was not working Iraqi per se, but on global terrorist interconnections. It also stated that the Special Plans Office was never tied to the Intelligence Collection Program—a program to debrief Iraqi defectors -- and relied on CIA inputs for its analysis. It states that simply conducted a review, presented its findings in August 2002, and its members returned to other duties. See Jim Garamone, "Policy Chief Seeks to Clear Intelligence Record," American Forces Information Service, June 3, 2003; and Briefing on policy and intelligence matters, Douglas J. Feith, under secretary of defense for policy, and William J. Luti, deputy under secretary of defense for special plans and Near East and South Asian affairs, June 4, 2003, http://www.defenselink.mil/transcripts/2003/tr20030604-0248.html.

Some intelligence experts dispute this view, however, and claim the team's effort was used to put press on the intelligence community. Such "B-teams" also have a mixed history. They did help identify an intelligence community tendency to underestimate Soviet strategic nuclear efforts during the Cold War. The threat analysis of missile threats posed to the United States by the "Rumsfeld Commission," however, was a heavily one-sided assessment designed to justify national missile defense. Also see Greg Miller, "Pentagon Defends Role of Intelligence Unit on Iraq," The Los Angeles Times, June 5, 2003; and David S. Cloud, "The Case for War Relied on Selective Intelligence," The Wall Street Journal, June 5, 2003.

[iv] Some press sources cite what they claim is a deliberate effort to ignore a September 2002 DIA report on Iraqi chemical weapons capabilities called "Iraq-Key WMD Facilities-An Operational Support Study." See James Risen, "Word that U.S. Doubted Iraq Would Use Gas," The New York Times, June 18, 2003 and Tony Capaccio, "Pentagon 2002 Study Reported No Reliable Data on Iraq Weapons," USA Today, June 6, 2003.

In fact, the unclassified excerpts from the DIA report, show that DIA was not stating that Iraqi did not have chemical weapons, but rather that it had, No reliable information on whether Iraq is producing and stockpiling chemical weapons, or where Iraq has -- or will -- establish its chemical weapons facilities." The report went on to say that, "although we lack any direct information, Iraq probably possess CW agent in chemical munitions, possibly include artillery rockets, artillery shells, aerial bombs, and ballistic missile warheads. Baghdad also probably possess bulk chemical stockpiles, primarily containing precursors, but that also could consist of some mustard agent of stabilized VX."

If anything, the report is a classic example of what happens when intelligence reports do state uncertainty and of how the user misreads or misuses the result.

[v] Alireza Jafarzadeh, "Iranian Regime's Plan and Attempts to Start Uranium Enrichment at Natanz Site," Statement at the National Press Club, Washington DC, January 10, 2006.

[vi] "Iran Says it Will Resume Uranium Conversion Today," Global Security Newswire, August 11, 2005, available at: http://www.nti.org/d_newswire/issues/2005/8/1/6860ebe5-d0a1-428e-829d-6005c7b26698.html

[vii] Dafna Linzer, "Powell Says Iran Is Pursuing Bomb," The Washington Post, November 18, 2004, p. A01.

[viii] "UN Atomic Agency Seeks To Visit Key Iranian Defense Site: Diplomats," Agence France Presse, September 10, 2004.

[ix] Dafna Linzer, "Nuclear Disclosure on Iran Unverified," The Washington Post, November 19, 2004, p. A01.

[x] Dafna Linzer, "Powell Says Iran Is Pursuing Bomb," The Washington Post, November 18, 2004, p. A01.