Antiwar.com Original Articles : Our Intelligence, and Theirs

Wed, 30 Sep 2009 10:03:11 +0000

This is what I send to an email list yesterday: In the NYT today Broad, Mazzetti and Sanger write: A Nuclear Debate Brews: Is Iran Designing Warheads? http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/29/world/middleeas... /quote/ The Israelis, who have delivered veiled threats of a military strike, say they believe that Iran has restarted these “weaponization” efforts, which would mark a final step in building a nuclear weapon. The Germans say they believe that the weapons work was never halted. ... German intelligence officials take an even harder line against Iran. They say the weapons work never stopped, a judgment made public last year in a German court case involving shipments of banned technology to Tehran. In recent interviews, German intelligence agencies declined to comment further. /endquote/ The NYT is lying here. There were reports back in July that the German secret service BND had said something like the above. In July there was a piece in the German weekly magazine Stern and the WSJ printed an opinion piece by one Bruno Schirra (who is know as not-so-reliable in Germany): Germany's Spies Refuted the 2007 NIE Report http://online.wsj.com/article/SB12480366941406303... The BND refuted the Stern piece: Germany's BND denies report on Iran bomb timing. http://news.stv.tv/world/109248-iran-could-have-a... /quote/ [A] BND spokesman said the article did not reflect the view of the agency, which is that Iran would not be able to produce an atomic bomb for years. "We are talking about several years not several months," the spokesman said. /endquote/ The German NPT and arms control guru Oliver Meier took the WSJ opinion piece apart: Iran Weaponization Intel: A Cautionary Note http://totalwonkerr.com/2077/iran-weaponization-i... /quote/ Schirra uses the Court’s 30-page legal opinion and a press release by the Court to claim that the BND “has amassed evidence of a sophisticated Iranian nuclear weapons program that continued beyond 2003.” However, the information publicly available about the Court’s ruling does not support such a broad claim. /endquote/ A week ago the head of the BND, Ernst Uhrlau, was on public TV here. Ernst Uhrlau im PHOENIX-Kamingespräch http://www.phoenix.de/content//264616 /quote/ Des weiteren widerspricht Ernst Uhrlau einem Stern-Bericht, demzufolge der Iran kurz vor dem Bau einer Uran-Bombe stehe: "Dieses Zitat deckt nicht die Aussage des BND (…), denn der Iran ist nicht in der Lage innerhalb eines halben Jahres nuklearfähig zu sein." Es gehe dem Iran auch nicht darum, ob "er innerhalb von einem, zwei, drei oder vier Jahren eine nukleare Schlagfähigkeit" erreichen könne. Der Iran ziele darauf ab, "durch die Beherrschung des doppelten Brennstoffkreislaufes die Fähigkeit zu erwerben, zu entscheiden, wann eine Nuklearwaffe für den Iran Sinn macht oder nicht." /endquote/ My rough translation /quote/ Additionally Urlau refuted a Stern report which said Iran was a short time before building a Uranium bomb."That quote does not fit the statements of the BND (...) because it is impossible that Iran can have nuclear weapon capability within a half year." It would not be Iran's point "to reach nuclear weapon capability in two, three or four years". Iran is aiming at "mastering the nuclear fuel cycle and gaining the ability to decide when and if a nuclear weapon makes sense for them or not." /endquote/ The BND says that Iran's (civil) nuclear program continues. It did never claim that a Iranian nuclear weapon program exists or continues. So the BND has multiple times denied what the NYT says it has claimed. This is "Curveball" and Iraq WMD all over. The NYT is again manipulating for war. (Feel free to use the above)

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Antiwar.com Original Articles : Our Intelligence, and Theirs