------ Forwarded Message > From: "dasg...@aol.com" <dasg...@aol.com> > Date: Thu, 4 Jun 2009 01:36:50 EDT > To: Robert Millegan <ramille...@aol.com> > Cc: <ema...@aol.com>, <j...@aol.com>, <jim6...@cwnet.com> > Subject: First Iraq, Then Iran -- Motto: "Through [LIES and FRAUD] Thou Shalt > Conquer" >
> Report Ties Dubious 'Iran' Nuclear Docs to Israel > > "Israeli intelligence used [bogus] 'Iranian' documents to 'prove' that Iran > had an active nuclear weapons program. The Mossad created a special unit in > 2003 to carry out a [propaganda] campaign toward that end, providing [U.S. > officials with] secret briefings on the state of Iran's nuclear program based > on certain documents allegedly obtained "from inside Iran." However, senior > U.N. officials and foreign intelligence experts who examined those documents > warned the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, "It is impossible to rule out > an elaborate intelligence ploy". > > > Analysis by Gareth Porter* > > http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=47081 > > > WASHINGTON, Jun 3 (IPS) - A report on Iran¹s nuclear programme issued by the > Senate Foreign Relations Committee last month generated news stories > publicising an incendiary [claim] that U.S. intelligence is underestimating > Iran¹s progress in designing a "nuclear warhead" before the halt in nuclear > weapons-related research in 2003. > > That false and misleading charge from an intelligence official of a foreign > country, which was not identified but was clearly Israeli, reinforces two of > Israel¹s key propaganda themes on Iran that the 2007 U.S. National > Intelligence Estimate on Iran is wrong, and that Tehran is poised to build > nuclear weapons as soon as possible. > > But it also provides new evidence that Israeli intelligence was the source of > intelligence documents which have been used to accuse Iran of hiding nuclear > weapons research. > > The Committee report, dated May 4, cited unnamed "foreign analysts" as > claiming intelligence that Iran ended its nuclear weapons-related work in 2003 > because it had mastered the design and tested components of a nuclear weapon > and thus didn¹t need to work on it further until it had produced enough > sufficient material. > That conclusion, which implies that Iran has already decided to build nuclear > weapons, contradicts both the 2007 National Intelligence Estimate on Iran, and > current intelligence analysis. The NIE concluded that Iran had ended nuclear > weapons-related work in 2003 because of increased international scrutiny, and > that it was "less determined to develop nuclear weapons than we have been > judging since 2005". > > The report included what appears to be a spectacular revelation from "a senior > allied intelligence official" that a collection of intelligence documents > supposedly obtained by U.S. intelligence in 2004 from an Iranian laptop > computer includes "blueprints for a nuclear warhead". > > It quotes the unnamed official as saying that the blueprints "precisely > matched" similar blueprints the official's own agency "had obtained from other > sources inside Iran". > > No U.S. or IAEA official has ever claimed that the so-called laptop documents > included designs for a "nuclear warhead". The detailed list in a May 26, 2008 > IAEA report of the contents of what have been called the "alleged studies" > intelligence documents on alleged Iranian nuclear weapons work made no > mention of any such blueprints. > > In using the phrase "blueprints for a nuclear warhead", the unnamed official > was evidently seeking to conflate blueprints for the reentry vehicle of the > Iranian Shehab missile, which were among the alleged Iranian documents, with > blueprints for nuclear weapons. > > When New York Times reporters William J. Broad and David E. Sanger used the > term "nuclear warhead" to refer to a reentry vehicle in a Nov. 13, 2005 story > on the intelligence documents on the Iranian nuclear programme, it brought > sharp criticism from David Albright, the president of the Institute for > Science and International Security. > > "This distinction is not minor," Albright observed, "and Broad should > understand the differences between the two objects, particularly when the > information does not contain any words such as nuclear or nuclear warhead." > > The Senate report does not identify the country for which the analyst in > question works, and the Senate Foreign Relations Committee staff refused to > respond to questions about the report from IPS, including the reason why the > report concealed the identity of the country for which the unidentified > "senior allied intelligence official" works. > > Reached later in May, the author of the report, Douglas Frantz, told IPS he is > under strict instructions not to speak with the news media. > > After a briefing on the report for selected news media immediately after its > release, however, the Associated Press reported May 6 that interviews were > conducted in Israel. Frantz was apparently forbidden by Israeli officials from > revealing their national affiliation as a condition for the interviews. > > Frantz, a former journalist for the Los Angeles Times, had extensive contacts > with high-ranking Israeli military, intelligence and foreign ministry > officials before joining the Senate Foreign Relations Committee staff. He and > co-author Catherine Collins conducted interviews with those Israeli officials > for "The Nuclear Jihadist", published in 2007. The interviews were all > conducted under rules prohibiting disclosure of their identities, according to > the book. > > The unnamed Israeli intelligence officer¹s statement that the "blueprints for > a nuclear warhead" -- meaning specifications for a missile reentry vehicle -- > were identical to "designs his agency had obtained from other sources in Iran" > suggests that the documents collection which the IAEA has called "alleged > studies" actually originated in Israel. > > A U.S.-based nuclear weapons analyst who has followed the "alleged studies" > intelligence documents closely says he understands that the documents obtained > by U.S. intelligence in 2004 were not originally stored on the laptop on which > they were located when they were brought in by an unidentified Iranian source, > as U.S. officials have claimed to U.S. journalists. > > The analyst, who insists on not being identified, says the documents were > collected by an intelligence network and then assembled on a single laptop. > > The anonymous Israeli intelligence official's claim, cited in the Committee > report, that the "blueprints" in the "alleged studies" collection matched > documents his agency had gotten from its own source seems to confirm the > analyst¹s finding that Israeli intelligence assembled the documents. > > German officials have said that the Mujahedin E Khalq or MEK, the Iranian > resistance organisation, brought the laptop documents collection to the > attention of U.S. intelligence, as reported by IPS in February 2008. Israeli > ties with the political arm of the MEK, the National Committee of Resistance > in Iran (NCRI), go back to the early 1990s and include assistance to the > organisation in broadcasting into Iran from Paris. > > The NCRI publicly revealed the existence of the Natanz uranium enrichment > facility in August 2002. However, that and other intelligence apparently came > from Israeli intelligence. The Israeli co-authors of "The Nuclear Sphinx of > Tehran", Yossi Melman and Meir Javeanfar, revealed that "Western" intelligence > was "laundered" to hide its actual provenance by providing it to Iranian > opposition groups, especially NCRI, in order to get it to the IAEA. > > They cite U.S., British and Israeli officials as sources for the revelation. > > New Yorker writer Connie Bruck wrote in a March 2006 article that an Israeli > diplomat confirmed to her that Israel had found the MEK "useful" but declined > to elaborate. > > Israeli intelligence is also known to have been actively seeking to use > alleged Iranian documents to prove that Iran had an active nuclear weapons > programme just at the time the intelligence documents which eventually > surfaced in 2004 would have been put together. > > The most revealing glimpse of Israeli use of such documents to influence > international opinion on Iran¹s nuclear programme comes from the book by > Frantz and Collins. They report that Israel¹s international intelligence > agency Mossad created a special unit in the summer of 2003 to carry out a > campaign to provide secret briefings on the Iranian nuclear programme, which > sometimes included "documents from inside Iran and elsewhere". > > The "alleged studies" collection of documents has never been verified as > genuine by either the IAEA or by intelligence analysts. The Senate report said > senior United Nations officials and foreign intelligence officials who had > seen "many of the documents" in the collection of alleged Iranian military > documents had told committee staff "it is impossible to rule out an elaborate > intelligence ruse". > > *Gareth Porter is an investigative historian and journalist specialising in > U.S. national security policy. The paperback edition of his latest book, > "Perils of Dominance: Imbalance of Power and the Road to War in Vietnam", was > published in 2006. > > (END/2009) > > > Limited Time Offers: Save big on popular laptops at Dell > <http://pr.atwola.com/promoclk/100126575x1221354145x1201369495/aol?redir=http: > %2F%2Fad.doubleclick.net%2Fclk%3B215221161%3B37268813%3By> > ------ End of Forwarded Message
