.bmp)
.bmp)
The accusations come almost every day from U.S. officials: Iran is seeking a nuclear weapon. Sponsoring terrorism. Killing Americans in Iraq. Intent on Israel's destruction. Yet, some officials add, its government will collapse if only given a push.Does the U.S. have solid proof that Iran is guilty of such a long list of misdeeds? Or is the case against Iran-and the certainty of its ill intent-a bit fuzzy?In the buildup to the Iraq war, the Bush administration made allegations against Saddam Hussein that polls show Americans believed, but which later proved wrong.Now, with U.S. officials leading the pressure on Iran, many Americans are weighing the evidence. Is there a smoking gun or even a smoldering one?In Tehran's traffic-clogged center, the walled compound down a leafy street is off-limits to ordinary Iranians. It is the nerve center of the country's supreme leader and hardline president.No doubt the two are hostile to America. They also crave a nuclear program, seek influence across the Mideast and send money to Islamic militant groups.They have never forgiven the U.S. for supporting Iran's shah, deposed nearly three decades ago. They tolerate only limited democracy under the boot of an Islamic theocracy. And one of them, the president, has attacked Israel in apocalyptic terms."We can never be reconciled," Hossein Shariatmadari, a hardline supporter of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, said in a recent interview. "We are ideological enemies."Indeed, the United States and Iran have been enemies since the 1979 Islamic Revolution, a bitter time of black-turbaned mullahs, screaming students, and blindfolded, helpless American hostages.But both countries have changed. Brushing away the strident ideology and the distrust, what now are Iran's weapons and its intentions?
For almost two decades, Iran pursued a secret nuclear program. It came partially to light in 2002, mostly through information from exiles, and has led to U.N. inspections, sanctions and standoff.Iran insists its program is for civilian power generation only. The U.S. says it is for a bomb.Many other countries agree that Iran's steps so far-especially its enrichment of uranium and its continued secrecy-suggest it seeks the capability to build a weapon.Those more friendly toward compromise, including Russia and China, urge Iran to be more open."There's no consensus that Iran's leadership has decided to build a nuclear arsenal," said David Albright, a former U.N. nuclear inspector now at Washington's Institute for Science and International Security. "There's more of a consensus that they've built a set of capabilities" that could be used for a weapon.Even if one assumes the goal is a weapon, it is a stretch to leap from that "to the assumption you know what Iran is going to do and when," said Anthony Cordesman, a Mideast expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.U.S. intelligence estimates are based mostly on the U.N. nuclear agency's findings and informed speculation, Cordesman and others say. A new national intelligence estimate, originally due last spring, was delayed by the need to evaluate new information, the U.S. national intelligence director, Mike McConnell, said recently. But most analysts say that new information is mostly just Iran's political developments and recent U.N. findings on enrichment, already public.Now scheduled for completion next month, the NIE-which won't be released publicly-will lay out the evidence and U.S. intelligence's judgment of what it shows. That judgment "is what we are wrestling through now," McConnell said.Last February, McConnell told Congress that Iran could make a nuclear weapon by "early to mid-next decade"-or roughly five to seven years from now.But he stressed, the U.S.'s information was incomplete.
To read more go to:
As in the days of Noah....
