RSSMore Iran Hysteria from the NY Times
The surest sign that another neocon bill of goods is being hawked in respect of the Iran “nuclear peril” is the revival of Rumsfeld-esque “unknowable unknowns”, a la Iraq WMD panic circa late 2002. In the real world, of course, solid progress is being made towards a plausible diplomatic deal to strengthen safeguards against Iran weaponizing the nuclear material it is producing. (See my latest on this at TIME.com)
But in the fevered world of the neocons, which the New York Time has, once again, bought into wholesale, the progress is illusory; Iran is playing games by only showing us the tip of the iceberg. Utterly shameless in its willingness to repeat the Judith Miller debacle, the Times tells us that Iran at Geneva agreed “to send most of its openly declared enriched uranium” to Russia for reprocessing into fuel rods for a medical research facility. Twice more in the story it uses the phrase “declared stockpile” — unmistakably signaling the reader that he or she ought to believe that Iran, of course, has other stocks of enriched uranium that are undeclared.
This new neocon talking point is explicitly elaborated by Michael Crowley in the New Republic: “It’s definitely good news that Iran has agreed to ship a large quantity of its low-enriched uranium out of the country. Every pound of the stuff that leaves Iran is a pound less that they can use for a bomb. But an agreement isn’t a shipment. And if there are more Qom-like secret enrichment facilities–which is likely–then Iran may have more enriched uranium than we know, and has the luxury of making a public show of giving some away.”
The New York Times may think it’s a serious newspaper, but not when it comes to Iran, where it is simply reprising the role of Fox News-for-the-arugula-crowd that it played in support of the Iraq invasion.
Writing about Iran’s “declared” facilities implies that there are undeclared ones. This is what Defense Secretary Rumsfeld called an “unknowable unknown” in the buildup to war in Iraq. Nobody knows that Iran has such undeclared stocks, nor has any evidence to that effect been cited by the IAEA or by U.S. intelligence. It’s simply a guess.
And a pretty stupid guess at that. If Iran was, indeed, secretly stockpiling enriched uranium, with all the risks that entailed, the only rationale for doing so would be to build a bomb. In which case, they wouldn’t confine themselves to the 4% enrichment of their “declared” stocks, which are suitable only for reactor fuel; they’d have enriched that material to the upward of 90% necessary to make weapons-grade materiel. Otherwise, why bother to keep it secret?
But if Iran already has stockpiles of weapons grade uranium, then the whole process of engagement is a farce. Sanctions, too. Because it means Iran essentially already has the key component of a bomb. And, of course, the vaunted “military option” still on Obama’s “table” would be a joke — if nobody knows where the “undeclared” facilities are, they can’t be bombed.
Having done its bit to create a climate for war against Iraq, the New York Times is once again carrying water for the neocons. Unwittingly, I’m sure, because I wouldn’t want to suggest that such a venerable institution had an “undeclared” agenda.
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12 Responses to “More Iran Hysteria from the NY Times”
per rumsfelds intelligence taxonomy, the real problem here is an effort to re-cast unknowable unknowns (i.e. is there some wild card we haven’t considered) into a knowable unknown (it is there, where is it), and ultimately with the help of the times etc., into a known known (where every fact innocent or otherwise is sold as incontrovertible evidence). of course the charges are usually made very loud and public, but the debunking, when it comes at all is usually in grudging or stifled whispers. it is harder to sell a preemptive war on the basis of the first.
In “The Zionist Connection” by Alfred Lilienthal, the author explains the history of how the NYT became a zionist propaganda organ.
In the 1950’s, zionist organizations launched a massive boycott of the newspaper because they were unwilling to publish an advertisement for Yitzak Shamir, who they regarded as a terrorist for his leadership of the Stern gang. The boycott nearly bankrupted the newspaper, which eventually caved in and replaced its staff with hard core zionists.
[...] More Iran Hysteria from the NY Times by Tony Karon — Rootless Cosmopolitan [...]
‘The New York Times may think it’s a serious newspaper, but not when it comes to Iran, where it is simply reprising the role of Fox News-for-the-arugula-crowd that it played in support of the Iraq invasion’
Not only about Iran but about anything to do with the Middle East. You might as well be reading a Knesset press release as read the NYT. And at least the former don’t claim to be a newspaper of record.
I know it’s terribly tempting to say, “they lied or were mistaken about Iraq’s weapons so they must be lying or mistaken about Iran’s weapons.” However, the evidence suggests that Iran really is trying to develop nuclear weapons and will covertly enrich uranium to do so. The fact that the Qom facility was undeclared until the Western countries were about to declare its existence points to such an intention and the means to achieve it.
‘the evidence suggests that Iran really is trying to develop nuclear weapons’
Really? How is it that those who desperately want to incriminate Iran haven’t found any such evidence yet?
The video depicted a room made of stone. At the center stood a Perspex mock-up - equipped with a flashing red light - of a ball-shaped bomb resting in the metallic, gold-plated cone of a missile warhead. In the most important scene in the film, the computer simulation shows the launched warhead reentering the atmosphere and exploding 600 meters above the earth’s surface. According to experts, this is the ideal altitude for detonating a nuclear bomb in order to generate the maximum degree of destruction on the ground.
At the briefing, Heinonen noted that the type of warhead represented by the model could fit an Iranian Shahab missile.
Thus, with the soundtrack of “Chariots of Fire” in the background, the participants in Vienna had the impression they were viewing a PR marketing film produced to advance the sales of some corporation. Some present thought it was a training film intended to demonstrate to senior Iranian officials - either members of the country’s political or religious echelons, or the top brass of its Revolutionary Guard - that Tehran had reached an advanced stage in its nuclear program.
In addition to the video, Heinonen displayed documents in Farsi, which he said dated back to July 2003-January 2004, and which included a number of sketches. Both the film and sketches showed a machine that can produce light-weight aluminum warheads.
…
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1121587.html
The Iranian nuclear program was uncovered in 2003. For years, they have been open to inspections and arguably more transparent than any other nation has been with regards to their nuclear program. Avi’s purported evidence is a videotape of a COMPUTER SIMULATION. This is the damning evidence they’ve come up with after 6 years of playing chicken little? In addition, Avi left out the part where scientists conclude that there is no evidence that the simulation is even of a nuclear armament other than a laymen’s interpretation. In fact, the head of the IAEA rejected this evidence altogether.
Avi, please stop reading Haharetz and JPost. Your information is one-sided and thoroughly spun or incomplete. In addition to your citing of a rather superficial and non-probative piece of evidence, you question why Iran did not declare its Qom facility. However, you are not aware that the NPT does not require Iran to declare that facility until it is within 6 months of receiving nuclear materials. That site, by all estimates, is a good 1.5 years from that point. They had no duty to report it. There is, however, good evidence to suggest that the US knew about it all along and disclosed of it as a means to gain negotiation leverage prior to the Geneva talks.
———–
It’s time to label AIPAC what it is: a foreign entity.
PersianAdvocate wrote:
“In addition to your citing of a rather superficial and non-probative piece of evidence, you question why Iran did not declare its Qom facility.”
Non-probative evidence is a contradiction in terms.
“However, you are not aware that the NPT does not require Iran to declare that facility until it is within 6 months of receiving nuclear materials.”
Now we have already established that you are not endowed with the world’s finest legal mind (see above) but do try to keep up.
In Feb 2003 Iran and the IAEA agreed that Iran would abide by a modified Code 3.1 under which Iran was obliged to disclose a decision to build a new facility before construction starts. A formal exchange of letters to this effect occurred at this time.
Iran subsequently purported to unilaterally withdraw from this agreement in March 2007 in a show of dissatisfaction with a package of measures offered to them in negotiations.
Still with me?
It is believed that construction on the Qom site started started before March 2007. However, even if the decision to build this site was taken after this date, there is no basis for Iran unilaterally withdrawing from the modified Code 3.1. As the IAEA stated that the time,
“14. In accordance with Article 39 of Iran’s Safeguards Agreement, agreed Subsidiary Arrangements
cannot be modified unilaterally; nor is there a mechanism in the Safeguards Agreement for the
suspension of provisions agreed to in Subsidiary Arrangements. Moreover, Code 3.1 is related to the
provision of design information, not to the frequency or timing of verification by the Agency of such
information. The Agency’s right to verify design information provided to it is a continuing right,
which is not dependent on the stage of construction of, or the presence of nuclear material at, a
facility.”
http://www.iaea.org/Publications/Documents/Board/2007/gov2007-22.pdf
In short PA, your reading of Iran’s obligations has no basis in law. Iran was in breach by its non-disclosure.
PA wrote:
“There is, however, good evidence to suggest that the US knew about it all along and disclosed of it (sic) as a means to gain negotiation leverage prior to the Geneva talks.”
And your point is?
Avi,
You point to this article;
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1121587.html
Anybody(with an IQ higher than 2!!!) reading this BS would laugh in your face till they cry.
Because it’s a “non-probative piece of evidence”?
after all these years of gathering
“non-probative piece of evidence”
Is there any probative evidence?
or we just do the preemptive?
just face it Iran has many cards to play and Israel and its apologists can’t stand it.
the US will cut a deal with Iran to save the empire from futher collapse
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