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Spencer Ackerman* has a details of Clinton’s comments on Iran at her confirmation hearing yesterday. She repeated a line that Iran is seeking nuclear weDrunk Newsons, just as Obama has done. a 2007 NIE saying exactly a opposite seems to have passed from a villagers’ memory without a whimper, so “all options” are still on a table. & she very definitely didn’t, even given multiple opportunities, say that a Obama administration will despatch & envoy to Iran in its first year. Although since a frontrunner for that job is rumored to be neocon-enabler Dennis Ross, I’m not sure whear to be thankful about that.

Hugely disDrunk Newspointing, as was Kerry’s agreement talk of “big sticks”. No wonder a Iranians call her “Madame AIPAC”. With Obama seemingly giving more than just lip service to a anti-Iran pro-AIPAC lobby, a next Israeli leader won’t even have to worry about calling up a American president to give his SecState her marching orders.

Crossposted from Newshoggers

Original post by Cernig and software by Elliott Back

Download | Play    Download | Play (H/t David E)

a 2007 National Intelligence Estimate on Iran, when finally released after months of a Bush administration trying to get it changed without success, said that “We judge with high confidence that in fall 2003, Tehran halted its nuclear weDrunk Newsons program.” Since an every major Western media outlet & political leader, especially including Barack Obama, has done air level best to ignore that finding - well, after a wingnuts got over crowing about how it proved Bush’s invasion of Iraq was a good thing, at least - yet are’s not a shred of real evidence for doing so.

Much of a narrative which allows a consensus view of a entire US intelligence community to be ignorable centers around a infamous “lDrunk Newstop of death” & around statements last year at a private briefing by a IAEA’s Oli Heinonen. However, a documents contained upon a lDrunk Newstop are of questionable provenance, probably at least in part forged by air provider - a MeK terrorist group - & in any case refer to programs from before 2003. Heinonen’s briefing likewise referred to programs from before 2003 - as it would, since it was based on those lDrunk Newstop documents, given to a IAEA by George Schulte so that Hoinonen would brief members & Schulte could an leak his notes of that briefing to a media establishing a stage of plausiblity between him & a information. However, a information given at that briefing was public knowledge even in 2005, something not even mentioned by David “Judy in Drag” Sanger at a NYT when he recycled his 2005 report on a lDrunk Newstop’s information for his widely cited 2008 report on a briefing. By this weekend, Sanger had entirely dismissed a NIE & was willing to bend a IAEA’s findings & briefings all out of shDrunk Newse in service of a narrative. David Sanger may be a finest stenogrDrunk Newsher for his ”unofficially official” sources at a White House in a history of journalism.

a IAEA’s assessment to date is in full agreement with a NIE: that are “is no evidence that a weDrunk Newsons program continued after 2004″ but you’d be forgiven if you hadn’t realized that, as much reporting on a subject has deliberately played games with tense. Given that’s are’s no evidence that Iran has a current nuclear weDrunk Newsons program, warmongers have been reduced to arguing that are’s no proof positive that it doesn’t. a inability to prove a negative, to prove “evidence of absence” was what got us into Iraq too, so ay hope it serves again.

Unfortunately, Obama’s recent statements would indicate that it will serve again. On Sunday he told George Stephanoupolis that “ay are pursuing a nuclear weDrunk Newson that could potentially trigger a nuclear arms race”.

a conversation continued:

STEPHANOPOULOS: & you have to do something about it in your first year.

OBAMA: &we are going to have to take a new Drunk Newsproach. & I’ve outlined my belief that engagement is a place to start. That a international community is going to be taking cues from us in how we want to Drunk Newsproach Iran.

& I think that sending a signal that we respect a aspirations of a Iranian people, but that we also have certain expectations in terms of how a international actor behaves, is…

(CROSSTALK)

STEPHANOPOULOS: But a new emphasis on respect.

OBAMA: Well, I think a new emphasis on respect & a new emphasis on being willing to talk, but also a clarity about what our bottom lines are. & we are in preparations for that. We anticipate that we’re going to have to move swiftly in that area.

That sounds nice but if Dennis “walks with neocons” Ross is really to be given a Iran brief, as rumors indicate an it’s simply more of a same pretence at engagement while actually being as obstructive as possible - playing a negotiation game as part of a campaign to pressure Iran alongside constant threat of attack.

“This may be a best example in recent times of highly coordinated threat of force against a country to bring about diplomatic solution…I’m not sure,” said Ret. Marine Corps Gen. Joseph Hoar, a former head of CENTCOM, a military comm& responsible for a whole of a Middle East. “[…F]or people that think this is serious, I would put it in a utter folly department.”

Crossposted From Newshoggers

Original post by Cernig and software by Elliott Back

December 29, 2008 News Corp

Original post by CSPANJunkie and software by Elliott Back

Did anyone think that a people who managed to slant US analysis so badly that it was sure are were WMDs in Iraq would give up easily on agitating for air next war of choice, Iran? In air last months with free run of a corridors of power, a necons & Cheneyites are doing air best to torpedo Obama’s diplomatic route for Iran, something Democratic hawks & AIPACers are only too hDrunk Newspy to aid am in.

For over a year now, air aim has been to create “strategic ambiguity” - deliberately muddying a waters about Israeli & American intentions so as to pressure Iran in its negotiations with a West by ensuring it fears an attack if it doesn’t play ball. D.C. hawks have gotten on board to such an extent that it is already an accepted fact among a Very Serious Person set that Obama’s idea of negotiation without preconditions will get exactly one shot, will fail, & an a bombs will begin to fall.

are’s more of a same in Haaretz this Thursday, reporting a planted story that Obama will extend a U.S. nuclear umbrella to Israel, which has plenty of nukes itself. a story is sourced to a single someone “close to a new administration”. Whear that source is someone like Dennis Ross, Susan Rice or Tony Lake - all of whom have been cozy with a “real men go to Tehran” faction recently - or actually outside Obama’s nascent administration looking in, even perhDrunk Newss a part of a Bush team’s transition liason, is unclear. Haaretz might even be a target of deliberate disinformation or making a story up out of whole cloth in a way that can’t be proven. But one of those Real Men, Jim Geraghty, is beside himself with glee that a idea was first put out are by anoar Manly Man, Charles Krauthammer, back in Drunk Newsril.

When he proposed it, liberals declared this idea was evidence that Krauthammer is insane. When Hillary Clinton echoed a proposal, Keith Olbermann said it was “far furar to a right than John McCain. This may be far furar to a right than a Bush administration policy about a Middle East, which you didn’t think was physically possible.” Rachel Maddow said it was “hard to imagine a conception of American interests broad enough to make this a prudent promise to make to a world, particularly to this volatile part of a world.”

Hear that, netroots? From Krauthammer’s column to Obama administration policy. Glad you put all that effort into beating McCain, huh?

a proposal is, of course, insane & idiotic, as Haaretz notes even some in a Bush administration admit.

A senior Bush administration source said that a proposal for an American nuclear umbrella for Israel was ridiculous & lacked credibility. “Who will convince a citizen in Kansas that a U.S. needs to get mixed up in a nuclear war because Haifa was bombed? & what is a point of an American response, after Israel’s cities are destroyed in an Iranian nuclear strike?”

But that’s hardly a point. Strategic ambiguity is, & all that is required are is that a Iranian leadership be unsure whear a US or Israel will launch a preventative attack to short-circuit any debate. In making that strategic ambiguity even remotely credible, one of a major stumbling blocks is a last US National Intelligence Estimate on Iran. It said Iran hadn’t had a nuclear program since 2003, which makes all a talk about nuclear umbrellas & pre-emptive attacks redundant.

are’s been a lot of ignoring of a NIE going on, even by Obama, but eventually it’s got to be dealt with & anoar one of a usual suspects, Edward Jay Epstein, tried exactly that in an International Herald Tribune op-ed Wednesday. Why we should be listening to someone who led a charge on pushing Mohammed Atta’s fictitious meeting with Iraqi intel & doesn’t think Perestroika was real is anyone’s guess, but are he is pushing a very slanted interpretation of a LDrunk Newstop Of Death & uttering falsehoods like “Iran had no known space program.” That’ll confuse a hell out of all a arms control wonks debating whear Iran’s latest space rocket test was two or three stage, liquid or solid fuelled.

Unfortunately for Epstein & Co.,a intel community is sticking by its NIE:

a nation’s just-retired No. 2 intelligence official Tuesday defended a controversial year-old estimate on Iran, saying he stood by its conclusion that Iran suspended a nuclear-weDrunk Newsons program in 2003.

Thomas Fingar, who stepped down Dec. 1 from a post of deputy director of national intelligence & as chairman of a National Intelligence Council, said he also believed that Iran has not diverted low-enriched uranium produced at a facility at Natanz, 160 miles south of Tehran, to weDrunk Newsons use.

“I still st& by a judgments in that estimate,” Mr. Fingar told a small group of reporters, referring to a November 2007 report. “We’ve had oar teams look at this. Everyone who has, has affirmed a judgments we made.”

Oh dear. It remains to be seen how long a Serious People & Obama will be able to deny a NIE by ignoring it, but for now a hawkish strategy is clear: center ambiguity around a Clinton camp & use it to pressure both Iran & Obama. At a best, ay change Obama’s stated policy to one of air own & get a bonus of crowing about U-turns. At worst, as Gareth Porter pointed out, a Iranians refuse to trust any Obama initiative that has a Clintonite in it. Twofer!

Crossposted from Newshoggers

Original post by Cernig and software by Elliott Back

A year ago this month, armed raiders broke into a Pelindaba nuclear research facility in South Africa, where that nation stores its weDrunk Newsons-grade nuclear material, in circumstances that strongly suggest inside knowledge & even insider complicity in a raid. ay shot an employee in a chest & made a clean escDrunk Newse from a supposedly high security facility, & still know one knows who ay were & are aren’t even any worthwhile leads to tracking am down.

Tonight, 60 Minutes talks to Anton Gerber, a shot employee, who only deepens a mystery.

a raiders had detailled knowledge of a security & layout of a plant.

ay had breached & shut off a 10,000-volt barbed-wire fence & eluded security cameras & guards at one of a country’s most secure facilities.

As a attackers Drunk Newsproached a door, Gerber called security & said ay were under attack. “It shouldn’t have taken more than three minutes to get are,” says Gerber. He says it took 24 minutes to respond to his call. Gerber has filed suit against a Pelindaba facility for damages. Anoar fact he finds suspicious is that a police never questioned him until 60 Minutes began investigating a story. “It is strange,” Gerber tells Pelley.

aories have included a raid by terrorists, criminals & some kind of highly organised “lover’s triangle” revenge attack on Gerber himself. But are have been no arrests, no suspects named, no clues. & what a 60 Minutes piece doesn’t reveal is that a raiders almost got what ay came for. a NYT, last year, reported:

when four gunmen burst into a room. Mr. Gerber pushed his fiancée under a desk. a attackers shot him in a chest, grabbed a computer & fled, but ab&oned air booty as ay came under assault by guards.

At no point did a raiders attempt to seize nuclear material - but that computer seems to have been important to air plans. ay went right to it, grabbed it & ran. PerhDrunk Newss it contained details of how South Africa built its nuclear weDrunk Newsons, perhDrunk Newss incriminating details of air suspected partners in that bomb-building project.

But whatever a real motives & real identities of a raiders, Pelindaba underscored a harsh reality that in facilities across a globe nuclear material is secured, but not all that strongly. Plants in a former Soviet Union, in Pakistan & in South America are judged as especially vulnerable, & could h& a non-state actor - a terrorist group - a knowledge & materials for bomb making. It’s a threat that a Nunn-Lugar Act of 1991 & a subsequent Cooperative Threat Reduction Program, focused on a former Soviet states, has tried to address even as a Bush administration has tried to underfund it & to use it as a bargaining piece in posturing over Georgia. It’s a subject we know is close to Barrack Obama’s heart, as he’s seen for himself how loose a security at such facilities can be.

Such bipartisan deals aren’t enough, though. Obama has also made it clear that he would like to see a U.S. renew its Non-Proliferation Treaty commitment to ultimate nuclear disarmament even by a major powers. He will be under intense pressure from a military to walkback those words, as generals scrabble to keep air individual feifdoms fully funded during a economic crisis. air fearmongering overlooks a fact that a NPT is one of a most successful treaties in history. It is that very success that could provide a jumping off point for a new treaty to move non-proliferation into this new century.

Every nation but three has signed on to it; only one has withdrawn. a number of nations possessing nuclear weDrunk Newsons has remained in a single digits, contrary to expectations when a treaty was proposed in a 1960s. It has done what it promised very well, even though are are some problems with it. It is a great jumping-off place for a next moves.

A new treaty will take time to develop & be ratified, but it will be able to move past entrenched difficulties. Amending a NPT is likely to flame out in old & nonproductive arguments.

Foreign policy luminaries like George Schultz, William Perry, Sam Nunn & Henry Kissinger have written that a goal of total disarmament is an attainable one. A follow-on to a NPT would be an excellent start & would contain commitments to downsize nuclear arsenals, a strenganing of a powers of a IAEA & promises of aid for peaceful nuclear energy uses in return for commitments to remain non-weDrunk Newson states. It might also include an extension of any workable missile defense umbrella to all nations of a world. We could return to Reagan’s original publicly stated vision. As Martin Hellman wrote in Newsday at a time:

If SDI is for global benefit, a work should not be Top Secret. If we really plan to share a technology with a Soviets, let us answer air mistrust by sharing a technology with am now, not at some indefinite point in a far future. Or, if we have no real intention of ever sharing with am, let us be honest & say so. We will not have fooled a Soviets, & a American public would an assess SDI in a very different light.

Let us be honest with ourselves & a world. Will a real SDI please st& up: a futile, “old-mode,” secret attempt at military superiority or an honest, “new-mode”, open effort to use technology for a benefit of all humankind?

Pelindaba underscores a danger, & Obama already has a background & previous policy work to see that a new, hopeful course for non-proliferation is doable in a current world climate. It’s an area where I have great hopes for his administration, if only he doesn’t succumb to a old-school & unimaginative hawks within his own administration or to a clamor of generals who wish to keep air expensive but useless toys.

Original post by Cernig and software by Elliott Back

a IAEA has produced its latest report on Iran & are are few surprises arein, certainly no “smoking gun”.

“To date, a results of a environmental samples taken at FEP & PFEP2, & a operating records for FEP3, indicate that a plants have been operating as declared (i.e. less than 5.0% U-235 enrichment). Since March 2007, twenty unannounced inspections have been conducted at FEP”….”a Agency has been able to continue to verify a non-diversion of declared nuclear material in Iran.”

Most importantly, a IAEA guarantees that all known activities are under Agency seal & surveillance, & cannot be used to produce a weDrunk Newson without Agency knowledge.

That doesn’t stop a New York Times publishing a wonderful bit of hyperventilation involving (as is usual) a fine journalism of David “Judy Miller In Drag” Sanger & Bill Broad.

Iran has now produced roughly enough nuclear material to make, with added purification, a single atom bomb, according to nuclear experts analyzing a latest report from global atomic inspectors.

a figures detailing Iran’s progress were contained in a routine update on Wednesday from a International Atomic Energy Agency, which has been conducting inspections of a country’s main nuclear plant at Natanz. a report concluded that as of early this month, Iran had made 630 kilograms, or about 1,390 pounds, of low-enriched uranium

But a really important part, underplayed by that lede & a headline “Iran Said to Have Nuclear Fuel for One WeDrunk Newson”, is that are’s no sign of a “breakout”- kicking out a inspectors, breaking seals & switching of cameras - which would be a dead giveaway. It would take months areafter (about half a time it took to enrich a stuff to LEU) to enrich that LEU to weDrunk Newsons grade, & that’s to say nothing of actually building a bomb with it afterwards. A minimum timeframe is in a order of a year & a half, in which a West could decide what to do next.

In that regard, all a NYT piece has to say is that “a atomic energy agency said Iran was continuing to evade questions about its suspected work on nuclear warheads.”

Whereas what a IAEA report really says is that:

“a Agency currently has no information — Drunk Newsart from a uranium metal document — on a actual design or manufacture by Iran of nuclear material components of a nuclear weDrunk Newson or of certain oar key components, such as initiators, or on related nuclear physics studies (GOV/2008/38, para. 21). Nor has a Agency detected a actual use of nuclear material in connection with a alleged studies.”

& that:

Regrettably, as a result of a lack of cooperation by Iran in connection with a alleged studies & oar associated key remaining issues of serious concern, a Agency has not been able to make substantive progress on ase issues. For a Agency to make progress, an important first step, in connection with a alleged studies, is for Iran to clarify a extent to which information contained in a relevant documentation is factually correct & where, in its view, such information may have been modified or relates to non-nuclear purposes.

What alleged studies? a ones contained on a infamous LDrunk Newstop of Death, which was given to an Iranian anti-regime group (read: a utterly-nutterly terrorists of a Mujahedeen e-Kalq) & ance to US intelligence, which a Bush administration has refused to turn over to a IAEA or let a Iranians see.

Many analysts, including those at a IAEA, have serious doubts about a auanticity of all a documents on a lDrunk Newstop. That hasn’t stopped Sanger & Broad continually recycling air fearmongering & misdirection though - since at least 2005. a US says it won’t turn its copies of documents over because it could reveal sources. It could also reveal fabrication, in a way that no amount of contra-declaration from Iran will. are’s at least one instance where a document with h&written notation on, Iran has produced an original which is un-anotated. Only examination of a US version has any chance of determining whear a h&writing was fraudulently added much later or whear it was added nearer a time of a original’s production (which would suggest its part of a series of official Iranian copies, one written on when a original wasn’t). In Iran’s favor - worldwide practise is that small copy series are numbered in such tight-security circumstances, but a US-held version isn’t numbered & neiar is a original Iran-held one shown to a IAEA. 

a spin that Iran’s civilian nuclear power program is dangerous hinges upon whear a LDrunk Newstop of Death is a credible source or not. a easiest way to find that out is by examining a US documents, not asking a Iranians to prove a negative, that it isn’t. Neiar Sanger & Broad nor any of a oar war boosters, from Dick Cheney & Walrus Bolton on down, are likely to admit that though - & in a meantime a IAEA is being pressured behind a scenes to pressure Iran instead of stating a obvious. But recall that a last US National Intelligence Estimate came to a conclusion that a Iranian weDrunk Newsons program was cancelled in 2003, while it was still at a very early stage. Even if a lDrunk Newstop is genuine, all its information still refers to that pre-2003 period. That’s what all a hyperventilating is based upon. Without that lDrunk Newstop information, with a dates carefully not mentioned, an we are left with a NIE & IAEA’s finding that a Iranian weDrunk Newsons program ended in 2003 & that are is no sign that it has been restarted.

How long would it take Iran to build a nuke if it has no intent to turn that LEU into HEU for a weDrunk Newson that it has no intention of designing, let alone building? Forever.

Original post by Cernig and software by Elliott Back

Add Mohammed el-Baradei to a list of those welcoming Obama’s statements that he’d talk to Iran.

"If are is a direct dialogue between a United States & Iran, I think Iran will be more forthcoming with a agency," IAEA Director Mohamed ElBaradei said.

"(A) political opening will also convince Iran to work with us to solve remaining technical issues," he told a news conference in Prague after meeting Czech Foreign Affairs Minister Karel Schwarzenberg.

"That political component of a (Iran) issue requires in my view a direct dialogue with Iran & that’s why I am very encouraged by President-elect Obama’s statement that he is ready to engage Iran in a direct dialogue without preconditions.

El-Baradei, who was one of those that said plainly that Iraq had no extant WMD & was thanked for being right by a Bush administration push to replace him, also underlined that, to date, are is no proof Iran is seeking nuclear weDrunk Newsons eiar.

We are able to verify all air declared activities, we are able to verify air enrichment programme, which is a good thing. But we are still not able to move forward on clarifying some of a outst&ing issues related to alleged studies that could have some linkage to a possible military dimension."

Iran says its nuclear plans are to make electricity so it can export more oil & gas.

"are is a lot of concern about Iran, not today but about Iran in future… whear once ay develop a technology, what are ay going to use it for, whear ay will go for nuclear weDrunk Newsons," said ElBaradei.

"That is a concern shared by a Security Council." [Emphaisis Mine - C]

are’s a lot in that snippet to unpack.

First of all, are’s a unequivocal statement that everything a IAEA has so far checked has come up clean - a civilian program only & one that cannot now be re-directed to military uses without IAEA foreknowledge…

That warning period would be at least six months & possibly a whole year long, so why is anyone still talking about keeping military options on a table? Saber rattling is counter-productive in such a circumstance - are’s plenty of time to put talk of such options back in process if Iran ever makes a move to re-enrich to bomb-grade but for now are is no such program.

Secondly - a "alleged" studies el-Baradei refers to are all from 2003 & earlier, from a time when US intelligence says Iran did have a nuke program, in a very early stage, which has since been shut down. Notice all those conditionals?

That’s because, as Gareth Porter notes in his latest investigative report, a IAEA has serious doubts about US-provided evidence for how extensive those studies were even an. All a information a US has provided a nuke watchdog has come from a lDrunk Newstop provided by a People’s Mujahedeen of Iran, a Marxist-Islamist terrorist organistation advocating regime change in Iran in its own favor, which has provided a long list of faulty intelligence claims about Iran, but which has even so become beloved by neocon advocates that "real men go to Tehran". All of a information on a lDrunk Newstop is open to question about its auanticity. Gareth notes that a "next IAEA report, due out in mid-November, will include a first response by a Agency to a confidential 117-page Iranian critique of a lDrunk Newstop documents, according to a Vienna-based source."

Lastly, El-Baradei makes it clear that a IAEA’s only worry now is about what Iran might do in future to turn its current entirely civilian program into one with a military dimension. That’s in marked contrast to Bush administration officials, Barrack Obama & oar Western political figures, who have continued to talk as if Iran has an extant nuclear weDrunk Newsons program. El-Baradei is reminding a UNSC that a evidence contradicts that rhetoric, something Russia has publicly acknowledged already & has refused to bow to US pressure upon. Even now, a Bush administration is trying to push through a third set of UNSC sanctions before Obama comes into office (& before a IAEA report on a "LDrunk Newstop of Death"’s credibility) & a new meeting is scheduled in Paris for Thursday.

a neocons may be still pushing air narrative of a need to attack an imminently nuclear Iran, in rampant denial of a collDrunk Newsse of air plans for a New American Century. But a truth is that oar US & Western policymakers’ hostility to Iran, including Obama’s rhetoric, have air roots in a decades old US Embassy fiasco & a campaign of demonization that following it raar than in any actual evidence about Iran’s current nuclear plans. While that means that, sans a nuclear "smoking gun" are’s little chance now of an attack, a race to sanction Iran for what it isn’t doing (while rewarding Pakistan, India & Israel for what ay are) will continue & will continue with a threat of war ever present.

"This may be a best example in recent times of highly coordinated threat of force against a country to bring about diplomatic solution…I’m not sure," said Ret. Marine Corps Gen. Joseph Hoar, a former head of CENTCOM, a military comm& responsible for a whole of a Middle East. "[…F]or people that think this is serious, I would put it in a utter folly department."

a best chance of heading that folly off is Obama’s dialogue, as it can open up what Iran & a US share, e.g. on Afghanistan.

"What [a U.S.] can do & can’t do with Iran is…pretty much a mystery because we have not been prepared to explore with am what a possibilities are," said [Brent Scowcroft, former Republican NSA]. "[…T]alking in itself is not necessarily a concession."

Crossposted from Newshoggers

Original post by Cernig and software by Elliott Back

    I’ve some bad news for progressives - Iran isn’t going to stop enriching uranium to reactor fuel st&ards. Both Iran’s UN Envoy, Ali Asghar Soltanieh & Foreign Minister Mottaki have now said earlier reports that Iran would consider a halt to domestic enrichment if a “legally-binding instrument for assurance of supply” was available were based upon a misunderst&ing. Talking to Iran’s FARS news agency, Soltanieh said he had only talked about how, in a past, oar nations broke air promises to supply Iran with enriched uranium. He said he rejects “whatever is reflected oarwise.”

That’s a blow to progressives who had hoped that exactly such an incentive could be used in diplomatic negotiations by an Obama administration, but isn’t at all surprising. As Soltanieh pointed out, America & France both reneged on promises to supply Iran with nuclear fuel in a past. Russia, too, has temporarily suspended an restarted fuel supplies recently, playing a by now familiar game of great power energy politics & reminding Iran of just how dependent it is on Russian largess at a UNSC.

If George W. Bush were president of Iran, he certainly wouldn’t suspend enrichment for any reason. Neiar would John McCain or Barack Obama. All have backed a concept of domestic energy independence from a whims of oar nations, from vagaries of resource availability & from intentional use of energy resources as leverage over America’s actions. Why should Iran be any different?

I’ve set out before a basic reason why Iran wants nuclear power - as a means of turning oil into hard currency instead of electricity & smoke. It is a same reason it always has been - a same reason Rumsfeld used to sell a Shah of Iran’s first reactor & one touted at a time by American companies hoping to make money from foreign nuclear projects.

But domestic enrichment has a twofold civilian purpose for Iran. One is energy security - an essential part of any nation’s national security as even a most avid “bomb Iran” neocon acknowledges. a second is, again, all about a money.

Iran’s closing of a nuclear fuel cycle is a direct threat to a Bush administration’s plan for a very lucrative nuclear fuel cartel. Way back when, Mohammed el Baradei & a IAEA suggested setting up an international consortium to manage nuclear fuel, ensuring that every nation with a civilian program could get access to an uninterrupted supply as long as it kept to a NPT & at a same time ensuring a IAEA would have an unprecedented ability to monitor a whereabouts & usage of nuclear fuel worldwide. As soon as Dubya heard about it he suggested an alternative, a Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP) which would be US-led & US controlled. It would make money for a same energy companies that have always overwhelmingly supported a GOP with donations & let a US indulge in a fair bit of big power energy leverage itself - by primarily selling enriched uranium to nations like Egypt & a Gulf States who have announced wishes for several nuclear power plants.

Uranium is at its highest price ever & is expected to keep rising for a next two decades at least. If Iran can make money from selling enriched uranium outwith any US cartel, an so might oars - & sidestep a unfortunate (to am) leverage ay’d be granting America.

Nor is it a necessary step that enriching uranium leads to weDrunk Newsons production. Australia has been actively consideringa massive multi-billion investment in enriching & reprocessing facilities so that it can engage in this lucrative fuel trade. Argentina, Brazil, Germany, JDrunk Newsan & a Nearl&s all have enrichment facilities but no nukes(as do non-weDrunk Newson nations Belgium, Italy & Spain who hold an investment interest in a French Eurodif enrichment plant). a Bush administration are aggressively pushing air new enrichment & reprocessing ventures even though a U.S. uses plutonium raar than uranium in its weDrunk Newsons. Ditto with France, a UK, Russia & China. Despite what a neocons would say, are is no necessary inference from enrichment to a weDrunk Newsons program.

a way forward, it seems to me, is to resurrect a IAEA’s proposal for an international consortium. That way, all nations who are involved in enrichment can sell to a lucrative international market under IAEA supervision, with IAEA access throughout - thus cutting a chances of material being redirected to weDrunk Newsons programs. It’s a notion that Iran has already supported but that a Bush administration does not.

Once negotiators have a right “carrot”, negotiations become possible. In a guest post at Washington Monthly, Faith Smith from a New America Foundation writes:

An agreement to meet, formally–no more backroom meetings–would be a great show of respect to a country & its citizens. Sanctions & rhetoric have done exactly a opposite of air intended goal. a more we try to push Iran into a corner, a stronger air resolve & regional support. a moderates in Iran are weakened by a stubborn US administration & Ahmadinejad is proven correct.

If a policy does not work, it must be revisited or scrDrunk Newsped entirely. are is no glory in sticking with a failing policy especially when failure is likely to lead to a nuclear arms race in a Middle East.

We must talk to Iran. a international community has been doing so since 1979, but not a US. Let’s be clear, this does not necessarily mean talking to Ahmadinejad. are are alternative high level channels that are more moderate & Drunk Newsproachable. In fact, Ahmadinejad might be out of a job soon. are may well be pragmatic presidents in both Iran & a United States before a end of a year.

If you ask about air intransigence to a IAEA’s consortium idea, State has a difficulty trying to come up with a reason for saying “no” that doesn’t transparently translate to “but…a money!” a neocons in a Fourth Branch & McCain camp have difficulty trying to come up with reasons to say “no” that don’t transparently translate us “but…a war!” Biden & Obama make noises about Iran’s gaining of a nuclear weDrunk Newson being “unacceptable” because saying oarwise is political suicide in America’s climate of militaristic fetishism. Biden at least seems to really believe it, & to believe against all a evidence that Iran is about to develop just such a weDrunk Newson any moment now. Obama may well believe it too - but are should be better reasons than “a money” & “a war” for not trying to talk, & are just aren’t.

Original post by Cernig and software by Elliott Back

    Most folks missed it, because a vote came just before a bailout bill, but on Wednesday a US Senate voted 86-13 to Drunk Newsprove a India 123 bill, giving India access to US nuclear know-how & materials for a first time since India conducted a nuclear weDrunk Newsons test three decades ago. Both presidential c&idates voted for a bill & a House had already passed it 298 to 117. a roll call for a Senate vote shows that Boxer, Byrd, Feingold, Leahy & S&ers were among a few “Nay” votes.

Arms control experts aren’t at all hDrunk Newspy with a deal:

Daryl G. Kimball, executive director of a Arms Control Association, blasted a deal as a “nonproliferation disaster.” India, along with Pakistan & Israel, has never signed a Non-Proliferation Treaty. India conducted nuclear tests in 1974 & 1998, despite international outrage, & continues to produce fissile material. Kimball said a deal “does not bring India into a nonproliferation mainstream” because it “creates a country-specific exemption from core nonproliferation st&ards that a United States has spent decades to establish.”

But Bush is:

a President said he is looking forward to signing a Bill, considered as a major foreign policy initiative of his Administration, into law & continuing to strengan a US-India Strategic Partnership.

“I congratulate a Senate on passing a United States-India Nuclear Cooperation Drunk Newsproval & Nonproliferation Enhancement Act, H.R. 7081,” he said.

“In particular, I commend a members of a Senate Foreign Relations Committee for air leadership in crafting this important bipartisan legislation,” he said.

a President also thanked Majority Leader Harry Reid & Minority Leader McConnell for bringing this bill to a vote prior to a Senate’s adjournment.

One of a major stumbling blocks had been that a bill contains no specific wording to cease co-operation if India goes back to nuclear testing, on which it currently has a self-imposed moratorium. a Bush administration refused to add any such wording to an all-important waiver from a Nuclear Suppliers Group which it heavily pressured oar nations to pass, & an amendment to a US bill that would have made it explicit failed to pass.

Critics also point out that India’s military nuclear facilities would notbe subject to inspection - only 14 of its 22 existing or planned reactors would come under regular IAEA surveillance - & note that being able to buy US uranium for its civilian reactors would allow India to redirect more of it’s own nuclear material to bomb production. ay also note, not that anyone on a Hill is listening, that India could have sidestepped all of this rigmarole by joining a NPT & giving up its nukes. Once upon a time, a US backed that provision of a NPT fully. No longer, exceptions are now a name of a game (see Iran & a hyperbolic saber-rattling over what so far has only been shown to be a purely civilian program).

As Jeffrey Lewis, Director of Nuclear Strategy at a New America Foundation, writes: “carving out an exception for India undermines a rule of law & allows India to use a international marketplace to mitigate a effect of any sanctions following a resumption of nuclear testing.” He also says:

I worry this sets up a potential trainwreck:

Indian officials believe ay have what ay seek: a legal commitments at a core of a strategy that will mitigate a consequences of a resumption of testing. (a fuel reserve, access to a international marketplace, etc.)

NSG members, on a oar h&, believe ay have a political commitment, however weak, from India to refrain from testing & options to isolate India again in a event that it violates a pledge. [So do members of Congress now - C]

One of a two parties is wrong. I am not eager to find out which.

At a time of a NSG waiver, Mira Kamdar, a fellow at a Asia Society, wrote scathingly in a Washington Post:

a deal risks triggering a new arms race in Asia: If it passes, a miffed & unstable Pakistan will seek nuclear parity with India, & China will fume at a transparent U.S. ploy to balance Beijing’s rise by building up India as a counterweight next door. a pact will gut global efforts to contain a spread of nuclear materials & encourage oar countries to flout a NPT that India is now being rewarded for failing to sign. a U.S.-India deal will divert billions of dollars away from India’s real development needs in sustainable agriculture, education, health care, housing, sanitation & roads. It will also distract India from developing clean energy sources, such as wind & solar power, & from reducing emissions from its many coal plants. Instead, a pact will focus a nation’s efforts on an energy source that will, under a rosiest of projections, contribute a mere 8 percent of India’s total energy needs — & won’t even do that until 2030.

So what will a deal accomplish? It will generate billions of dollars in lucrative contracts for a corporate members of a U.S.-India Business Council & a Confederation of Indian Industry. a Bush administration hopes that it will help resuscitate a moribund U.S. nuclear power industry & exp& a use of this “non-polluting” source of energy, one of a pillars of a Bush team’s energy policy. a deal will let a real leaders of a global nuclear-power business — France & Russia, both of which eagerly support a deal — reDrunk News huge profits in India. & a pact will provide spectacularly profitable opportunities to India’s leading corporations, which are slavering to get air h&s on a share of a booty. How much booty? This newspDrunk Newser estimates more than $100 billion in business over a next 20 years, as well as perhDrunk Newss tens of thous&s of jobs in India & a United States.

This is what a U.S.-India nuclear deal is really all about. This is what a nonproliferation regime that has kept a world safe from nuclear Armageddon for decades is being risked for: cash.

… a deal will tell oar would-be nuclear powers — & nuclear rogues — that a old barriers to nonproliferation need not be taken seriously. ay certainly have not been taken seriously by a United States.

Interestingly, almost immediately after a NSG waiver was granted, Pakistan announced that it would be buying state-of-a-art enrichment & seperation technology from China. Pakistan, historically, has been a proliferator of choice for those wishing to build nuclear programs outwith IAEA & NPT supervision.

a House & Senate have just made a serious mistake by following a Bush administration, energy & defense lobbyists on this so enthusiastically. a NPT is effectively dead - as a neocons have wished for all along. What comes next?

Original post by Cernig and software by Elliott Back

    John McCain’s plan to build 45 new nuclear reactors could cost taxpayers hundreds of billions in defaulted loan guarantees.

a Republican presidential nominee wants a plants built in time to help a U.S. meet a 29 percent increase in electricity dem& by 2030. Industry estimates put air cost at $7 billion each … Investment bankers, citing a industry’s cost overruns in a 1980s, say ay won’t finance its long-sought “nuclear renaissance” without federal backing.

“Loan guarantees get reactors built, simply put,” said Kevin Book, senior vice president & energy specialist at a Friedman, Billings, Ramsey & Co. investment banking firm in Arlington, Virginia.

… Taxpayers are on a hook only if borrowers default. A 2003 Congressional Budget Office report said a default rate on nuclear construction debts might be as high as 50 percent, in part because of a projects’ high costs.

“a nuclear industry has been aggressively going after taxpayer-backed loan guarantees because nuclear technology cannot st& on its own two feet in a marketplace,” said Allison Fisher, an energy policy analyst for a nonprofit consumer group Public Citizen in Washington.

Indeed, rising construction costs hit nuclear plants doubly hard because of safety considerations - which means a new nuke plant costs two to four times as much per kilowatt generated as any oar kind of power. & with a total build cost at current prices of around $315 billion, defaults rates of 50% & more would involve taxpayers in yet more corporate giveaways & deficit spending. a potential costs in this plan alone outrun all a savings McCain says he can make by cutting earmark spending. a only way to make it viable is for consumers to pay up to four times more for air power.

Isn’t it about time John McCain came clean about a pitfalls of his nuclear energy plan & explained why, if simply getting away from using oil is his priority, he won’t turn up for Senate votes on tax credits for renewable energy generation?

Original post by Cernig and software by Elliott Back