The President of the Islamic Republic of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad,while on his visit to the Ilam province in western Iran on wednesday said that "Today, the Iranian nation is victorious but you[the U.S] are empty handed." He was quoting the new U.S intelligence report which stated that Iran halted its atomic nuclear programme in 2003. This assessment contained in the latest National Intelligence Estimate(NIE) is produced collectively by washington's numerious intelligence agencies.
The NIE is the consensus view of the 16 U S intelligence agencies. Most of the 16 agencies are components of Cabinet Departments with other roles, with the exception of CIA. The rest include three major intelligence agencies in the Department of Defence-the Security Agency, the National Reconnaissance Office and the Geospatial-Intelligence Agency. There is also the Defence Intelligence Agency, the State Departments Bureau of Intelligence and Research, the FBI, the intelligence organisation of the four military services-Air Force, Army, Navy and Marines-the Department of the Homeland Security, the Coast Guard, the Energy Department, the Department of the Treasury and the Drug Enforcement Agency.
Despite this findings, "hawks" in the Bush administration led by Dick Cheney sought to build a case for punitive action against Iran, including the use of force. Anything can happen because the NIE though supposed to be independent but it is the White House who retains control of whether the estimate will be publish. The U.S President Gorge W Bush even said on Tuesday that Iran remained a danger because it was mastering technology with a military use. He again refused to rule out military action if diplomatic efforts failed to resolve the dispute.
But from the latest report, it is a lesson for all those countries including India, France and Germany for it's uncritically accepted allegations peddled by American officials of Iran and sanction at the IAEA and the United Nations. For the IAEA and its Director-General Mohammed el-Baredi, they stand vindicated once again for their professional apporach as it was in the case of Iraq and its non-existent of WMD. Over the past two years, the IAEA has consistently maintained that there was no evidence of Iran running a clandistine nuclear programme.
Where do we need to place ourselves in such situation?
Where do we need to place ourselves in such situation?
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