Iran Super Thread- Merged

[CougarKing]

Kirkhill,

If you read a little bit more, you will realize that the 99 year lease of Hong Kong territory by the Qing Dynasty to the Brits only extended to the New Territories area/Kowloon Peninsula on the mainland, but that the actual "lease" of Hong Kong Island itself by the Brits was indefinite. Ironically, if the UK govt. had decided to keep just Hong Kong Island and not the rest of the territory when the lease expired, they would be at a disadvantage, supposedly because they would be cut off from the freshwater supply from the mainland. That was one of the reasons I heard was behind their deciding to give up the WHOLE territory when then PM Margaret Thatcher and a UK delegation when to Beijing sometime in the early 1980s to try to extend the lease.

I also find that hard to swallow considering the size of Tai Tam resevoir that I saw on Hong Kong Island- please don't tell me that's not enough to sustain the people of the island for some time? How about building desalination plants? Personally, I think giving the territory "back" was a mistake; also technically they weren't giving it "back" since the lease had been made with the Qing Dynasty and NOT with the current CCP-led govt. The Qing Dynasty doesn't exist anymore today, but of course one can argue that the PRC/CCP govt. is the status quo govt. of China and thus the rightful successor to the Qing.  :

What does that make the ROC/Taiwan then? Hmm...chopped liver? Mashed tofu? The ROC was the immediate successor to the Qing Dynasty, and the seat of the original ROC is just in Taiwan province, although in the 1980s, Chiang-Kai Shek's son Chiang-Ching Kuo supposedly gave up his father's dream of liberating the mainland from the reds after his father passed away. Under other successors like Lee-Tung Hui and Chen Shui Bian, they recently got rid of the level of provincial govt. there because there didn't need to be an extra layer of govt. between the ROC National govt. and the county govt.s of Taiwan province. Remember, during WW2, the ROC was one of the members of the Allied powers that defeated the Axis(in the form of Guo Min Dang forces continuing the fight against Japanese forces), and it was with the ROC that the govt.s of powers like Britian negotiated an end to all those "unfair treaties" made during the Qing Dynasty, such as returning the control of the Shanghai International Settlement back to China. But of course, giving Hong Kong to the ROC govt. now is also impractical.

Sorry for going off again about China, folks- I just had to share my thoughts about this.

Campbell,

Thinking again about Iran vis-a-vis the SCO, I would guess that Iran might be suspicious of an organization that has allowed other Muslim nations into membership- but which are Sunni Muslim instead of Shia. And we all know that Iran is a Shia nation. However, Iran has attended conferences of some Pan-Muslim organizations- is the Arab League one of them? Please correct me if I'm wrong.

 

[Kirkhill]

Interesting stuff on Hong Kong Cougardaddy but I suspect that the ultimate reason for "relinquishing" Hong Kong was a fear of a repeat of 1941-42 and as was concurrently demonstrated at Singapore.  A lack of money, will and capability to hold the place if challenged.

 

[CougarKing]

No offence to anyone who thinks differently, but I think Singapore could have been held until relieved- it was all because of General Percival who overestimated the Japanese threat and thus gave the order to surrender the base and the city.

Anyways, that was yet another topic hijack.

BTW, doesn't Iran use the same kind/specific flight of Kilo class submarines as China or what? I await the professionals' comments on this.

 

[Edward Campbell]

Kirkhill,
...
Campbell,

Thinking again about Iran vis-a-vis the SCO, I would guess that Iran might be suspicious of an organization that has allowed other Muslim nations into membership- but which are Sunni Muslim instead of Shia. And we all know that Iran is a Shia nation. However, Iran has attended conferences of some Pan-Muslim organizations- is the Arab League one of them? Please correct me if I'm wrong.

I don't know.

I'm asking some acquaintances who might know, or who might think they know, but the beggars always put doing their jobs ahead of answering my questions.

 

[Kirkhill]

No offence to anyone who thinks differently, but I think Singapore could have been held until relieved- it was all because of General Percival who overestimated the Japanese threat and thus gave the order to surrender the base and the city.

Anyways, that was yet another topic hijack.

BTW, doesn't Iran use the same kind/specific flight of Kilo class submarines as China or what? I await the professionals' comments on this.

It won't be me taking offence.  And I think there were a fair number of Brits, Aussies and Indians, as well as Burmese, Singaporeans and Malayans, that might have felt the same way you do.

 

[Mike Baker]

LINK

WASHINGTON - Iran halted its nuclear weapons development program in the fall of 2003 under international pressure but is continuing to enrich uranium, which means it may still be able to develop a weapon between 2010 and 2015, senior intelligence officials said Monday.

 

[aesop081]

BTW, doesn't Iran use the same kind/specific flight of Kilo class submarines as China or what? I await the professionals' comments on this.

China has 2 different sub-types of the KILO ( 636 and 877EKM ) while Iran operates only one (the 877EKM )

 

[MarkOttawa]

Maybe not so soon:

U.S. Says Iran Ended Atomic Arms Work
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/03/world/middleeast/03cnd-iran.html?_r=1&hp&oref=login

A new assessment by American intelligence agencies concludes that Iran halted its nuclear weapons program in 2003 and that the program remains on hold, contradicting an assessment two years ago that Tehran was working inexorably toward building a bomb.

The conclusions of the new assessment are likely to be a major factor in the tense international negotiations aimed at getting Iran to halt its nuclear energy program. Concerns about Iran were raised sharply after President Bush had suggested in October that a nuclear-armed Iran could lead to “World War III,” and Vice President Dick Cheney promised “serious consequences” if the government in Tehran did not abandon its nuclear program.

The finding also come in the middle of a presidential campaign during which a possible military strike against Iran’s nuclear program has been discussed. The assessment, a National Intelligence Estimate that represents the consensus view of all 16 American spy agencies, states that Tehran’s ultimate intentions about gaining a nuclear weapon remain unclear, but that Iran’s “decisions are guided by a cost-benefit approach rather than a rush to a weapon irrespective of the political, economic and military costs.”

“Some combination of threats of intensified international scrutiny and pressures, along with opportunities for Iran to achieve its security, prestige, and goals for regional influence in other ways might — if perceived by Iran’s leaders as credible — prompt Tehran to extend the current halt to its nuclear weapons program [emphasis added],” the estimate states...

The national security adviser, Stephen J. Hadley, quickly issued a statement describing the N.I.E. as containing positive news rather than reflecting intelligence mistakes. “It confirms that we were right to be worried about Iran seeking to develop nuclear weapons,” Mr. Hadley said. “It tells us that we have made progress in trying to ensure that this does not happen. But the intelligence also tells us that the risk of Iran acquiring a nuclear weapon remains a very serious problem.”..

The N.I.E. concludes that if Iran were to end the freeze of its weapons program, it would still be at least two years before Tehran would have enough highly enriched uranium to produce a nuclear bomb. But it says it is still “very unlikely” Iran could produce enough of the material by then.

Instead, today’s report concludes it is more likely Iran could have a bomb by the early part to the middle of the next decade. The report states that the State Department’s Bureau of Intelligence and Research judges Iran is unlikely to achieve this goal before 2013, “because of foreseeable technical and programmatic problems.”..

Mark
Ottawa

 

[Kirkhill]

Courtesy of David Blair at the Telegraph

A newly declassified "National Intelligence Estimate", representing the considered judgment of all 16 US spy agencies, plays down Teheran's nuclear ambitions and says that Iran may be eight years away from mastering the technology needed to build a Bomb.

Under the heading "Key Judgments", the document says: "We judge with high confidence that in the fall of 2003, Teheran halted its nuclear weapons programme."
This freeze came when Iran stopped enriching uranium and signed an "Additional Protocol" giving more powers to inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency.

The combined effect of these two agreements, reached after a diplomatic drive led by Britain, France and Germany, was to render it extremely difficult for Iran to build a nuclear bomb.

In effect, American intelligence believes that Teheran's regime decided to put the entire programme on hold.

Yet these deals collapsed after President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad won power in 2005. 

Even so, America's intelligence agencies "assess with moderate confidence" that "Teheran had not restarted its nuclear weapons programme as of mid-2007".

They add: "But we do not know whether it currently intends to develop nuclear weapons."

Instead, US intelligence believes "with moderate-to-high confidence" that "Teheran at a minimum is keeping open the option to develop nuclear weapons".

As for Iran's intentions, the intelligence estimate notes that Teheran's decision to freeze its bomb programme "suggests it is less determined to develop nuclear weapons than we have been judging since 2005.

"Our assessment that the programme probably was halted primarily in response to international pressure suggests Iran may be more vulnerable to influence on the issue than we judged previously".

Iran is presently enriching uranium inside the underground nuclear plant in Natanz.

This highly sensitive procedure – which breaches three United Nations Resolutions – could be used for either civilian or military purposes.

If uranium is enriched to 4.5 per cent purity, it can be used to generate electricity in power stations.

But if Iran chooses to enrich it to 87.5 per cent purity, the uranium reaches weapons grade and become the key ingredient for a bomb.

America's intelligence agencies believe that Iran will not reach this threshold until the period between 2010 and 2015. There is a "possibility that this capability may not be attained

So we seem to have a circumstance that the Mullahs had plans for the bomb and were dissuaded from pursuing it by "international pressure" by 2003.  That coincides with them co-operating against the Taliban in Afghanistan.

In 2005 Ahmadinejad comes out of nowhere against Rafsanjani and resparks the nuclear programme.  The Mullahs have been worried ever since.  They tried to clip Ahmadinejad's wings by shortening his term by a year but he still seems to be threatening a street fight.  His term is up in August 2009.

Interestingly CNN just ran a documentary from Iran about "A Nation Divided", essentially about the divide between Ahmadinejad's conservative peasants and the elite reformers of Tehran.  Given CNN's history of not hurting the feelings of the governments of the countries it reports from it might be a worthwhile suggestion that the Mullahs approved the message.

Given the previously reported great concern over the potential of an American strike, and the Syrian "demonstration" I wonder if it is possible that the Mullahs are trying to distance themselves from Ahmadinejad and the nukes at the same time trying to avoid riots in the streets.

If that is true then the Iranians could be considered to have blinked. 

What was it Sun Tzu said about effective generals never fighting battles?

Ahmadinejad is a liability.

Tangentially Related - The Annapolis Meetings: Talking heads are noting that yet another US President is making a late term attempt at a Mid East Legacy.  A BBC panel openly laughed at the prospect of Bush the Peacemaker.  However even they had to admit that something changed between Clinton's attempts and Bush's attempt: the Arabs and Syria came to the table as well, in public, against the Iranians.  And that never happened under Clinton, Bush Sr, Reagan, Carter, Nixon, Kennedy, Eisenhower or Truman.    To crib a Mulroneyism, if nothing else Bush has re-rolled the dice.

 

[CougarKing]

China has 2 different sub-types of the KILO ( 636 and 877EKM ) while Iran operates only one (the 877EKM )

Thanks for the reply. Correct me if I'm wrong but the latter type- the type 877- is the one equipped with a SAM launcher on its conning tower, right? If this is true, it will probably be a threat to ASW planes and helos searching for them in the event of a conflict with Iran, but you and others in your line of work are probably already well aware of that.

 

[SeaKingTacco]

It is a threat...once.

It also marks the datum quite nicely and the remaining members of the ASW team will be Weapons Free and in a mood to stomp some ass.

 

[Procrast]

Hey i am not backing up what i'm about to say with sources....this is purely an opinion but....attacking Iran would be a mistake....this would really irritate the moderate islamics.Like i said this is just an opinion but i believe this would really give terrorists a boost when it comes to support.


Procrast.

 

[aesop081]

Thanks for the reply. Correct me if I'm wrong but the latter type- the type 877- is the one equipped with a SAM launcher on its conning tower, right? If this is true, it will probably be a threat to ASW planes and helos searching for them in the event of a conflict with Iran, but you and others in your line of work are probably already well aware of that.

SA-N-8 and SA-N-10

Both are shoulder-Launched SAMs. Like SKT said, it would take a rather stupid sub commander to surface in order to use such weapons.

 

[The Bread Guy]

For the word straight from the horse's mouth, here's the National Int Estimate (.pdf), and here's the Key Judgements:

Key Judgments

A. We judge with high confidence that in fall 2003, Tehran halted its nuclear weapons
program1; we also assess with moderate-to-high confidence that Tehran at a minimum is
keeping open the option to develop nuclear weapons. We judge with high confidence
that the halt, and Tehran’s announcement of its decision to suspend its declared uranium
enrichment program and sign an Additional Protocol to its Nuclear Non-Proliferation
Treaty Safeguards Agreement, was directed primarily in response to increasing
international scrutiny and pressure resulting from exposure of Iran’s previously
undeclared nuclear work.

• We assess with high confidence that until fall 2003, Iranian military entities were
working under government direction to develop nuclear weapons.
• We judge with high confidence that the halt lasted at least several years. (Because of
intelligence gaps discussed elsewhere in this Estimate, however, DOE and the NIC
assess with only moderate confidence that the halt to those activities represents a halt
to Iran's entire nuclear weapons program.)
• We assess with moderate confidence Tehran had not restarted its nuclear weapons
program as of mid-2007, but we do not know whether it currently intends to develop
nuclear weapons.
• We continue to assess with moderate-to-high confidence that Iran does not currently
have a nuclear weapon.
• Tehran’s decision to halt its nuclear weapons program suggests it is less determined
to develop nuclear weapons than we have been judging since 2005. Our assessment
that the program probably was halted primarily in response to international pressure
suggests Iran may be more vulnerable to influence on the issue than we judged
previously.

B. We continue to assess with low confidence that Iran probably has imported at least
some weapons-usable fissile material, but still judge with moderate-to-high confidence it
has not obtained enough for a nuclear weapon. We cannot rule out that Iran has acquired
from abroad—or will acquire in the future—a nuclear weapon or enough fissile material
for a weapon. Barring such acquisitions, if Iran wants to have nuclear weapons it would
need to produce sufficient amounts of fissile material indigenously—which we judge
with high confidence it has not yet done.

C. We assess centrifuge enrichment is how Iran probably could first produce enough
fissile material for a weapon, if it decides to do so. Iran resumed its declared centrifuge
enrichment activities in January 2006, despite the continued halt in the nuclear weapons
program. Iran made significant progress in 2007 installing centrifuges at Natanz, but we
judge with moderate confidence it still faces significant technical problems operating
them.
• We judge with moderate confidence that the earliest possible date Iran would be
technically capable of producing enough HEU for a weapon is late 2009, but that this
is very unlikely.
• We judge with moderate confidence Iran probably would be technically capable of
producing enough HEU for a weapon sometime during the 2010-2015 time frame.
(INR judges Iran is unlikely to achieve this capability before 2013 because of
foreseeable technical and programmatic problems.) All agencies recognize the
possibility that this capability may not be attained until after 2015.

D. Iranian entities are continuing to develop a range of technical capabilities that could
be applied to producing nuclear weapons, if a decision is made to do so. For example,
Iran’s civilian uranium enrichment program is continuing. We also assess with high
confidence that since fall 2003, Iran has been conducting research and development
projects with commercial and conventional military applications—some of which would
also be of limited use for nuclear weapons.

E. We do not have sufficient intelligence to judge confidently whether Tehran is willing
to maintain the halt of its nuclear weapons program indefinitely while it weighs its
options, or whether it will or already has set specific deadlines or criteria that will prompt
it to restart the program.
• Our assessment that Iran halted the program in 2003 primarily in response to
international pressure indicates Tehran’s decisions are guided by a cost-benefit
approach rather than a rush to a weapon irrespective of the political, economic, and
military costs. This, in turn, suggests that some combination of threats of intensified
international scrutiny and pressures, along with opportunities for Iran to achieve its
security, prestige, and goals for regional influence in other ways, might—if perceived
by Iran’s leaders as credible—prompt Tehran to extend the current halt to its nuclear
weapons program. It is difficult to specify what such a combination might be.
• We assess with moderate confidence that convincing the Iranian leadership to forgo
the eventual development of nuclear weapons will be difficult given the linkage many
within the leadership probably see between nuclear weapons development and Iran’s
key national security and foreign policy objectives, and given Iran’s considerable
effort from at least the late 1980s to 2003 to develop such weapons. In our judgment,
only an Iranian political decision to abandon a nuclear weapons objective would
plausibly keep Iran from eventually producing nuclear weapons—and such a decision
is inherently reversible.

F. We assess with moderate confidence that Iran probably would use covert facilities—
rather than its declared nuclear sites—for the production of highly enriched uranium for a
weapon. A growing amount of intelligence indicates Iran was engaged in covert uranium
conversion and uranium enrichment activity, but we judge that these efforts probably
were halted in response to the fall 2003 halt, and that these efforts probably had not been
restarted through at least mid-2007.

G. We judge with high confidence that Iran will not be technically capable of producing
and reprocessing enough plutonium for a weapon before about 2015.

H. We assess with high confidence that Iran has the scientific, technical and industrial
capacity eventually to produce nuclear weapons if it decides to do so.

1 - For the purposes of this Estimate, by “nuclear weapons program” we mean Iran’s nuclear weapon design and weaponization work and covert uranium conversion-related and uranium enrichment-related work; we do not mean Iran’s declared civil work related to uranium conversion and enrichment.

 

[tomahawk6]

This recent NIE is BS !! Its more political than anything else. Here is a great article about Iran's ratlines into Iraq. Hopefully we are attacking these lines into Iraq and disrupting their efforts to subvert Iraq.

http://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2007/12/irans_ramazan_corps.php

 

[Nemo888]

We lost the moral high ground in Iran when Kermit Roosevelt drove out Mossadeq and crushed the Middle East’s first fledgling modern Democracy and installed the Shah. The West has been pretty scummy to Iran and treated their national resources like we owned them for quite some time. I think its time to apologize and start diplomacy. We have no moral right to tell them anything until we do that. I understand we have strategic interests, but I’d rather be poorer with honour than repeat colonialism’s and later the Cold War’s hubris.

 

[aesop081]

We lost the moral high ground in Iran when Kermit Roosevelt drove out Mossadeq and crushed the Middle East’s first fledgling modern Democracy and installed the Shah. The West has been pretty scummy to Iran and treated their national resources like we owned them for quite some time. I think its time to apologize and start diplomacy. We have no moral right to tell them anything until we do that. I understand we have strategic interests, but I’d rather be poorer with honour than repeat colonialism’s and later the Cold War’s hubris.

F**k Iran........then and now

 

[CougarKing]

We lost the moral high ground in Iran when Kermit Roosevelt drove out Mossadeq and crushed the Middle East’s first fledgling modern Democracy and installed the Shah.

Nemo888,
"Kermit Roosevelt"? You must be talking about Pres. FDR of the US, right? That's the first time I've heard him called that.

You may resent him for doing that to Iran, aside from resenting him for being a Democrat, but the joint Allied-Soviet occupation of Iran was necessary to prevent that nation from possibly leaning to help the Axis, as what happened with neighboring Iraq during WW2. The nearest Axis troops were those Vichy French troops in Syria/Lebanon at the time and the Allies were taking no chances.

Here's an excerpt from wikipedia about Iran during WW2 and the early 1950s:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran

In summer of 1941 Britain and the USSR invaded Iran to prevent Iran from allying with the Axis powers. The Allies occupied Iran, securing a supply line to Russia, Iran's petroleum infrastructure, and forced the Shah to abdicate in favor of his son, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi.

In 1951, a nationalist politician, Dr. Mohammed Mossadegh rose to prominence in Iran and was elected Prime Minister. As Prime Minister, Mossadegh became enormously popular in Iran by nationalizing the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company (later British Petroleum, BP) which controlled the country's oil reserves. In response, Britain embargoed Iranian oil and began plotting to depose Mossadegh. Members of the British Intelligence Service invited the United States to join them, convincing U.S. President Eisenhower that Mossadegh was reliant on the Tudeh (Communist) Party to stay in power. In 1953, President Eisenhower authorized Operation Ajax, and the CIA took the lead in overthrowing Mossadegh and supporting a U.S.-friendly monarch; and for which the U.S. Government apologized in 2000

It was Eisenhower who authorized the CIA's plot to overthrow Mossadegh, not FDR. Get your facts straight.

 

[Kirkhill]

This from the Wall Street Journal is interesting.  Regardless of the allegations about individuals the "politicization" of this process is, as the WSJ rightly points out at the end, "dangerous".

....... Even if it is human nature to communicate and act independently (see my remarks on DND and its budget)

'High Confidence' Games
The CIA's flip-flop on Iran is hardly reassuring.

Wednesday, December 5, 2007 12:01 a.m. EST

In his press conference yesterday, President Bush went out of his way to praise the "good work" of the intelligence community, whose latest National Intelligence Estimate claims the mullahs of Iran abandoned their nuclear weapons program in 2003. "This is heartening news," Mr. Bush said. "To me, it's a way for us to rally our partners."

We wish we could be as sanguine, both about the quality of U.S. intelligence and its implications for U.S. diplomacy. For years, senior Administration officials, including Condoleezza Rice, have stressed to us how little the government knows about what goes on inside Iran. In 2005, the bipartisan Robb-Silberman report underscored that "Across the board, the Intelligence Community knows disturbingly little about the nuclear programs of many of the world's most dangerous actors." And as our liberal friends used to remind us, you can never trust the CIA. (Only later did they figure out the agency was usually on their side.)

As recently as 2005, the consensus estimate of our spooks was that "Iran currently is determined to develop nuclear weapons" and do so "despite its international obligations and international pressure." This was a "high confidence" judgment. The new NIE says Iran abandoned its nuclear program in 2003 "in response to increasing international scrutiny." This too is a "high confidence" conclusion. One of the two conclusions is wrong, and casts considerable doubt on the entire process by which these "estimates"--the consensus of 16 intelligence bureaucracies--are conducted and accorded gospel status.
Our own "confidence" is not heightened by the fact that the NIE's main authors include three former State Department officials with previous reputations as "hyper-partisan anti-Bush officials," according to an intelligence source. They are Tom Fingar, formerly of the State Department's Bureau of Intelligence and Research; Vann Van Diepen, the National Intelligence Officer for WMD; and Kenneth Brill, the former U.S. Ambassador to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

For a flavor of their political outlook, former Bush Administration antiproliferation official John Bolton recalls in his recent memoir that then-Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage "described Brill's efforts in Vienna, or lack thereof, as 'bull--.'" Mr. Brill was "retired" from the State Department by Colin Powell before being rehired, over considerable internal and public protest, as head of the National Counter-Proliferation Center by then-National Intelligence Director John Negroponte.

No less odd is the NIE's conclusion that Iran abandoned its nuclear weapons program in 2003 in response to "international pressure." The only serious pressure we can recall from that year was the U.S. invasion of Iraq. At the time, an Iranian opposition group revealed the existence of a covert Iranian nuclear program to mill and enrich uranium and produce heavy water at sites previously unknown to U.S. intelligence. The Bush Administration's response was to punt the issue to the Europeans, who in 2003 were just beginning years of fruitless diplomacy before the matter was turned over to the U.N. Security Council.

Mr. Bush implied yesterday that the new estimate was based on "some new information," which remains classified. We can only hope so. But the indications that the Bush Administration was surprised by this NIE, and the way it scrambled yesterday to contain its diplomatic consequences, hardly inspire even "medium confidence" that our spooks have achieved some epic breakthrough. The truth could as easily be that the Administration in its waning days has simply lost any control of its bureaucracy--not that it ever had much.

In any case, the real issue is not Iran's nuclear weapons program, but its nuclear program, period. As the NIE acknowledges, Iran continues to enrich uranium on an industrial scale--that is, build the capability to make the fuel for a potential bomb. And it is doing so in open defiance of binding U.N. resolutions. No less a source than the IAEA recently confirmed that Iran already has blueprints to cast uranium in the shape of an atomic bomb core.

The U.S. also knows that Iran has extensive technical information on how to fit a warhead atop a ballistic missile. And there is considerable evidence that the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps has been developing the detonation devices needed to set off a nuclear explosion at the weapons testing facility in Parchin. Even assuming that Iran is not seeking a bomb right now, it is hardly reassuring that they are developing technologies that could bring them within a screw's twist of one.

Mr. Bush's efforts to further sanction Iran at the U.N. were stalled even before the NIE's release. Those efforts will now be on life support. The NIE's judgments also complicate Treasury's efforts to persuade foreign companies to divest from Iran. Why should they lose out on lucrative business opportunities when even U.S. intelligence absolves the Iranians of evil intent? Calls by Democrats and their media friends to negotiate with Tehran "without preconditions" will surely grow louder.

The larger worry here is how little we seem to have learned from our previous intelligence failures. Over the course of a decade, our intelligence services badly underestimated Saddam's nuclear ambitions, then overestimated them. Now they have done a 180-degree turn on Iran, and in such a way that will contribute to a complacency that will make it easier for Iran to build a weapon. Our intelligence services are supposed to inform the policies of elected officials, but increasingly their judgments seem to be setting policy. This is dangerous.

By the way I think Nemo888 might be a bit confused....Roosevelt died in 45.  Truman took over until 53 when he handed off to Eisenhower.  Mossadeq was turfed in 1952 under Truman's CIA.   And we have nothing to apologize for.  Ask the Afghans and Iraqis about Persian interference in their internal affairs - point of origin seems to be somewhere around 5000 BC. 

Edited to bow to Cougar Daddy.

 

[Nemo888]

Nemo888,
"Kermit Roosevelt"? You must be talking about Pres. FDR of the US, right? That's the first time I've heard him called that.

You may resent him for doing that to Iran, aside from resenting him for being a Democrat, but the joint Allied-Soviet occupation of Iran was necessary to prevent that nation from possibly leaning to help the Axis, as what happened with neighboring Iraq during WW2. The nearest Axis troops were those Vichy French troops in Syria/Lebanon at the time and the Allies were taking no chances.

Here's an excerpt from wikipedia about Iran during WW2 and the early 1950s:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran

It was Eisenhower who authorized the CIA's plot to overthrow Mossadegh, not FDR. Get your facts straight.

]

Kermit Roosevelt was his granson get YOUR facts straight. The plan to oust Mossadeq didn't start till after the war. It began when Mossadeq wanted Iran to have some revenues from all the oil being pumped out of it by British Petroleum.