Surprising, and made me think of Obama's lines about "one president at a time"
and "delicate negotiations":
U.S. Rejected Aid for Israeli Raid on Iranian Nuclear Site
by David E. Sanger, January 11 New York Times headline story:
President Bush deflected a secret request by Israel last year for specialized bunker-busting bombs it wanted for an attack on Iran's main nuclear complex and told the Israelis that he had authorized new covert action intended to sabotage Iran's suspected effort to develop nuclear weapons....
...the Bush administration was particularly alarmed by an Israeli request to fly over Iraq to reach Iran's major nuclear complex at Natanz, where the country's only known uranium enrichment plant is located.
The White House denied that request outright, American officials said, and the Israelis backed off their plans, at least temporarily. But the tense exchanges also prompted the White House to step up intelligence-sharing with Israel and brief Israeli officials on new American efforts to subtly sabotage Iran's nuclear infrastructure, a major covert program that Mr. Bush is about to hand off to President-elect Barack Obama.
This account of the expanded American covert program and the Bush administration's efforts to dissuade Israel from an aerial attack on Iran emerged in interviews over the past 15 months with current and former American officials, outside experts, international nuclear inspectors and European and Israeli officials. None would speak on the record because of the great secrecy surrounding the intelligence developed on Iran...
The interviews also suggest that while Mr. Bush was extensively briefed on options for an overt American attack on Iran's facilities, he never instructed the Pentagon to move beyond contingency planning, even during the final year of his presidency, contrary to what some critics have suggested.
The interviews also indicate that Mr. Bush was convinced by top administration officials, led by Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, that any overt attack on Iran would probably prove ineffective....
Instead, Mr. Bush embraced more intensive covert operations actions aimed at Iran, the interviews show, having concluded that the sanctions imposed by the United States and its allies were failing to slow the uranium enrichment efforts. Those covert operations, and the question of whether Israel will settle for something less than a conventional attack on Iran, pose immediate and wrenching decisions for Mr. Obama....
Certainly looks like a lot of bloggers and others like Seymour Hersh and Larry Johnson were pushing the wrong assumptions on the Iran story.
There have been other dribbles about this I think. I'm not so sure Hersh was on the wrong track. Bomb, bomb Iran was the track Cheney and gang were on, but Bush ended up going with Rice. Probably up until last week though, there was always nervousness in the State Dept. that at some point Cheney would finally win the day.
I'll see if I can dredge up where I was getting this.
January 11, 2009 10:02 AM | Reply | Permalink
There are different constituencies in the administration. The arguments for "preventive war" were entirely convenient and applied only to Iraq, in Bush's mind. He had no personal interest in Iran, and was not easily persuaded to risk the now-shaky "achievements" in Iraq by blowing up more stuff. People on the outside, like Kristol et al, were just noise. Cheney just wanted to scare Iran, I'd bet.
It does comport with my personal prediction to a conservative friend, when Bush "Doctrine" as offered as reason for Iraq, that no other preventive wars would occur.
January 11, 2009 10:33 AM | Reply | Permalink
I think the prelude to Iran was so clearly similar to that of Iraq -- which had occurred only a few years before -- that the American populace would really have talked about "Fool me once, shame on your, fool me twice, we won't get fooled again."
You have to remember that we simply can't open up a 3rd war effort at this point either. The military is already cutting back on research and development budgets -- and if the DoD is getting squeezed to pay for the war, you know how bad it really is.
January 11, 2009 3:26 PM | Reply | Permalink
It remains difficult to figure out the convoluted thinking of the current administration. But I have to go with clearthinker here. Our military is simply stretched too thin for any more significant involvement. And Gates is smart enough to make that argument stick, with a little nudge from Rice.
January 12, 2009 7:19 AM | Reply | Permalink
If Iraq had not proven to be such a disaster and demonstrated the true incompetency of this administration, and if, if , if , if, we probably were going to invade Iran.
I have no absolute proof of this, but I think the neo-cons really wanted several more wars in the Middle East.
But with the approval rating of w down in the 20s and loaw 30 for over two years, he just did not have the 'political capital' to go ahead with these plans.
This NYT article is interesting.
Thank you for pointing it out.
January 11, 2009 11:36 AM | Reply | Permalink
What did Hersh get wrong? All the reports I read were that the Bush regime was planning for such a move. I never read it was a done deal. I've no doubt they have done the planning, but I also read in numerous places that the new Chairman of the Joint Chiefs was openly opposed to any attacks or assiting any attacks on Iran. It could simply be an instance where stupidity failed to win the day in the Bush regime... for once.
January 11, 2009 11:41 AM | Reply | Permalink
A couple of things I just read that I sense might be related to the relationship between Bush policy, Obama policy, and intel the public doesn't know about. Don't ask me to explain why, because it's basically just based on intuition.
from
Clinton vows smart mix of diplomacy, defense
ROBERT BURNS and ANNE FLAHERTY
AP News, Jan 13, 2009 12:16 EST
from
Iran Gives Hamas Enthusiastic Support, but Discreetly, Just in Case
By MICHAEL SLACKMAN
New York Times, January 12, 2009
January 13, 2009 3:04 PM | Reply | Permalink
January 13, 2009 11:48 PM | Reply | Permalink
January 14, 2009 12:03 AM | Reply | Permalink