Iraqi WMDs, mobile weapons labs, Curveball unavailable for comment.

Uh, when were weapons inspectors in Iran destroying their WMDs?

TheConvincingSavant: Uh, when were weapons inspectors in Iran destroying their WMDs?

Must have been their Core.

TheConvincingSavant: Uh, when were weapons inspectors in Iran destroying their WMDs?

Are you serious? What WMDs?

GED in U.S. intel?

kronicfeld: GED in U.S. intel?

I don't know if this was directed at me, but just in case:
No, I don't have a GED in U.S. Intel, but for 6 years I've been the senior editor of a categorized news portal, one category of which is "Iran". As a result, I have to monitor daily news and blog Google alert digests under the topic of "Iran" and "Ahmadinejad". To date, no threat of Iranian WMD's have been prominently featured. Maybe I missed it, so I'm asking to be informed.

I personally, have an issue with US intelligence agencies and their credibility. Bush pushes them so hard to come up with specific intel that everything they say is now suspect.

/Counting down the day until GW is gone...

Because the IAEA has proven so effective in the past...

If you have evidence, present it. Great.

This is what they should have done from the start instead of starting up with the bells and whistles with not much more than a drumbeat.

I can't wait to see this evidence myself. Of course it can (and should) be scrutinized, taking to account the lessons we learned from Iraq about cherry picking and misleading evidence.

POAC: Are you serious? What WMDs?

Well, if you go the vague WMD route, Iran DOES have WMDs, and HAS had them for over a quarter century now in the form of Bio/chem weapons from the Iran/Iraq war.

First the tax refunds, and now this. Lewis Black is really going to be able to recycle his entire act from 02 and 03. Seriously.

In this photo we see Saddam Ahmadinejad moving weapons of mass destruction or *blblblblblblbl* ice cream!

All $600 does is remind you of how f*cked you are!

I don't need any real or phony intel from the US Intel community to tell me that Iran has obtained a viable nuclear facility capable of making weapons grade fuel thanks in large part to Russia. That said, I'm more worried about their long range missiles than I am their ability to make one Hiroshima sized bomb in 10 years.

Besides, Obama is going to talk to that Ahmadinejad guy and straighten out all that misunderstanding stuff. We are fine.

So if US intelligence agencies had all this super-cereal intel on Iran's weapons programs, why didn't any of it bubble up into the latest NIE?

So...it's not very clear from the article, or I need another cup of coffee, but this "intel" that the US just declassified and gave to the IAEA is the *same* "intel" stating that Iran gave up its nuke program 4 years ago?

Over the past two years, the U.S. already has shared material on a laptop computer reportedly smuggled out of Iran. In 2005, U.S. intelligence assessed that information as indicating that Tehran had been working on details of nuclear weapons, including missile trajectories and ideal altitudes for exploding warheads.

Laptops smuggled from Iran? Since when that's a reliable evidence to accuse a whole country of a nuclear weapons program? Iran's got nothing, if they did it would have been bombed by now. It wouldn't even be up for debate at the UN. There was no debate on the Iraq's reactor and there were no sanctions for the Syrian one. They got bombed and destroyed as soon as they were verified as a weapons program. US knows Iran's not after nukes, it's all fear-mongering and trying to get AIPAC off their back. "look we're doing something about Iran, now you can stop calling us every 5 minute."

I've SAID it before, I'll say it AGAIN.

IRAN can't process its own Crude Oil, and its trying to process Uranium.. HAHAHHA. Yea let me know how that one goes.

Persepolis: POAC: Are you serious? What WMDs?

Well, if you go the vague WMD route, Iran DOES have WMDs, and HAS had them for over a quarter century now in the form of Bio/chem weapons from the Iran/Iraq war.

Vague? Gas and bio are vague? Check with 25,000 dead Kurds on how 'vaguely' gas is a weapon of mass destruction.

They have nukes! Okay, they don't have nukes, but they have a program that's really close to making nukes! Okay, the program isn't close to making nukes, but they still have a program! Okay, they don't have a program, but they have other programs that are similar! Okay, they don't, but they really want them!

Fate comes a-knockin'
Doors start lockin'
Your old time connection
Change your direction
You ain't gonna change it
Can't rearrange it
Can't stand the pain
When it's all the same to you, my friend

It's the same old story
Same old song and dance, my friend

xanadian: So...it's not very clear from the article, or I need another cup of coffee, but this "intel" that the US just declassified and gave to the IAEA is the *same* "intel" stating that Iran gave up its nuke program 4 years ago?

That was my read as well. I also think the author intentionally muddied the waters in the hope that we wouldn't come away with just that conclusion.

Oooga booga.

VictoryCabal
So if US intelligence agencies had all this super-cereal intel on Iran's weapons programs, why didn't any of it bubble up into the latest NIE?

It's probably a repeat of the lead-up to Iraq, Bush is just re-presenting information the CIA discredited long ago, and acting like the debunking never happened by not revealing that it had.

TheGreyPiper: Persepolis: POAC: Are you serious? What WMDs?

Well, if you go the vague WMD route, Iran DOES have WMDs, and HAS had them for over a quarter century now in the form of Bio/chem weapons from the Iran/Iraq war.

Vague? Gas and bio are vague? Check with 25,000 dead Kurds on how 'vaguely' gas is a weapon of mass destruction.

You're right. We should also bomb Germany and Vietnam, since they also did terrible things in the past.

/It's been over two decades.
//Isn't the shelf life on those chemical weapons less than a decade?
///Have they been actively making more?

MindStalker: I've SAID it before, I'll say it AGAIN.

IRAN can't process its own Crude Oil, and its trying to process Uranium.. HAHAHHA. Yea let me know how that one goes.

That's because all their tech is going in to the centrifuges.

/"[Pakistan] will have the atomic bomb even if the people of Pakistan have to eat grass." --P.M. Zia.

Persepolis: If you have evidence, present it. Great.

This is what they should have done from the start instead of starting up with the bells and whistles with not much more than a drumbeat.

I can't wait to see this evidence myself. Of course it can (and should) be scrutinized, taking to account the lessons we learned from Iraq about cherry picking and misleading evidence.

winner.

TheGreyPiper: MindStalker: I've SAID it before, I'll say it AGAIN.

IRAN can't process its own Crude Oil, and its trying to process Uranium.. HAHAHHA. Yea let me know how that one goes.

That's because all their tech is going in to the centrifuges.

/"[Pakistan] will have the atomic bomb even if the people of Pakistan have to eat grass." --P.M. Zia.

[Iran] is the topic of the thread.

Bloody William: TheGreyPiper: Persepolis: POAC: Are you serious? What WMDs?

Well, if you go the vague WMD route, Iran DOES have WMDs, and HAS had them for over a quarter century now in the form of Bio/chem weapons from the Iran/Iraq war.

Vague? Gas and bio are vague? Check with 25,000 dead Kurds on how 'vaguely' gas is a weapon of mass destruction.

You're right. We should also bomb Germany and Vietnam, since they also did terrible things in the past.

/It's been over two decades.
//Isn't the shelf life on those chemical weapons less than a decade?
///Have they been actively making more?

Huh? I was just baffled by the characterisation of gas and bio as 'vaguely' massively destructive.

Or you just being difficult?

TheGreyPiper: Vague? Gas and bio are vague? Check with 25,000 dead Kurds on how 'vaguely' gas is a weapon of mass destruction.

I meant the vague term WMD, when we're talking specifically about nukes.

I really can't imagine how that's hard to understand. But then again, farkers suprise me every day.

Iran currently is capable of enriching uranium to about 3-5%. In order to create bomb fissile material you need to enrich your uranium to over 90%. Iran is very far from that level of sophistication.

The other option would be using plutonium as a fissile material. However in order to extract plutonium from the spent uranium rods you would need a massively shielded processing plant that is capable or remotely separating the highly radioactive materials. A processing plant of this nature, and the isotopes it releases while active is something Iran, nor any country for that matter is capable of hiding.

So to put this in simpler terms... Iran doesn't have "the bomb", and they are a long ways off from having one. Should Iran decide to create "the bomb" the logistics required to do so would be easily removed via strategic air strikes.

even if we prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that iran is doing something very horrible...

we can't afford to act. literally, can't afford to. don't have the money laying around.

mostly because we racked up huge debts by blowing our money in iraq.

so really, looks like no matter what, we kinda screwed the pooch.

Persepolis: TheGreyPiper: Vague? Gas and bio are vague? Check with 25,000 dead Kurds on how 'vaguely' gas is a weapon of mass destruction.

I meant the vague term WMD, when we're talking specifically about nukes.

I really can't imagine how that's hard to understand. But then again, farkers suprise me every day.

Then say 'nuke' if you mean 'nuke'. How hard is that?

Bloody William: You're right. We should also bomb Germany and Vietnam, since they also did terrible things in the past.

Well we already bombed Iraq, and they were the ones that gassed the kurds.

TheGreyPiper: Huh? I was just baffled by the characterisation of gas and bio as 'vaguely' massively destructive.

Or you just being difficult?

Just being difficult. Sorry.

Bloody William:
You're right. We should also bomb Germany and Vietnam, since they also did terrible things in the past.
Don't forget about invading the one country that has actually used them :)

Oh wait i forgot those are weapons of Kindess and Love not Mass Destruction.

Bloody William: TheGreyPiper: MindStalker: I've SAID it before, I'll say it AGAIN.

IRAN can't process its own Crude Oil, and its trying to process Uranium.. HAHAHHA. Yea let me know how that one goes.

That's because all their tech is going in to the centrifuges.

/"[Pakistan] will have the atomic bomb even if the people of Pakistan have to eat grass." --P.M. Zia.

[Iran] is the topic of the thread.

Yeah, I think I caught that. The point was that a determined nation managed to make itself a nuclear power even while lacking a sophisticated technological base, and despite the estimations of existing nuclear powers. Sorry, this was a historical reference, and you probably wouldn't have seen it on MTV.

TheGreyPiper: Then say 'nuke' if you mean 'nuke'. How hard is that?

Because I was responding to someone who used the vague term WMD. And I wanted to specify I was talking about OTHER WMDs and not nukes, which is what the thread is about.

Well, at least they haven't come after OUR WMDs yet...

Because bombing ourselves back into the stone age just wouldn't be funny.

We blew it with Iraq, no one is going to believe us regardless of the evidence. Our only hope is to quietly put pressure on the regime while (very quietly) supporting the younger and more progressive element that's already quite pro-Western. We already wasted two generations, supporting an oppressive regime and then making Iran into a bogeyman; let's not blow it for another generation.

Iran is an advanced, educated country and one of our primary goals for the region should be to stop wasting our time with vindictive nomads stuck in the 13th century and work to turn Iran a stable ally (not a lackey, but an ally).

Oil - exports: 2.52 million bbl/day (2006 est.)
Natural gas - exports: 4.33 billion cu m (2005 est.)

Kyndig: Because the IAEA has proven so effective in the past...

Well, they aren't effective if you have a puppet president pushed by neo-con madmen who simply lie to the American people about the IAEA's findings:

"OCTOBER 8, 1997 - IAEA SAYS IRAQ FREE OF NUCLEAR WEAPONS: "As reported in detail in the progress report dated 8 October 1997...and based on all credible information available to date, the IAEA's verification activities in Iraq, have resulted in the evolution of a technically coherent picture of Iraq's clandestine nuclear programme. These verification activities have revealed no indications that Iraq had achieved its programme objective of producing nuclear weapons or that Iraq had produced more than a few grams of weapon-usable nuclear material or had clandestinely acquired such material. Furthermore, there are no indications that there remains in Iraq any physical capability for t he production of weapon-usable nuclear material of any practical significance." [Source: IAEA Report, 10/8/98 (new window) ]"

Which is what is happening again - at the behest of Israel, which is freaking out that Bush will leave office without starting yet another ruinous, illegal misadventure in the Middle East to enhance their security (not ours).

/no...not ours

TheConvincingSavant: Uh, when were weapons inspectors in Iran destroying their WMDs?


I'm in ur Iran, Destroying ur WMDs?

/can't think of a pic for that

Persepolis: TheGreyPiper: Then say 'nuke' if you mean 'nuke'. How hard is that?

Because I was responding to someone who used the vague term WMD. And I wanted to specify I was talking about OTHER WMDs and not nukes, which is what the thread is about.

Ah. I think the word you want is 'general', in that case.

Aw jeez, not this shiat again.

5000_gallons_of_toothpaste: First the tax refunds, and now this. Lewis Black is really going to be able to recycle his entire act from 02 and 03. Seriously.

In this photo we see Saddam Ahmadinejad moving weapons of mass destruction or *blblblblblblbl* ice cream!

All $600 does is remind you of how f*cked you are!

I seriously want him to just take one of his performances and literally, obviously dub it over just like that.

That would be so awesome.

TheNintendoKid: [...war chart...]

Well, duh! How else are we gonna cull the herd?

TheGreyPiper: Ah. I think the word you want is 'general', in that case.

You're kidding right? I don't see why I can't use vague here. Now you're getting into nit-pick semantics, and this makes no sense to me.

Frankly I don't see what a Swedish furniture store is going to do to help.

Jimsus: Frankly I don't see what a Swedish furniture store is going to do to help.

I dunno, but I just wish Intel would stick with building computers and shiat...

Jon Snow: Aw jeez, not this shiat again.

I know, it was quite for a while. Now it's back on again.