THE WAR drums are reverberating while warnings about an Iranian nuclear threat are becoming more frequent and dire. The 2005 National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) concludes that Iran, if left to its own devices, is about a decade away from manufacturing the key ingredient for a nuclear weapon. In making a judgment about the soundness of that estimate, it would be prudent to recall the October 2002 NIE on Iraq's WMD capability. That estimate proved to be altogether wrong in alleging the existence of such programs in Iraq. Should we wager that the estimate on Iran is more accurate?
In contrast to the claims made in the run-up to the war in Iraq, the Bush Administration will prove to be fully justified by the facts in the case of Iran. Iran continues to provide direct operational support both to Al-Qaeda and a congeries of other Islamic terrorist groups. Moreover, the regime has carried out mass-casualty terrorist attacks against the United States. Iran played a direct role in the 1996 attack on the U.S. military base in Dharan, Saudi Arabia, and, regardless of how accurate the NIE is, Iran is seriously pursuing the development of the only real weapon of mass destruction: a nuclear bomb. The extensive reporting in the New York Times on the contents of a laptop computer obtained in Iran by U.S. intelligence bears directly on the subject. The computer is reputed to have contained a mass of details pointing to Iranian intentions to produce a miniaturized weapon that could be mated with a guided missile. U.S. intelligence officials believe, according to their own sources, that the ongoing Iranian ballistic missile program has now produced a vehicle that has a 2,000-kilometer range and is geared towards developing a ballistic missile with a 6,000-kilometer range. There is a very real and gathering threat from Iran--but the United States needs a viable policy, not sloganeering or wishful thinking, for dealing with Tehran.
