Iranian estimate or guesstimate..

The drum is back in the cupboard for the time being. The drum beat of war that has become louder and faster for the last year has been knocked out of its stride. This week's National Intelligence Assessment (NIE) downplays the threat posed by Iran's nuclear programme: "in fall 2003, Tehran halted its nuclear weapons program"; as of June 2007 the intelligence agencies "assess with moderate confidence Tehran had not restarted its nuclear weapons program". Iran still poses a threat, being "technically capable of producing
and reprocessing enough plutonium for a weapon before about 2015," with "the scientific, technical and industrial capacity to produce nuclear weapons if it decides to do so." The pressure seems to have abated and this volte-face appears to be an apparent triumph for the diplomatic voices of Britain and Europe. Russia and China will use this revision as a justification for their caution and resist stricter sanctions. The hawks in the Bush administration have had their march to Tehran cancelled, temporarily, but will there be a rapprochement with the long standing foe? On the evidence of today's White House conference, this seems unlikely. Iran continues to antagonise America (and Israel) in a variety of ways. Any grand bargain now still implies acceptance of Iran's behaviour and this seems inconceivable given the rhetoric of recent months. A clearer understanding of the Bush administrations animosity and intransigence towards Iran is provided by the fact that this estimate was drafted one year previous. Verbal assaults have been used to discourage Iranian meddling in Iraq, maintain Bush's "war president" status, and scare Democrats from any dovish position, in the knowledge that the threat isn't that great. The intelligence agencies have shown their hand early to avoid a repeat of the Iraq war build up - where the inevitability of war shaped intelligence, not the reverse. A collision course between Iran and Bush is still a route, but the CIA, NSA or anyone of the other 14 agencies are not providing the map this time. When neocons like Robert Kagan - an intellectual architect of the Iraq war - advise the administration to talk to Iran, the game seems up, a new era of peace will surely be upon us! Unfortunately we have two radical unpredictable and ignorant leaders on either side, who are more than capable of snatching defeat from the jaws of an acceptable score draw.

Iran's leadership will react with predictable self-satisfaction. A role exists for the Gulf Arab states - having concluded the recent Gulf Co-operation Council meeting in Qatar - facing a diminished Iranian threat, as a possible bridge between the Great Satan and the Mad Mullahs. The Democrats are refocusing the domestic debate with diplomacy as the sole elixir, putting to bed neoconservative militarism. But Bush probably would have gone to war against Iraq with or without credible intel, and Iran - as the estimate does state - still has the capability to go nuclear, so Ayatollahs lounging on Texan ranches or George and Laura admiring the mosques of Qom are far off visions at the moment I'm afraid.