CNN's Sesno asserted Iran is "still proceeding" with highly enriched uranium processing -- not according to NIE
SUMMARY: In CNN's investigative report, Iran: Fact & Fiction, Frank Sesno said that Iran's nuclear "weaponizing program" has "apparently ... stopped," but that Iran is "still proceeding with" its development of highly enriched uranium. However, the most recent National Intelligence Estimate noted that "Iran's civilian uranium enrichment program is continuing," not that Iran is currently processing highly enriched uranium. And in its report, the International Atomic Energy Agency stated that from "samples taken by the Agency from cascade components and related equipment" in Iran, it has found, so far, only uranium enrichment consistent with a civilian nuclear program.
After reportedly shelving its speculative documentary, We Were Warned -- Iran Goes Nuclear, because of the recently released National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) conclusion that Iran halted its nuclear weapons program in 2003, on December 8, CNN instead aired Iran: Fact & Fiction, a "CNN: Special Investigations Unit" report, narrated by CNN anchor Campbell Brown. During the report, special correspondent Frank Sesno said that Iran's nuclear "weaponizing program" has "apparently ... stopped" -- an apparent reference to the Iran NIE -- but added that Iran is "still proceeding with" its development of highly enriched uranium (HEU). However, the NIE noted that "Iran's civilian uranium enrichment program is continuing," not that Iran is currently processing highly enriched uranium. Moreover, in the most recent report (November 15) on Iran's nuclear program, International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) director general Mohamed ElBaradei stated that "from the environmental samples taken by the Agency from cascade components and related equipment" in Iran, the IAEA has found, so far, only uranium enrichment consistent with a civilian nuclear program.
To produce a nuclear weapon, uranium must contain 85-90 percent or more of the isotope uranium-235 (U-235). The term, "highly enriched uranium," refers to uranium containing 20 percent or more U-235. Low-enriched uranium, which contains less than 20 percent U-235, is used in civilian nuclear programs for power reactors. While ElBaradei's November 15 report stated that the IAEA "is not in a position to provide credible assurances about the absence of undeclared nuclear material and activities in Iran," it also stated that "the highest U-235 enrichment measured so far from the environmental samples taken by the Agency from cascade components and related equipment [in Iran] is 4.0 [percent]."
During the report, Sesno claimed Israel is "not wrong" to threaten military action if Iran does not stop its enrichment program, because "you need three things to make a nuclear bomb a real threat: One, you need the weaponizing program. That's what apparently Iran has stopped. Two, you need the highly enriched uranium. They're still proceeding with that. And three, you need a missile or some way to deliver it. They're still working with that." However, according to the most recent NIE, Iran halted its nuclear weapons program in 2003 and currently does not have the technical capabilities to produce enough highly enriched uranium for a nuclear weapon. From the report's "key judgments":
- 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 [State Department Bureau of Intelligence and Research] judges Iran is unlikely to achieve this capability before 2013 because of foreseeable technical and programmatic problems.)
The NIE also stated with "moderate confidence" that Iran "would use covert facilities" to enrich uranium to a high level of U-235 but 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." From the report's "key judgments":
- 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.
Variety magazine reported that CNN aired Iran: Fact & Fiction after "postpon[ing]" We Were Warned, because of the conclusions in the latest NIE. According to Variety, "[t]he two-hour spec, which was slated for Dec. 12 under the 'CNN Presents' banner, was 'set partially in the future,' featuring a what-if scenario as former government officials -- playing fictional cabinet members -- debate how to deal with the Iranian threat." Variety quoted CNN vice president and senior executive producer Mark Nelson's claim that We Were Warned was "based on a different set of rules and a different set of conditions" and that the NIE "changed everything."
From the December 8 broadcast of the "CNN: Special Investigations Unit" report, Iran: Fact & Fiction:
BROWN: But you're getting a very hard-line position from every -- the Bush administration -- we talked about that obviously -- but also Israel, a predictable reaction, saying they give up enrichment or face military action.
SESNO: And guess what? They're not wrong. I mean, you need three things to make a nuclear bomb a real threat: One, you need the weaponizing program. That's what apparently Iran has stopped. Two, you need the highly enriched uranium. They're still proceeding with that. And three, you need a missile or some way to deliver it. They're still working with that.
So, it's not exactly as if the Iranians have said, "Oh, never mind. We're going to join the community of nations. We didn't mean all this." It's still out there and because of these suspicions and this distrust that's so deep, it's going to take an enormous amount of work to get past that and to get past the threat.
BROWN: Trita Parsi [president of National Iranian American Council] and Frank Sesno, thanks.
Once again, we can't let the facts get in the way of a good story.
Senos should have begun his report that he is "moderately" confident that Iran is "still proceeding with" its development of highly enriched uranium (HEU).
After all the NIE judges with moderate confidence that Iran could have enough HEU by 2009 at the earliest... And with the same moderate confidence thinks it is more probable in the 2010-2015 time frame.
Hmmm... For all you nuclear experts out there, I have a question. Even though the IEA has found only enriched uranium at the 4% level, can't the Iranians keep refining it till it gets to the 90-95% level?
oops IEA should be IAEA. Sorry for the confusion.
AA:
Good point - I don't think we can afford to give Iran a pass on enriching uranium at all.
Iran, IAEA in new talks to clear nuclear doubtsMon Dec 10, 2007 8:09am ESTIran and the U.N. body agreed in August on a timetable to answer outstanding questions about nuclear activities which Tehran says are aimed at generating electricity.
Previous rounds of talks dealt with centrifuges used to enrich uranium and other issues. The new talks are expected to focus on questions about particles of arms-grade enriched uranium found by IAEA inspectors at Tehran's Technical University.
"The talks will be focused on the source of contamination," the report said without elaborating.
Enriched uranium can be used both for fuelling power plants and, if refined much further, for making bombs. But Iran says it wants to refine uranium only as an alternative source of electricity so it can export more of its oil and gas.
The IAEA said in a report last month Tehran was cooperating but not proactively.
Signers of the non proliferation treaty have a RIGHT by international law to enrich uranium for use in power generation. I dont see what right we could POSSIBLY claim to stop them from doing so.
How about the right to common sense?
Do you have a "common sense " plan to stop them that doesn't include another war?
What about Pakistan?
In what way is it common sense to tell them they have no right to enrich uranium for powerplants at the same time WE are saying we are going to build a whole new generation of more USEABLE nuclear WEAPONS? Why does some appeal to common sense give us the right to hold others to standards we would NEVER accept for ourselves?
They could, which is why they need to agree to have IAEA observers in their sites regularly to ensure that they are not enriching weapons-grade uranium.
There is, however, no treaty or sanction anywhere that states that Iran is not allowed to enrich Uranium at levels used for energy.
On a side note, this is, in my opinion, another perfect reason why it is in our best interest to create marketable, efficient alternative energy technology. If we had a legitimate alternative to fossil fuels and to nuclear power, we could push for developing countries to stop using dirty coal plants, and we could push for the abandonment of nuclear energy. That would eliminate the need for us to constantly look over the shoulder of countries like Iran to see what they are doing with their uranium. In other words, they would lose their energy argument that seems to be so common lately.
>>After all the NIE judges with moderate confidence that Iran could have enough HEU by 2009 at the earliest.
Please read more carefully. The report states "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."
That is much different from what you said. Being technically capable of enriching uranium is much different from saying they could have enough.
>>Even though the IEA has found only enriched uranium at the 4% level, can't the Iranians keep refining it till it gets to the 90-95% level?
Not without getting caught. A nuclear reactor itself cannot produced enriched uranium for bombs. It is much more difficult to get uranium enriched for bombs.
They can but if we are looking it is virtually impossible to hide. That is how we caught North Korea.
Come on now Eddie, it did say "Fact & Fiction" Light on the former, heavy on the latter.
Based on the language used, it's pretty clear that Sesno doesn't have the first damn idea what he's talking about. "Weaponizing" is intended as a catch-all phrase but is similar to the term "yellowcake". Both mean virtually nothing without context, but they sound really sinister, and serve the political goal of maintaining fear factor amongst the sheeple.
There are so many things wrong with the Iran situation, from how we're interacting with them.
1st, even if Iran goes nuclear, they can't reach the US, and we'd turn their country into a big glowing diamond if they shot one at our troops.
2nd, Israel is an ally, but we don't have to fight all our allies' fights for them, so we can let Israel deal with it.
3rd, if the Iranians really are funding/supplying insurgents in Iraq and we catch them in the act, there's no issue blowing the heck out of a few weapons caravans close the border that we know are going right to Al-Sadr. We don't need to justify that to the UN or occupy/nationbuild if we just do that.
Iran is not a threat to the United States
Crumbuling infastructure, healthcare issues and economic unfairness are threats to the United States.
Oh but DORISRUSSELL, war games are much more fun.
Doris,
Forgive me for going off topic. What do you mean by economic unfairness?
The divide between rich and poor, the crumbling mortgage crisis, I did not want to get off topic , sorry.
Yes Doris, while I'm no AA in my socioeconomic beliefs, pray tell what you mean by "economic unfairness."
Don't you know that if you say ANYTHING negative about this country you're going to have all the righties in here jump on you like flies on s...? - At least as long as the Republican administration is in office.
Mark my words - 15 months from now when the Democras are in control of the White House, these same unconditionally loyal "patriots" will find plenty of things wrong - and it will all be the Democrats fault. I can hardly wait to call them anti-American communist traitors for daring to speak out.
For now, as long as they have health insurance, think they can ignore the underprivilaged or struggling working class beacuse they "gave at church", and the bridges they cross don't crumble - you should just shut your piehole or move to another country.
Doris, I have to chime in, too. Crumbling infrastructure where?
Well the Minnesota bridges, our aging airport system, our undefended ports. Our old roads.
http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2005-03-09-infrastructure_x.htm
A report by the American Society of Civil Engineers released Wednesday assessed the four-year trend in the condition of 12 categories of infrastructure, including roadways, bridges, drinking water systems, public parks, railroads and the power grid.
The overall grade slipped from the D-plus given to the infrastructure in 2001 and 2003.
One bridge in Minnesota goes belly up and all of a sudden our entire infrastructure is collapsing? The bridge in question was 40 years old. It lived through a bunch of different party regimes, but somehow now Bush is to blame.I blame W for alot, but the fact that a bridge collapsed is not one of them. Katrina is another.
Did you read the link I provided? It doesn't base its claim on one bridge.
The infrastructure has been crumbling for years, and not just under Bush. We have needed new bridges for decades, but we don't address that problem.
Dave
The bridge is not Bushs fault, and I do not think anyone suggested it. It is a fact though that our roads are in disrepair.
link For hazardous waste, federal funding for cleanup of the nation's worst toxic waste sites has steadily decreased since 1998, reaching its lowest level since 1986 in fiscal year 2005. There are 1,237 contaminated sites on the National Priorities List, with a possible addition of 10,154. In 2003, there were 205 cities with "brownfields" sites awaiting cleanup that would generate an estimated 576,373 jobs and $1.9 million annually if redeveloped. For three categories - bridges, dams and solid waste, the grades remained the same as in 2001. Bridges received a C grade again. Between 2000 and 2003, the percentage of the nation's 590,750 bridges rated structurally deficient or functionally obsolete decreased slightly from 28.5 percent to 27.1 percent. However, one in three urban bridges was classified as structurally deficient or functionally obsolete, much higher than the national average. It will cost $9.4 billion a year for 20 years to eliminate all bridge deficiencies and long-term underinvestment is compounded by the lack of a federal transportation program.
You can't blame Dave. With all that sand surrounding his head, it's hard to see what's going on around him.
So NOW Media Matters trusts the NIE. It figures you would do that when the NIE matches your liberal ideology of supporting the Iranian regime.
Please show an instant where MMFA has questioned NIE unfairly.
How did you go from "So NOW Media Matters trusts the NIE" to " NIE matches your liberal ideology of supporting the Iranian regime" ?????.
If you don't get up every morning and say 5 times that Iran is the evilest regime ever, then you must be supporting it. Likewise, if you happen to tell the truth about Iran, then you are also supporting that regime.
you are too funny.............
Now Hotwings believes that MediaMatters believes in something but has no facts to support it.. It fits RIGHT in with the lunacy ideology of the MediaMatters haters. Damn MMFA always printing exact transscripts. Damn you again.
HotWings, you are wrong.
Yeah but I like his moniker Hot Wings.
I'm so hungry ;-)
I prefer chicken faces.
HW,
I know I shouldn't probably take you seriously, but here is my reason to perhaps trust the NIE.
With this President, we have erred on the side of War/worst-case scenario. Bush warned us that if we did not invade Iraq we might find a "mushroom cloud" in one of our cities. Now, I can't exactly recall what the NIE said then, but I am guessing it had something to do with WMDs.
This time, a country that Bush warned us might be involved in a potential WWIII (he didn't say we were in it, but said that if we were interested in preventing it, we should care about their nuclear program). Bush has warned us constantly about the threat Iran poses over and over again. Since his intelligence people have consistently gone with the idea that threats are large and now they say no immediate threat, I am more inclined to believe them this time because if the threat was what Bush had said it was, I would assume that the NIE would have magnified it. Make sense?
So NOW Hotwings doesn't trust the NIE. It figures you wouldn't do that when the NIE doesn't match you war loving ideology of starting wars and killing without thought.
Another mindless rant from a psychophantic propaganda parrot. The 02 NIE had contradictory data and analysis from different agencies. The State Depts intelligence arm didnt agree with the CIAs. This one is unanimous.
Iran IS still enriching uranium, according to western European and Israel intelligence agencies.
The career leftist morons at the CIA were duped by the Iranians.
Stupid hippie leftist CIA agents! Maybe if they took a break from their "pot parties" and Strawberry Alarm Clock concerts and did some work, they wouldn't have been fooled.
Heh. "Falcon and the Snowman" starring Sean Penn. Go rent it.
"Career leftist morons at the CIA?!?!?!" Quote of the year! Care to give examples?
You are FAR too stupid to be talking about anyone elses intellectual capacity. Yours is near ZERO. Your ignorance is mildly amusing and YES Iran is enriching uranium, we have no evidence that they are enriching it to the highly refined state necessary to use for weapons. Neither Israel or the other sabre rattlers have produced any evidence to support their claims. When they do we will listen. YOU are far too stupid to have credibility on what day of the week it is.
Stranger and stranger... Your first sentence is correct, if you add the NIE to your list: perhaps you should read the rest of the article. Your second is .. well .. strange, Stranger, did you mean the loony leftist pot-smoking morons who said Saddam's WMDs were a slam dunk?
That said, this NIE's wording is abominable -- even if Bush wanted to negotiate (yeah, right) he wouldn't have a leg to stand on now -- he can only "stay the course", as it were, with his BS and bluster.
Facts won't stop a preplanned conclusion. Just remember, Bush once claimed Saddam's lack of WMD was proof he was hiding something.