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Just Out: Iran Red Lines: A parade of high level Israeli officials are on their way to the White House over the next two weeks to discuss Iran policy. The two countries differ over what to do next.
While the Israeli government considers the Bush administration highly sympathetic and sensitive to its security concerns, there are growing signs that Washington and Jerusalem may be diverging in their analysis of the urgency of the threat posed by Iran’s nuclear program and its defensive military preparations for countering a possible strike, and their subsequent prospective timelines for considering possible military action against Iran. While Israeli national security experts say that Israel would not act without coordinating with the US, and there are other significant factors weighing against prospective Israeli military action on Iran before the Bush term ends, there are also emerging differences between the US and Israel on the accepted intelligence over when Iran would be considered to have a nuclear breakthrough, as well as what would constitute a “redline” that would prompt military action, Washington analysts say. In addition, the US, unlike Israel, feels more deeply constrained by the considerable investment it has made in blood and treasure in stabilizing Iraq, which could be risked by the tumult that could follow military action on Iran.Go read the rest. More from the Forward.“My sense is the Pentagon would be worried or opposed to an Israeli attack,” says David Wurmser, former Middle East advisor to Vice President Dick Cheney, who left the White House job late last summer. “They are afraid it would inflame the situation in Iraq, which could undermine the US position there.
“Ultimately, my gut tells me that most of the administration on most levels would push back very hard,” on Israeli pressure on Washington to authorize it to strike Iran, Wurmser added. “What those in the administration who don’t want Israel to act probably won’t want is for it to be taken to the highest level. They would always be afraid that [the president] might not be so tough on the Israelis. If the Israeli [government] really intends to do something, they would go to the highest level without a lot of people knowing.”
Last week, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Adm. Michael Mullen visited Israel, during which Mullen is reported to have told Israeli leaders that, speaking for the highest levels of the Bush administration, they did not have a green light from Washington for military action on Iran. Now, Mother Jones has learned, a parade of senior Israeli government officials is making its way to Washington over the coming two weeks, to discuss the Iran issue with top Bush administration officials. Among those scheduled to arrive, Mother Jones has confirmed with Israeli sources in Washington and Israel: Israeli defense minister Ehud Barak, who departs Israel Monday for meetings in Washington with President Bush, Vice President Cheney, and Pentagon officials; and the Israeli Defense Forces chief of staff Gabi Ashkenazi, who comes the following week on his first visit to Washington in that position. A former Pentagon intelligence official who spoke with Mother Jones also alleges that Meir Dagan, the chief of the Israeli intelligence service the Mossad, held secret meetings with officials in the White House on Wednesday. Neither the Israeli embassy or National Security Council would comment on whether Dagan had been at the White House.
US sources who did not wish to be identified describe a disagreement between the US and Israeli intelligence communities over the timetable of Iran’s alleged weaponization and research and development efforts. [...]
Robert Gallucci, a former longtime State Department non proliferation expert who now serves as dean of Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service, said a recent consultation with US government scientists persuaded him that Iran is not likely to have significant nuclear breakout capability for about five years."The test is when Iran could plausibly accumulate significant quantities of highly enriched uranium or plutonium so you have to worry about not only nuclear weapons development, but also the possible threat of transfer to a terrorist organization," Gallucci said Friday.
"I came away [from recent consultations with government scientists] believing that is actually some distance away in time – beyond five years," Gallucci said.
Gallucci said he was talking about when Iran could conceivably produce five or ten or more nuclear weapons (Iran denies it is seeking a nuclear weapons capability at all, and the 2007 US NIE concluded that Iran had halted its weaponization program in 2003). Are Israel's threat assessments based on the projection of when Iran could produce one nuclear weapon? "I tend to want to answer that and say there are two ways to come up with a difference [between US and Israeli assessments]. Technically, Israel and the US could have a different assessment of the obstacles that the Iranians might run into and how quickly they could overcome them."
"There could also be a tolerance [difference]," Gallucci said. "We're prepared to say, 'It's unlikely they could do this in this amount of time.' The Israelis could be saying, 'Thank you very much, we're a little closer to the problem than you are.' American national security types are not certain of how quickly Iran could do it, but are just as uncertain about whether Iran would do it or not."