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Posted By Josh Rogin
Thursday, January 19, 2012 - 6:28 PM
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President George W. Bush's administration concluded that a military strike on Iran's nuclear facilities would be a bad idea -- and would only make it harder to prevent Iran from going nuclear in the future, former CIA and National Security Agency (NSA) chief Gen. Michael Hayden said Thursday.
"When we talked about this in the government, the consensus was that [attacking Iran] would guarantee that which we are trying to prevent -- an Iran that will spare nothing to build a nuclear weapon and that would build it in secret," Hayden told a small group of experts and reporters at an event hosted by the Center for the National Interest.
Hayden served as director of the NSA from 1999 to 2005 and then served as CIA director from 2006 until February 2009. He also had a 39-year career at the Air Force, which he ended as a four-star general.
Without an actual occupation of Iran, which nobody wants to contemplate, the Bush administration concluded that the result of a limited military campaign in Iran would be counter-productive, according to Hayden.
"What's move two, three, four or five down the board?" Hayden said, arguing that an attack on Iran's nuclear facilities was only a short-term fix. "I don't think anyone is talking about occupying anything."
Hayden then said he didn't believe the Israelis could or even would strike Iran -- that only the United States has the capability to do it -- but either way, it's still a bad idea.
"The Israelis aren't going to [attack Iran] ... they can't do it, it's beyond their capacity. They only have the ability to make this [problem of Iran's nuclear program] worse. We can do a lot better," he said. "Just look at the physics, the fact that this cannot be done in a raid, this has to be done in a campaign, the fact that neither we nor they know where this stuff is. [The Israelis] can't do it, but we can."
Hayden then went into some detail about how a U.S.-led strike on Iran's nuclear facilities could be accomplished, and why it would not solve the Iranian nuclear threat. There would first be a movement of aircraft carriers into the area, Tomahawk land-attack cruise missile strikes, a diplomatic effort to get Gulf states to give access to their airspace, and "then you would pound it [with airstrikes] over a couple of weeks," Hayden explained.
But he also said that efforts to slow down the nuclear program, through mostly clandestine measures and encouraging internal dissent, is the better course of action.
"Could we go back to July 2009 and see where that could have led?" he said, referring to the Green Movement protests that raged through Iran then but ultimately failed to alter the regime's course. "It's not so much that we don't want Iran to have a nuclear capacity, it's that we don't want this Iran to have it ... Slow it down long enough and maybe the character [of the Iranian government] changes."
Hayden's comments track closely with the argument made by Colin Kahl, the recently departed head of Middle East policy at the Pentagon, who opposed a military strike on Iran in an article this week in Foreign Affairs.
"Even if a U.S. strike went as well ... there is little guarantee that it would produce lasting results," Kahl wrote. "[I]f Iran did attempt to restart its nuclear program after an attack, it would be much more difficult for the United States to stop it."
A DELAY IS GOOD ENOUGH FOR NOW
If u need to do it again in a few yrs then thats what u have to do....iran is to blame...not the rest of the world....they created this....
A war of aggression every few years!
Hey, yeah, sure, that's the Israeli way.
You can try selling tickets to the event but, so sorry Timing, you'll have to don your IDF uniform and do it all on your own.
Just don't come cryin' to us if you end up with your arse handed to you on a plate.....
A simple way out of Iran's nuclear impasse
For the willing; the solution to Iran's nuclear impasse is simple:
1- US and Russia create an international bank for Low Enriched Uranium (LEU).
2- Iran is allowed to produce as much LEU as it desires on the condition that it sells its stock of LEU in excess of one ton to the LEU-bank.
3- Iran is guaranteed unlimited purchase of LEU fuel-rods for its nuclear power stations and research reactors.
The above formula should satisfy both the West and Iran:
Iran will continue its pursuit of nuclear technology for peaceful purposes unhindered; and at no point in time will have enough LEU to enrich further to build a bomb.
Such a plan would defuse tensions, show that Iran is making good faith efforts towards peaceful nuclear power and make it impossible to take Iran's belligerent rhetoric seriously.
Its too sensible!
Plus it doesn't give the Iranian government an excuse to unnecessarily escalate the situation. They don't want that! This has all been about creating a minor conflict for its own sake. Iran needs to have a real outside enemy or people will start looking at the foibles of their government.
It's also remarkably like the deal that Brazil and Turkey cut with Iran AT THE BEHEST OF OBAMA.
And the moment that Brazil and Turkey rang the White House and told the President that the Iranians had agreed then Obama scuppered that deal, and told them both to go home.
If ignorance is bliss, you must be one happy camper.
Leon Panetta admitted they are not buildign nukes, so what is it they created?
Time to move on dude,
Your wingnut conspiracy theories are boring and no one but you agrees with them.
>> Its too sensible!
No it's jkust too incovenient for Israel, who want war.
>> Plus it doesn't give the Iranian government an excuse to unnecessarily escalate the situation. They don't want that!
Escalte what situation? Iran has not attacked rorinavded anyone in 270 years, so what are they waiting for?
>> Iran needs to have a real outside enemy or people will start looking at the foibles of their government.
Yo muct be confusing Iran with Israel, in which case, you would be right.
You are correct they haven't invaded anyone for a while. Instead they use their prozy group Hezboallah to do their dirty work. What has Hexbollah done?
Hezbollah and its affiliates have planned or been linked to a lengthy series of terrorist attacks against the United States, Israel, and other Western targets. These attacks include:
a series of kidnappings of Westerners in Lebanon, including several Americans, in the 1980s;
the suicide truck bombings that killed more than two hundred U.S. Marines at their barracks in Beirut, Lebanon, in 1983;
the 1985 hijacking of TWA flight 847, which featured the famous footage of the plane's pilot leaning out of the cockpit with a gun to his head;
two major 1990s attacks on Jewish targets in Argentina--the 1992 bombing of the Israeli Embassy (killing twenty-nine) and the 1994 bombing of a Jewish community center (killing ninety-five).
a July 2006 raid on a border post in northern Israel in which two Israeli soldiers were taken captive. The abductions sparked an Israeli military campaign against Lebanon to which Hezbollah responded by firing rockets across the Lebanese border into Israel.
While Hezbollah has not claimed responsibility for any major international attacks since 2006, the group's weapons stockpile has increased and and its capabilities have strengthened. In November 2009, Israeli athorities intercepted a ship (TIME) carrying more than three thousand Iranian-made rockets and mortars which they believed were bound for Hezbollah. In April 2010, Israeli and U.S. officials also claimed that Syria transfered SCUD missiles (WSJ) to Hezbollah. On July 14, 2010, Naim Qassem, Hezbollah's second-in-command, said the group possesses an extensive list of Israeli targets (AFP) should a new conflict with Israel begin.
The word Isolationism has become a " Dirty Word ." While it's true we had to get into WWll and maybe even waited a little too long to do so, that really was the last conflict into which we should have forced our way. It's been said ad-Nauseum, that we have become the Policemen of the World without the thanks of the World but in return have earned it's disdain. And our reward ? Trillions in debt not only from other causes, but the vast amount spent to wage these Wars , not only in Money, but in the American Lives lost in our Quest to make every other Nation a Democracy. Not only don't most want to be a Democracy, but most are content with what they have . And do we benefit those who have been killing each other for centuries by sticking our noses into their affairs ?
After all, if we have thrown away our Republic long ago, and want to foist Democracy upon others , shouldn't we be the models for it's acceptance ? We are now offering the Flags to be Saluted to be : A nation overwhelmed with Pornography , Same-Sex Marriage , Accepted Homosexuality in the Private Sector as well as our Military , Abortion , and Contraception , even now the bane of China who sees the folly of it all. " Let He who is without sin, cast the first stone "
I wanted to write a reply to this inane comment...
but couldn't because I was overwhelmed by pornography, same sex marriage, and accepted homosexuality in the private sector.
Another fun observation: I did not realize that all those people who protested for varying levels of democracy and governmental transparency in the Middle East, Russia, China, and North Africa were "content with what they have?" Odd way to show how content they are.
Every war on this world is started by usa.
One has to wonder at the naivety of accepting the results of any opinion poll in fashion wholesaleEvery phone, email, Facebook account and conversation is liable to be bugged.
Obama's CIA Director, who was once's Bush's fair-haired CelebuGen in Iraq, should listen to Bush's CIA Director. Hayden has experience and perspective. He is not as self-serving as David Petraeus, who has long eyed Iran in terms of military options. Would be better for U.S. security if Petraeus returned to polishing his image via his press releases and his contacts with fawning media. (NPR ran a CIA story today, so maybe he's doing this.) He's less dangerous when he's thinking more about himself and the presidency for 2016.
John Hudson reports on national security and foreign policy from the Pentagon to Foggy Bottom, the White House to Embassy Row, for The Cable.
May/June 2013
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