HUH?:

Pssst: Some Hope for Spycraft (TIM WEINER, 12/09/07, NY Times)

In a new National Intelligence Estimate, analysts found that Iran had suspended its covert nuclear weapons program back in 2003. But that was not the biggest surprise. The head-swiveling reversal was based less on surmise than on seemingly sound intelligence — a sign that American spycraft might be working.

After years of struggle, it looked as if American intelligence had learned important lessons from its disastrous mistakes.

If so, the world could be a safer place, for now.

Why would the United States start a war to stop a weapons-of-mass-destruction program that had been placed on hold? Been there, done that. American spies and analysts conjured up phantom Iraqi weapons programs in 2002; the nation went to war largely on the basis of that bad intelligence. And yet, according to the new analysis, American intelligence seems to have erred in much the same way in 2005, assuming Iran’s nuclear bomb was still in the works when it was not.

But last week’s about-face showed that the analysts are unlikely to make the same mistake thrice. Why? Because American intelligence is now asking itself: How do we know what we know?

The nation paid a terrible price for failing to do that about Iraq five years ago.

Not only is liberal angst a small price to pay for liberating 20 million people, but if Mr. Weiner believes the intelligence he's reporting then it would be hard to argue that the good news he's celebrating is unrelated to that small price.

Posted by Orrin Judd at December 10, 2007 6:56 AM