The wrong-headed NIE

Dennis Ross on the public roll-out of the NIE on Iran...

Once again, one sees irony. The subtext of the NIE is that the Iranian leadership makes its decisions on a "cost-benefit approach"--and that the nuclear weapons program "probably was halted primarily in response to international pressure." But the way the NIE has framed the issue, it will now be harder to apply the very pressure it concludes worked in 2003.

One can criticize the intelligence community for framing the NIE around the wrong issue, but the intelligence community was not responsible for the public roll-out of its estimate. President Bush and those around him made the decision to publicize it--after all, NIEs are not typically publicized. No doubt, the president and his advisors understood that once the NIE was briefed to the congressional oversight committees on the Hill that its findings would leak, and they wanted to get out in front of the leaks.

Fair enough. Unfortunately, their presentation was not only poor in terms of framing, but also because it blindsided our allies. The British, French, and Germans have led the diplomatic efforts at the U.N. and in the E.U. on Iran; it was important for them not to be exposed on this issue since each country's population holds such grave doubts about anything the Bush Administration portrays as threat. How could we not go to them in advance of the release of the NIE, explain the key judgments, and work out a common public approach? Had there been such coordination on the public message, it is hard to believe that the public presentation of the findings would not have been better presented--leaving all of us better positioned today.

Sadly, it's now easier for Iran to proceed unimpeded with its nuclear plans. It is far less likely to face the economic (or potentially military) pressures that in 2003 might have persuaded those in the Iranian leadership that the costs of developing their nuclear capabilities were too high. Who in the Iranian elite will argue that or oppose Ahmadinejad's approach to nukes now? No doubt, that is not what the authors of the NIE sought, but here poor statecraft has trumped our improved efforts at spycraft.