U.S. intelligence reconfirms Iran has no nuclear arms program
U.S. intelligence reconfirms that Iran has no nuclear weapons program, the new U.S. intelligence director Dennis Blair said in an annual threat assessment to Congress on Thursday.
The assessment essentially reaffirmed a 2007 intelligence report that at the time was widely seen as a setback to international efforts to put pressure on Iran to abandon its nuclear program.
Blair’s predecessor, retired admiral Mike McConnell, later said it had been a mistake to make public the key judgments of the intelligence assessment because it suggested Iran was not pursuing nuclear weapons.
Asked about it at a Senate hearing, Blair acknowledged it was a difficult question to deal with in a public setting.
“I can say at this point that Iran is clearly developing all the components of a deliverable nuclear weapons program -- fissionable material, nuclear weaponizing capability and the means to deliver it,” he said.
“Whether they take it all the way to nuclear weapons and become a nuclear power will depend a great deal on their own internal decisions,” AFP quoted him as saying.
The assessment comes at a time when the new U.S. administration and Tehran appear to be in a diplomatic dance over whether and how to engage in direct dialogue.
Asked about Iran’s launch last week of a domestically manufactured satellite into orbit, Blair said it demonstrated that the Iranians are mastering multi-stage missile technology that could be used for either peaceful or military purposes.
“If they put resources on it, they can make a serious missile force,” he said. Blair said the United States should not count on a change in policy in Iran even if President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is turned out of office in June presidential elections.
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