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December 03, 2007
Iran Halts Its Nuclear Program
FOX News Special Report With Brit Hume
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
STEPHEN HADLEY, NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISER: The intelligence community has high confidence that Iran halted its covert nuclear weapons program in the fall of 2003 and they had moderate confidence that it had not started that program again as of mid 2007.
SEN. HARRY REID, (D) MAJORITY LEADER: We should be having a surge of diplomacy with Iran, and based upon this, I think it would be a pretty good idea.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUME: And says Harry Reid, he was the one that called for this National Intelligence Estimate because he suspected the administration was making scary noises about Iran in order to take us into war.
Some thoughts about this from Fred Barnes, executive editor of "The Weekly Standard", Mort Kondracke, executive editor of "Roll Call" and the syndicated columnist Charles Krauthammer, Fox News contributors all.
Well, what to make of this? I mean, this, at first brush, this is about as good news as you could ask for. Iran has halted the program, it has been under intense pressures since and it doesn't sound like it could be very far along under any circumstances. What about it, Mort?
MORT KONDRACKE, "ROLL CALL": Well, yes, it stopped the program in 2003, we don't know for sure whether it has restarted it or not. There is less confidence about that than there was about the fact that they halted it. I think it undercuts the so-called neoconservative case for a bombing raid on Iran. I mean, I don't see how the president could possibly persuade anybody that we need to bomb out Iran's nuclear facilities, if that's what he decided to do, on the basis of the fact that they're not very far along.
On the other hand, we don't know whether they intend to start again. They are still trying to reprocess uranium. If they find out how to reprocess uranium, it's a short step from that to a nuclear program. So I think that the case for sanctions and inspections very strong.
FRED BARNES, "WEEKLY STANDARD": Certainly, look, Harry Reid must not have read the same report I did. He said he hasn't read it. Or seen the briefing by Steve Hadley.
HUME: He said he hadn't read it when he said that stuff.
BARNES: Well, look, this is not a case for diplomacy. That's not what worked. It wasn't diplomacy. He wants a surge in diplomacy, what they should be calling for is a surge in increased pressure economically and otherwise on the Iranians to stop the enrichment of uranium. It's clear what the Iranians are doing is trying to develop the capacity for a nuclear weapon even though they may not be pursuing weaponization at this moment, but they want to have the increased uranium, the enriched uranium, and they want to have the long ballistic missiles and so on they can at some point have a nuclear weapon.
CHARLES KRAUTHAMMER, SYNDICATED COLUMNIST: If you want to go nuclear, you have to have three things. You have to have the raw material, uranium enrichment, which Iran is doing at a high level. You have to have ballistic missiles to deliver the stuff at the end, which Iran is doing with alacrity and success, but you need a third element, which is to turn the raw material into a weapon which you then stick on the ballistic missile.
The third step is what the NIE is saying has now been halted four years ago, and is now remains halted.
HUME: As far as they know.
KRAUTHAMMER: As far as they know. The confidence in the halting is high, but the confidence in the non-resumption two years ago when the uranium enrichment was resumed is only moderate. Now, that means the news is good. I'm a believer in accepting good news unlike the Democrats, for whom good news on Iraq is bad news. Good news on Iran is good news for the whole country and I welcome it, and I think it's a reason to increase our pressure.
When you get a John Edwards arguing that this report means that he was right in imposing the economic sanctions on the Revolutionary Guards who are working on the nuclear stuff, he's exactly wrong. That's what has been working and that that's why it has to be continued and accelerated.
HUME: Charles, what impact will this report have on our allies whose cooperation would obviously be helpful in making further sanctions meaningful?
KRAUTHAMMER: It takes the military option off the table. There is no question in our minds and in theirs, but I think that it's something that may actually encourage the ones who are aren't serious, the French, the Germans and the British .
HUME: Really?
KRAUTHAMMER: Yes. I don't think it will encourage laxity. It will encourage strengthening this because the conclusion here is that the Iranians are acting rationally.
HUME: And in response to pressure.
And it also means, Mort, the other part of this report that I suppose is good news that it shows they are more subject to pressure short of military that anybody might have thought.
KONDRACKE: Apparently - they did. According to this report, they stopped their program in response to the initial pressure applied by the IAEA. And you're right except the Chinese and Russians will say, well, we got a lot of time so we don't have to be that insistent on sanctions.
HUME: When we come back, the margins narrow in the Democratic presidential race. We will see how Hillary Clinton is coping with what is now a serious challenge. We'll be back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
