How to sell a war
Seeing the right-wing hacks already eagerly pushing military action against Iran is disturbing. Especially since it's being done in the same way they sold Iraq-- fear and misrepresenting the intelligence.
Behold Matt Drudge's headline:
Iran 'Could Produce Nuclear Bomb in 16 Days'
There's one very significant problem with this assessment-- Iran would need 54,000 centrifuges to reach that rate of production. They have fewer than 200.
While Iran claims they fully intend to acquire the other 53,800 centrifuges, the estimates that it will be five to ten years before Iran has enough weapons-grade uranium to produce one atomic weapon take that into account. But a headline screaming "Iran could produce nuclear bomb in five years and sixteen days" just isn't as scary.
UPDATE: I probably should have pointed out from the start that the man making the '16 days' claim is Assistant Secretary of State Stephen Rademaker. He's already drawing some scrutiny on the blogs for his rhetoric on Iran, and I came across an online State Department Q&A he's done dealing largely with Iran.
The measured tone of his responses is a pretty stark contrast to the urgency he expresses today. It's all about bilateralism, UN involvement, and resolution through diplomacy. Yet he always adds a caveat about the grave consequences of an uncooperative Iranian regime. It will all sound eerily familiar to those who recall the president's rhetoric prior to Iraq, and the insistence that he didn't want to invade, but was left with no choice. Yet a mountain of evidence has piled up that he wanted to invade in a bad way, and was ready to trick Iraq and the UN to get his justification.
Bill Scher has written a brief piece at HuffPost pointing out a few ways in which the administration is already making misleading claims about their dealings with Iran, and Rademaker is right at their side. While I don't know much about him, he does appear to be a loyal Bushie. And that doesn't say much for his credibility on the issue.
Behold Matt Drudge's headline:
Iran 'Could Produce Nuclear Bomb in 16 Days'
There's one very significant problem with this assessment-- Iran would need 54,000 centrifuges to reach that rate of production. They have fewer than 200.
While Iran claims they fully intend to acquire the other 53,800 centrifuges, the estimates that it will be five to ten years before Iran has enough weapons-grade uranium to produce one atomic weapon take that into account. But a headline screaming "Iran could produce nuclear bomb in five years and sixteen days" just isn't as scary.
UPDATE: I probably should have pointed out from the start that the man making the '16 days' claim is Assistant Secretary of State Stephen Rademaker. He's already drawing some scrutiny on the blogs for his rhetoric on Iran, and I came across an online State Department Q&A he's done dealing largely with Iran.
The measured tone of his responses is a pretty stark contrast to the urgency he expresses today. It's all about bilateralism, UN involvement, and resolution through diplomacy. Yet he always adds a caveat about the grave consequences of an uncooperative Iranian regime. It will all sound eerily familiar to those who recall the president's rhetoric prior to Iraq, and the insistence that he didn't want to invade, but was left with no choice. Yet a mountain of evidence has piled up that he wanted to invade in a bad way, and was ready to trick Iraq and the UN to get his justification.
Bill Scher has written a brief piece at HuffPost pointing out a few ways in which the administration is already making misleading claims about their dealings with Iran, and Rademaker is right at their side. While I don't know much about him, he does appear to be a loyal Bushie. And that doesn't say much for his credibility on the issue.
posted by Matt Sandwich | 9:00 AM
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