Marc Abear: What did Tulsi Gabbard’s Iran assessment really mean?

To The Daily Sun,

In March, Tulsi Gabbard testified before the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, “The IC [intelligence community] continues to assess that Iran is not building a nuclear weapon and Supreme Leader Khomeini has not authorized the nuclear weapons program that he suspended in 2003.”

The media is asserting Gabbard’s statement to Congress in March indicates a “clear divergence” between the president’s views and those of his director of National Intelligence. We have to be careful in reading media reports. What they say we should infer is too often political slant, not reporting. Here’s why we know this to be true.

Gabbard gave that public statement to the House Intelligence Committee. It was not a statement of her own assessment of the situation; rather, it was a reiteration of the assessment of the intelligence community’s she had inherited. There has been significant changeover in personnel since that point.

One might ask: Why were the personnel changes felt to be necessary? We might ask: Is Gabbard’s position aligned with that of the IC she inherited leadership of? Were changes in the IC because she found shortcomings? What were those shortcomings?

Both statements, Donald Trump’s and Gabbard’s, are on the record. Trump’s position has historically been Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon. Gabbard is not on the record recently stating her position with respect to Iranian fissile material enrichment.

The IAEA, the international nuclear watchdog, has consistently and repeatedly reported Iran is enriching uranium to levels beyond what is required for electric power generation. One does not need a nuclear fuel enrichment site built under a mountain such as Fordow if it doesn’t need protection from enemy attack. Nobody is attacking electric power plants. Iran’s enemies might want to destroy a nuclear weapons production and storage facility.

Marc Abear

Meredith