SuN
.:~**~.~**~.~**~:.
So after all, the Israelis didn't launch a pirate, prejudice, Islam hunting attack on poor little syria.
Government Releases Images of Syrian Reactor
Written by CRNews, NYTimes, AP, US GOV
Friday, 25 April 2008
White House says Syria 'must come clean' about nuclear work
Government Releases Images of Syrian Reactor
By DAVID E. SANGER
April 25, 2008
WASHINGTON — The Bush administration released detailed photographic images on Thursday to support its assertion that the building in Syria that Israel destroyed in an airstrike last year was
a nuclear reactor constructed with years of help from North Korea.
The administration said it withheld the pictures for seven months out of fear that Syria could retaliate against Israel and start a broader war in the Middle East.
The photographs taken inside the reactor before it was destroyed in an air raid on Sept. 6 clearly show the rods that control the heat in a nuclear reactor, one of many close engineering similarities to a reactor halfway around the world where North Korea produced the fuel for its nuclear arsenal.
While the photographs were not dated, some taken on the ground seemed to go back to before 2002.
But after a full day of briefing members of Congress, two senior intelligence officials acknowledged that the evidence had left them with no more than “low confidence” that Syria was preparing to build a nuclear weapon. They said that there was no sign that Syria had built an operation to convert the spent fuel from the plant into weapons-grade plutonium, but that they had told President Bush last year that they could think of no other explanation for the reactor.
Among the photographs shown to members of Congress and reporters on Thursday was one of the manager of North Korea’s Yongbyon nuclear plant with the director of Syria’s nuclear agency. A car in the background has Syrian license plates.
When asked about North Korea’s motivation for the project, one of the senior intelligence officials said simply, “Cash.” He refused to say how much.
The revelation of the plant’s existence is not new; The New York Times reported in mid-October that Israel had brought the United States evidence that the Syrian building was a partly constructed reactor. But no more than a handful of lawmakers had ever been briefed on the attack.
A senior administration official, briefing reporters with the help of the two senior intelligence officials, said for the first time that the White House had extensive discussions with Israel before the airstrike in September. The official said the White House had raised the possibility of confronting Syria with a demand that it dismantle the reactor or face the possibility of an attack.
But that idea apparently never gained traction with the Israelis or some in the administration, and in the end, the official said, Israel cited satellite evidence to declare that the Syrian reactor constituted “an existential threat” to Israel because it might soon be ready for operation. The senior administration official, who was a central player in Mr. Bush’s deliberations, added that Israel’s attack proceeded “without a green light from us.”
“None was asked for, none was given,” the official added.
While one of the senior intelligence officials said that the United States agreed that Syria was “good to go” in turning on the reactor, it would have been years before it could have produced weapons fuel.
It is unclear how the Syrians planned to get the uranium they needed. Once they got it, the reactor would have had to run for roughly 18 months before the fuel was “cooked.” And then to turn it into weapons-grade plutonium, it would require reprocessing, presumably outside the country unless Syria found a way to build its own plant.
The announcement on Thursday closes one chapter of a secretive intelligence and military operation and opens several others that will play out over the remainder of the Bush presidency.
The crucial question now is how the North Koreans will react. Some officials said that they hoped the announcement would embarrass the North into admitting to nuclear proliferation activities, while others said it could prompt the North to walk away from the negotiating table — and collapse the deal Mr. Bush was hoping to reach by the end of his presidency. In return for North Korea’s declaration of all its nuclear activities, the United States would lift sanctions and begin to negotiate the North Koreans’ reward for turning over their fuel and weapons.
The announcement also raises the possibility of new tensions with Syria, as the White House on Thursday accused the Syrian government of a “cover-up” consistent with a government that “supports terrorism, takes action that destabilizes Lebanon” and allows militants to enter Iraq.
Last year, Mr. Bush ordered that knowledge of the Syrian project be limited to a few crucial officials, and he put the C.I.A. in charge of marshaling the assets of other intelligence agencies.
Still, the Americans were somewhat blindsided. By their own account, they suspected that North Korea and Syria were at work together in Syria, but only identified the plant at Al Kibar, named for the nearest town, after they received photos of the interior of the plant last spring from Israel, American and Israeli officials said last year.
Only selected pictures were released by the intelligence agencies on Thursday, including a video that combined still photos and drawings, and had a voice-over that gave the presentation the feel of a cold-war-era newsreel about the Korean War. In fact, it was intended in part, officials said, to try to draw that war — in which the United States and North Korea never signed a peace treaty — to a close.
But inside the administration, the battle over whether to try to strike a deal with North Korea or keep it under sanctions in hopes of setting off the collapse of its government continues into the last months of Mr. Bush’s term. Representative Peter Hoekstra, a Republican from Michigan, expressed annoyance on Thursday that the administration waited seven months to brief Congress.
“I think many people believe that we were used today by the administration,” he said.
At the C.I.A., Gen. Michael V. Hayden, the agency’s director, told employees on Thursday that they should “take heart because our team effort on the Al Kibar reactor is a case study in rigorous analytic tradecraft, skillful human and technical collection, and close collaboration.”
But even this victory, some experts note, raises questions about the agency’s focus. The reactor was built within 100 miles of the Iraqi border yet never identified even though the administration was searching for any form of such arms programs in Iraq.
Moreover, even some senior officials of the administration acknowledge that they are likely to leave Mr. Bush’s successor with a North Korea with roughly 10 nuclear weapons or fuel for weapons, up from the one or two weapons it had when Mr. Bush took office in 2001.
“I’d say the score is Kim Jong-il eight, and Bush zero,” said Graham Allison, a Harvard professor and author of “Nuclear Terrorism,” who was in Washington on Thursday to testify about Iran’s nuclear program. “And if you can build a reactor in Syria without being detected for eight years, how hard can it be to sell a little plutonium to Osama bin Laden?”
Government Releases Images of Syrian Reactor
Written by CRNews, NYTimes, AP, US GOV
Friday, 25 April 2008
White House says Syria 'must come clean' about nuclear work
Government Releases Images of Syrian Reactor
By DAVID E. SANGER
April 25, 2008
WASHINGTON — The Bush administration released detailed photographic images on Thursday to support its assertion that the building in Syria that Israel destroyed in an airstrike last year was
a nuclear reactor constructed with years of help from North Korea.
The administration said it withheld the pictures for seven months out of fear that Syria could retaliate against Israel and start a broader war in the Middle East.
The photographs taken inside the reactor before it was destroyed in an air raid on Sept. 6 clearly show the rods that control the heat in a nuclear reactor, one of many close engineering similarities to a reactor halfway around the world where North Korea produced the fuel for its nuclear arsenal.
While the photographs were not dated, some taken on the ground seemed to go back to before 2002.
But after a full day of briefing members of Congress, two senior intelligence officials acknowledged that the evidence had left them with no more than “low confidence” that Syria was preparing to build a nuclear weapon. They said that there was no sign that Syria had built an operation to convert the spent fuel from the plant into weapons-grade plutonium, but that they had told President Bush last year that they could think of no other explanation for the reactor.
Among the photographs shown to members of Congress and reporters on Thursday was one of the manager of North Korea’s Yongbyon nuclear plant with the director of Syria’s nuclear agency. A car in the background has Syrian license plates.
When asked about North Korea’s motivation for the project, one of the senior intelligence officials said simply, “Cash.” He refused to say how much.
The revelation of the plant’s existence is not new; The New York Times reported in mid-October that Israel had brought the United States evidence that the Syrian building was a partly constructed reactor. But no more than a handful of lawmakers had ever been briefed on the attack.
A senior administration official, briefing reporters with the help of the two senior intelligence officials, said for the first time that the White House had extensive discussions with Israel before the airstrike in September. The official said the White House had raised the possibility of confronting Syria with a demand that it dismantle the reactor or face the possibility of an attack.
But that idea apparently never gained traction with the Israelis or some in the administration, and in the end, the official said, Israel cited satellite evidence to declare that the Syrian reactor constituted “an existential threat” to Israel because it might soon be ready for operation. The senior administration official, who was a central player in Mr. Bush’s deliberations, added that Israel’s attack proceeded “without a green light from us.”
“None was asked for, none was given,” the official added.
While one of the senior intelligence officials said that the United States agreed that Syria was “good to go” in turning on the reactor, it would have been years before it could have produced weapons fuel.
It is unclear how the Syrians planned to get the uranium they needed. Once they got it, the reactor would have had to run for roughly 18 months before the fuel was “cooked.” And then to turn it into weapons-grade plutonium, it would require reprocessing, presumably outside the country unless Syria found a way to build its own plant.
The announcement on Thursday closes one chapter of a secretive intelligence and military operation and opens several others that will play out over the remainder of the Bush presidency.
The crucial question now is how the North Koreans will react. Some officials said that they hoped the announcement would embarrass the North into admitting to nuclear proliferation activities, while others said it could prompt the North to walk away from the negotiating table — and collapse the deal Mr. Bush was hoping to reach by the end of his presidency. In return for North Korea’s declaration of all its nuclear activities, the United States would lift sanctions and begin to negotiate the North Koreans’ reward for turning over their fuel and weapons.
The announcement also raises the possibility of new tensions with Syria, as the White House on Thursday accused the Syrian government of a “cover-up” consistent with a government that “supports terrorism, takes action that destabilizes Lebanon” and allows militants to enter Iraq.
Last year, Mr. Bush ordered that knowledge of the Syrian project be limited to a few crucial officials, and he put the C.I.A. in charge of marshaling the assets of other intelligence agencies.
Still, the Americans were somewhat blindsided. By their own account, they suspected that North Korea and Syria were at work together in Syria, but only identified the plant at Al Kibar, named for the nearest town, after they received photos of the interior of the plant last spring from Israel, American and Israeli officials said last year.
Only selected pictures were released by the intelligence agencies on Thursday, including a video that combined still photos and drawings, and had a voice-over that gave the presentation the feel of a cold-war-era newsreel about the Korean War. In fact, it was intended in part, officials said, to try to draw that war — in which the United States and North Korea never signed a peace treaty — to a close.
But inside the administration, the battle over whether to try to strike a deal with North Korea or keep it under sanctions in hopes of setting off the collapse of its government continues into the last months of Mr. Bush’s term. Representative Peter Hoekstra, a Republican from Michigan, expressed annoyance on Thursday that the administration waited seven months to brief Congress.
“I think many people believe that we were used today by the administration,” he said.
At the C.I.A., Gen. Michael V. Hayden, the agency’s director, told employees on Thursday that they should “take heart because our team effort on the Al Kibar reactor is a case study in rigorous analytic tradecraft, skillful human and technical collection, and close collaboration.”
But even this victory, some experts note, raises questions about the agency’s focus. The reactor was built within 100 miles of the Iraqi border yet never identified even though the administration was searching for any form of such arms programs in Iraq.
Moreover, even some senior officials of the administration acknowledge that they are likely to leave Mr. Bush’s successor with a North Korea with roughly 10 nuclear weapons or fuel for weapons, up from the one or two weapons it had when Mr. Bush took office in 2001.
“I’d say the score is Kim Jong-il eight, and Bush zero,” said Graham Allison, a Harvard professor and author of “Nuclear Terrorism,” who was in Washington on Thursday to testify about Iran’s nuclear program. “And if you can build a reactor in Syria without being detected for eight years, how hard can it be to sell a little plutonium to Osama bin Laden?”
