Played for Fools Again: U.S. Keeps Falling for Iran’s Nuclear Three-Card Monte Game

Editorial
11/22/2009
New York Daily News
Original Source: http://www.nydailynews.com/opinions/2009/11/22/2009-11-22_played_for_fools_again_us_keeps_falling_for_irans_nuclear_threecard_monte_game.html

Surprise, surprise. The cheater is cheating.

The regime that has been obsessed with obtaining nuclear weapons is obsessed with obtaining nuclear weapons.

The nation that has spent years deceiving the United Nations about its intentions and capabilities is deceiving the UN about its intentions and capabilities.

This dog-bites-man story is news. Very dangerous news.

The latest installment comes courtesy of Iran's foreign minister, who made it official last week that the Ahmadinejad-Khamenei government is refusing the international community's perfectly sane request that Iran send its partially enriched uranium abroad.

The purpose of the request was to ensure that Iran's professed aim of generating civilian nuclear power is satisfied, while its officially disavowed goal of getting nuclear weapons is scuttled.

A request that Iran has summarily spat on.

Add to this the recent report from the International Atomic Energy Agency, the UN's nuclear watchdog, which last month had a first look at Iran's previously secret uranium processing site - the one tunneled into the side of a mountain near the town of Qom.

After its inspection, the IAEA still had questions about the purpose for which the facility had been intended and how it fit into Iran's nuclear program.

Meaning: Iran's insistence that this was just part of a civilian nuclear apparatus simply does not pass muster.

There's more. Based on the facility's design - on what's there and what's missing, and an understanding of the science - the IAEA had strong reason to believe that Iran has additional secret nuclear sites. It has pressed Iran to disclose them.

When? In that favorite word of UN types: soon. All this begs the question: When do you stop listening to a pathological liar? When does talk of consequences turn into consequences?

Well, President Obama, when does it?