(TIME) Joe Klein - In late 2006, George W. Bush met with the Joint Chiefs of Staff at the Pentagon and asked if military action against Iran's nuclear program was feasible. The unanimous answer was no. But when Secretary of Defense Robert Gates told Fox News on June 20, "We do not accept the idea of Iran having nuclear weapons," he was reflecting a new reality in the military and intelligence communities. Diplomacy and economic pressure remain the preferred means to force Iran to negotiate a nuclear deal, but there isn't much hope that's going to happen. So the military option is very much back on the table. Intelligence sources say that the U.S. Army's Central Command, which is in charge of organizing military operations in the Middle East, has made some real progress in planning targeted air strikes - aided, in large part, by the vastly improved human-intelligence operations in the region. "There really wasn't a military option a year ago," an Israeli military source told me. "But they've gotten serious about the planning, and the option is real now." Israel has been brought into the planning process. One other factor has brought the military option to a low boil: Iran's Sunni neighbors really want the U.S. to do it.
2010-07-16 10:16:08Full ArticleBACK Visit the Daily Alert Archive