The release last week of the unclassified summary of the latest National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) on Iran provoked a wide range of reactions -- relief that it seemed to dispel the option of a military strike, anger that intelligence seems to be politicized once again, and dismay over how this would affect U.S. policy options.

Intelligence estimates may be better left in the classified realm. It is too easy to confuse information with judgments, and intelligence with policy. On the other hand, such unclassified estimates may protect the intelligence community against unauthorized (or authorized?) leaks that could equally be misinterpreted. This Proliferation Analysis seeks to shed some light on the role of NIEs, why they have become controversial, and what this NIE really says -- and does not say -- about Iran’s intentions and capabilities.

Background

Over a year ago, the FY07 Defense Authorization Act required the Director of National Intelligence to give Congress a classified estimate on Iran by early 2007, along with an unclassified summary, consistent with protecting intelligence sources and methods. The last such estimate was conducted in 2005, but without an unclassified summary. We know now, however, that there were key differences between the 2005 and 2007 efforts. For example, in 2005, the estimate judged with "high confidence" that Iran was determined to develop nuclear weapons despite its international obligations and international pressure. In 2007, it states, "we do not know whether it currently intends to develop nuclear weapons." However, this statement follows high confidence judgments that Iran halted its "nuclear weapons program." Other differences between the two NIEs can be found in a summary table at the end of the NIE.[1]

It is a fundamental tenet of threat assessments that they must distinguish between intentions and capabilities. Leaders in particular countries may have intentions to develop nuclear weapons, but without capabilities, their programs will go nowhere. Libya was in this category, until A.Q. Khan provided significant help. Similarly, countries may possess all the ingredients -- personnel, scientific, technical and engineering expertise, fissile material, delivery vehicles -- but not the intentions. A country like Japan falls into this category. Even when capabilities and intentions are moving in the same direction, it is difficult to estimate the success of efforts. Yet again, countries may secretly want to retain an option for a weapons capability, which casts doubt on their ultimate intentions.

The recent NIEs associated with weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and Iran have been sharply criticized for making assumptions on one side or the other. For example, the 2002 Iraq NIE assumed intentions and interpreted capabilities to match those intentions.[2] The 2005 Iran NIE has been criticized for assuming Iran’s intentions to develop nuclear weapons, but did not judge that the capabilities matched the intentions. This 2007 Iran NIE is a backlash from both of those efforts.[3] It states clearly that the analysis process did not begin with the assumption that Iran intends to acquire nuclear weapons, and that the intelligence community does not know if Iran currently intends to develop nuclear weapons. Because the first key judgment in the unclassified summary states that there is high confidence that Iran halted its nuclear weapons program in 2003, many observers have made the cognitive leap in assessing that Iran no longer has weapons intentions.

Any assessment of intentions must be weighed against the nature of the intelligence problem. It is critical to remember that the NIE is by nature subjective -- its job is to estimate how capabilities might develop, in this case over a ten-year timeframe. First, this NIE states clearly that the ten-year period is more appropriately applied to capabilities than intentions or foreign reactions. Second, what the NIE does not state, however, is that information on capabilities is much easier to collect than on intentions, and that U.S. intelligence assets are also typically oriented in that direction. It is not hard to see why: in a country with a clandestine nuclear weapon program, the circle of people who really know what the plans are is likely to be extremely small, and difficult to penetrate. So, we need to be skeptical of judgments about intentions.

What the NIE Says (and Does Not Say) About Iran’s Capabilities

• There was ongoing nuclear weapons work before 2003. This included nuclear weapons design, weaponization work, and covert uranium conversion- and enrichment-related work. This is in addition to Iran’s now declared uranium enrichment activities at Natanz.
  
   
• But weaponization is not the biggest technical hurdle -- fissile material production is. Proliferation analysts generally assume that weaponization can be accomplished within six months of obtaining fissile material. 
  
  
• Military entities were working on nuclear weapons under the direction of the government.
  
   
• These efforts stopped somewhere at the end of 2003 and probably lasted a few years; there is moderate confidence that the efforts had not restarted by mid-2007.
  
   
• Information about weaponization can confirm a weapons program, but the lack thereof is not considered an intelligence gap because it is generally exceedingly difficult to get. 
  
  
• Technical difficulties make it very unlikely that Iran would be able to produce enough highly enriched uranium for a weapon before the end of 2009; there is moderate confidence that this could occur sometime between 2010 and 2015.
  
   
• As long as Iran continues to develop its uranium enrichment capabilities, it is closer to achieving a nuclear weapons capability.

What the NIE Says (and Does Not Say) About Iran's Intentions

• The decision to halt the weapons program suggests Iran is less determined to develop nuclear weapons than previously judged.
  
   
• Did the 2005 assessment assume Iran embarked on a "crash" program?
  
   
• Iran may be more vulnerable to influence on the issue than previously judged. Iran's signing the Additional Protocol in 2003 and suspending enrichment-related activities are indicators that Iran was susceptible to pressure.
  
   
• NIE did not mention that Iran revoked both those measures in 2006. What conclusions about Iran’s vulnerability would it draw in response?
  
  
• The NIE did not say that Iran did not still intend to pursue a nuclear weapons program, just that it had no information about it.

Conclusions

Making unclassified summaries available to Congress -- and the world -- runs the risk of politicizing the intelligence information, whether the impetus comes from the top or the bottom. In the case of the 2002 Iraq NIE, the credibility gap between the summary and the classified estimate was so wide as to cast real doubt on the Bush Administration’s intentions. It is too soon to tell whether this summary of the Iran NIE differs significantly from the classified version (and we may never know), but it is certainly unique in its attempt to be clear and specific, particularly about levels of confidence. In this regard, it may promise more than it delivers. 

Sharon Squassoni is a Senior Associate in the Nonproliferation Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.


Endnotes

1. http://www.odni.gov/press_releases/20071203_release.pdf

2. Here there was a discernible difference between the classified estimate, which contained many caveats, and the unclassified summary.

3. All references to the 2007 Iran NIE refer to the unclassified summary only.