1115.org

U.S. escalating covert operations against Iran – Reuters (6/29/08):

U.S. congressional leaders agreed late last year to President George W. Bush’s funding request for a major escalation of covert operations against Iran aimed at destabilizing its leadership, according to a report in The New Yorker magazine published online on Sunday.

The article by reporter Seymour Hersh, from the magazine’s July 7 and 14 issue, centers around a highly classified Presidential Finding signed by Bush which by U.S. law must be made known to Democratic and Republican House and Senate leaders and ranking members of the intelligence committees.

“The Finding was focused on undermining Iran’s nuclear ambitions and trying to undermine the government through regime change,” the article cited a person familiar with its contents as saying, and involved “working with opposition groups and passing money.”

I wonder what else happened late last year that might be related…

Iran ‘has halted its nuclear weapons programme’ – The Independent (12/4/07):

In a blow to Bush administration hawks demanding military strikes on Iran, a US intelligence report reveals that Tehran’s secret nuclear weapons programme was shut down four years ago.
[...]
President Bush seemed to prepare the ground for just such an attack last month when he declared that any international effort to avoid “World War III” would have to start by preventing Iran from acquiring a nuclear capability. Vice-President Dick Cheney then threatened “serious consequences” if Tehran did not abandon its nuclear programme.

As these threats were being made, the CIA had secretly concluded that President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad ended the nuclear weapons work years ago in the face of diplomatic pressure and the threat of sanctions.
[...]
Harry Reid, the Senate majority leader, said the assessment was “directly challenging some of this administration’s alarming rhetoric about the threat posed by Iran.” The administration should “appropriately adjust its rhetoric and policy”.

As Senate Majority leader, Reid is exactly one of the “congressional leaders” who would have had to sign off on Bush’s funding request. Heckuva job, Harry!