Former US ambassador to the UN, John Bolton, attacks a recent intelligence report that discredited Washington for its policies on Iran.
US intelligence services were seeking to influence political policy-making with their assessment that Iran had halted its nuclear arms program in 2003, Bolton told the Der Spiegel magazine.
The surprise report was ‘a quasi-coup against the president,’ the former UN ambassador said.
“This is politics under the guise of intelligence reporting,” he claimed.
The hawkish Bolton was referring to the recent US National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) on Iran which confirms that Tehran is not developing nuclear weaponry.
Some experts say the release of the report was the final nail in the Bush doctrine and that Washington’s hands are now tied as they are unable to wage war on Iran.
A previous NIE report that was released in October 2003 claiming that Iraq had nuclear, chemical and biological weapons, gave Bush the necessary support to pursue his warmongering policies in Iraq.
Bolton is a staunch supporter of Bush and believes that the US must either wage war on Iran or topple Tehran’s government to counter the so-called threat of the Islamic Republic.
Bolton has also fiercely criticized remarks by Mohamed ElBaradei, head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), for declaring the non-diversion of Iran’s nuclear program.