The argument goes something like this: We don't know what we
don't know, and this is why we must bomb them. It is that it may turn out we
should have known something we didn't know but had we known, we would have bombed.
So let's do that now and be on the safe side … just in case.
The bunk does not stop here. It goes on to add something to
this effect: And by the way, we know they have been cheating because if we
don't know what we don't know, it is that they are hiding something. And they
would not be hiding something unless they did not want us to see it. Which is
all the more reason why we must bomb them now and get it over with.
This is what you find at the core of the Michael Makovsky
article which came under the title: “Iran 's Cheating” and the subtitle:
“Can't trust, can't verify.” It was published in the Weekly Standard, one day
after the William Kristol article: “Unravel the Deal” in which he describes how
to go about getting the mentally retarded of the Congress to bankrupt America
and send its children to die for the glory of Israel.
He begins with the Jewish thing to do, which is to pluck
from the air a statement that, if true, would confirm what he says, and
presents said statement as the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the
truth. He then builds on that fallacy by constructing an “Alice in Wonderland” sort of Jewish fantasy
which he tries to make the deficient in the Congress believe is the reality of
what goes on in the world today.
The fallacy on which Makovsky chose to build his case this
time is not only the Jewish thing to do; it is the VERY Jewish thing to do. It
is to accuse someone of doing what the Jews normally do … that is, to accuse a
gentile of acting like a Jew. Here is what he has plucked from the air this
time: “The President [Obama] insisted on April 2, that 'Iran has met
all of its obligations.' This is demonstrably false.” The trouble is that
Makovsky demonstrates nothing because there is nothing he can demonstrate. All
he can do, sitting in his Washington
office, is to pluck from the air statements not worth the toilet paper that
would wipe them. Here is an example of that: “In the past year alone Iran violated
its international agreements at least three times.”
This done, he comes to the theme of “we don't know what we
don't know, so let’s bomb them now” by quoting Obama as saying that “inspectors
will have unprecedented access to the entire supply chain supporting Iran's
nuclear program … With this deal [Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action
(JCPOA)] Iran will face more inspections than any other country in the
world.” And so Makovsky comments that “heretofore the monitoring effort created
after the 1990-91 Gulf war [UNSCOM] … could not verify that Saddam had
completely disarmed.” Saying this much, he ignores the fact that a great deal
has been learned since that time, which is why the new monitoring system will
be “unprecedented” … like says the President.
To counter this, Makovsky relies once again on the Jewish
thing to do, plucking from the air this statement: “The inspection regime
contemplated in the JCPOA seems woeful in comparison.” Believing he has a Smart
Aleck quip he can hide behind this time, he mentions the Additional Protocol
(AP) whose application “would represent a major advance beyond the current
measures.” But he goes on to say, there is a problem because “this provision …
makes it impossible to know what measures Iran will end up being bound by.”
In other words, we don't know what we don't know, so let's bomb them now.”
Here is how he builds up to the Smart Aleck quip. He tells
that the AP provides for the conduct of “anytime, anywhere” sort of inspections
that include Iran 's
uranium mines and centrifuge factories.” And here is how he drops his Smart
Aleck bombshell: “If Iran
decides to sprint to the nuke, however, it won't do so in a uranium mine; it
will do it at one of its enrichment plants.”
With this, the man just shoved his foot in his mouth. Here
is how and why: Sitting in his office in Washington
or at home, he could only visualize inspectors (as in the late night TV shows)
going to places looking for the bomb and discovering it in a warehouse. But
this is not how things happen in real life.
What happens in this kind of inspections is that technicians
rely on the fact that metals and minerals of the same mine have a signature
they carry with them anywhere they are transported. Knowing the signature of
every mine in Iran and that
of the foreign mines that may supply it with additional feedstock, will tell the
inspectors if Iran
has brought in foreign supplies or has shipped out any of its own. When this is
added to the knowledge of how uranium changes in weight and size as it moves
through the process of being refined, it will tell the inspectors what exactly
the Iranians have been doing.
Well, it looks like someone has tried in vain to explain all
this to Makovsky who could not grasp it. It is why, perhaps, he wrote at the
top of the article: “Some will assess the truth by crunching the centrifuges
and uranium stockpile numbers. However vital such analysis will be, it is
important not to lose sight of the nukes for the Centrifuges.”