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S. Hrg. 109–672

IRAN: TEHERAN’S NUCLEAR RECKLESSNESS AND

THE U.S. RESPONSE—THE EXPERTS’ PERSPECTIVE

HEARING

BEFORE THE

FEDERAL FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT, GOVERNMENT 

INFORMATION, AND INTERNATIONAL 

SECURITY SUBCOMMITTEE

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON 

HOMELAND SECURITY AND 

GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS 

UNITED STATES SENATE

ONE HUNDRED NINTH CONGRESS

FIRST SESSION

NOVEMBER 15, 2005

Printed for the use of the Committee on Homeland Security 

and Governmental Affairs

(

(II)

COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY AND GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS 

SUSAN M. COLLINS, Maine, Chairman 

TED STEVENS, Alaska 

GEORGE V. VOINOVICH, Ohio 

NORM COLEMAN, Minnesota 

TOM COBURN, Oklahoma 

LINCOLN D. CHAFEE, Rhode Island 

ROBERT F. BENNETT, Utah 

PETE V. DOMENICI, New Mexico 

JOHN W. WARNER, Virginia 

JOSEPH I. LIEBERMAN, Connecticut 

CARL LEVIN, Michigan 

DANIEL K. AKAKA, Hawaii 

THOMAS R. CARPER, Delaware 

MARK DAYTON, Minnesota 

FRANK LAUTENBERG, New Jersey 

MARK PRYOR, Arkansas

MICHAEL D. BOPP, Staff Director and Chief Counsel 

JOYCE A. RECHTSCHAFFEN, Minority Staff Director and Chief Counsel 

TRINA DRIESSNACK TYRER, Chief Clerk 

FEDERAL FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT, GOVERNMENT INFORMATION, AND 

INTERNATIONAL SECURITY SUBCOMMITTEE 

TOM COBURN, Oklahoma, Chairman 

TED STEVENS, Alaska 

GEORGE V. VOINOVICH, Ohio 

LINCOLN D. CHAFEE, Rhode Island 

ROBERT F. BENNETT, Utah 

PETE V. DOMENICI, New Mexico 

JOHN W. WARNER, Virginia 

THOMAS CARPER, Delaware 

CARL LEVIN, Michigan 

DANIEL K. AKAKA, Hawaii 

MARK DAYTON, Minnesota 

FRANK LAUTENBERG, New Jersey

KATY FRENCH, Staff Director 

SHEILA MURPHY, Minority Staff Director 

JOHN KILVINGTON, Minority Deputy Staff Director 

LIZ SCRANTON, Chief Clerk 

(III)

C O N T E N T S 

Opening statements: Page 

Senator Coburn ................................................................................................. 1

Senator Dayton ................................................................................................. 4

Senator Lautenberg .......................................................................................... 4

Senator Carper ................................................................................................. 5

Senator Akaka .................................................................................................. 7

Senator Domenici ............................................................................................. 11

Senator Collins ................................................................................................. 21

WITNESSES 

TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 15, 2005

Hon. R. James Woolsey, Former Director, Central Intelligence Agency ............. 9

Hon. Alfonse D’Amato, Former U.S. Senator from the State of New York ........ 12

Hon. Newt Gingrich, Former Speaker, U.S. House of Representatives .............. 15

Gary S. Samore, Vice President, Program on Global Security and Sustainability, John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation ............................... 29

Ray Takeyh, Senior Fellow, Middle East Studies, Council on Foreign Relations ....................................................................................................................... 31

Ilan Berman, Vice President for Policy, American Foreign Policy Council ........ 33

Hon. Rick Santorum, a U.S. Senator from the State of Pennsylvania ................ 43

ALPHABETICAL LIST OF WITNESSES

Berman, Ilan: 

Testimony .......................................................................................................... 33

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 99

D’Amato, Hon. Alfonse: 

Testimony .......................................................................................................... 12

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 53

Gingrich, Hon. Newt: 

Testimony .......................................................................................................... 15

Prepared statement with attachments ........................................................... 57

Samore, Gary S.: 

Testimony .......................................................................................................... 29

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 88

Santorum, Hon. Rick: 

Testimony .......................................................................................................... 43

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 43

Takeyh, Ray: 

Testimony .......................................................................................................... 31

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 93

Woolsey, Hon. R. James: 

Testimony .......................................................................................................... 9

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 49

APPENDIX 

Article submitted by Senator Carper entitled ‘‘Iran’s Strategic Weapons Programmes, a net assessment,’’ dated September 6, 2005 ................................... 105

Questions and responses for the Record from Mr. Woolsey ................................. 109

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IRAN: TEHERAN’S NUCLEAR RECKLESSNESS 

AND THE U.S. RESPONSE—THE EXPERTS’ 

PERSPECTIVE 

TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 15, 2005

U.S. SENATE,

SUBCOMMITTEE ON FEDERAL FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT,

GOVERNMENT INFORMATION, AND INTERNATIONAL SECURITY, 

OF THE COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY

AND GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS, Washington, DC. 

The Subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 3:05 p.m., in room 

342, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Tom Coburn, Chairman 

of the Subcommittee, presiding. 

Present: Senators Coburn, Domenici, Collins, Carper, Akaka, 

Dayton, and Lautenberg, 

Also Present: Senator Santorum. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR COBURN 

Senator COBURN. The hearing will come to order. We will attempt it. There are certain Senatorial habits that tend to persist 

even when one leaves the Senate, I believe. 

Thank you for joining us today. This hearing will focus on Iran 

and examine the relationship between Iran’s pursuit of nuclear 

weapons and its status as a state-sponsor of terrorism. 

Some have argued that we should de-link Iran’s global support 

for terror from its pursuit of nuclear weapons. They suggest that 

the two problems are different and need to be addressed differently. I couldn’t disagree more. The facts that Iran is trying to 

build nuclear weapons and that it is a terrorist regime are not two 

different problems—they are the same problem. 

Possession of nuclear capabilities by responsible governments 

who use such weapons defensively and as a deterrent and who 

have a track record of respecting life and liberty is one thing. But 

that’s not what we’re dealing with here. A nuclear weapon in the 

hands of the regime in Teheran could mean that no one on earth 

is safe from nuclear attack. Iran has a history of supporting terror 

against its own citizens and against the United States—and that 

is why the State Department lists it as a state sponsor of terrorism. Permitting a more destructive weapon in the hands of those 

motivated to murder is worse than reckless, it is immoral. 

I am convinced that history will judge those who spent more time 

talking and less time acting to prevent such a disaster. Action is 

2

demanded when we move from talking about nuclear proliferation 

to talking about just who it is that is proliferating. 

So exactly what are Iran’s intentions? If they weren’t clear before, they certainly are now. Just last month, Iran’s President 

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad proclaimed to the world his government’s 

desire to ‘‘wipe Israel off the face of the map.’’ This statement sent 

chills around the globe. British Prime Minister Tony Blair stated, 

‘‘I feel a real sense of revulsion at these remarks. Anyone in Europe, knowing our history, when we hear such statements made 

about Israel, it makes us feel very angry. It’s completely wrong.’’

White House spokesman Scott McClellan correctly stated, ‘‘Iran’s 

pronounced intention underscores the concerns we have about 

Iran’s nuclear intentions.’’ 

There should be no doubt that Iran isn’t just blustering here. 

Iran has a record of carrying out its threats. Iran’s history of supporting murderous terrorist activity speaks for itself. That’s why 

the United States has, for the ninth consecutive year in a row, listed Iran as the ‘‘most active’’ state sponsor of terrorism. 

That is why the State Department said in its Country Report on 

Terrorism for Iran: ‘‘During 2004, Iran maintained a high-profile 

role in encouraging anti-Israeli terrorist activity, both rhetorically 

and operationally. Supreme Leader Khamenei praised Palestinian 

terrorist operations, and Iran provided Lebanese Hezbollah and 

Palestinian terrorist groups—notably Hamas, the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, and the Popular Front 

for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command—with funding, 

safe haven, training, and weapons. Iran provided an unmanned 

aerial vehicle that Lebanese Hezbollah sent into Israeli airspace on 

November 7, 2004.’’

None of this is new, of course, for Iran’s Islamist regime. Who 

can forget the harrowing hostage drama 25 years ago that played 

out on the world stage for over a year? Or Iran’s complicity in the 

terrorist murder of 200 innocent Americans at a U.S. Marine base 

in Beirut, only a few years later? 

Americans, however, have hardly been the only victims of Iran’s 

Islamist regime. On the contrary, Iran’s human rights record with 

its own people is well documented. The State Department’s latest 

human rights report on Iran describes gross violation against the 

Iranians themselves. They include political killings and executions 

following mock trials. The regime outlaws dissent and the punishment is death for such crimes as ‘‘attempts against the security of 

the state, outrage against high-ranking officials and insults against 

the memory of Imam Khomeini and against the Supreme Leader 

of the Islamic Republic.’’ A photographer who dared to take pictures of a Teheran prison was killed in police custody. No one was 

ever punished for her murder. 

In light of Iran’s murderous intentions around the world, nuclear 

proliferation by the regime is a serious threat. So let us talk about 

where they are in that process. 

All experts agree that Iran has been working in secret for some 

time to develop a nuclear weapon. In August 2002, an Iranian dissident group, the National Council for Iranian Reform, informed 

the world that Iran had secret uranium-enrichment facilities and 

was building a heavy water plant. Conveniently, shortly thereafter, 

3

Iran issued a series of public claims about its entree into supposedly legitimate nuclear power projects. These ‘‘projects’’ were 

then used as a cover to explain why the regime was acquiring 

facilities needed to complete a nuclear fuel cycle, including a uranium-conversion facility, uranium-enrichment facility, a fuel-fabrication plant, and a facility to produce uranium oxide. 

Defense Intelligence Agency officials testified earlier this year 

that Iran is likely to develop nuclear weapons sometime early in 

the next decade. In August of this year, the Washington Post, citing 

U.S. intelligence sources, concurred that Iran’s nuclear program 

may already be so advanced as to produce a nuclear weapon within 

6 to 10 years. What is next? 

Today, we will hear testimony about how the United States can 

effectively address the threat of Iran’s nuclear program. More 

broadly, we will also address the issue of our overall U.S. policy toward this rogue regime, since the two are necessarily linked. 

Some have argued that containment of Iran’s nuclear threat lies 

within the U.N.’s International Atomic Energy Agency. I look forward to hearing from our witnesses about the likelihood of success 

at the IAEA process in convincing Iran to dismantle its nuclear 

weapons program. I am also eager to hear about other diplomatic 

options available to the United States that could deter Iran’s attempt to obtain a nuclear weapon, such as President Bush’s Proliferation Security Initiative. 

Unveiled by the President in 2003, supported initially by 16 

countries and now an estimated 60 countries, the objectives of the 

initiative is to create counter-proliferation measures and partnerships that work together to hamstring the efforts of global bad actors to trade in weapons of mass destruction and missile-related 

technology. 

In addition to trying to thwart trade in weapons and technology, 

we need to follow the money. There are a number of countries that 

have financial contracts with Iran that may be helping to support 

Iran’s nuclear ambitions. For example, Russia has a contract to 

provide Iran with nuclear reactors. I am interested in hearing our 

witnesses’ views on how these financial ties corrupt voting patterns 

on Iran at the IAEA and the U.N. Security Council. 

But our policy must be much broader than simply trying to shut 

down proliferation, both technologically and economically. We have 

to get at the root cause of the problem. That means investing in 

efforts to undermine the ideology that would promote the slaughter 

of innocent civilians by the masses. This ideology is not only directed at so-called enemies such as U.S. citizens, but at fellow Muslims, at women and children, students, small business owners, 

wedding parties—all just innocently trying to live their lives. 

The people of Iran do not embrace this ideology. The people of 

Iran, like all people everywhere, yearn for freedom, prosperity, and 

peace. 

It is critical that the United States and the international community build and strengthen democratic efforts within Iran. Democracies tend not to threaten other democracies. When Iran is free, 

when Iran is open, when Iran honors the dignity of each human 

person, Iran’s neighbors will be able to relax. When Iran is safe for 

Iranians—Iran will be safe for the world. 

4

Senator Dayton. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR DAYTON 

Senator DAYTON. Mr. Chairman, I want to thank you for convening this very important hearing and assembling two very distinguished panels of witnesses. 

I just echo your concern. When I was in Israel last spring, I was 

taken by the military to one of their defense missile sites and was 

told that they have 21 seconds from the time they see on the radar 

screen a missile or something coming from Iran to determine the 

nature of it. 

The development of nuclear weapons by Iran represents one of 

the most profound threats to the continued stability and security 

of the world. I, again, commend you for holding this hearing. 

Senator COBURN. Senator Lautenberg. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR LAUTENBERG 

Senator LAUTENBERG. Mr. Chairman, thanks for reminding us 

about the terrible mistake made by the President of Iran and alerting us to the fact that we have got to get on——

Senator COBURN. Senator Lautenberg, would you turn on your 

microphone, please? 

Senator LAUTENBERG. I thought you were hoping I wouldn’t. 

[Laughter.] 

We are friends. I thank you again, Mr. Chairman, for having 

noted the ugly remarks made by the President of Iran, so outrageous a statement in talking to students, by the way, a group of 

students. Not only did he say that Israel must be wiped off the 

map, he also condemned his neighbors by warning that anybody 

who recognizes Israel will burn in the fire of the Islamic nations’ 

fury. 

I failed to acknowledge our distinguished guests here, my longtime friend with whom I had many pleasant moments, some the 

other way, too, but Senator D’Amato and I are joined at the river 

and we have a lot of common interests—the Hudson River, in our 

case. And, of course, seeing Newt Gingrich here, a familiar face, 

looking fit, and we are happy to see Mr. Woolsey, as well. 

These hateful comments made to 4,000 students, just hours before a terrorist bomber murdered five people and wounded more 

than 30 in a small Israeli town stimulated, of course, by that kind 

of outrageous statement. The terrorist murders of Islamic jihad are 

supported and trained by Iran. 

I joined Senator Gordon Smith in offering a bipartisan resolution 

condemning these remarks and the Senate overwhelmingly passed 

it, but it is going to take more than resolutions to stand up to the 

terrorist regime in Teheran. 

We need to stop American companies from being able to support 

Iran through lucrative business deals. It just doesn’t make sense. 

Oil production is Iran’s goldmine and American companies are 

helping the Iranian regime expand its financial resources by improving its oil operations. In my view, it is a treasonous act. It 

astounds me that any patriotic American would offer aid or assistance to this evil regime, but I am sorry to say that some American 

companies are putting profit ahead of our Nation’s security. 

5

Think about it. Every day that we hear that another American 

has died in the conflict in Iraq, and here we are knowing very well 

that Iran is helping to supply and to fund and train these terrorists. These companies that do that exploit a loophole in our laws 

by forming subsidiaries based in foreign countries so they can do 

business with the Iranians. 

I have introduced a measure that would close this loophole. Unfortunately, the Senate voted against my measure on a largely 

party line vote. Instead, the Senate approved a weaker version that 

pays lip service to the problems but doesn’t really shut down the 

loopholes, doesn’t really stop these companies from doing business 

in Iran, with Iran. 

Mr. Chairman, the Teheran regime is using profits from its oil 

reserves to fund terrorism and develop nuclear weapons and getting help from American companies. It is almost incomprehensible, 

because we are standing idly by. 

Senator Santorum from Pennsylvania was going to be here 

today. I know that he has a bill that deals with Iran. But I have 

got to say to my colleague from Pennsylvania that I am disappointed that the bill that he was presenting does not close that 

loophole that allows U.S. companies to do business with Iran. The 

House counterpart, in contrast, sponsored by Congresswoman 

Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, does close this loophole. 

Mr. Chairman, by ignoring this serious issue, the Senate is sending the wrong message to American companies, saying it is OK to 

do business with Iran. When I think of the woeful news that comes 

out of Iraq on a regular basis and knowing that Iran supports that 

activity, kill Americans, maim Americans, it is an unacceptable 

condition, and I am hoping that Senators on this panel will change 

their views about the kind of legislation that we are going to be 

talking about. I thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 

Senator COBURN. Thank you, Senator Lautenberg. We will have 

Senator Santorum join us later. He is in another hearing right now 

and will join us on the dais. 

Senator Carper. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR CARPER 

Senator CARPER. Thanks, Mr. Chairman, and to each of our witnesses, welcome. We are delighted to see all of you and thank you 

for taking the time to share your thoughts and insights with us on 

what I believe is a real important subject, and I know you do, too. 

As we gather here today, I understand that the International 

Atomic Energy Agency Director General El Baradei is poised to join 

Russian negotiators to push for a solution to Iran’s nuclear brinkmanship. As a testament to his being selected as Nobel Peace Laureate, El Baradei is to push for a solution despite reports that Iran 

may have already rejected this proposal. 

If those negotiations fail, I believe another opportunity to back 

Iran away from the nuclear weapons precipice will take place in 

just over a week, when the International Atomic Energy Board of 

Governors meets in Vienna to determine if and when Iran will be 

referred to the U.N. Security Council for its actions. 

Sixty years ago today, on November 15, President Harry S Truman planted the seeds of the nonproliferation regime in a joint decVerDate 0ct 09 2002 09:21 Nov 17, 2006 Jkt 024931 PO 00000 Frm 00009 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\24931.TXT SAFFAIRS PsN: PAT
6

laration right here in Washington, DC with British Prime Minister 

Clement Attlee and Canadian Prime Minister Mackenzie King. 

The proposal was to ensure that atomic energy could be used for 

peaceful purposes while ultimately working toward eliminating nuclear weapons globally. Iran makes it very clear today that we have 

yet to reach this important goal, but it is nonetheless imperative, 

maybe more imperative, that we do so. 

While it would have been helpful to have had the opportunity to 

hear today from Under Secretary of State Robert Joseph, who led 

the briefings on Iran’s nuclear warheads at the IAEA back in July, 

I welcome the testimony, I think on our second panel, of Dr. Gary 

Samore, who is the architect of the internationally acclaimed International Institute of Strategic Studies publication on Iran’s weapons capabilities. Hopefully, he can shed some light on these nuclear 

warhead plans that appeared in this weekend’s New York Times

and how soon Iran could develop a nuclear weapon and be of danger to the rest of us. 

In addition to understanding Iran’s weapons capabilities, it is 

also very important that we begin to better understand Iran, why 

it is in pursuit of nuclear weapons, and what it would want and 

need from the international community to stop its pursuit permanently. 

Iran has, as we all know, a new president who is anti-U.S., antiIsrael, anti-west, and if left to his own devices, a great risk, I 

think, to international security. He has inexcusably called for the 

disruption of Israel, incited violence against western interests in 

his own country, and attempted to stack his government with those 

who hold the same beliefs. 

Yet, instead of totally backing the efforts of the new president, 

Iran’s Supreme Leader has been running interference. A meeting 

with the Supreme Leader led the new president to change his rhetoric of hatred about wiping Israel off the map to calling for democratic elections in Palestine. And after a fiery U.N. speech, another 

body of government, Iran’s Expediency Council, was given oversight powers over this new president. And the president has yet to 

get approval of an oil minister from the Iranian parliament after 

having submitted several persons for the position, despite the parliament being dominated by hard-liners who would be expected to 

be sympathetic to this new president of Iran. 

Yet, that new president still retains the blessings of the Supreme 

Leader, power, and support from many Iranians, plausibly because 

he campaigned as a ‘‘man of the people who would promote the interests of the poor and return Iranian government to the principles 

of the Islamic revolution during the time of the Ayatollah Khomeini.’’

With nearly three-quarters of Iran’s population under the age of 

30, with unemployment rampant, it is easy to understand why the 

Iranian people are looking for change. 

What does all of this mean for nuclear negotiations? I am hoping 

that our esteemed witness Ray Takeyh, who has great insights into 

Iran’s inner workings, can tell us what is going on with Iran’s leadership and its impact on nuclear negotiations. 

But I also have a couple of questions. First, are Iranians supportive of the new president because of his ideology, his promises 

7

of government reform, or both? Second, even if the new president 

is successful in pressing for government reforms, could they alone 

save Iran’s economy, or would investment from the west still be 

needed? 

Have past and current U.S. policy approaches taken both the economic concerns of urban Iranian middle class into account and 

those of poor Iranians, who seem to believe that ushering in the 

past in the form of this new president could serve them in a way 

that trade, privatization, and foreign investments could not? 

If this is their belief, there may be a mismatch between the incentives that the west is currently offering Iran to give up their nuclear aspirations and what Iranians actually want or feel that they 

need. Conversely, if Iranians truly feel it is a sense of national 

pride and security to have nuclear weapons capability, there may 

be nothing that the west can offer to be a deterrent. 

And if this is, indeed, true, we must be certain that our diplomatic ducks are in a row so that we can ensure that Iran is referred to the U.N. Security Council and that success is guaranteed 

once they have been sent there. 

Too much hangs in the balance for us not to explore all of our 

options. Sixty years ago, our country set forth a goal of removing 

nuclear weapons from the world, 60 years ago today. Many of these 

goals have been enshrined in the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. 

If Iran acquires nuclear weapons capabilities while it is signatory 

to the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty and under the watch of the 

IAEA, it will send a message that other countries can do the same 

and could incite a renewed arms race. 

If Iran is referred to the U.N. Security Council and we are unable to get member countries to agree to multilateral sanctions or 

other punitive measures, as in the case of North Korea, it will also 

signal that being a signatory to the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty is actually a means to acquire weapons technology and that 

there are no real repercussions for doing so. 

At all costs, this means we must be successful: First, to preserve 

our ultimate goal of nuclear weapons eradication. Second, to preserve the doctrine of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty that we 

have crafted to help us reach that goal. Third, to secure our Nation 

from a potentially nuclear Iran, those who could pass such technology to, and the arms race that could ensue. And fourth and most 

importantly, to secure our own security and that of our children. 

Thanks, Mr. Chairman, for calling this hearing and to our panel 

of witnesses that are arrayed before us and those that will follow. 

Senator COBURN. Thank you. Senator Akaka. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR AKAKA 

Senator AKAKA. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman and Senator Carper. I want to commend you on holding this hearing. This 

Subcommittee has a long and valued history of examining our national security policy as it pertains to weapons of mass destruction. 

It was a major focus of this Subcommittee when I was Chairman, 

as well as when I was Ranking Member under Senator Cochran’s 

leadership. I am pleased, Senator Coburn, that you are carrying on 

the great tradition of this Subcommittee. 

8

The issue of Iran’s nuclear policy has been in the headlines for 

many years with little apparent slowdown in their efforts to pursue, first covertly and now more overtly, a nuclear weapons program, including the means to deploy them on long-range missiles. 

Mr. Chairman, I look forward to the testimony by our former 

Congressional colleagues, Representative Gingrich—it is good to 

see you again, Newt—and also Senator D’Amato, good to see you 

again, and other expert witnesses. I thank you folks for being here. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Senator COBURN. Thank you, Senator Akaka. 

First of all, welcome. Let me introduce our first panelists, if I 

may. R. James Woolsey joined Booz Allen Hamilton in July 2002 

as Vice President and officer in the firm’s Global Resilience Practice located in McLean, Virginia. Previously, Mr. Woolsey served in 

the U.S. Government on five different occasions, where he held 

Presidential appointments in two Republican and two Democratic 

administrations. During his 12 years of government service, Mr. 

Woolsey was Director of Central Intelligence from 1993 to 1995. He 

was also previously a partner at the law firm of Shea and Gardner 

in Washington, DC, where he practiced for 22 years in the fields 

of civil litigation and alternative dispute resolution. He also hails 

from Oklahoma. 

Senator Alfonse D’Amato is the Managing Director of Park Strategies, LLC, and served in the U.S. Senate from 1981 to 1999. Senator D’Amato was first elected to the U.S. Senate on November 4, 

1980. Known for his tenacity and ability to get results, Senator 

D’Amato served three distinguished terms in the Senate, advocating the interests and the people of New York State. During his 

tenure in the U.S. Senate, D’Amato served as Chairman of the Senate Banking Committee, Housing and Urban Affairs, overseeing 

legislation affecting America’s financial institutions, banking, and 

public and private housing, urban development, and trade promotion. Senator D’Amato also served on the Senate Finance Committee. He also served on the Senate Subcommittee on Health 

Care, the Subcommittee on International Trade, and the Subcommittee on Taxation and IRS Oversight. 

Finally, our third panelist is the former Speaker, Newt Gingrich, 

former Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives. He serves as 

a Senior Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and is also 

a Visiting Fellow at the Huger Institution at Stanford University. 

Speaker Gingrich is a member of the Terrorism Task Force for the 

Council on Foreign Relations and the U.S. Commission on National 

Security, an Advisory Board member of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, a member of the Defense Policy Board. Gingrich also serves as Co-Chair, along with former Senate Majority 

Leader George Mitchell, of the Task Force on U.N. Reform created 

by the Congress in December 2004. The task force delivered its report, entitled ‘‘American Interests in U.N. Reform,’’ to the Congress 

this past June. 

He is also an Editorial Board member of the Johns Hopkins University Journal of Biosecurity and Bioterrorism and a news and political analyst on FOX News. He is the author of nine books and 

novels, including New York Times best-selling ‘‘Winning the Future: A 21st Century Contract With America,’’ and most recently, 

9

1The prepared statement of Mr. Woolsey appears in the Appendix on page 49. 

‘‘Never Call Retreat: Lee and Grant, the Final Victory,’’ the third 

and final novel in his trilogy about the Civil War, and he is my favorite history professor. 

Director Woolsey, if you would, please. 

TESTIMONY OF R. JAMES WOOLSEY,1 FORMER DIRECTOR, 

CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY 

Mr. WOOLSEY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. It is an honor to be invited to be with you today. I will submit my four-page statement, 

if I might, and then just speak informally from it for a few minutes 

by way of summary. I am testifying solely on my own behalf today, 

Mr. Chairman. 

There was a window of time from the late spring of 1997 until 

the late spring of 1998 in which, after President Khatami’s election, I think it was reasonable for there to have been some optimism about the possibility of working with Iran and seeing an Iranian evolution in terms of its dealings with the West and its neighbors. But that window ended in the spring of 1998 as the Iranian 

government began to assassinate newspaper editors, kill students, 

make mass arrests, and the rest. 

And I believe it has not really been the case for those years since 

1998 that we have had an Iran with which we could reasonably 

work. With the ascendancy of Mr. Ahmadinejad to the presidency 

a few months ago and Iran’s rejection, as far as we now know, last 

Saturday of the EU3 proposal from Britain, France, and Germany 

that its nuclear fuel be enriched by Russia and not by Iran itself, 

one would think that even those who are most committed to the notion that we can work with this Iranian government would have 

turned into pessimists. 

There is no reason in common sense or economics for Iran to be 

involved in fuel enrichment and processing unless it has a nuclear 

weapons program. This is admittedly a question of intent under the 

current Nonproliferation Treaty. That treaty is, I believe, fundamentally flawed precisely because it does not bar the expansion 

of enrichment and processing. For Iran to declare that it needs fuel 

enrichment and processing in order to have nuclear power for energy purposes is roughly equivalent to its claiming that it must 

build a factory that produces both trucks and tanks in order to be 

able to buy a few cars. 

The Nonproliferation Treaty regime is, unfortunately, one that 

derives from the Atoms for Peace Program and thus does not explicitly bar the expansion or institution of enrichment and processing. It is a question of intent. I think the Iranian intent is crystal clear to any objective observer, but the treaty regime is not one 

that helps us as much as we might like. 

It is clear that Iran hid its fuel enrichment work until the IAEA 

was tipped off in 2003, and then discovered Iranian preparation for 

uranium enrichment via the use of some 50,000 potential centrifuges at Natanz. Iran constructed a heavy water plant and reactor to produce plutonium. Seven covert nuclear sites have been 

built. Traces of uranium enriched to the high levels needed for a 

bomb, rather than the much lower levels needed for a reactor genVerDate 0ct 09 2002 09:21 Nov 17, 2006 Jkt 024931 PO 00000 Frm 00013 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\24931.TXT SAFFAIRS PsN: PAT
10

erating electric power, have been found. And Iran bulldozed one 

site at Lavizan-Shian, before inspectors were allowed to visit. 

Iran has acknowledged acquiring nuclear materials from the notorious head of the Pakistani program, A.Q. Khan, in recent material obtained by U.S. intelligence—cited in an article this past Sunday that many here, I am sure, have read in the New York Times

by Broad and Sanger—indicates that the Iranians are working on 

a sphere of conventional explosives designed to compress radioactive material to begin chain reactions in a bomb. They are working on positioning a heavy ball inside a warhead to ensure stability 

and accuracy during the terminal phase of a nuclear-armed missile 

flight. And they are working on detonation at a 2,000-foot altitude, 

which is really appropriate only for nuclear weapons, not for conventional, chemical, or even bacteriological ones. 

How soon might Iran obtain nuclear weapons? The estimates in 

years that you see are really driven by how soon intelligence believes they might be able to enrich enough and process enough nuclear material to have enough fissionable material for a bomb. But 

if they obtain the fissionable material, particularly highly enriched 

uranium, elsewhere, for example from their erstwhile collaborators 

the North Koreans, they could have a bomb in very short order. 

It should be remembered that although we tested the plutonium 

bomb that we dropped on Nagasaki before it was used in combat, 

60 years ago the United States felt that the simple shotgun HEU 

weapon that was dropped on Hiroshima was so reliable, even 

though it had never been tested in the history of the world, that 

we dropped it in combat without ever having tested it. The designs 

for simple shotgun HEU weapons are available on the web. It is 

really just a question of having the highly enriched uranium. 

So if Iran obtains such highly enriched uranium, even if it is not 

able to enrich enough itself domestically, one could quite reasonably be looking at an Iranian nuclear weapon in extremely short 

order. 

I wish I thought that referral to the Security Council and potential severe sanctions were likely to be a useful step. It may be politically an important thing for us to do internationally, but the 

high probability of Russian, French, and possibly Chinese veto of 

any substantial steps in the Security Council and the difficulty of 

implementing sanctions against a country which really exports only 

oil at a time of $60 a barrel oil is a very severe international political problem. 

The Ahmadinejad regime is not really accurately characterized 

by the word that the President has used now twice to refer to some 

of the Islamist groups on the Sunni side of the divide within Islam. 

He has used the term ‘‘Islamo-fascist.’’ That is not severe enough 

for Mr. Ahmadinejad because the Italian fascists, although terrible, 

were not genocidal, not explicitly genocidal. Mr. Ahmadinejad and 

the Iranian regime are genocidal. 

He spoke in his own speech of, ‘‘a world without America and Zionism. This slogan and this goal are attainable and can surely be 

achieved.’’ And Mr. Abbassi, the head of his war preparation plan, 

has said recently, ‘‘We had a strategy drawn up, the destruction of 

Anglo-Saxon civilization. We must make use of everything we have 

at hand to strike at this front by means of our suicide operations 

11

or means of our missiles. There are 29 sensitive sites in the U.S. 

and the West. We have already spied on these sites and we know 

how we are going to attack them. Once we have defeated the 

Anglo-Saxons, the rest will run for cover.’’

I am afraid, Mr. Chairman, Members of the Subcommittee, that 

with respect to this regime, regime change is really the only option. 

I very much hope it would not need to involve the use of force. That 

should only be our last resort, but an option that we, under no circumstances, should take off of the table. 

There are two chains of policy which it would be useful to follow. 

Reuel Gerecht has recently pointed out in the Weekly Standard 

that if we are successful in moving toward a Shiite majority democracy operating in Iraq, it will substantially help undermine Khamenei’s and Ahmadinejad’s rule in Iran. 

And second, Ambassador Mark Palmer has written persuasively 

about how we might engage and work with the Iranian people and 

various Iranian groups that are struggling for freedom without enhancing the position of or making concessions to the Iranian government. 

Finally, Mr. Chairman, I believe that this situation with respect 

to Iran and its sponsorship of terrorism and its nuclear weapons 

program is such that it would be prudent for us to embark upon 

a major expansion of our own armed forces. This would entail a 

substantial increase, in my view, in the defense budget and tax increases to pay for it. I don’t believe we should balk at this. Earlier 

generations have sacrificed much more, even in the absence of 

shooting wars. In the early 1960s, the U.S.’ defense budget was 

over 9 percent of GDP. That was because we changed strategies 

from massive retaliation to flexible response and needed more expensive conventional weapons. Nine percent of GDP in today’s 

nearly $12 trillion American economy would be a defense budget of 

well over $1 trillion. 

Admittedly, we have changed the way we care for old people in 

the last 20, 30, 40 years in the United States with respect to Social 

Security, Medicare, and Medicaid. That has an important effect on 

the Federal budget. But we can’t let those decisions made in the 

last few generations about how we care for our elderly undermine 

our willingness to protect ourselves and to pay for this protection. 

Appeasement, in my view, whatever euphemism is used, of Iran 

under the current circumstances will not work any better than it 

did with Nazi Germany in the 1930s. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Senator COBURN. Thank you. I would like to, with unanimous 

consent, recognize Senator Domenici for a few moments. He is 

going to have to leave. Without objection. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR DOMENICI 

Senator DOMENICI. Thank you. First, I want to thank you for 

holding these hearings. I think it is very important. I am very 

sorry that I cannot be here very long. I am hoping to come back. 

But I also want to thank the witnesses. Their presence and what 

I know they have to say is very important. 

I hope that, sooner or later, not only America, but others that 

think like we do, are going to find a way to see that this continued 

build-up stops. We think we know what is going on, but it seems 

12

1The prepared statement of Senator D’Amato appears in the Appendix on page 53. 

like we are struggling to find out what to do about it. Ultimately, 

it seems to me, we can’t do that alone. We have to do it with others. And yet it is so vitally important. The more we know and the 

harder we try to get to the bottom of it and the more we let their 

new leader and those that work with him know what we think 

about this, I think the better off we are and the better off our 

friends are. 

So thank you to the witnesses. It is good to see you, Senator 

D’Amato. It is a pleasure to have you. 

Senator D’AMATO. Good to see you. 

Senator DOMENICI. And Mr. Speaker, I remember balancing a 

budget with you in the room. I don’t know who won, but we got 

a balanced budget. 

Mr. GINGRICH. Right. 

Senator DOMENICI. You got some, I got some, and it was a good 

day. Thank you. 

Senator COBURN. Thank you. Senator D’Amato. 

TESTIMONY OF HON. ALFONSE D’AMATO,1 FORMER U.S. 

SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF NEW YORK 

Senator D’AMATO. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I want 

to commend you for these hearings. I think it is probably one of 

the most, if not the most, important issue of the day, and somehow 

we seem to miss it. I would ask that the full text of my remarks 

be submitted in the record as if read in its entirety. 

Senator COBURN. Without objection, all submitted statements 

will be included in the record. 

Senator D’AMATO. Mr. Chairman, I couldn’t help but reflect on 

the very challenging remarks made by former Director Woolsey. He 

is someone who understands what it is like to deal with the despots and the dictators and the kinds of regimes and the one in particular that now represents Iran. 

All the wringing of hands in the world isn’t going to change the 

situation. All of the threats and the bellicose nature on our part 

that we sometimes seem to engage in is not going to change it. 

Threatening of the new leader—you raised the question as to what 

does he want and what does he represent. He was elected by a 

landslide with the fundamentalist and the mullahs supporting him, 

but he made an appeal to the poor, to the so-called disenfranchised, 

to the young people who are without jobs, and that obviously 

played a great part in the size of his victory over a cleric. No one 

really expected his victory to be so complete. 

And he has all of the things that you mentioned and that my 

former colleague from New Jersey talked about in terms of the destruction of the State of Israel. That is not the kind of rhetoric that 

one should take lightly, understand, and Jim Woolsey understands. 

The passage of sanctions, and I was proud to be one of those in 

the forefront of sponsoring and getting legislation passed, the Iranian-Libyan Sanction Act, known as ILSA, that was signed by the 

President into law on August 4, 1996, and at the White House ceremony, President Clinton said, ‘‘The greatest enemy of our generaVerDate 0ct 09 2002 09:21 Nov 17, 2006 Jkt 024931 PO 00000 Frm 00016 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\24931.TXT SAFFAIRS PsN: PAT
13

tion is terrorism,’’ and that the United States will not shirk its responsibility to lead in the fight against it. We have. We have. 

If I were to suggest to you that the passage of ILSA was almost 

impossible were it not for some bombings and events that took 

place and the downing of an airliner that shocked the conscience 

of the world, we wouldn’t have passed that. It was some of the industrial giants of this Nation who were opposed. They were more 

concerned about being able to do business with Iran and Libya and 

the loss of income. We had to construct legislation which gave all 

kinds of prerogatives and waivers, and we had to reduce substantially the penalties imposed. It was incredible. 

So it was only a shocking event that made it possible for us to 

pass that legislation, and I have to tell you, even though it was administered over a period of time, and sometimes, I think, inadequately when various presidents gave waivers to other countries, 

like to the French and to TOTAL in terms of their conducting business there, it did have quite an impact. As a matter of fact, going 

back to 2001 when the bill came up for renewal, the Administration was not happy about it and tried to limit it to 2 years instead 

of 5 years. 

Indeed, testimony demonstrated that we had probably cut monies 

that would have flowed into Iran for investment and furthering 

their money-producing industry, which is oil and gas, that we cut 

it substantially. They were able to get investments of only $8 billion of foreign capital, whereas you take a country like Qatar, very 

small, not nearly the kind of resources in terms of energy that Iran 

had, and they had twice as much. Indeed, Iran at that time was 

using 40 percent of its oil for domestic purposes and their oil industry and gas industry was fading in terms of their production. 

Had we really stuck at it and enforced that embargo and not 

turned our head, we might have had a different result. But what 

we call the policy of constrictive engagement, by saying to them, 

when you undertake the kinds of actions that are threatening, we 

will tighten, we will punish you. And when you don’t just speak but 

act, why, then we will reward you. 

And bringing in the world community—you cannot do this alone. 

Mr. Woolsey is absolutely right. But I have to tell you, I think 

there is—in our approach to this, I feel more optimistic than he 

does in one sense. You see, they talk about the Shahab missile—

they can go 1,000 miles—that the Iranians have developed and 

that they are looking to be able to put nuclear capabilities into that 

missile. I am not concerned about that. They are not going to use 

that missile because mutually assured destruction works, and even 

the MAD people understand that. 

But what I am concerned about is the terrorist threat that nuclear capabilities and fissionable materials in their hands permits, 

because while we can by way of mutually assured destruction, 

which has worked over the years with the Russians and with others, there is no such threat to terrorists and you don’t have the capability to say with definiteness that these materials, these suitcase bombs were made available, for example, by Iran to the shadowy groups. It is the greatest threat that mankind faces today, and 

yet we do very little. 

14

In just talking to one of your witnesses who came up here, there 

is a great company that works in the United States that does hundreds of millions, if not billions of dollars worth of work, and yet 

they are at the centerpiece of helping design and create an opportunity for Iran to have a bomb. Is that amazing? That is Siemens, 

a German company. Amazing. And we do nothing to stop it. 

Now, for the first time, it seems to me, we have an opportunity 

to forge a real alliance with countries who have not traditionally 

been our allies, the Russians, because if there is any country that 

faces a challenge as great, if not greater, from some of the fundamentalists, it is the Russians. 

And so we have the ability, and I think some of our allies, even 

those who have not been so supportive of us and our policies and 

we have had discord with, for the first time are beginning to recognize what this extremism and what terrorists represent as a way 

of a threat to them and to their people, and I am talking about the 

French, and I will mention the Germans. I think we have, for the 

first time, an opportunity to build a coalition and we cannot afford 

to go it alone. 

I am not suggesting that we can allow them to build with impunity those kinds of devices that we would have to and be ready to 

take whatever action necessary to defend ourselves, very much like 

Israel did in Osirak in 1981 when they took that facility out. But 

I think that by utilizing the kinds of legislation and putting in a 

program of restrictive engagement with Iran, we might be able to 

tell and demonstrate to them and to the world that we mean business. That is a way of utilizing collectively our economic force, but 

it has to be collectively. I think it can work. 

It is not going to be easy and the Iranians will test us and we 

will have to demonstrate that we are willing to meet that challenge. And we will have to make it clear to our allies that we need 

them. But we can’t do it in a bellicose way. We have got to work 

behind the scenes and work hard to build that kind of coalition. If 

we fail to do that and fail to get into this ring and take on this 

incredible challenge, I think we betray everything that we are 

about. 

Again, I am concerned that the economic interests that some of 

our own international corporations are more interested in still have 

a lot of sway in this country and I would hope at this critical time 

that we would be able to look back on history and see what has 

taken place when we fail to stand up and to do what is right. It 

is a great responsibility you have, and to be quite candid with you, 

I don’t see that you have great public support to rally to take on 

this cause. And yet I can’t think of one that is more imperiling and 

more challenging than the one we face today with the spread of nuclear weapons, particularly in the hands of terrorists that make it 

almost impossible to stop if they were to get these devices. 

So thank you, Mr. Chairman, for your holding this hearing today 

and trying to focus some attention and the spotlight on this important issue. 

Senator COBURN. Thank you, Senator D’Amato. Speaker Gingrich. 

15

1The prepared statement of Mr. Gingrich with attachments appears in the Appendix on page 

57. 

TESTIMONY OF HON. NEWT GINGRICH,1 FORMER SPEAKER, 

U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

Mr. GINGRICH. Let me, first of all, thank you for calling these 

hearings and for focusing attention on this very important topic. I 

ask that my written testimony be submitted for the record. 

Senator COBURN. Without objection, so ordered. 

Mr. GINGRICH. I want to start by reemphasizing a little bit of 

what my two colleagues have commented on. I think we could be 

entering a decade that is extraordinarily dangerous. Let me give 

you three futures, and I say this in the context of everybody who 

said after September 11, ‘‘oh, gee, why didn’t anybody think of it?’’

The first future is simple. Tel Aviv and Jerusalem are wiped out 

in one morning. President Ahmadinejad said recently, October 28, 

that Israel should be ‘‘wiped off the face of the earth.’’ Rafsanjani 

said in December 2001, when Iran gets nuclear weapons, ‘‘on that 

day, this method of global arrogance would come to an end. This 

is because the use of a nuclear bomb in Israel will leave nothing 

on the ground, whereas it will only damage the world of Islam.’’

Now, these aren’t made-up quotes. My first question for this Subcommittee and for the Members of the House and Senate and for 

the Administration is, why have a Holocaust Museum in Washington, getting together occasionally to say, never again is the lesson of the Holocaust, and then when you are told explicitly that 

you have somebody who wants to wipe out Israel, we try to find 

some way to avoid confronting the reality? 

Second, consider a future where Iran develops ship-borne missiles with nuclear weapons that could threaten the United States 

directly. They have already tested in the Caspian Sea a ship-borne 

missile. There is every reason to believe that within a decade, they 

may acquire such a missile. And one of the great complexities of 

the modern world is that we don’t control all the technology in the 

democracies. The North Koreans have technology. The Chinese 

have technology. The Pakistanis have technology. The Russians 

have technology. And the idea that the Iranians at $60 a barrel 

won’t be able to buy technology strikes me to be a complete 

misreading of the modern world. 

Third, imagine that by 2010, there is an Iranian-Chinese-Russian alliance to block U.S. influence in the Persian Gulf. China is 

the most rapidly growing purchaser of oil in the world. The Chinese have a long-term contract with Iran. The Chinese have a deep 

interest in the region. The Russians very badly need hard currency. 

The Russians would like to prove they are independent of us. I 

don’t think it is a particularly difficult act of imagination to believe 

that by the end of this decade, we could see those three countries 

actively blocking us in the Persian Gulf. 

Now, I think these are all practical, real threats, but let me remind you of some recent quotes, because I want you to understand 

how totally real this is. There is a picture that is also in your packet that shows President Ahmadinejad standing in front of a huge 

poster in which the United States has already fallen to the ground 

and been shattered and Israel is in the process of falling to the 

16

ground. Now, this by the way, was all done in English. Unlike 

Adolf Hitler, who did require you to either get a translation or to 

read German, they are quite cheerful about flaunting in our face 

the degree to which they are determined to destroy us. 

Let me give you some examples. Ahmadinejad speaking on October 28 said, ‘‘They say, how could we have a world without America 

and Zionism, but you know well that this slogan and goal can be 

achieved and can definitely be realized.’’

Hassan Abbassi, a Revolutionary Guard intelligence advisor to 

the president, August 30, 2004, ‘‘We have a strategy drawn up for 

the destruction of Anglo-Saxon civilization. We must make use of 

everything we have at hand to strike at this front by means of our 

suicide operations and by means of our missiles.’’

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, June 24, 2004, ‘‘The world of Islam has 

been mobilized against America for the past 25 years. The peoples 

call, ‘Death to America.’ Who used to say, ‘Death to America’? Who, 

besides the Islamic Republican and the Iranian people used to say 

this? Today, everyone says this.’’

The point I am making is, by any standard of the 1930s, you 

have an Iranian dictatorship which is openly, clearly seeking a 

method of eliminating Israel, which would be an act of genocide, 

and defeating the United States and Great Britain and says so 

publicly. 

I am submitting for the record, we are not going to ask to play 

it today, but there is an 11-minute animated film, a cartoon, that 

was shown on Iranian television on October 28, designed to recruit 

children to be suicide bombers. We have given a copy of the DVD 

to every Senator. I would urge you at some point to watch it. It is 

effective, it is chilling, and this was shown on state television. Basically, it is designed to recruit young people and to say, committing 

suicide on behalf of Allah is a good thing to do and being a suicide 

bomber is a reasonable occupation because the other side is so evil. 

The points I would make are, I think, probably more direct than 

we normally hear. I think that the measure that the Senate should 

establish and the House should establish for dealing with Iran is 

very straightforward. Will it be effective? 

Let me just say a brief word about sanctions. We have had sanctions against Fidel Castro since 1960. We had sanctions against 

Saddam Hussein for years. If you read carefully the record of the 

sanctions against Saddam Hussein, it does three things. It 

strengthens the dictatorship, because they are the only people with 

money. It leads to massive levels of corruption. And everything 

they need gets through. 

Now, any person who believes that the second-largest source of 

oil and natural gas on the planet, in a time when China and India 

are desperately buying everything they can get, can be significantly 

crippled by a sanctions regime, if you are prepared to say you want 

a naval blockade and nothing goes in, you can make some case for 

this. But short of that level of intervention, which is, again, something you would have to sustain for a long time, countries don’t collapse. This is historically not how things happen. 

We have two choices. We can decide to live with a genocidal, 

homicidal regime which is openly explaining it seeks to destroy us 

and then we can hold hearings after we lose Tel Aviv and JeruVerDate 0ct 09 2002 09:21 Nov 17, 2006 Jkt 024931 PO 00000 Frm 00020 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\24931.TXT SAFFAIRS PsN: PAT
17

salem and maybe lose New York and Atlanta and say, gee, why 

didn’t we do anything, or we can study seriously the lesson of Winston Churchill in the 1930s, when, by the way, the British and 

French did nothing, the League of Nations was pathetic. 

I would just commend you, read what the Secretary General 

said. He read with ‘‘dismay.’’ He couldn’t bring himself to condemn. 

He couldn’t bring himself to say it was wrong. But he topped out 

at dismay when the President of Iran proposed eliminating Israel 

from the face of the earth. Read what the Security Council did. 

They couldn’t even come to a resolution. They issued a press release, and the word ‘‘pathetic’’ comes to mind. 

Senator Santorum’s bill is a useful, small first step. It should be 

the policy of the United States of America to replace this regime. 

We should communicate to our allies around the world, we would 

like to have their help. We should communicate to international institutions that to the degree they wish to be effective, we would 

like to participate. We should not allow ‘‘can’t’’ to hide behind. We 

should not allow resolutions that are meaningless, proposals that 

have no teeth, or regimes that will have no effect. 

We should indicate clearly that we are the allies of all the Iranian people who would like to live in a non-homicidal, non-totalitarian regime, and we should indicate unequivocally that at some 

point in the not-distant future, there will be a new government of 

Iran and a simple, small first step would be to move to suspend 

Iranian membership in the U.N. as long as the head of the government is claiming the right to eliminate a fellow state. 

Now, if we don’t have the nerve to stand up and say, this is 

homicidally wrong and we have been warned, there is no reason to 

believe that our European friends, whose record of appeasement is 

unending, are going to have any nerve, and there is no reason to 

believe that any international organization is going to have any effectiveness. 

If, on the other hand, we are determined to win in the Middle 

East, we are prepared to do what it takes, and we are prepared to 

communicate unequivocally to our friends and allies that we will 

do what it takes, I suspect a number of countries will end up helping us and a number of countries will end up being actively in 

favor of replacing the current government. I think anything short 

of replacing the current government is basically irrelevant, and I 

think you should expect at some point in your lifetime to see a 

major war, and probably a nuclear war, if this government is not 

replaced. 

Thank you for allowing us to be here. 

Senator COBURN. Speaker Gingrich, thank you very much. 

Next week, on November 24, IAEA is expected to debate the 

issue of Iran. This will be a follow-up to their last discussion this 

past September. They fell short of passing a resolution to send to 

the Security Council to consider sanctions. 

If the IAEA is not able to garner sufficient support to put pressure on Iran, what is the effectiveness of the IAEA? Does anybody 

want to answer that? In light of the testimony that we have had 

here today and they can’t garner the support to create a mechanism with which to sanction, just to sanction the statement that 

18

this is wrong, or as Speaker Gingrich recommended, removal, what 

is the effectiveness of IAEA? 

Mr. GINGRICH. I recently co-chaired with former Majority Leader 

George Mitchell a task force on United Nations reform. I am going 

to speak only for myself, but we spent more than 6 months looking 

at the entire international system. 

I think we have to get away from the notion that there is moral 

authority inherent in meetings of people who do nothing meaningful. That is, the IAEA should see itself as being under test next 

week, not the United States. If the IAEA cannot bring itself to 

adopt a firm resolution reporting this to the Security Council, and 

if the Security Council cannot take decisive action, then the United 

States’ attitude should be, these are irrelevant institutions that are 

not, frankly, very useful. I think the institutions should be served 

notice that they are the ones who are being judged by history, not 

those of us who are concerned about the Iranians. 

But to allow ourselves to be handicapped, as we have been, for 

example, in Sudan, where we wring our hands, virtual genocide occurs, there is an argument about whether enough hundreds of 

thousands of people have died in Darfour to count as true genocide 

or simply mass murder, and nothing happens because the Chinese 

are getting oil and the French are getting sales, and then we say, 

well, gee, we can’t do anything because the Security Council can’t 

act. In the case of Sudan, it is a tragedy for the human race. In 

the case of Iran, it is a direct threat to the survival of the United 

States and we should serve notice that an impotent IAEA and an 

ineffective United Nations simply mean we will pursue our diplomacy elsewhere and not, frankly, worry much about their ineffectiveness. 

Senator COBURN. Mr. Woolsey. 

Mr. WOOLSEY. I agree with Newt, Mr. Chairman. I would only 

add that I alluded in my opening remarks to the ineffectiveness of 

the nonproliferation regime because it does not explicitly bar enrichment and fuel processing. So it gives the hesitant or the bribed 

an out. It lets a Russia or a France effectively say, ‘‘well, we can’t 

say that there is a violation of the letter of the treaty. It is all a 

matter of intent. So, let us talk some more.’’

Senator COBURN. Are you suggesting that treaty be opened up to 

be revised? 

Mr. WOOLSEY. In an ideal world, one would have a treaty regime 

which had two separate functions. One was to help countries that 

needed help develop adequate energy of different kinds. Sometimes, 

that might mean a nuclear reactor for electricity generation. I tend 

to think mainly it would be other types of energy. But even if that 

assistance or encouragement was provided and even for nuclear 

power generation, there would be no reason under this mythical regime we are just sort of inventing here, to permit fuel processing 

or enrichment. There is plenty of that capability in the world in the 

five named nuclear powers. There are 30-some countries in the 

world that have electricity generation from nuclear reactors and 

don’t have fuel processing and enrichment. 

So I would think, yes, ideally, we would move to a separate regime that did not permit fuel enrichment or processing to be newly 

constructed. But trying to restructure the current regime of interVerDate 0ct 09 2002 09:21 Nov 17, 2006 Jkt 024931 PO 00000 Frm 00022 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\24931.TXT SAFFAIRS PsN: PAT
19

national controls at the time we are facing similar cheating from 

North Korea and Iran would be an extraordinary diplomatic undertaking. It might be worthwhile trying to begin it in order to show 

our disdain for, or lack of satisfaction, for some, but in any case the 

unsatisfactory nature, of the current nonproliferation regime. But 

the chance of actually getting a completely restructured regime 

that the world could go along with over the course of the next few 

years is tiny. I think it would be a titanic task. 

Senator COBURN. Senator D’Amato, do you want to comment? 

Senator D’AMATO. Mr. Chairman, we have to find out what the 

IAEA will do because they have, for the first time, I think, seen 

very clearly what is taking place. They heard the words of the Iranians. I am much more hopeful that they may act in a more forward way. It is not going to bring about regime change, and let me 

ask you, how do we bring about regime change? Are we talking 

about a blockade? Are we talking about an attack? It is very easy 

to say, let us bring about regime change. 

And what policies do we undertake? Do we take Radio Free 

whatever it is, beaming it into Iran? Do you think that is going to 

bring about a regime change? And it is one thing to say that sanctions have never worked, but the fact of the matter is that they 

have had an impact, and I talked about Libya. 

Now, if we want to sit around and just wring our hands and say 

that they don’t work, I respectfully disagree. But it can’t be sanctions alone. It has to be engaging countries who heretofore have 

not been willing to back it up and make those sanctions effective. 

And if that means an embargo at some point in time, that is why 

I said I referred in my speech to constrictive engagement, to constrict them. If they begin to do the things they are supposed to do 

and they demonstrate it, don’t talk about it, then we will reward 

them. And if they don’t, we squeeze harder and harder. 

So if we are going to talk about regime change, I don’t think the 

American people are willing at this point in time to say, let us go 

to war. Let us bomb them. How do you bring that about? 

I am suggesting to you that you don’t bring it about without involving the world community, and that is hard work. That is not 

easy. But let me tell you, there is a community of interest, Mr. 

Chairman, that we have to explore to become involved in this battle. What is the biggest threat to the Russians? The Chechens and 

the same kind of terrorism that they face. I am not suggesting that 

the Russians are all good guys, but let us use our allies or those 

people. 

There is an old thing that I used to hear the Administration talk 

about, I don’t necessarily agree with it, the enemy of my enemy is 

my friend. So, consequently, let us begin to turn that around and 

if we have an opportunity to involve the Russians and others in 

this battle, let us see if we can’t do it. If we have to go it alone, 

that is another matter and I say then we should do it. 

Senator COBURN. Speaker Gingrich, in your testimony, you outlined the eight steps for regime change. Would you mind commenting on those now? I think it is appropriate, since nobody is 

talking about armed conflict here, but nobody has taken that off of 

the table, but that is not the purpose and the focus of our hearing 

today. I would like to hear Speaker Gingrich comment, if he would, 

20

on the eight steps that he talked about in his testimony in terms 

of regime change. 

Mr. GINGRICH. Well, let me say first, I think the first key step 

is victory in Iran. I think the rise of a democratic Shiia, largely 

Shiia government—60 percent of the population is Shiia—would 

have a substantial impact on the Iranian people. Every indication 

we have is the younger Iranians desperately would like to have an 

open regime, that this is, in fact, a relatively unpopular regime and 

that there is a substantial well of discontent in Iran. I think winning in Iraq and being decisive in helping the Iraqi people run 

their own country is a very important step in the right direction. 

Second, I think it is very important for us to say openly and aggressively what kind of regime this is. The recent description, for 

example, of a young girl, 16 years of age, being strangled to death 

because she behaved immorally by walking hand-in-hand with an 

older man, and so she was publicly hung without using a hangman’s knot and for 11 minutes, she gradually, slowly choked to 

death as a symbol. People don’t describe how vicious this regime 

is, and we are not aggressive enough in saying publicly, these are 

bad people who do bad things and we want to be the allies of the 

good Iranians, and frankly, I think, a Radio Free Iran does help. 

Ronald Reagan rolled back the Iron Curtain, eliminated the Soviet Union, and didn’t fire a single shot outside of the Afghan campaign, but if you think about all the rest of the things that were 

done in the Soviet Union, they were all economic, political, and diplomatic. 

Third, I think it is very important for us to say that we favor 

freedom in Iran and we favor an Iran that doesn’t favor its neighbors. There is very profound testimony by Natan Sharansky, who 

was in the Soviet gulag at the time Ronald Reagan used the term 

‘‘evil empire,’’ and his vivid emotional explanation of the power of 

an American President to really send signals. 

We should send a signal to the Iranian people. Every Iranian 

who wants to live in peace with their neighbors, we are your allies. 

Every Iranian who wants to live in freedom, we are your allies. 

Every Iranian who wants to live in a prosperous, middle-class society, we are your ally, and make it quite clear who we are opposed 

to. 

Fourth, there are democracy movements. At a time when the Iranian dictatorship provides somewhere between $100 and $200 million a year to Hezbollah, the fact that we can’t find a way to provide a couple hundred million dollars a year to those who want to 

free Iran is just utterly irrational. I mean, the ineffectiveness of 

this Administration and its predecessor to have any kind of coherent strategy—at one point there was, I remember, a television satellite program out of Los Angeles by Iranians who live in Los Angeles. We couldn’t even get support for that. It was just utterly 

manically stupid. 

I think the notion ought to be, let us match them. Every dollar 

they spend on Hezbollah, we will match undermining the current 

regime, and that would be a reasonable deterrent. 

Fifth, we have got to think through a strategy on Russia and 

China. Right now, Russia and China have no long-term incentives 

to not deal with Iran, and whether that means, for example, we say 

21

to the Chinese there is an American market and an Iranian market. Choose. The Chinese would not be able to choose the Iranian 

market in that setting. But I think it also means you have got to 

find ways to deal with the things they do need, which in the Russian case is hard currency and in the Chinese case is oil. 

Sixth, and we probably do disagree on this, I think the direct application of sanctions—selective sanctions make a lot of sense, and 

selective technology control makes a lot of sense, and putting a lot 

of pressure on Germany, France, and others about selective technology makes sense. Broad sanctions don’t make sense because 

they will just be porous. All you will do is punish Americans because you can’t get anybody else to do it. 

Seventh, I think it would be helpful to start establishing special 

tribunals for members of the Iranian Republican Guard Corps and 

those who are human rights violators. It is important to set a principle, which certainly we are seeing in Iran, which we should be 

seeing in Sudan, and by the way, we did call for this in our bipartisan Task Force on U.N. Reform. We think there ought to be a 

principle established that when you are destroying human beings 

and you are killing human beings, that you will be brought to account even if it is not today. We think that actually does act as an 

inhibition against this behavior. 

I think two last things are that we have got to look at a ballistic 

missile defense and also at a defense against electromagnetic pulse, 

which I think is the most serious technical danger to the U.S. 

today. But a ballistic missile defense in the region. We should be 

able to say to the Gulf states that want to side with us, we should 

be able to say to Kuwait or to Iran as well as Israel that we are 

prepared to defend against the Iranian weapons of mass destruction. 

And finally, I think there should be a contingency plan, A, if the 

regime collapses, or B, if a civil war breaks out. Iran is not a purely 

Persian country run by a coherent dictatorship. In this sense, it actually is not like Nazi Germany. Iran has a very large population 

that is non-Iranian. They have a lot of people who are not happy 

with the current regime. And under the right circumstances, you 

could, in fact, imagine a civil war breaking out in the country, and 

we ought to have though through strategically in advance what we 

would do in those circumstances. 

Senator COBURN. Thank you. Senator Carper. 

Senator CARPER. No questions 

Senator COBURN. Senator Collins. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR COLLINS 

Chairman COLLINS. Senator Carper totally surprised me there, 

so I am not as ready as I was going to be. 

To follow up on Speaker Gingrich’s comments on what we could 

do, Mr. Woolsey, in your testimony, you discuss engagement with 

the Iranian people and Iranian groups who are struggling for freedom and you go on to say that such efforts would probably require 

more U.S. presence in Iran. Could you describe in more detail how 

the United States could engage the more moderate population to 

bring about change? How do you get more U.S. presence in Iran? 

22

Mr. WOOLSEY. It is my understanding, Senator Collins, that 

there is an Iranian interests section in the United States that has 

about 50 Iranians in it. Many or most, even perhaps all of these 

may have dual nationality. But nonetheless, we have nothing like 

that in Iran. 

I don’t think under the current circumstances it would be wise 

to have formal recognition and exchange of ambassadors. There 

may have been a time when that would have been reasonable. In 

the spring of 1997, right after Khatami was elected would have 

probably been a good time. But now, one doesn’t want to look like 

one is giving any kind of a positive nod to Mr. Ahmadinejad in 

light of the events of the last few months. But I think an Iranian 

interests section, an American interests section in a friendly embassy, Swiss or some other, in Iran in which we could have some 

people on the ground would probably be a plus. 

Whether we do that or not, we ought to be engaging financially 

and personally with Iranian dissident groups in this country, and 

with Iranian exiles in the region. We ought to be blanketing that 

country with broadcasts—not only Radio Free Europe-type broadcasts in Farsi and Arabic, but we ought to be ridiculing these 

mullahs and Ahmadinejad. I would go, frankly, to the two gentlemen who run and have created South Park and ask them to come 

up with some films ridiculing these people. If you have seen Team 

America World Police and see what they have done to Kim Jong 

Il, it is impossible to look at Kim Jong Il after seeing that movie 

and not burst out laughing. 

I think we should basically, with all the tools of American communications, of our civil liberties organizations, our NGOs working 

with Iranian exile organizations, with ridicule, as I have said, turn 

up what used to be called out at the CIA the ‘‘great Wurlitzer.’’ 

And we don’t need to do this covertly, the way it was done back 

in the late 1940s and 1950s. This can all be done—as far as I am 

concerned, it is better to do it—overtly and to put a stake in the 

ground by the way we undertake these actions. 

I would say that two people have looked at this more thoroughly 

and carefully than I, my friend Mike Ledeer, who is at the American Enterprise Institute, and my friend Ambassador Mark Palmer, 

who was my Vice Chairman when I was Chairman of the Board of 

Freedom House. Mark was also the American Ambassador in Hungary at the end of the 1980s and beginning of the 1990s and practiced himself as an ambassador some of the types of engagement 

with Hungarian dissident groups and the like which bore fruit. So 

I would pull together Mike Ledeen and Mark Palmer and get some 

creative ideas from them on some of these areas, as well. 

Chairman COLLINS. I, of course, did not get any of the movie references. I just want to go clearly on record on that. [Laughter.] 

Mr. WOOLSEY. One wants to watch out for Team America World 

Police. There are some rather gross parts to it. [Laughter.] 

Chairman COLLINS. In August, the Washington Post reported 

that the national intelligence estimates reassessment of Iran’s nuclear capability judged that the country was approximately 10 

years away from being able to deploy a nuclear bomb. Do you agree 

with that assessment? 

23

Mr. WOOLSEY. That must be because they are assuming that the 

Iranians are enriching their own uranium, and processing their 

own plutonium or fuel, all domestically. I haven’t seen the estimate 

and it may well be a reasonable one under that set of assumptions. 

But if they are able to obtain from, say, North Korea, with whom 

they have a close working relationship on ballistic missiles—essentially, the Taepodong and the Shahab are the same missile. It is 

a joint North Korean-Iranian missile program. If they were able to 

obtain from North Korea a few kilograms of plutonium or slightly 

more of highly enriched uranium, especially with highly enriched 

uranium, they could have a bomb much sooner than that. It is, unfortunately, rather easy to make a highly enriched uranium bomb. 

They might not have something they could put on the front end of 

a Shahab missile and launch at Israel, but something that could 

be detonated on a tramp steamer in New York Harbor, it is entirely plausible, I am afraid. 

Chairman COLLINS. Speaker Gingrich, do you have any comment 

on that? 

Mr. GINGRICH. My only comment is that several years ago, the 

North Korean public television—which is the only television, I 

guess, in North Korea—North Korean television showed an Iranian 

delegation visiting with the beloved leader, wandering around looking at missiles in sort of a missile bazaar. He is there saying, this 

will be a great one for you to buy. 

So in a world where you can put the amount of material that Mr. 

Woolsey is describing in a suitcase, put it on an airliner, and have 

it show up, the notion that any planning agency—we have been 

through this whole thing with Iraqi WMD, but what people tend 

to forget is in 1991, when we actually got a chance to look at where 

Iraq was, they were radically closer to having a nuclear weapon in 

1991 than anybody in the Western intelligence community thought 

possible. 

So anybody who says to you that they can’t get a weapon in the 

next decade doesn’t have a clue what they are talking about. There 

is clearly a desire to get a weapon. There is clearly a world market 

of knowledge on how to get a weapon. And I think a prudent country would assume that at some point in the not-distant future, the 

Iranian regime is going to have a nuclear weapon. 

Chairman COLLINS. Thank you. I want to thank all three of you 

for your testimony on a very important issue. 

[The prepared statement of Senator Collins follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF SENATOR COLLINS 

Iran has been seeking to develop both indigenously and through foreign acquisitions nuclear technology, ostensibly for ‘‘peaceful’’ purposes. Repeatedly, the Government of Iran has insisted that, under the NPT, it has an ‘‘inalienable right to have 

access to [nuclear] technology for peaceful purposes.’’ But, as virtually every nuclear 

expert can attest, a full-blown ‘‘peaceful’’ nuclear program, with a uranium enrichment program in tow, is only a small step from having a nuclear weapons program 

itself. 

While Iran’s explicit intentions may be obscured, some facts are indisputable. The 

June presidential elections brought to power a more hard-line regime in President 

Ahmadinejad. Moderates and so-called pragmatists were purged from parliament in 

the previous year. Not surprisingly, Freedom House has rated Iran’s adherence to 

fundamental political and civil rights for its citizens next to last. Then, on October 

28, President Ahmadinejad declared his desire for Israel to be ‘‘wiped off the map.’’ 

And, of course, Iran’s support for terrorism has not abated at all. Combine these 

24

facts with the increase revenues from oil that Iran is receiving and, at least in the 

short run, we are facing a very difficult problem. 

Yet, one thing I think that is important to keep in mind when it comes to Iran 

is that, in most places in the Middle East, some of the government leaders are 

friendly to the United States, but their populations are anti-American; in Iran, it’s 

just the opposite. Iran’s leaders are virulently anti-American but, poll after poll, indicates that most of Iran’s population views the United States in a positive light. 

How we might use this singular bit of good news when it comes to Iran is something 

I will be anxious to hear form our distinguished panel of experts.

Senator COBURN. I believe by early bird rules, Senator Lautenberg was here ahead of Senator Dayton, and so we will recognize 

Senator Lautenberg. 

Senator LAUTENBERG. Thanks, Mr. Chairman. Unfortunately, the 

subject is not only complicated, but interesting, as well, and it 

would be good if we could have a little freer dialogue about it. 

I want to remind my friend Al D’Amato that he and I were on 

the Pan Am 103 investigating committee and it was realized then 

that Libya had a hand there and that sanctions worked, Newt, so 

they do work in some cases. 

And otherwise, I look at things—we talk about flexing muscles, 

but if you don’t have muscles, there is nothing to flex. Right now, 

with our situation, we have seen what happens when our troops 

are committed to a serious engagement in more than one place, 

and they are. We are spread around the world. We don’t have the 

reserves to send out the naval blockade that we would like to see 

and things of that nature. 

While I agree we ought to make changes, to me, one of the worst 

things that I see happening is what I will call sabotage from within. It is an incredibly disloyal situation. I wore a uniform. Everybody in those days was concerned about keeping secrets, and if 

there was ever a company who did business with the enemy, by 

God, they would be sunk either by a mass uprising or law promulgated. 

And so I ask for Mr. Woolsey and Mr. Gingrich and Senator 

D’Amato, there is a loophole in the law that allows U.S. companies 

to do business with Iran through its foreign subsidiaries. I ask you, 

should that loophole be closed? Mr. Woolsey. 

Mr. WOOLSEY. I certainly think so. I think any pressure is good, 

and I think Newt’s point is a good one, that general sanctions—

particularly for a country that has the oil reserves Iran does and 

oil being as desired and the market being as strong for it as it is—

are most unlikely to be effective. But specific sanctions dealing 

with particular types of technology——

Senator LAUTENBERG. Well, I wonder if I could restrict you to do 

that, the answer you initially gave and you said yes. I would ask 

Mr. Gingrich, because we have time limitations. 

Mr. WOOLSEY. Sure. 

Mr. GINGRICH. I am for cutting off specific technologies, but I am 

not for punishing American companies in settings where you clearly have replacements from other countries. Having the Chinese 

provide something we don’t provide doesn’t strike me as helpful. 

Senator LAUTENBERG. But let me understand. We are talking 

about not the competitive environment. We are talking about 

whether or not American companies ought to be allowed to do business with an avowed enemy, as we all clearly understand, through 

25

some sham structure by having a headquarters or an operating facility in Dubai and headquarters in the Grand Cayman. Should 

that loophole be closed, or should we just let it go? 

Mr. GINGRICH. I think sanctions against a country like Iran 

should be very selective and primarily aimed at keeping technology 

out of their hands. 

You and I just disagree, Senator. I don’t think it does any great 

advantage to our long-term goal to enable five other countries to 

sell precisely the same product rather than the United States. I 

don’t see how—you haven’t affected Iran at all. 

Senator LAUTENBERG. Should we help them develop revenues, 

this enemy of ours, develop revenues by helping them produce their 

oil more efficiently to be used to fund Hezbollah and Hamas and 

the others? Is that an appropriate thing, in your mind? 

Mr. GINGRICH. I am for changing the regime, not annoying it. 

Senator LAUTENBERG. Well, when do you want to change it next 

week or do we do something relatively immediately to change it? 

Mr. GINGRICH. Ronald Reagan was very deeply opposed to the 

Soviet Union and thought that the wheat cut-off was totally stupid 

because the only people it hurt were farmers in the Midwest, OK? 

Senator LAUTENBERG. Yes——

Mr. GINGRICH. Reagan was very selective in the things that we 

isolated the Soviet Union from because he had a very conscious 

strategy of dismembering the regime and it worked. 

Senator LAUTENBERG. Thank you very much. Senator D’Amato, 

do you think we ought to close loopholes for companies that——

Senator D’AMATO. We should absolutely close the loopholes. The 

President would always have the right to make exceptions where 

he finds, for food, for medicine, etc. But the loopholes, in general, 

should be closed. 

Senator LAUTENBERG. Thank you. 

Senator D’AMATO. This, then, would force whoever was attempting to do business to come in and make the case. You wouldn’t 

have, for example, a Siemens—admittedly, it is not an American 

company, but it does a heck of a lot of business here, probably more 

than any other place—you could then get them to stop giving the 

kind of technology that is helping these rascals build a bomb. 

Senator LAUTENBERG. Absolutely. Separate subject. I agree with 

you totally there. 

I want to ask, again, our three friends here, foreign subsidiaries 

of American companies cannot do business with Cuba, but under 

current law, they can do business with Iran. Is Cuba a bigger 

threat to America than Iran? 

Mr. WOOLSEY. No, it is not, and I would agree with closing that 

gap but using it, essentially, with exceptions, using it basically the 

way Newt said. 

Senator LAUTENBERG. Mr. Gingrich. 

Mr. GINGRICH. No, I think Iran is a much bigger danger to the 

United States than Cuba. 

Senator D’AMATO. I agree with Newt and Mr. Woolsey. 

Senator LAUTENBERG. Let me say this, and I appreciate the fact 

that we can differ on things and I respect your ability to express 

it. I am dug in deep on this because when I see kids from New Jersey being buried, whether it is in Arlington Cemetery or I go with 

26

the parents and I stand there and I watch them weep and I see 

the little kids that they have left behind being held, and talking 

to a fellow at Walter Reed who is sightless and 28 years old and 

his wife was sitting there and I tried to talk to them about Danny 

Inouye and Bob Dole and war heroes. I was a soldier. I wasn’t a 

hero. I did my duty. I say to this man, things are there that can 

help you get along and we want to help you and he said, ‘‘I may 

never see my 28-month-old child again. I want to hold her in my 

arms. I want to know that I am there with her.’’

And when I see that and I hear it and I think of companies who 

do business with our enemy, people who help pump money into 

that terrorist network, and I say, how can we dare to—we ought 

to be ashamed of ourselves, and I am going to do whatever I can 

to close that loophole. Thank you all very much. 

Senator COBURN. Senator Dayton. 

Senator DAYTON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Director Woolsey, I am on the Armed Services Committee and I 

agree with you, there are areas where we are certainly militarily 

deficient. Your bulls-eye, just on my quick notations here, involves 

about a $600 billion a year increase in our military spending, 

which you propose—and you deserve the platinum medal for political courage in Washington to fund it with a tax increase. I wonder, 

seriously, what areas you would look to expand as priorities. 

Mr. WOOLSEY. Senator, I wasn’t necessarily saying we should go to a $1.1 trillion defense budget. I was just saying that was what 

the Kennedy Administration had, in GDP terms. I think one might 

be able to get by with less of an increase than that, but I do 

think——

Senator DAYTON. I won’t accuse you of calling for a tax increase——

Mr. WOOLSEY. Well, I am perfectly happy to call for a tax increase. I don’t have to get an election certificate to have my job as 

a consultant, so——

Senator DAYTON. That is an advantage you have. 

Mr. WOOLSEY. But I do believe that a substantial increase in our 

military forces is necessary. There are some things with respect to 

Nation building and the like which one can do with civilian agencies. But as I think the situation in Iraq has shown—and I saw 

this up close when I was over there in February 2004—it would be 

better if we had a lot more civil affairs people directly in our military, the ability immediately to have construction work begin, to 

have the military paying people while they are protecting them. All 

of that capability was pulled out of the active forces and put into 

the reserves—and it is very thin even there—a few years ago. 

I think our active forces need those kinds of capabilities. I think 

we need enough of a Navy and Air Force to be able to deal with 

China. I don’t like seeing capable vessels in the fleet being put up 

in mothballs now because we can’t afford to keep them going. I 

think we need more divisions in the Army. We might have to fight 

in two places at once and we have a one-war Army now. I would 

also increase the Marines. 

I think something in the order of $100 to $200 billion a year 

more in the defense budget is entirely warranted given the circumstances we are in. That would bring us up to around 4 to 5 perVerDate 0ct 09 2002 09:21 Nov 17, 2006 Jkt 024931 PO 00000 Frm 00030 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 C:\DOCS\24931.TXT SAFFAIRS PsN: PAT
27

cent of GDP, somewhere around half the level of proportionate sacrifice that was being made in the Kennedy Administration. If that 

didn’t do the job, I would add another $100 or $200 billion. 

Senator DAYTON. Robert Kennedy said that one of the lessons in 

the aftermath of the Bay of Pigs is that if you want to diffuse an 

international crisis, you have got to put yourself in the other guy’s 

shoes. Given the realities in the Middle East and the Iranian perception, I assume that Israel has nuclear weapons. How are we 

going to get them to forego them if they believe that Israel possesses them? I will give each of the three of you a response to that. 

Mr. WOOLSEY. I don’t think the reason the Iranians have a nuclear weapon program is because they believe they need to deter 

an attack with nuclear weapons from Israel. I think they understand that they cannot simultaneously maintain their fanatical regime and support for terrorism and all the rest without being able, 

principally, I think, to deter us from using conventional forces 

against them. And that is one reason that they have—or a major 

reason they have—their nuclear weapons program. That and their 

own regional ambitions in places like Azerbaijan and the rest. They 

want to be able to expand to dominate the region and nuclear 

weapons help them very much there. Although they will, for reasons of debate, international debate, talk about Israel to the nuclear weapons program, I don’t believe that is really what is driving them. 

Senator DAYTON. Speaker and Senator, I have about 2 minutes, 

so I will give a minute apiece here. 

Mr. GINGRICH. I think that we have this politically correct passion for avoiding the truth about this regime. This is a regime 

which believes that it has a mission to extend its view across the 

planet. It says so in its constitution. Its president says so. Its ayatollah says so. Its senior advisors say so. They fund Hezbollah 

probably to the tune of better than $100 million a year. They have 

engaged in active warfare against the United States at least since 

the early 1980s. 

I think it is just like saying about Adolf Hitler, why is he so mad 

with the Czechs and the Poles? I mean, he was mad with the 

Czechs and Poles because they existed. He intended to eliminate 

that problem. 

I think we are dealing with a regime we don’t want to be honest 

about. If Israel has had these weapons for a long time, they clearly 

have proven they have not attacked anybody with their nuclear 

weapons. I think it is impossible for anyone to have the same sense 

of security about what would happen with the current Iranian dictatorship. 

Senator DAYTON. Senator D’Amato. 

Senator D’AMATO. I think in that case, the Congressman and Mr. 

Woolsey are absolutely correct. Israel does not present the threat 

to the Iranians. That is not why they are looking to build the bomb. 

It is for all the other reasons that people have indicated, their hatred of Anglo-Saxons, their hatred of the state of Israel, their view 

that they will prevail and have the jihad. This is what motivates 

them. This is what drives them. 

So the one is no excuse, does not give them any moral leverage 

to say that Israel should be without. You have to look at the facts 

28

as they are. And we simply do not want to, and I agree with the 

Congressman, we don’t want to really recognize—I don’t think the 

political climate and the courage is here, given whole lots of factors, given Iraq, the situation, people don’t even want to hear about 

it, let alone those who have to run for political office to say, hey, 

you better look at this. You better look at this and North Korea 

and rogue nations and come up with a policy of constrictive containment. 

Senator DAYTON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Senator COBURN. Thank you. 

Senator DAYTON. I appreciate our witnesses’ candor and the excellent discussion. Thank you. 

Senator COBURN. I want to make sure everybody understands 

that—several have addressed the chair in terms of having this 

hearing. The real purpose and drive behind this hearing was Senator Carper, and he deserves the credit for it because it is an issue 

and he is a co-partner with me on this Subcommittee and I want 

to recognize him and thank him for that. 

I will be sending each of you two written questions, one on what 

impact would premature withdrawal from Iraq have in terms of our 

relationship with Iran? How do we influence Russia in terms of the 

player that we need them to be? 

Now we will proceed with the next panel of witnesses. I want to 

thank you each for coming to testify and appreciate you being here. 

I am sorry that we are running over. 

Senator DAYTON. Mr. Chairman, I am not going to object to the 

questions, but the first one on premature withdrawal seems to me 

to be a pretty biased question. I would like to ask the opportunity 

to present another question that would be included to them. 

Senator COBURN. Absolutely. Any questions that you would like 

to ask, we will be more than happy to have them answered. 

Senator DAYTON. Thank you. 

Senator COBURN. First of all, let me welcome each of you and 

thank you very much. 

Dr. Gary Samore is Vice President for Global Security and Sustainability of the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation. 

As Vice President, he is responsible for the foundation’s international grantmaking, currently totaling approximately $75 million 

annually. The international program provides grants in the fields 

of international peace, security, human rights, international justice, the environment, and population. Headquartered in Chicago, 

the foundation has offices in Mexico, India, Nigeria, Russia, and 

supports work in 85 countries. 

Ray Takeyh is a Senior Fellow for Middle East Studies at the 

Council on Foreign Relations. His areas of specialization are Iran, 

political reform in the Middle East, and Islamist movements and 

parties. He is also contributing editor of the National Interest. Mr. 

Takeyh was previously Professor of National Security Studies at 

the National War College, Professor and Director of Studies at the 

Near East and Southeast Asia Center, a National Defense University Fellow in International Security Studies at Yale University, a 

fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, and a fellow at the Center for Middle Eastern Studies at the University of 

California-Berkeley. 

29

1The prepared statement of Mr. Samore appears in the Appendix on page 88. 

Ilan Berman is Vice President for Policy of the Washington-based 

American Foreign Policy Council. He is an expert on security in the 

Middle East, Central Asia, and the Russian Federation. He has 

consulted for both U.S. CIA and the U.S. Department of Defense 

and provided assistance on foreign policy and national security 

issues to a range of governmental agencies and Congressional offices. Mr. Berman is Adjunct Professor for International Law and 

Global Security at the National Defense University in Washington, 

DC. He serves as a member of the reconstituted Committee on the 

Present Danger and is editor of the Journal of International Security Affairs. He is author of ‘‘Tehean Rising: Iran’s Challenge to the 

United States,’’ published in 2005. 

I welcome each of you. Dr. Samore. 

TESTIMONY OF GARY S. SAMORE,1 VICE PRESIDENT, PROGRAM ON GLOBAL SECURITY AND SUSTAINABILITY, JOHN D. 

AND CATHERINE T. MACARTHUR FOUNDATION 

Mr. SAMORE. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, for giving me 

this opportunity to discuss the challenge of Iran’s nuclear program 

with the Subcommittee. 

I would like to very briefly discuss the main technical conclusions 

of the study that you discussed that was put out by the Londonbased International Institute of Strategic Studies in September and 

then I will focus most of my remarks on the diplomatic state of 

play concerning efforts to try to prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapons capability. 

First, from a technical standpoint, the study by the International 

Institute of Strategic Studies concludes that Iran still faces a number of technical hurdles before it can achieve a nuclear weapons capability in terms of its capability to produce sufficient fissile material for nuclear weapons. So we conclude that even if Iran tried to 

go for a nuclear weapon as quickly as possible by lifting all political 

constraints, we estimate that it would still take several years, perhaps a minimum of 5 years, before Iran could produce enough 

weapons-grade uranium for a single bomb. This estimate represents the time required to complete and then operate a pilot scale 

centrifuge plan long enough to produce 20 to 25 kilograms of weapons-grade uranium, which is enough for a simple implosion device. 

Over a much longer period of time, over a decade, it would be 

possible for the Iranians to complete industrial-scale enrichment facilities or facilities to produce and separate large quantities of plutonium, which would make it possible for the Iranians to have a 

much larger nuclear weapons program. 

None of these technical barriers are fatal, but they create space 

and time for international efforts to try to deny Iran from acquiring 

a nuclear weapons capability. 

Unfortunately, the effectiveness of diplomatic efforts over the 

past 21⁄2 years, since Iran’s secret nuclear program was first publicly revealed, have been very mixed. On one hand, to avoid referral 

to the U.N. Security Council, which the Iranians fear could lead to 

political isolation, economic sanctions, and even military attack, Teheran has been compelled to cooperate with investigations by the 

30

International Atomic Energy Agency into its nuclear secrets and to 

suspend some key elements of its enrichment activity since October 

2003. 

On the other hand, the Iranians have adamantly rejected all diplomatic efforts to permanently cease its fuel cycle program in exchange for assistance to its nuclear power program and other economic and political inducements offered by European negotiators. 

In the same way, I think it is very unlikely that Iran would accept 

the current Russian proposal for partial ownership of an enrichment facility on Russian soil in return for limiting its indigenous 

fuel cycle program just to conversion activities. So whether or not 

Mohammed ElBaradei, the head of the IAEA, goes to Teheran prior 

to the next meeting of the IAEA Board of Governors in November, 

I think it is very unlikely we will see a diplomatic solution. 

In other words, Iran has made tactical concessions under pressure, under threats, to accept limits or some delays in its nuclear 

fuel cycle program, but it hasn’t been willing to abandon the program altogether at any price, and I think that reflects a deeply 

held and longstanding conviction among all major elements of 

Iran’s leadership that Iran needs to acquire a nuclear weapons option, although there may be different views on the wisdom of actually building nuclear weapons. 

So under these circumstances, the immediate diplomatic objective is to maintain pressure in order to delay the program by keeping the remaining suspension in place and by putting pressure on 

Iran to continue to cooperate with the IAEA. 

In this respect, Teheran calculates that the balance of power is 

shifting in its direction, which, therefore, reduces the risk of referral to the Security Council. From the standpoint of Teheran, the 

tight oil and gas market affords protection against the risk of economic sanctions, as the previous panel discussed, and the U.S. entanglement inside Iraq provides temporary protection against the 

risk of U.S. military attack. 

Nonetheless, Teheran has acted very cautiously. In August, the 

Iranians resumed operations at the Esfahan uranium conversion 

facility to convert yellow cake into US6, feed material for enrichment, but they have maintained the suspension on the manufacture, the installation, the operation of centrifuge machines at their 

enrichment plant that is under construction. 

Furthermore, the Iranians have continued to dribble out some 

enhanced cooperation with the IAEA, most recently allowing additional access to a military testing facility where it is thought Iran 

may have been conducting some weaponization experiments. 

Using these salami tactics, Teheran has successfully defeated the 

efforts of the U.S. and European powers at the IAEA Board of Governors to refer Iran to the U.N. Security Council, and I suspect 

that pattern will continue at the next meeting in 2 weeks. 

The near-term danger, it seems to me, Mr. Chairman, is that 

Iran will calculate that it has a window of opportunity while the 

United States is weak and while the international community is divided to advance its nuclear program further by lifting the suspension on some of its enrichment activities while it continues to cooperate with IAEA inspections. The challenge for us is to mobilize 

31

1The prepared statement of Mr. Takeyh appears in the Appendix on page 93. 

strong support for enrichment as a red line, even though we have 

failed to enforce conversion as a trigger for referral. 

The key here in terms of drawing a new red line is Russia and 

China. Certainly, both Moscow and Beijing share our view that 

Iran is seeking to develop a nuclear weapons capability, and as I 

understand it, they have privately warned Iran through diplomatic 

channels not to resume enrichment. But it is less clear that Moscow and Beijing are prepared to support referral to the Security 

Council if Iran resumes its enrichment program or that they would 

support any serious international pressure on Iran in the event 

that referral takes place. 

Basically, Russia and China don’t want to be dragged into a confrontation over Iran’s nuclear program, which would jeopardize 

their relations with Iran on one hand and their overall relations 

with the U.S. and European powers on the other. 

Therefore, it seems to me, in the near term, we need to convince 

Moscow and Beijing the best way to avoid a crisis is to convince 

Iran not to aggravate the situation by resuming enrichment activities, and that requires a strong private warning from Russia and 

China to Iran not to take that step, and I certainly hope President 

Bush makes that point in his meetings in the next few days with 

President Putin and President Hu from China. 

If Iran is confronted with such a threat by the big powers, it may 

decide that it has no choice but to keep the suspension in place for 

the time being, and that could create some conditions for eventually resuming formal negotiations. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I look forward to responding to the 

Subcommittee’s questions and comments. 

Senator COBURN. Thank you. Mr. Takeyh, thank you very much. 

I have read your testimony and your entire testimony will be made 

a part of the record. 

TESTIMONY OF RAY TAKEYH,1 SENIOR FELLOW, MIDDLE EAST 

STUDIES, COUNCIL ON FOREIGN RELATIONS 

Mr. TAKEYH. Thank you. After, I suppose it is 26 years now, it 

is not unusual that the complexion of the Iranian regime is changing. As was mentioned, a new generation of conservatives is beginning to come to power with its own distinct views and ideologies. 

Ahmadinejad’s presidential triumph actually concludes a cycle of 

resurgence of the right in Iran that has now captured all the relevant elected institutions. With this new generation of hardliners, 

it is their war with Iraq and not so much the revolution that is 

their defining experience. Their isolation of the United States, their 

suspicion of the international community, and their continued attachment to some basic tenets of the revolution tends to define 

their ideology. 

The new generation of Iranian conservatives are unyielding in 

their ideological commitments. They are persistent in their notion 

that the government of God has relevance, and they are rather 

simplistic in their understanding that all of Iran’s problems could 

somehow be resolved if only you go back to the roots of the revolution, whatever that is. 

32

Despite the conservative jubilation, their political hegemony may 

prove short-lived. Their conservative government was elected on a 

rather daunting mandate of relieving Iran’s economic difficulties. It 

is unlikely, given their intellectual poverty, given their corruption, 

attachment to anachronistic policies that this government can tackle Iran’s significant political and economic troubles. 

There are some signs that the clerical regime is rebalancing itself 

and seeking to restrain its new impetuous president. President 

Ahmadinejad’s inexperience, ideological stridency has already cost 

Iran dearly. His uncompromising and provocative speech in the 

U.N. September meeting was largely responsible for crafting an 

international coalition within the IAEA for potential referral of 

Iran to the Security Council. And, of course, his speech regarding 

wiping Israel off the map was also greeted with international condemnation by leading powers and international institutions. 

On the domestic front, Ahmadinejad’s cabinet choices, with their 

marked incompetence and inexperience, have received a poor reception even from a friendly hardline parliament that has refused to 

confirm a number of his candidates. As we sit here today, I don’t 

believe Iran still has an oil minister, a rather critical portfolio for 

a country that is so energy dependent. 

Given this record of inaccomplishment in a rather brief tenure, 

in a rather unprecedented move, the Supreme Leader of Iran has 

empowered the Expediency Council and Mr. Rafsanjani to supervise the workings of the government. How this will evolve in practice is hard to tell, but it seems to be an attempt, a rather subtle 

one, to restrain Mr. Ahmadinejad, check his excesses, and impose 

limits on his rather provocative ideological vision. 

Iran today is what it has been, I suspect, for the past 27 years, 

a Nation in search of an identity. It oscillates between sort of the 

promises of democratic modernity and retrogressive tradition. Iran 

will change. However, Iran’s democratic transition must come on 

its own terms and its own pace. The castigation of Iran, denigration of its political process, only provides ammunition to hardliners 

decrying Iran’s democrats and reformers as unwitting agents of 

Western machination. Contrary to depictions, the struggle in Iran 

is not a simple conflict between the people and the mullahs. Iran’s 

factional politics, ideological divisions, political rivalries are much 

more complex and nuanced. The dissident clerics within the seminaries, the young functionaries within the state, the student organizations defying the authorities, and Iranian women who persistently challenge religious strictures all are part of a movement seeking to liberalize the parameters of the state. The stark division between the people and the regime quickly fades when one considers 

how decentralized and flexible Iran’s governing order has become 

in the intervening 30 years. 

What is to be done is the question that is often posed, nearly impossible to answer. At the outset, it must be appreciated that the 

notion of a regime change is more of a slogan than a policy. The 

United States does have an important stake in Iran’s internal 

struggles. As I mentioned, Iran will change. However, this is not 

a change that can be imposed, manipulated, accelerated from 

abroad. The best manner of impacting Iran’s internal struggles is 

to reconnect the American and Iranian societies. Cultural exVerDate 0ct 09 2002 09:21 Nov 17, 2006 Jkt 024931 PO 00000 Frm 00036 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 C:\DOCS\24931.TXT SAFFAIRS PsN: PAT
33

1The prepared statement of Mr. Berman appears in the Appendix on page 99. 

changes, academic scholarships, trade, relaxed visa policies can 

yield a great degree of interaction between two societies that have 

been long estranged from another and effectively erode the foundations of the theocratic regime. 

Beyond that, the United States would be wise to relax its rhetoric. For too long, we have relied on the hard stick of coercion. It 

is perhaps time to consider overwhelming Iran with America’s 

more compelling soft power. By integrating Iran in the global economy and the global society, the United States can generate internal 

pressures for transparency, decentralization that will press Iran toward a more responsible international conduct. Through a multilateral and multifaceted approach, the United States can best deter 

Iran’s provocative policies in the short term and cultivate a democratic transition in the long run. I will stop right there. 

Senator COBURN. Thank you very much. Mr. Berman. 

TESTIMONY OF ILAN BERMAN,1 VICE PRESIDENT FOR POLICY, 

AMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY COUNCIL 

Mr. BERMAN. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Let me ask 

also at the outset, like my colleagues, that my written testimony 

be entered into the record. 

Senator COBURN. All written testimonies will be placed in the 

record, without objection. 

Mr. BERMAN. Thank you, sir. And also, I would like to say that 

my oral remarks are intended as an elaboration of several of the 

points in my written testimony, primarily four points. First, what 

we know about Iran’s nuclear ambitions. Second, what the international response has been so far. Third, the flaws in that response. And fourth, some proposals about what the United States 

can do. 

First, all of the indications suggest that Iran’s nuclear program 

is far more than simply an effort to develop civilian nuclear energy. 

You have many concealed sites. You have work on both uranium 

enrichment and plutonium conversion. You have a pattern of consistent diplomatic obfuscation vis-a ́-vis the International Atomic 

Energy Agency. And most importantly, because of the ideological 

connotations, the nuclear program, as well as Iran’s chemical and 

biological weapons program and its strategic arsenal of ballistic 

missiles, is firmly in the control of the clerical army, the Pasdaran, 

which were created by the Ayatollah Khomeini as the shock troops 

of the Islamic revolution. 

Also, in the public discourse, there have been a lot of discussions 

about reasons why Iran is not simply seeking civilian nuclear energy. Let me propose one more. Iran is a major oil exporter. It exports approximately 2.5 million barrels per day, 60 percent of its 

total output. But according to the U.S. Department of Energy, last 

year, it imported between two and three billion U.S. dollars’ worth 

of refined gasoline. If Iran was truly interested in rapidly filling domestic energy needs, it could easily build new refineries. After all, 

they cost much less than nuclear reactors. The fact that it is not 

doing so is very telling. 

34

The international response to Iran’s nuclear ambitions has been 

woefully inadequate thus far. Since mid-2003, our principal vehicle 

of engagement has been the EU3 negotiations, which are aimed at 

securing a lasting Iranian freeze on uranium enrichment in exchange for economic and political incentives. Since February of this 

year, the Bush Administration has thrown its weight behind this 

diplomatic process, despite the fact that the President has previously reiterated that he ‘‘will not tolerate a nuclear Iran.’’

The flaws with this process are manyfold. First of all, it is quite 

clear that the United States and its allies across the Atlantic have 

incompatible goals. The Bush Administration has made clear that 

it will not tolerate a nuclear Iran, but some European officials have 

endorsed at least a degree of atomic capability. In fact, a European 

Union proposal submitted in the spring of this year actually offers 

a certain level of nuclear capability to the Islamic Republic. That 

offer was rejected, but the offer was on the table. 

Also, it is not at all clear that the United States and our allies 

in Europe can actually reach a durable consensus about exactly 

which degree of nuclear capability is acceptable for the Islamic Republic to have. We certainly have a stricter interpretation of the 

type of nonproliferation activities that we should be pursuing towards Iran than France and Germany do, for example. 

Second, we have a problem regarding expectations. We should 

have very low expectations for this process. Europe’s current diplomatic approach is not a new effort. During the mid-1990s, the EU 

attempted very much the same thing. It attempted to influence 

Teheran’s stands on weapons of mass destruction, on terrorism, on 

human rights, and on the Israeli-Palestinian confrontation through 

a series of political and economic inducements. That process was 

called ‘‘critical dialogue.’’ ‘‘Critical dialogue’’ fizzled in the middle of 

1997, but the harm had already been done. It had been an economic and political boon to the Islamic Republic. It had reconnected Iran with a number of important trading and political partners in Europe. And the rest, as they say, is history. 

There is every reason to suspect that the current round of negotiations, as we are seeing already, will fail as well, all of the current indications suggest that the goal of the Islamic Republic is not 

to allow an indefinite freeze on its nuclear progress. 

There is also a question regarding timing. Until quite recently, 

Washington and Europe were very far apart in their conceptions 

about when Iran would actually go nuclear. In this context, a new 

national intelligence estimate that Senator Collins mentioned earlier, which estimated that Iran would have a nuclear capability in 

10 years, can be and should be seen as a political move by the intelligence community to endorse the European negotiating track. 

Candidly, I would say that this approach is foolish at best, and 

it is dangerous, at worst, for the simple reason that there are many 

of what Secretary Rumsfeld calls ‘‘unknown unknowns.’’ The national intelligence estimate makes no mention of Iranian clandestine acquisition efforts on the nuclear black market that exists in 

the former Soviet Union. It makes no mention of its clandestine 

interaction with cartels, such as that of A.Q. Khan, the Pakistani 

nuclear scientist, which still exists in one form or another. And as 

35

a result, the types of projections that we receive from this national 

intelligence estimate are, frankly, a bit detached from reality. 

Finally, and I think this is a crucial point, the diplomatic track 

has no credible end game. Even if the International Atomic Energy 

Agency votes next week to refer the Iranian nuclear file to the U.N. 

Security Council, the most likely result is going to be diplomatic 

deadlock. It is going to be diplomatic deadlock because two of the 

Security Council’s permanent members, Russia and China, have 

been central to the development and evolution of the Iranian nuclear program over the past decade and a half. This track record 

of cooperation means that any application of sanctions, let alone 

anything more forceful, by the United Nations is highly unlikely 

and actually might look every bit as tense diplomatically as the run 

up to the Iraq war did. 

This has substantial implications for U.S. strategy. The fundamental problem that we are facing is that Iran’s nuclear clock, the 

clock that is ticking down to when Iran has some level of nuclear 

capability, is ticking much faster than its regime change clock, the 

clock that is ticking down until a fundamental transformation of 

the regime from within. Altering that equation, and making the 

nuclear clock tick slower and the regime clock tick faster, should 

be, in my estimation, the starting point for any serious American 

strategy. 

The United States can do so. It can delay Iran’s nuclear ambitions and mitigate their impact on the Middle East through a series of measures, including international cooperation, aggressive 

counterproliferation, and even Gulf defense. What it can’t do, however, is change Iran’s desire for the bomb, and this is what makes 

the issue of regime character paramount. 

The radical regime in Iran is the world’s leading state sponsor 

of terrorism. It is also actively proliferating catastrophic technologies to groups like Hezbollah in Lebanon. This means that it 

is foolish to assume that Iran is going to be a mature nuclear possessor. As a result, the United States must do more than simply 

deter and contain Iran. It has to also focus its energies upon the 

means by which it can spur a fundamental transformation of that 

regime. Thank you. 

Senator COBURN. Thank you very much. 

First of all, Dr. Samore, what would happen if Iran had fissile 

material now, in your estimate? 

Mr. SAMORE. You mean if they suddenly were able to acquire sufficient quantities of fissile material from North Korea or the black 

market or something? 

Senator COBURN. Yes. 

Mr. SAMORE. Well, that would drastically reduce the amount of 

time it would take for the Iranians to be able to build nuclear 

weapons. Now, it is very difficult, I think, to give you an accurate 

estimate of how much time it would take because at least in terms 

of the information that is publicly available, we really don’t know 

very much about Iran’s weaponization activities, and so as a consequence, I can’t tell you whether it is 6 months or 1 year or 2 

years or 3 years. We just don’t know about their weaponization——

Senator COBURN. But it would certainly advance it? 

36

Mr. SAMORE. It would certainly advance it significantly. The 

most important constraint on their ability to build nuclear weapons 

right now is that they can’t produce adequate amounts of fissile 

material. If you suddenly made that available, it would dramatically really remove that most significant technical hurdle. 

Senator COBURN. Iran has made tactical concessions, but really 

no real change in agenda, just a lengthening out in terms of their 

plans, actually delay getting caught at what we actually know, I 

believe, is going on, in terms of what we have seen. What should 

be our approach? 

Mr. SAMORE. Well, as I suggested, I don’t see a diplomatic deal 

under current circumstances that would convince the Iranians to 

permanently give up their ambition to develop a nuclear weapons 

option. Therefore, I think the best you can do diplomatically is use 

the threat of referral to the Security Council in order to stop some 

of the key elements of the program. And as I suggested since October 2003, that approach has had some success in stopping the Iranians from at least proceeding with their enrichment program. 

So as I look at this issue in terms of the art of the possible, I 

think you have got to focus on making the threat of referral to the 

Security Council as credible as possible in order to convince the 

Iranians not to proceed with those sensitive elements of the program, and as Ray Takeyh has discussed, I think that the missteps 

of President Ahmadinejad has tremendously helped us because it 

has made Teheran much more nervous about international political 

isolation, and as a consequence, I think our ability to pressure the 

Iranians to continue to be cautious has been actually helped quite 

a bit by President Ahmadinejad. 

Senator COBURN. Thank you. Mr. Takeyh, I really had a good 

time reading your statement. There were a lot of things brought up 

in your statement that I hadn’t quite honestly thought about. A 

couple of questions that I have for you. 

What are the threats that if you were to sit down and teach me 

tomorrow in the mind of the Iranians, what are the threats that 

they see that they face? I think to understand this, we have got to 

understand where they are in their mindset. 

Mr. TAKEYH. In terms of the strategic threats, since September 

11, the strategic situation of Iran has been sort of paradoxical. On 

the one hand, through United States policy, two of Iran’s enemies, 

in Afghanistan and Iraq, have been removed from power, so objectively, Iran’s security has improved. 

Yet at the same time, there has been sort of a massive projection 

of American power on all of Iran’s periphery and this projection of 

power has come with a rather provocative American doctrine that 

has suggested preemption as a tool of disarmament, regime change 

as an avenue of disarmament, so that their sense of insecurity has 

been intensified and that has made the option of nuclear deterrence even more viable. 

The other lessons that Iranians have drawn from Operation Iraqi 

Freedom is that mere possession of chemical and biological weapons do not constitute a necessary deterrent to possible American 

intervention. I mean, that was the lesson of Iraq, namely, even 

when the United States contemplated that Iraq possessed weapons 

37

of mass destruction, it was nevertheless not deterred by that and 

it went in. 

So, therefore, the lesson of the Operation Iraqi Freedom is the 

only way the United States can potentially be deterred is through 

the possession of the strategic weapon, and that lesson has been 

even more dramatically reinforced by developments in the Korean 

peninsula, namely that once you do have at least the perception of 

nuclear weapons or perception of that capability, that not only obviates possibility of coercive regime change, but that invites potential security and economic concessions. So almost everything that 

has happened during the past 3 years has made the nuclear weapons option a more strategic tantalizing and appealing one. 

Senator COBURN. But the threat is us? 

Mr. TAKEYH. Primarily threat. There are a number of threats. 

The primary threat today as far as the Iranians are concerned 

most likely is the United States. There are a series of secondary 

threats—the stability of Pakistan and potential collapse of Pakistan to a Sunni radical regime with hostility to a Shiite Iran, potentially what type of Iraq emerges next door. Is it going to be a 

strong, cohesive state, maybe even behaving as an adjunct of American power in the Gulf, or is it going to be a weak, decentralized 

state with the possibility of civil war seeping over? This is the unpredictable nature of Iraq. And what type of a security architecture 

emerges in the Persian Gulf, which still constitutes Iran’s most 

suitable link to the international petroleum market, the lifeblood of 

its economy. 

So there is a series of long-term and short-term threats that condition Iran’s strategic approach and condition its defense priorities. 

Senator COBURN. Thank you very much. 

Senator CARPER. Gentlemen, thank you all for being with us 

today and for your testimony. 

Let me just ask of Mr. Takeyh, you and I have talked before. Do 

I understand that your family is from Iran? 

Mr. TAKEYH. Yes. 

Senator CARPER. Were you born there? 

Mr. TAKEYH. Yes. 

Senator CARPER. OK. Do you ever go back for any visits? 

Mr. TAKEYH. Teheran, spring of 1979. 

Senator CARPER. Nineteen seventy-nine, that was the last time 

you were there? And Dr. Samore? 

Mr. SAMORE. Yes, I was there in March. It was quite an interesting trip. March of this year. 

Senator CARPER. Mr. Berman. 

Mr. BERMAN. No, sir. 

Senator CARPER. Dr. Samore, talk to us a little bit about how 

people responded to you or to other Americans with whom you 

were traveling. 

Mr. SAMORE. Well, one of the fascinating things about Iran is 

that Americans are very popular. It is very unlike traveling 

throughout the Arab world, where, of course, people are hospitable 

because that is their custom, but you know that they are not really 

very happy with Americans. Because from the standpoint of many 

ordinary people in Iran, they see the United States as standing for 

democracy and freedom and social freedom, which is the main 

38

grievance, I think, against the regime. You find when you talk to 

young people that they feel that their personal freedom and economic opportunities are not faring very well. Now, that doesn’t 

mean they are ready for revolution. It is just that is their complaint against the mullahs. 

Senator CARPER. How do you explain, how do we explain a radical mayor of Teheran taking out in a presidential election 

Rafsanjani, who has been there forever? 

Mr. SAMORE. Well, I think that was Rafsanjani’s problem. I 

mean, he was seen as very much a representative of corrupt order 

that had failed to solve these kinds of problems and Ahmadinejad 

ran on really a populist ticket that he would deal with issues of social injustice and economic unfairness. But Ray might be in a better position to address that. 

Senator CARPER. Mr. Takeyh. 

Mr. TAKEYH. I think it was a powerful appeal of the notion of 

economic justice, the notion of anti-corruption, the idea of the powerful and the powerless, and he managed to appeal to that particular instinct. At the time of economic hardship and economic difficulty for the average Iranian, he manages to essentially have a 

very populist appeal at that time. 

I think some of that has evaporated, given the fact that his economic program is rather discursive, but it was essentially a very 

populist campaign where he essentially ran against the establishment, an establishment that was detached, that was indifferent, 

and in many cases corrupt. 

Mr. SAMORE. Just to make one other point, Senator, I think it 

is important to recognize that Ahmadinejad is seen as a minor 

player in foreign and defense policy. I mean, the key players on the 

nuclear issue and on broader foreign and defense policy is really 

the Supreme Leader and also the head of the Expediency Council, 

Rafsanjani. So I think that even though Ahmadinejad may say very 

provocative things, which isolates Iran, he is not really the one who 

is making the key decisions on the nuclear program. 

Senator CARPER. Who appoints the head of the Expediency Council? 

Mr. SAMORE. Well, the Supreme Leader. 

Senator CARPER. All right. So the guy who heads up the Expediency Council, appointed by the Supreme Leader, was just defeated 

in a presidential election by the old mayor of Teheran. 

Mr. SAMORE. Well, I mean, Ray is the expert, but what I have 

learned about looking at Iranian politics is that they are incredibly 

complicated and subtle and that you had many different competing 

forces and personalities and it is all a balance that is very difficult, 

I think, for outsiders to fully appreciate. 

Keep in mind, these people have known each other for years and 

years. I mean, after the founder of the revolution died in 1989, the 

country was ruled by the Supreme Leader Khamenei and by President Rafsanjani. So they have been partners in sharing power since 

1989. 

Senator CARPER. In this country, we think of the President and 

we think of a strong chief executive, the commander in chief, the 

head of the Executive Branch of our government who holds sway 

in a lot of ways. But I gather that is not the case in Iran? 

39

Mr. TAKEYH. There is a—it is a peculiar constitutional structure. 

In a sense, there are elected institutions, the parliament and the 

office of the presidency, but they are rather subordinate to 

unelected institutions, which are first and foremost, of course, the 

Office of the Supreme Leader, which tends of oversee all national 

affairs, the Council of Guardians that vets legislation and suitability of candidates for public office, and the Office of Expediency 

Council, whose job it is to mediate differences between the presidency and the parliament should there be a deadlock between 

them. And the way policy is made, it is an informal interaction between all these institutions and all these individuals. 

I want to say that Ahmadinejad is not an irrelevant player in 

Iran’s foreign policy deliberation. He has a seat at the table. But 

he is not the predominant player. He certainly has an influential 

voice. He has an influential power base within the Revolution 

Guard and the judiciary and so forth. But he is an actor within a 

larger drama. 

Senator CARPER. Who makes, or what group of folks over there 

make the decision as to whether or not to acquiesce and to find 

common ground with the Europeans and us in this negotiation? 

Mr. TAKEYH. The nuclear decisions are made within the context 

of the Supreme National Security Council, which has all the relevant members within it. There is a separate committee that actually deals with this issue on a day-to-day basis and it has five 

members in it. It is the Minister of Defense, the Minister of Intelligence, Ali Larijani, who is the head of the Supreme Council, head 

of the National Security Council. It is the representative of the 

president and also members of the military and the Revolutionary 

Guard. They tend to deal with this issue on an operational level 

and make their recommendations to the larger Supreme National 

Security Council, which ultimately comes to a decision on whether 

Iran should accept or defer any sort of an arrangement with the 

Europeans, IAEA, what have you. 

Senator CARPER. Going back to my earlier question, it sounds 

like this new president was elected, at least in part on the issues 

of economic justice and appealing to the electorate. My sense is 

that a lot of people who are maybe more the moderates or the reformers within the country stayed home and didn’t vote because a 

lot of the folks they would like to have supported for parliamentary 

positions were not allowed to run. 

I am trying to figure out, and help me with this, I am trying to 

figure out what kind of incentives are the real power brokers in 

this country likely to respond to, or what kind of pressures are they 

likely to respond to? 

Mr. TAKEYH. Well, as far as Ahmadinejad is concerned, there is 

not a whole lot of either incentives or pressures that is going to 

have a meaningful impact on him. I mean, he is rather dubious of 

international investment and he is indifferent to threats of coercion 

and sanctions and so forth and obviously incredulous to any sort 

of American military sanction, given the problems next door. 

But as a whole, I mean, this is a system, this is a government 

that comes to decision on the nuclear issue, and before one postulates incentives and so forth, we have to understand what sort of 

a nuclear deal one is looking for, whether it is the dispension of the 

40

fuel cycle, a permanent one, a durable one, what have you. But it 

is important to look at Iran within a long history of proliferation. 

This is not the first time the international community has met 

a challenge of proliferation. In the past, many states—Argentina, 

Brazil, South Africa—have toyed with the idea of having nuclear 

weapons as a means of dealing with their security concerns. In all 

these cases, there was ultimately a set of factors that led these 

countries to step back from the nuclear precipice. First, it was a 

lesson, external danger. I mean, in a sense, the strategic environment that they existed in changed. 

Second of all, it was always a combination of inducements, economic rewards, access to international lending institutions, preferential trade arrangements, essentially a sort of a counterbalancing set of incentives that led them to deter from pursuing 

nuclear weapons. I understand every country is different and has 

to be viewed within the context of its own national narrative, but 

I can’t think of a country that has disbanded nuclear weapons capability or has disavowed those intentions on the threat of economic strangulation or military reprisal. 

Decades of sanctions against Pakistan ultimately did not deter 

the Pakistanis from actually detonating the bomb. You can say 

similar things about India. And ultimately, what we know about 

China in the 1960s, it was its perceptions of danger and its perception of inevitability of conflict with the United States that led it to 

actually develop its own indigenous nuclear capability. 

So the combination of incentives and penalties, big sticks and big 

carrots, ultimately is the only diplomatic approach to dissuading a 

country from pursuing nuclear weapons, and I suspect that is true 

even in the case of Iran. 

Mr. SAMORE. Although I would just want to add that in the talks 

so far with the EU3, the Iranians have not suggested that some set 

of incentives or inducements would be sufficient to convince them 

to give up their efforts to develop a fuel cycle program. Their position has been that under no conditions, not at any price, will we 

agree to permanently give up our enrichment program. 

Now, Mr. Takeyh may be right that at some point, the Iranian 

leadership will decide that they will see what they can get in exchange for trading this program away, especially if it looks like the 

risks of proceeding with it are so great that they don’t have any 

choice. But certainly the record of the negotiations so far does not 

suggest that there is a deal out there: If only we make the carrots 

look a little bit more attractive, the Iranians will give up their program. 

Unfortunately, this program has a very deep history. It goes back 

at least 20 years under the revolution, and in fact, if you look at 

the Shah’s nuclear program in the 1970s, it looks amazingly like 

the program now. So I suspect that this is something pretty deeply 

rooted in the Iranian sense of what their national destiny is and 

their national needs are. 

Senator CARPER. All right. Thank you very much. 

Senator COBURN. Senator Dayton. 

Senator DAYTON. Briefly, gentlemen, because my time is limited, 

would you say that Ahmadinejad won a democratic election? 

41

Mr. TAKEYH. I think there were two elections that took place. 

The first one is the election that had all the members and he came 

in second in that particular election, I think with 19 percent of the 

vote, in order to make it to the second round. The top two candidates made it. He and Rafsanjani made it. I think in the first 

election, there were ample irregularities and he was unlikely to 

have that position in a sort of a clear voting and a pristine election. 

Then comes the second election, where he is in a run-off with 

former President Rafsanjani and he wins by 63 percent of the vote. 

I think that was actually legitimate, in the sense that I don’t believe that Mr. Rafsanjani, which has so intimately involved with 

Iranian corruption, could have won any sort of a—he has no electoral——

Senator DAYTON. I need you to be brief, I am sorry, because I am 

short of time. Mr. Berman, do you want to answer? 

Mr. BERMAN. Senator Dayton, let me just say the following. I 

think we tend to view the Iranian elections incorrectly. Dr. Takeyh 

just talked about two elections. In fact, there were actually three 

selections that took place. There was a selection that took place 

earlier in the spring in which the political vetting authority for the 

Islamic Republic excluded more than 1,000 potential presidential 

candidates. The slate that was left was a slate of eight and it 

spanned the political spectrum. There were reformists, there were 

conservatives, there were hardliners, there were people like Mr. 

Ahmadinejad, who were former Pasdaran officials. 

But the common thread uniting all of them was the fact that the 

Supreme Leadership of the Islamic Republic was comfortable 

enough with them. They might talk a different talk, but they walk 

the same walk. And that, I think, informs the rest of the political 

process going forward. It is impossible to talk about Iran in electoral terms the way we talk about the United States. 

Senator DAYTON. It seems that you are, like the first panel, very 

pessimistic about the prospects for stopping Iran’s nuclear program 

short of a regime change or major change of mind on their part, 

which you said is the result of big carrots and big sticks which are 

hard to formulate. Mr. Berman, you seem to be of this group the 

principal advocate for regime change, which seems to me only to 

be achievable by direct military intervention by the United States. 

Do you have a strategy or a game plan for regime change, or what 

does that entail? 

Mr. BERMAN. I think this is obviously the $64,000 question. In 

my book, ‘‘Teheran Rising,’’ I propose a two-tier strategy. The first 

track is designed to delay the time when Iran gets a nuclear weapon; in essence, to create a window of opportunity. You can do that 

through counterproliferation, through missile defense, through all 

sorts of tactical measures. But that is the easy part. 

The hard part becomes what to do with the time that you have 

gained. Here, the essential discourse in the United States has to 

be about what kind of regime you want ultimately to wield those 

weapons. This regime has a checkered past. It is the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism. It will not be a mature nuclear possessor. Therefore, you have to think about regime change, and that 

opens up the door for discussions about things like Speaker Gingrich talked about. 

42

Broadcasting is one approach. Today, this fiscal year, the entire 

U.S. Government broadcasting effort into Iran is $16.4 million. 

That is roughly 21.5 cents per Iranian per year for a country of 70 

million. You can argue about how much that should be increased, 

but it is quite clear that if our message is not getting through, it 

might be through lack of bandwidth, through lack of resources. 

I actually agree with Dr. Takeyh on the idea of cultural exchanges. During the Cold War, we had the opportunity through 

third country contacts to cultivate a cadre of leaders like Vaclev 

Havel, like Lech Walesa, that would go back and take the American message back to their home countries. We haven’t done that. 

We have really abdicated the tools of political warfare that we used 

during the Cold War. 

Senator DAYTON. Do either of you care to comment? It seems to 

me that if we want to assure that we are deadly serious about stopping proliferation, that it is unlikely that we are going to get them 

to stop proliferation as long as they are increasingly fearful that we 

are going to propose regime change. As you said, Mr. Takeyh, 

where they are concerned, the primary concern is about our intervention, which I assume means to them a military intervention to 

bring about regime change. Then at the same time, we are talking 

about better interorganizational and personal exchanges. It doesn’t 

seem like a consistent or coherent policy. 

Mr. SAMORE. Well, I think the best you can do with diplomacy 

now is buy time, and I think the most effective tool to buy time 

is the threat of referral to the Security Council. And since October 

2003, that has been an effective instrument which has forced the 

Iranians to limit their nuclear program. 

So my argument is that, in a tactical sense, what we have to do 

is try to strengthen the credibility of that threat in order to buy 

time. What happens in the long term, whether it is possible for the 

United States to change Iran through either soft or hard means or 

some combination of the two, I don’t think anybody can be confident of that. But clearly, we want to buy time, and the best way 

to do that——

Senator DAYTON. So if you were going to recommend or structure 

a Senate resolution that was going to have some real effect to it, 

some reality-based teeth to it, would you recommend then something along the lines of that kind of urging that kind of referral? 

Mr. SAMORE. Frankly, I think what is much more important than 

what the United States does is what Russia and China does, because the Iranians already know that the United States and the 

major European powers are prepared to send them to the Security 

Council if they break the enrichment red line. But there is uncertainty or ambiguity about where Moscow and Beijing is. So I think 

this is really much more an international issue than anything the 

United States does, either Congress or the Executive Branch. 

Senator DAYTON. My time has expired, but it has been an excellent panel. I thank all three of you. It has been very enlightening. 

Thank you. 

Senator COBURN. Senator Santorum, thank you very much for 

being here. Your statement will be made a part of the record. 

43

TESTIMONY OF HON. RICK SANTORUM, A U.S. SENATOR FROM 

THE STATE OF PENNSYLVANIA 

Senator SANTORUM. I appreciate that. I appreciate the opportunity to be here to talk to these folks and I appreciate your willingness to let a non-member sit on the panel. 

[The prepared statement of Senator Santorum follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF SENATOR SANTORUM 

For many years, the Department of State has consistently declared the Islamic 

Republic of Iran the world’s leading sponsor of terrorism. The Iranian regime created Hezbollah, arguably the most dangerous terrorist organization, and it actively 

supports Hamas and Islamic Jihad. The leader of the terrorist insurgency in Iraq, 

Abu Musab al Zarqawi, lived in Teheran while he created a terrorist network that 

ranged from Afghanistan to the capitals of Europe, including Italy and Germany. 

In recent weeks, the British Government has blamed Iranian terrorists for the 

killing of several British soldiers in southern Iraq. Our own government has repeatedly declared that Iran is deeply involved in supporting both Sunni and Shiite terrorists against American and other coalition soldiers in both Iraq and Afghanistan. 

Just last Friday, Under Secretary of State Nicholas Burns, in a public statement 

in New Delhi, proclaimed Iran ‘‘a terrorist state.’’

And as we all know, it is a terrorist state intent on acquiring nuclear weapons. 

That thought alone should put Iran at the top of our national agenda. 

In short, there is no doubt about Iran’s leading role in the terror war directed 

against us and our friends and allies, or about the importance of dealing effectively 

with the Islamic Republic. yet, more than four years after the attacks of September 

11, 2001, this administration still has not defined an Iran policy. 

This is both lamentable and dangerous. Lamentable, because it bespeaks a lack 

of will and coherence on the part of the Executive Branch. Dangerous, because we 

can expect the Iranians and their terrorist allies to do everything in their power to 

kill Americans. 

We must have an Iran policy, and that policy must directly pressure the Teheran 

regime. To that end. I and others in this body have introduced legislation. S. 333, 

the Iran Freedom and Support Act, that would put the United States firmly and 

actively on the side of the vast majority of Iranians, those who oppose the repressive 

terrorist regime under which they suffer, and which they desperately want to replace with a free and democratically elected government. Additionally, I have introduced S. 1737, the Iranian Nuclear Trade Prohibition Act of 2005, to prevent U.S. 

entities from purchasing nuclear fuel assemblies from entities that provide these 

items to Iran. 

It is regrettable that we have not rallied to the side of the democratic opposition 

in Iran. To date, despite numerous fine statements from the President and the secretaries of state and defense, no real support has been given to the pro-democracy 

forces in Iran. Indeed these fine words, combined with inaction, are a betrayal of 

the Iranian people, because the words lead them to expect that we will act, and encourage them to expose themselves to a harsh regime that ruthlessly arrests, tortures and murders them. 

I would have preferred to follow the lead of the Executive Branch on this matter, 

but we clearly have an obligation to insist on an effective Iran policy. The events 

in Iraq, Afghanistan, Lebanon and Syria have shown that the peoples of the Middle 

East want freedom and are prepared to take great risks, and pay a great and terrible price, in order to achieve it. The Iranians have often taken to the streets to 

demonstrate their desire for freedom, and I believe it both wise and morally right 

for us to support them. 

In fact, it would be the right policy for us, even if Iran were not the leading supporter of terrorism, and were not actively encouraging and enabling the killing of 

our men and women in Iraq, even as I speak. A generation ago, this body gave full 

support to democratic dissidents in the Soviet Empire, from Jewish refuseniks to 

Polish workers in the then largely unknown city of Gdansk. The Jackson-Vanik Act 

and the other measures enacted by the Senate gave hope to men and women who, 

in remarkably short order—and contrary to the confident predictions of scores of 

self-proclaimed experts—brought down a tyrannical regime that many believed 

would rule indefinitely. 

We can, and we must, do the same for the Iranian people. We must do it because 

it is right, because it will strike a devastating blow against the terrorists with whom 

44

we are at war, and because it will save the lives of fine people, including our own 

children.

Senator SANTORUM. It is interesting, just to pick up where Senator Dayton left off and summarize what you are saying, is that 

your sense is that additional sanctions may not be all that helpful 

from the United States. Putting additional sanctions on Iran will 

not be the stick that will be helpful. 

Mr. Berman, you suggested that we need to send better messages 

into Iran as a way to begin to change the regime. As you know, 

I have introduced a piece of legislation that tries to provide help 

to opposition forces, opposition groups. Can you give me a sense of 

what you would do? First off, does that make sense to you, and 

what sort of help can we provide to these nascent groups in Iran 

that are, as Mr. Samore said, are pro-American and pro-democracy? What can we do to take this rather disorganized group of 

people, from every report, and begin to gel a real opposition movement? 

Mr. BERMAN. I think better messages should be just the beginning. A little over a month ago, I was on the West Coast. I had 

the opportunity to interact very extensively with the Iranian-American community there and I learned an interesting fact which I 

didn’t know before. There are 22 radio and television broadcast outlets that beam into Iran via satellite or medium-wave, long-wave 

radio that operate, if not 24 hours a day, for the majority of the 

day. Now, certainly some of them are not good contenders for U.S. 

support. But I am sure some are, and frankly, we are not supporting them. 

The consequences of that were clear a couple of years ago. In the 

summer of 2003, there were protests on a smaller scale resembling 

those that took place in Teheran in 1999 that began to take place 

on university campuses in Teheran and then radiated outward to 

other cities, like Isfahan. As those gathered strength, a lot of people in Washington, myself included, were watching this very closely. All of a sudden, over the course of 3 to 4 days, those protests 

petered out. It was rather hard to determine why until I spoke 

with a number of people who were involved with U.S. public diplomacy. 

The answer was that the Iranian regime could not block broadcasts, because they were beaming off of a satellite from NITV (National Iranian Television) in Los Angeles. The students were using 

this television outlet to coordinate where the next protest would be, 

where the next activities would be. So the Iranian regime asked 

the regime of Fidel Castro in Cuba to jam those satellite broadcasts, and they did so. Over the course of 2 to 3 days, the Iranian 

protests lost steam precisely because they had no coordinating 

mechanism. 

And by not responding to this in any way, the United States sent 

a very dangerous message. The message was: There is a limit to 

our support for Iran’s urge for democracy. That is the wrong message to send. 

Mr. TAKEYH. What you see in Iran today is a considerable degree 

of opposition sentiment, but there is no opposition movement as 

such. It doesn’t have strong labor union traditions, as you saw in 

Eastern Europe. There is no equivalent of Solidarity. There is no 

45

charismatic figure, like Iran’s own 1979 revolution, that could bring 

all these forces together. There is a lot of division and fragmentation within the Iranian opposition. They tend to be all over the 

spectrum. 

I am not quite sure if that could be created abroad by any external power, no matter how powerful. Ultimately, it has to do with 

the Iranian people themselves. The Iranian youth has been particularly imaginative, but they have been imaginative not in terms of 

challenging the regime, but circumventing it in the sense that they 

have their own private social life, their own, essentially, activities 

that they try to conceal from the regime. 

And so long as there is no active Iranian leadership coming from 

the domestic scene, internal in Iran coming to the surface and organizing this opposition sentiment around a cohesive movement, I 

am not quite sure there is much the international community can 

do. 

Mr. SAMORE. I can only give you the views of the tourist. It didn’t 

seem to me like this was a sort of pre-revolutionary situation, 

where you are going to have people prepared to risk their lives to 

try to overthrow the government. They are very unhappy. Most of 

them would like to come to the United States so they could have 

personal freedom. But I didn’t get the sense that this is a situation 

where we are likely to be able to bring about hard regime change. 

Both of the other panelists have talked about the value of soft 

regime change, that is to say through cultural and other exchanges, 

but those kinds of things take a very long time, and unfortunately, 

during that time, we have got to try to slow down the nuclear 

clock. 

Senator SANTORUM. One other question, and my time is running 

out. Just give me your insights as to what you think Iran is doing 

to provide assistance to some of the terrorist elements within Iraq 

and whether they seem to be functioning and what the impact of 

a democratic Iraq is on their world view. 

Mr. BERMAN. I think this is a central question. There has been 

a lot of discussion lately, certainly in the media, about Iran’s role 

in Iraq in sponsoring the insurgency. I would say that Iran, in my 

estimation, has a much more complex role that it is playing in Iraq 

than is usually noted. They are not just sponsoring the insurgency, 

although there is credible evidence to suggest that elements of 

Iran’s clerical army, the Pasdaran, are providing bomb-making assistance, as well as training and tactics assistance to elements of 

the Iraqi insurgency. 

They are also attempting to shift the terms of the political debate 

in Iraq through their sponsorship of certain groups, such as the Supreme Council for the Islamic Republic in Iraq, SCIRI, and their 

subsidiary support for armed militias associated with those groups. 

SCIRI has a militia named the Badr organization, which is very active. 

The strategy there is multifaceted, I think the goal, though, is 

very clear. Last year, the commander of Iran’s clerical army gave 

a speech in which he said, ‘‘that if American strategy encounters 

difficulties in Iraq, it will stop. Otherwise, it will undoubtedly 

stretch to other countries, to neighboring countries.’’

46

This is the clearest indication that I can find in the open source 

that Iran has declared opposition to democratization as a key element of regime strategy, and I think this is something that should 

be of very much concern to all of you here in Washington. 

Mr. TAKEYH. I would say if you look at Iran’s strategy, which has 

changed and evolved over time, increasingly, the core Iranian strategic objective in Iraq is empowerment of the Shiia community and 

particularly the organized aspect of the Shiia community, which 

happens to be the Supreme Council of Islamic Revolution, also the 

Davo party, which the current Prime Minister of Iraq is a member 

of, are the most organized ones. 

The empowerment of those particular groups is an important objective in Iran, and somehow you see what they are doing in Iraq 

today reminiscent of what they did in Lebanon, namely organization of the Shiia community, winning their hearts and minds 

through economic assistance, but also at the same time offering assistance to the militia groups that are associated with those Shiia 

political parties, such as the Badr brigade. 

It is important to recognize the Badr brigade is not an illegal militia. Iraq’s constitution recognizes that political parties can have 

armed militias, as was the case with the Kurdish population, as 

well. 

Increasingly, I begin to think that Iran’s strategy in Iraq is 

namely the realization of this strategy is contingent on actually the 

democratic process. The more Shiites are elected and the more they 

are empowered and the more Iraq’s promises become stronger and 

the central government becomes weaker. As such, the stability and 

success of Iraqi democracy is incongruously in Iran’s own interest. 

Also, when Iraq is a stable democratic system, that is the time 

when the American forces will leave. As the President has said, we 

will stand down when they stand up. Well, that is the day that Iranians are looking forward to. 

So I am not quite sure if the Iranian strategy at this point is to 

subvert the democratic process. 

Mr. BERMAN. Could I just interject one point here? I think that 

is a perfectly valid scenario. There is also another scenario that I 

think needs to be taken into account, however. If it is credible that 

Iran is attempting to monopolize the democratic process, there can 

be an equally credible case made that Iran is attempting to subvert 

the democratic process to foment some sort of civil strife in which 

Shiite communities will look to the Islamic Republic for protection 

and allow Iran to expand its influence in Iraq that way. 

Mr. SAMORE. Just to answer very briefly, what the Iranians will 

say to you is that they have benefitted tremendously from the U.S. 

invasion of Iraq. First, the mess in the country and the insurgency 

ties down U.S. forces and therefore provides some protection to 

Iran and also gives the Iranians leverage against the United 

States, because if they want to retaliate if we do something they 

don’t like, they can step up their support for the insurgency. So 

they like the mess next door. That helps them. 

At the same time, what the Iranians will say is that they think 

that eventually, when a government emerges in Baghdad, it is very 

likely to be dominated by Shiias and therefore very likely to be 

much more friendly to them than Saddam Hussein was. 

47

Some of this may be bravado, but what you hear from Iranians 

is the sense that things are going pretty well for them in terms of 

the Iraqi situation. 

Senator SANTORUM. Thank you. 

Senator DAYTON. Senator Coburn, I would like to thank you for 

what I think is one of the very best hearings I have had my entire 

time in the Senate. It was really excellent. I thank all of you. 

I would like to suggest the possibility of a hearing at some point 

to look at what have been the successful strategies the United 

States—and Libya comes to mind—with deterring other nations 

from going through with this procurement or development of nuclear weapons. Conversely, what has failed? I mean, this seems to 

me the crux of the problem here. 

Again, I commend you for this. It has really been very insightful. 

Thank you. 

Senator COBURN. Thank you. We will take that under advisement with Senator Carper. 

First of all, let me thank each of you for your time and your testimony. There are several questions that we will be submitting that 

we would like for you to answer, if you would, on a timely basis. 

I plan on contacting each of you. I want to learn more about your 

thoughts. 

Mr. Takeyh, you have a great insight because not only are you 

an American, you are an Iranian and that gives us an insight into 

feelings, emotions, and connectivity with the Islamic Republic of 

Iran that we might not have otherwise, and so I look forward to 

visiting with each of you on this very difficult subject for us. Thank 

you very much for being here. 

The hearing is adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 5:38 p.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.] 

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