Seymour Hersh, who's reputation as an investigative reporter has had its ups and downs, has a new revelation in New Yorker magazine. Truthout.org., whose own reputation for accurate and balanced reporting has had its ups and downs as well, gives us the report from which the following is excerpted:
WASHINGTON - The United States has been conducting secret reconnaissance missions inside Iran to help identify potential nuclear, chemical and missile targets, The New Yorker magazine reported Sunday. Hersh quotes one government consultant with close ties to the Pentagon as saying, "The civilians in the Pentagon want to go into Iran and destroy as much of the military infrastructure as possible."
The former intelligence official told Hersh that an American commando task force in South Asia is working closely with a group of Pakistani scientists who had dealt with their Iranian counterparts. The New Yorker reports that this task force, aided by information from Pakistan, has been penetrating into eastern Iran in a hunt for underground nuclear-weapons installations.
Hersh reported that Bush has already "signed a series of top-secret findings and executive orders authorizing secret commando groups and other Special Forces units to conduct covert operations against suspected terrorist targets in as many as 10 nations in the Middle East and South Asia."
Let's hope that this, like a rare planetary conjunction, is a remarkable instance of both Hersh and Truthout being simultaneously correct and that matters are as this report states. It is somewhat reassuring to think that this president is as serious about fighting the war against terrorists as they are about fighting their war against us.