Israel Matzav

'Axis of Evil' confirmed

Writing in yesterday's New York Sun, Eli Lake reports that the disclosure that the North Koreans were building a nuclear reactor in Syria confirms President Bush's 2002 'Axis of Evil' speech (Hat Tip: Hot Air).

[Ranking Republican on the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, Peter] Hoekstra and the president's former ambassador to the United Nations, John Bolton, first raised the prospect of North Korea's cooperation with Syria last fall after the Israeli strikes. Both men have pressed the president to make the intelligence available to Congress and the public.

Mr. Bolton said that in 2003 he personally clashed with some members of the intelligence community on the question of whether Syria had a nuclear weapons program. "The argument then was that Syria can't be interested in nuclear weapons and it didn't have the money to build a program," he said. "But this is not about the money. North Korea can supply the technical capabilities, and Iran can supply the money."

Mr. Bolton said that he suspected Iran, which has been sanctioned three times by the United Nations Security Council for its enrichment of uranium, played some role in Syria's nuclear project. "Right now we don't know what the role of Iran was in this if any," he said. "But I would be amazed if Syria would be engaged in nuclear proliferation with North Korea without at least Iran's acquiescence and quite possibly its active cooperation." Iran and Syria signed a series of defense and intelligence agreements in June 2006. Both countries cooperate in supporting the Lebanese terrorist group Hezbollah.

The disclosures about Syrian and North Korean cooperation in some ways confirm the president's 2002 axis of evil speech, which posited that Iran, Iraq, and North Korea cooperated in support of terrorism and weapons proliferation. A co-author of that speech, David Frum, when reached for a comment said, "There is now irrefutable public confirmation of North Korean and Syrian nuclear cooperation and suggestive indication of Iranian involvement. It's almost like they formed an axis or something."

Almost?

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 10:38 PM