NYT "C.I.A. Chief Will Face Critical Gaps in Iran Data"

C.I.A. Chief Will Face Critical Gaps in Iran Data
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By SCOTT SHANE
Published: May 7, 2006
WASHINGTON, May 6 — As the Central Intelligence Agency undergoes its latest round of turmoil, legislators and former intelligence officials say that serious gaps in the United States' knowledge of Iran are among the most critical problems facing a new director of the spy agency.

A year after a presidential commission gave a scathing assessment of intelligence on Iran, they say, American spy agencies remain severely handicapped in their efforts to assess its weapons programs and its leaders' intentions. Whoever takes the helm of the C.I.A., after the resignation on Friday of Porter J. Goss, will confront a crucial target with few, if any, American spies on the ground, sketchy communications intercepts and ambiguous satellite images, the experts say.

When Mr. Goss took the job 19 months ago, part of his mandate was to make certain that the wildly mistaken prewar assessments about Iraq's weapons would not repeated. But as Mr. Goss leaves the agency, intelligence watchers say huge uncertainty remains in estimates of Iran's weapons, complicating the task of persuading the United Nations Security Council to impose sanctions or take other measures.

"How many years are they away from having a nuclear weapon?" asked Senator Pat Roberts, a Kansas Republican and chairman of the Senate intelligence committee, in an interview this week. "We don't know, and the people providing the answers don't know."