(IsraelNN.com) The National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) that downplayed the danger from Iran's nuclear program was "fundamentally dishonest," former Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives Newt Gingrich said in an exclusive interview with Israel National Radio's Tovia Singer.

"If you simply change about three words you change the whole report," Gingrich said, adding that the report seems to have been "deliberately written to maximize the pain to the Bush administration." It was written by three former State Department officials who were "deeply opposed to what President Bush is doing," he said, and who wrote the report "to maximize confusion."

Gingrich characterized the NIE as "very misleading, very destructive and very unfortunate… almost a bureaucratic coup d'etat."


The NIE was "very misleading, very destructive and very unfortunate…"

Military attack? Only as last resort
If read without the opening paragraph, Gingrich said, the report actually shows Iran poses a great danger: "Iran has 3,000 centrifuges. They could build one bomb a year with 3,000 centrifuges… you go down this list and you realize nothing has changed," he said. "All that happened is that there was one specific weaponization process which may have been suspended but not closed… and meanwhile everything else in their program is moving forward."

Gingrich played down the importance of the report, predicting that "in a few weeks the report will almost be as if it never existed."

Gingrich said that a military attack on Iran should only be the last resort. In the 1980s, he reminded the listeners, President Ronald Reagan, Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and the Pope helped bring down the unpopular regime in Poland by creating an alternative to it.  

Click here to listen now to the interview with Newt Gingrich (starts at 24:40 minute mark).

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