"Please, Sir... I Want Some War"

With apologies to Oliver Twist, it sounds as if some of the neocons are not happy that we haven't been able to come up a reason to attack Iran.

Some senior Bush administration officials and top Republican lawmakers are voicing anger that American spy agencies have not issued more ominous warnings about the threats that they say Iran presents to the United States.

Some policy makers have accused intelligence agencies of playing down Iran’s role in Hezbollah’s recent attacks against Israel and overestimating the time it would take for Iran to build a nuclear weapon.

The complaints, expressed privately in recent weeks, surfaced in a Congressional report about Iran released Wednesday. They echo the tensions that divided the administration and the Central Intelligence Agency during the prelude to the war in Iraq.

The criticisms reflect the views of some officials inside the White House and the Pentagon who advocated going to war with Iraq and now are pressing for confronting Iran directly over its nuclear program and ties to terrorism, say officials with knowledge of the debate.

I just can't understand why the the CIA and the other intelligence agencies are unwilling to take a stronger stance. After all, they did such a good job in the run-up to the war in Iraq, didn't they?