The top U.S. military officer told Reuters on Wednesday he did not know whether Israel would alert the United States ahead of time if it decided to take military action against Iran.
General Martin Dempsey, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, also acknowledged differences in perspective between the United States and Israel over the best way to handle Iran and its nuclear program.
He said the United States was convinced that sanctions and diplomatic pressure was the right path to take on Iran, along with “the stated intent not to take any options off the table” – language that leaves open the possibility of future military action.
“I’m not sure the Israelis share our assessment of that. And because they don’t and because to them this is an existential threat, I think probably that it’s fair to say that our expectations are different right now,” Dempsey said in an interview as he flew to Washington from London.
Asked whether he was talking about the differences between Israeli and U.S. expectations over sanctions, or differences in perspective about the future course of events, Dempsey said: “All of the above.” He did not elaborate.
He also did not disclose whether he believed Israel was prepared to strike Iran.
Iran is facing new sanctions after the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) reported earlier in November that Tehran appeared to have worked on designing a bomb and may still be conducting secret research to that end.
Iran says its nuclear program is peaceful.
The sanctions push got added momentum on Wednesday as diplomatic sources said Britain would support an embargo on Iranian oil imports. But Iran sees its nuclear program as a source of power and prestige and it is unclear whether sanctions will alter its cost-benefit analysis.
There has been concern that if world powers cannot nudge Iran into serious nuclear negotiations, then Israel, which feels threatened by Iranian nuclear aspirations, will attack.
Asked directly whether Israel would alert the United States ahead of time if it chose to go forward with military action, Dempsey replied flatly: “I don’t know.”
NO NEW ARGUMENTS
Last week, U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta raised American concerns about the unintended consequences of any military action against Iran during talks with his Israeli counterpart, Ehud Barak, at a security forum in Canada.
Those included U.S. fears about fallout on the world economy and that a strike would only delay – not derail – Iran’s nuclear program.
Iran has warned that it will respond to any attacks by hitting Israeli and U.S. interests in the Gulf. Analysts say Tehran could retaliate by closing the Strait of Hormuz, the waterway where about 40 percent of all traded oil passes.
Dempsey, who took over the Pentagon’s top uniformed position in September, said there were no new arguments the United States was about to pose to Israel on the matter. Instead, he cited U.S. and Israeli efforts to “consistently try to update each other on the existing arguments.”
A US congressional report on Wednesday flagged Nigeria’s Boko Haram Islamist sect as an “emerging threat” that could represent an eventual security risk to the United States and its interests.
The group has been blamed for scores of attacks in Nigeria, including the August suicide bombing of the United Nations’ Nigeria headquarters in the capital Abuja that killed at least 24 people, and is believed to have ties to Al-Qaeda.
The Congress report, presented at a hearing of the House of Representatives subcommittee on counter-terrorism and intelligence, said that US interests are also at risk.
“Boko Haram has quickly evolved and poses an emerging threat to US interests and the US homeland,” said the 28-page report written by the panel.
“The United States should work with the government of Nigeria to build counterterrorism and intelligence capability to effectively counter Boko Haram,” it said.
The document added that the Islamist group “has the intent and may be developing capability to coordinate on a rhetorical and operational level with Al-Qaeda in the Lands of the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) and Al-Shebab.”
Boko Haram has claimed responsibility for multiple gun, bomb and suicide attacks this month in Damatur, targeting police and churches and killing 150 people in addition to the UN attack, and US lawmakers said they believe that the risk to the United States has been underestimated.
The group’s “fast evolution in targeting and tactics mirrors other Al-Qaeda affiliated groups and is worrisome,” the subcommittee’s chairman, Representative Patrick Meehan, said at the start of the hearing.
“While I recognize there is little evidence at this moment to suggest Boko Haram is planning attacks against the (US) homeland, lack of evidence does not mean it cannot happen,” he said.
Peter Pham, an expert with the Atlantic Council thinktank, testified at the hearing that for the moment, the Nigerian group’s reach is “still somewhat limited.”
“Nevertheless, the fact that the group has been able in recent months to expand its operations beyond its base in northern Nigeria ought to be a wake-up call to both the Nigerian government and the international community,” Pham told lawmakers.