Disproving their own case

Thanks to Juan Cole, I came across this piece by Gareth Porter that hits the nail on the head. It's entitled "U.S. Briefing on Iran discredits official line."

WASHINGTON, Feb 13 (IPS) - The first major effort by the George W. Bush administration to substantiate its case that the Iranian government has been providing weapons to Iraqi Shiites who oppose the occupation undermines the administration's political line by showing that it has been unable to find any real evidence of an Iranian government role.

Contradicting recent claims by both Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Secretary of Defence Robert Gates that U.S. intelligence had proof of Iranian government responsibility for the supply of such weapons, the unnamed officials who briefed the media Sunday admitted that the claim is merely "an inference" rather than based on a trail of evidence.

Although it was clearly not the intention, moreover, the briefing revealed for the first time that the Iranians and Iraqis detained by U.S. forces in recent months did not provide any evidence implicating either the Iranian government or the Islamic Revolutionary Guards in the acquisition of armour-piercing explosive devices and other weapons by Iraqi Shiite groups.