Report: New Intelligence Boosts U.S. Confidence over Iran

A stealth surveillance drone operated by the CIA penetrated deep inside Iran over three years ago, snapped images of Iran's secret nuclear facility at Qom and returned home, The Washington Post reported late Saturday.

The newspaper said that during that flight, analysts at the Central Intelligence Agency and other agencies watched carefully for any sign that the aircraft, called the RQ-170 Sentinel, had been detected by Tehran's air defenses on its maiden voyage.

"There was never even a ripple," the paper quotes an unnamed former senior U.S. intelligence official as saying.

CIA stealth drones scoured dozens of sites throughout Iran, making hundreds of passes over suspicious facilities, before a version of the RQ-170 crashed inside Iran's borders in December, the report said.

The surveillance has been part of an intelligence surge that is aimed at Iran's nuclear program and that has been gaining momentum since the final years of George W. Bush's administration, The Post noted.

The effort has included eavesdropping by the National Security Agency, the formation of an Iran task force among satellite-imagery analysts, as well as an expanded network of spies, the paper added.

The expanded intelligence collection has reinforced the view within the White House that it will have early warning of any move by Iran to assemble a nuclear bomb, the report said.

"There is confidence that we would see activity indicating that a decision had been made," The Post quoted a senior U.S. official as saying. "Across the board, our access has been significantly improved."

According to the paper, the expanded intelligence effort has coincided with a covert campaign by the CIA and other agencies to sabotage Iran's nuclear program.

The administration of President Barack Obama has cited new intelligence reports in arguing against a preemptive military strike by Israel against Iranian nuclear facilities.