Some are certain that the intelligence community has been tricked, while others see it as deliberately seeking to undermine the hard-line Bush administration stance toward Iran. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's crowing about how the NIE "vindicates" him only makes its conclusions appear more suspect and even disloyal in the eyes of many Bush administration supporters.

The purpose of national intelligence estimates, though, are not to serve as justifications for administration policy, but to describe as accurately as possible what is actually taking place. In fact, it is especially important that this be done when an administration - whether knowingly or not - is basing its policy on an inaccurate understanding of reality.

The fact that so many American conservatives have criticized this NIE tells the rest of the world that they are less interested in what Iran is or is not actually doing and more interested in punishing Iran regardless.

This perception is extremely harmful. For while nobody outside Iran wants Tehran to acquire nuclear weapons, there are many governments that fear the Bush administration has exaggerated the prospect that Iran will do so in order to justify attacking it - much like the same Bush administration whipped up fear over an Iraqi weapons of mass destruction program to justify invading that country, only to discover that Saddam had dismantled it.

Like the boy in the fable, many see Bush as having cried "wolf" over Iraq. Several other countries rushed to help him deal with a wolf, only to discover that it wasn't there. Now that Bush has cried "wolf" again - this time over Iran - many doubt there is one while others fear that there is. What the NIE has effectively done is to state that there is no nuclear weapon "wolf" in Iran right now.

The Bush administration is extremely embarrassed - as it should be - because its bluff was called. But this NIE has actually done the United States two great services. First, it makes it very difficult for the Bush administration to justify intervening in Iran and risk getting America bogged down in another quagmire in order to destroy a nuclear weapons program that the report says Tehran halted in 2003.

Second, if Iran ever does resume work on a nuclear weapons program, a subsequent NIE stating this will have much greater credibility than an administration that continually says so without the hard evidence.

For while some would deny that Iran was attempting to acquire nuclear weapons until the moment Tehran announced it has done so - if indeed it would be so open - there are many others who would be willing to side with the United States if convinced that Iran really was a threat.

For if the U.S.-led intervention in Iraq has taught Washington nothing else, it should have taught it that doing so without broad international support for a problem that no longer exists is not in America's interests.

U.S. foreign policy makers should bear in mind that they are pursuing multiple goals. Preventing Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons is an important one. But so is maintaining - and after Iraq, restoring - America's relations with its allies.

To achieve the second goal, it is important that Washington speaks truthfully to its friends and others. But to do this, Washington must make sure it knows what the truth is. The latest NIE shows that the American intelligence community is trying to do so, even if the Bush administration is not.

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Mark N. Katz is a professor of government and politics at George Mason University.