The Bush administration is planning a massive bombing campaign against Iran, including use of bunker-buster nuclear bombs to destroy a key Iranian suspected nuclear weapons facility, The New Yorker magazine is to report in its April 17 issue.

The article by Seymour Hersh said that President Bush and others in the White House have come to view "Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as a potential Adolf Hitler." "That's the name they're using," the report quoted a former senior intelligence official as saying.

A senior unnamed Pentagon adviser is quoted as saying that "this White House believes that the only way to solve the problem is to change the power structure in Iran, and that means war."

In recent weeks, the president has quietly initiated a series of talks on plans for Iran with a few key senators and members of the House of Representatives, including at least one Democrat, the report said.

One of the options under consideration involves the possible use of a bunker-buster tactical nuclear weapon, such as the B61-11, to insure the destruction of Iran's main centrifuge plant at Natanz, Hersh wrote.

© 2006 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)