Regarding the questionable story about Iranian tunneling attributed to an “intelligence service” (“Geheimdienst” in German), a colleague notes these sort of stories are sadly common in the German press.
As evidence, he cites a recent story in Die Welt—attributed only to “Western intelligence services”—suggesting that Syrian units were operating in Darfur, using chemical weapons against the population. (It took the right wing blogosphere all of five minutes to suggest that these were Saddam’s missing WMD.)
American and German intelligence sources promptly denied the report. (I have wire service copies in case anyone wants to see the originals.)
I guess I have to be nicer to the New York Times.