NEW YORK, July 4: The United States army is against an air strike on Iran and it has communicated to President George W. Bush the drawbacks of such an attack, the New Yorker magazine has claimed.

Writer Seymour Hersh claimed in an article that the Bush administration had withdrawn its strike option at the insistence of the army and plans to use tactical nuclear weapons against Iran’s nuclear plants had been dropped.

He said the army had briefed the Bush administration that an air strike would fail to stop Iran’s nuclear programme.

Mr Hersh quoted American commanders as saying that an attack on Iran would result in serious economic, political and military consequences for the US. He said the army opposed an operation against Iran because of lack of intelligence on production of nuclear weapons by Tehran, its nuclear plants being spread over a large area and technical difficulties.