All of the talk about Iran obtaining nuclear arms capability is getting everyone’s attention, including mine. A nuclear Iran in itself would not be a serious threat to the US although it might forestall some of our options in dealing with that country. There are two significant fears with respect to a nuclear Iran, the implied threat to Israel and the worry that a nuclear weapon might end up in the hands of terrorists. The fear of a nuclear attack on the US by an Iranian-armed terrorist cell has all of us concerned. Before we rush into another middle-eastern war, however, let’s examine the details more fully.
Based on news reports of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s statements, the average American or Israeli citizen believes that the threat to Israel is not insignificant. It turns out that news reports, even by highly respected news organizations such as the New York Times, might be using a poor translation and political hyperbole by Mr. Ahmadinejad to Advance a questionable conclusion. The most commonly repeated quote is that Ahmadinejad called for the destruction of Israel. Based on data in Wikipedia (see link), this appears to be based upon a speech that he gave in 2005 at a “World Without Zionism” conference. While Mr. Ahmadinejad’s attendance at such a gathering as well as statements he has made with respect to the Holocaust suggest that he is a deeply biased man with a bigotry against Jewish persons, his statement may have been poorly translated and misinterpreted. Reading the section of the Wikipedia piece entitled “Translation Controversy” and “Clarifying Comments” suggest that the man was not calling for the destruction of Israel by war but by democracy. True, he wanted to include the 5 million or so former residents of Israel and their descendants in the vote but that is apparently what he advocated. His speech and attitudes represent uncivil discourse and bigotry without a doubt but fall short of a call for war. Does this mean that Iran is no threat to Israel? No, but the immediacy of the threat is perhaps less than has been advanced by pundits and news publishers.
How about the threat that Iran might arm a terrorist group with a nuclear warhead? The answer to this question is a little ambiguous. The actions of Iran to date show a government that views terrorist organizations as but another delivery mechanism for their ends. Based on this evidence, I think we could conclude that arming terrorist with nuclear weapons is not outside the realm of possibility for the theocracy that is Iran. There are, however, some limits to such actions that should be considered before we march headlong into war. First are the costs of a nuclear weapon. It is one thing to assume that Iran would be willing to arm a terrorist organization but considering the massive cost to the regime in terms of manpower, invested costs, and sanction costs, would they be willing to part with such a scarce commodity on ideological grounds? Current estimates are that Iran, if unchecked, could produce at most 1 to 3 bombs within the next 5 years. I seriously doubt that they would part with a warhead that cost a significant portion of their GDP without provocation. Now, a provoked Iran might well decide to use a terrorist cell to deliver a bomb to our shores where they lack another means to do so. What would stop them would be the anticipated response from our country. The same is true for Israel. It has been alleged that Israel already has nuclear weapons although they have never confirmed this. You can imagine the Israeli response if attacked by a terrorist with a nuclear weapon. As to the fear of a "dirty bomb", the Iranian enrichment facilities have already made 2% enriched Uranium and that or even unenriched Uranium is sufficient for a dirty bomb. The US and/or Israeli response would be similar.
Based on this, I believe that there is not a great risk of Iran attacking either the US or Israel unless a state of war existed. Certainly we have some control over that. While Iran has shown itself not to be our friend and has aided in the death of our soldiers, our government under Presidents Bush and Obama has made no overt effort to engage them militarily. I suspect that there may be a covert “cold” war between our nations but we have deniability as well as the Iranians.
Iran is a large country with a population that largely bears us no ill will. The hatred of Israel, inflamed by both the theocracy and hardliners, is probably more palpable but that alone is not a reason for their destruction. Prior to the fall of the Shah, the US was involved heavily in Iran and we have many friends there. There are also many Iranian-Americans that have chosen to come here and have relatives in Iran. While we may wish for either better relations or an end to the current theocracy in Iran, we need to remember that most Iranians are not our enemy.
We also need to heed the lessons of Iraq. While we may one day determine that the Iraq war was good for our country (and I won’t debate that in this post), there was a terrible cost to our soldiers and their families to obtain what we did. The cost of a similar war in Iran would be higher. For those that believe that simply taking out the Iranian enrichment sites would suffice, I suggest that such an attack would embolden the hardliners and engender them more support. Attacking Iran without UN sanctions is likely a violation of international law. While Israel, who is already isolated, might contemplate such an action, the US cannot do so without serious consequences. To use force against another sovereign regime would isolate us and would have dire economic consequences.
We need to find a better way to deal with Iran.
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