But a repressive, terror-sponsoring regime without nukes--and with sanctions lifted as the price to get rid of those nukes (or at least to promise to get rid of those nukes)--will continue to be a repressive, terror-sponsoring regime. But with more access to money, of course.
I'd much rather have a sane government in Iran, which will probably conclude it doesn't need nuclear weapons. And even if such a sane government did seek nukes, would prove far less of a threat than the current regime without nukes. How many people worry that France has nukes?
Michael Barone reminds us that our real problem isn't nukes in the mullahs' hands, but the mullah regime itself:
Some points are so elementary that people tend to overlook them. Case in point: if we want to eliminate the danger of nuclear weapons in the hands of Iran’s mullah regime, the best way is to overthrow that regime. True, that’s much more easily said than done. But it might be easier than getting the mullahs to give up their nukes voluntarily. Anyway, the point is worth making, again and again, as it has been today by Michael Ledeen in the Wall Street Journal, Robert Kagan in the Washington Post. And and Rosemary Righter in the Times of London.
While it will be a victory of sorts to convince Iran to give up nuclear weapons, it is not the basic problem. An Iran under nuts without nukes just makes the problem less catastrophic in worst case scenarios.
It seems that our government is distracted from the real threat. Which is funny coming from this crowd.
But I sincerely doubt we can get Iran to renounce nuclear weapons and allow safeguards sufficient to keep them from cheating. Even if we don't understand the problem, the mullahs understand that their regime is the real threat to us, and they understand deep down that renouncing nukes won't make the threat Iran poses to us go away--so they won't abandon nukes. Or do you assume an Iran that agrees not to build nukes will stop trying to kill American troops in Iraq and Afghanistan? I hope you won't insult my intelligence by telling me that Iran will stop supporting Hamas, Hezbollah, and any number of other odious groups and regimes.
Once Iran goes nuclear, the basic problem of Iran under mullah control will again reveal itself and regime change will become the only solution to our problem--and no, accepting a mullah bomb is not a solution.
