The latest International Atomic Energy Agency report on Iran's nuclear program, issued Tuesday, merely reconfirms what clear thinkers determined years ago: The Iranian regime knows how to hide a nuclear weapons development program in plain sight. So once again we are hearing demands for harsher anti-nuclear sanctions. Sanctions, however, will not deter Iran's nuclear quest.
Sanctions are the solution, because we tell ourselves that Iran is still far from nuclear weapons. In truth, we don't know how close Iran is. Estimates over the past years included worst case guesses that Iran would have those weapons by now. They do not. Does this mean the estimates are worthless? Only if you are having the wrong debate over how far along the path Iran is. Ahmadinejad says they won't be turned away from their path:
"This nation won't retreat one iota from the path it is going," Ahmadinejad told thousands of people in Shahr-e-Kord in central Iran. "Why are you ruining the prestige of the (U.N. nuclear) agency for absurd U.S. claims?"
That's the problem. A nuclear armed mullah regime is a disaster waiting to happen whether it happens in 1 year or twenty years:
I suspect the debate we are having is only important for some to argue that not dealing with Iran now isn't really appeasement and surrender, because some argue Iran is years from being able to deploy nuclear weapons.
It is bad whether Iran gets nuclear weapons in one year or five years.
Call me cynical, but I think the people unwilling to act now because they don't think Iran is close to producing nuclear weapons will not be willing to act should the consensus develop that Iran is close to getting nuclear weapons.
The basic hope of these people (including the Europeans) is to forestall action until Iran is openly a nuclear power and then say, "Oh well, too late to do anything now. We'll have to live with Iran's nuclear weapons."
Keep in mind, also, that the Iranians can see we are focused on this technical debate and might be aware that if Iran makes sufficient progress toward nuclear weapons that we might actually be motivated to stop them. What might the Iranians do to take advantage of our technical debate?
The problem from Iran's point of view is that they can't know if crossing one of these lines could trigger an American or Israeli preemptive strike out of fear that further delay in attacking would be too late to prevent Iran from getting nuclear weapons. And if I was an Iranian nutball, I wouldn't assume the Americans and Israelis couldn't knock out my infrastructure.
Were I an Iranian nutball, under those circumstances, I'd want at least a few atomic warhead on hand before I announce capabilities to produce atomic weapons-grade material. Which would mean I'd have had to have bought some from either North Korea or Pakistan--or possibly even from some broke custodian of Russia's arsenal.
If Iran can announce both the ability to make nuclear bomb material and the possession of actual nuclear weapons--perhaps by detonating one in a test on their own territory--Tehran would quite possibly deter an attack on Iran's nuclear infrastructure.
We're not dealing with idiots. If the Iranian mullahs believe there are red lines that trigger Israeli or American action, why wouldn't they take counter-actions rather than just blindly cross those lines and provide a pretext for military action against them?
And the debate we are having misses the point that the real problem is not that Iran might get nuclear weapons, but that Iran's mullah regime will have nuclear weapons:
Mullen is right that the real problem is Iran. They are a threat to the region and more given their position astride the main oil exporting routes, even without nuclear weapons and even with a military whose equipment should be sitting outside Veterans of the Iran-Iraq War posts throughout Iran.
People opposed to striking Iran's nuclear facilities like to say that Iran's nuclear program is a matter of pride for even non-nutball jihadist Iranians. Fine. But an Iran not under the control of nutball jihadists simply isn't in the same order of nuclear danger as a nutball regime with nukes. It would be a proliferation danger and not an attack danger. A nutball regimes in Tehran proves it is a danger even without nukes every week, does it not?
And an Iran under non-nutballs might actually decide that the cost of the nuclear program is too high given Iran's other problems and limited money to address them. Pride is one thing. Providing for your family might be preferable to eating grass and having nuclear weapons. Iranians might want to ask Pakistanis how that bargain is working out for them.
Look, striking Iran's nuclear facilities is a gamble. It would surely have a short-term rally around the flag effect. But longer term it might undermine the mullahs by showing that they can't actually protect Iran despite decades of scary press releases about wonder weapons. Nuclear weapons are popular as a symbol of power. How will the reality of powerlessness play out? But it is uncertain.
And we don't know how long we will set Iran back if the mullahs retain power. Not the least because I don't know how much of Iran's nuclear program is safely hidden abroad to provide a core of knowledge and capabilities to rebuild what was destroyed in Iran without having to start from scratch.
But letting the mullah regime get nuclear weapons is a bigger gamble. Our priority should be to get rid of the root cause of the problem--the mullah regime. But if we can't do that, buying time by wrecking as much as we can with an air campaign (at least) is the least bad option we have.
Oh, and have no doubt that an air campaign lasting perhaps weeks against Iran's nuclear facilities and other military assets and command and control assets is the opening act of a war. Even if it doesn't expand to a general war, our air campaign must be the opening salvo in a war over the fate of the mullah regime in Iran. Either we win that war before the mullahs can get nukes or Iran gets nukes and seeks revenge. Not that our attack would cause the problem. But it would surely provide more incentive to do even more damage.
Or do you really want to argue that the mullah regime can be trusted with nukes? Because all the focus on the technical arguments about how far along Iran is obscures that the debate really is a simple question.
Have a nice day.
