"If a political decision is made to refer Iran to the U.N. Security Council, it will be entering a lose-lose game. It will have its own certain consequences and will affect Iran's decisions. We prefer that such a game is not played."
He did not specify what those consequences would be, but Iran is a major oil exporter.
The Iranians could just give us a reason to strike and Iran's threat is empty:
Iran's economy relies heavily on oil export revenues - around 80-90 percent of total export earnings and 40-50 percent of the government budget.
So Iran, with a population seething in anger at the ruling mullahs, needs oil exports in a major way. How much of a budget shock could the mullahs endure without selling oil?
And it gets more interesting for an oil exporter:
Iran has imported refined products since 1982, and these imports have been increasing rapidly. In 2004 alone, Iran imported an estimated 160,000 bbl/d of gasoline at an estimated annual cost of around $2-$3 billion.
That's right. Iran imports gasoline. The oil weapon is not the wonderfully precise weapon the mullahs try to pretend it is. Cut off the oil trade and Iran's economy goes in the tank and Iran's consumers don't even have the ability to drive for long.
Take Iran down. We can't let them get nukes. We must not.
