Israel is making noises about a strike on Iran's nuclear facilities.
And even Britain is reported to be preparing to join in a strike mission.
Which makes me think that no strikes are in preparation and that this is all about pressuring Iran into cutting a deal.
Still, our restraint has in part been part of a deal to let the Europeans push for a deal. At what point does the deal swing to military action as Iran fails to respond to diplomatic overtures and as non-military means of coercion fail to do more than slow down Iran's drive for nuclear weapons?
And after years of hearing similar sabre rattling, Iran may be immune to such threats. Which, of course, could be used to mask visible preparations for an actual strike.
But we've made progress since those hopeful days when our intelligence community was confident that Iran's nuclear weapons program was dormant. That's how the press spun that particular estimate, led by the nose by intelligence people eager to prevent Bush from acting (but covering their butts in the footnotes of the estimate, I should add).
Was our intelligence community wrong then, when Bush was president? Or was our era of hope and change actually convince Iran to restart the program after cowboy Bush left office?
Heck, with the heads of Osama bin Laden, Awlaki, and Khaddafi figuratively on pikes displayed on the White House lawn, perhaps the Iranians appreciate that President Obama could nuke Iran and get (another) Nobel Peace Prize.
UPDATE: Still, I'd bet we're trying to scare other countries into reacting to the IAEA report coming out soon:
"The IAEA is scheduled to release a report on Iran's nuclear program next week and President Sarkozy and I agree on the need to maintain the unprecedented pressure on Iran to meet its obligations," he told reporters.
Yeah. Worry about what America, Israel, and Britain might do if you don't join us in tighter sanctions. It's a shame that people worry more about what we might do about Iran's nuclear ambitions rather than worry about Iran's nuclear ambitions. But that's the way it is.
One day, unless there is a Persian Spring, we will face the choice of Iran going nuclear or doing nothing. I don't think we believe we are there yet.
