As we continue to talk to Iran about Iran's nuclear ambitions, I've always been certain of how it would end:
I remain convinced that diplomacy is as much about the non-U.S. West trying to buy time for Iran to go nuclear as it is Iran buying time to go nuclear.
If Iran would only get on with it and go nuclear at long last, western diplomats could stop pretending they are trying to stop Iran from getting nuclear weapons. The West could then just shrug and say, darn it all, too late! We'll just have to learn to live with the Iranian bomb. Israel or America will be nuked after all, not Europe. And think of all those post-nuclear strike rebuilding contracts that European companies might snag!
Of course, America is now in that category as our European-Americans run our foreign policy. Now we pretty much all are impatient for Iran to hurry up and go nuclear so we can give up, exclaiming, "Darn! Too late! We were so going to stop them."
But I totally neglected the first three stages to that final stage of our diplomacy (tip to Weekly Standard):
And I failed to foresee that every foreign challenge would be met with the same strategy.
Now I understand nuance.
