Iran and the Nuke

The prime minister (again) of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu recently told The Atlantic that the two biggest obstacles that the Obama administration faced were the economy and Iran. Obviously he has the concerns of his own country foremost in his mind, but the comment deserves significant merit especially in light of the recent disclosure that a Chinese national has been funneling banned nuclear material to Iran through a sophisticated network of banks and shell companies.

The approach to Iran has been the same for quite some time. The idea is that the government of Iran is extremely unpopular, oddly enough with the same demographic that originally helped thrust the regime into power, the educated youth. While the government pours vast resources into nuclear development, the people are suffering and there is a general feeling of unrest. The recent drop in gas prices has only added fuel to the fire of belief that the current regime cannot last as they are seeing the main source of their income drop with the falling price of oil.

Still they seem to be clinging to power at the same time pushing down political dissent and working with other dictatorial regimes throughout the world. They have allied themselves with Syria, Venezuela, North Korea, Russia, and evidently are being aided, at least indirectly, by China. The problem is how long do you wait?

For fifty years we have imposed sanctions on Cuba. The gradual effect of the sanctions making life unbearable for some, but others have never known anything different. Those who couldn’t take it anymore have fled to other countries, including the US. If oppression and a dictatorial regime are all you have ever known then it is hard to believe that you could be free of such a system.

So how long is too long?

In this case I think it will be when Iran completes their first nuclear weapon.

Once the first nuke is finished now you have an unstable and irrational government armed with a nuclear weapon. We have learned the difficulties in controlling and containing WMD while invading a country and we’ve also learned that people and weapons are easy to hide even with advanced satellites, drones, and high altitude aerial surveillance. How do you destroy an existing nuclear weapon in a controlled fashion, minimize casualties, and guarantee that you have neutralized your target? If you miss now all bets are off. Now you have a unstable and irrational government… fighting for its existence. The first situation is bad, but now you’ve shaken the hornets nest. It will also shore up the regimes support in their own country because people will be thinking the same thing; better the crazed unstable dictator that you know, rather than the psychotic, trigger happy, madman waiting around the corner. This means that once they get the weapon, it is going to be very difficult if not impossible to remove the regime and replace it.

So then it seems obvious that you need to attack before the nuke is finished.

Unfortunately now you risk destroying the resistance itself. Attack from an outside invader that the leadership has already painted as a religious and moral enemy will only shore up support for the current regime.

Tough call.

Can we really afford to wait much longer? Can Israel afford to wait ANY longer?

My hope is that we have very good intel going on and the reality on the ground is a lot different than the press that Iran is putting out. Rather than months from a nuke they are actually years. That would be my optimistic hope.

Pessimistically I can see the current administration having considered it a forgone conclusion that Iran will acquire a nuclear weapon, but don’t believe them capable of actually using it. They would hope that they are planning on utilizing the nuke as a tool rather than a weapon. A bargaining chip rather than a global panic button.

I don’t know if that is really a gamble that Israel can afford to make, and one we should not ask them to.

Strike now. Wipe out any thought of a nuclear weapons program and hit the regime hard enough to weaken their grip; all while fueling and equipping a resistance dedicated to democratic reforms. Unfortunately you have to understand that you could be creating an even larger mess, with long term cleanup implications, but that seems to me to be the only risk worth taking.