The current debate on whether or not to bomb Iran is being framed as a false choice. Proponents state we must bomb Iran to keep it from developing a nuclear weapon. Yet in the same statement they often admit that even an effective bombing campaign will delay the program only a few years. Thus, the real choice being offered is not to bomb Iran or face an Iran with nuclear weapons. The real choice is facing an Iran with nuclear weapons or facing an Iran with nuclear weapons after you have bombed it.I am sure there are some who think we can just bomb Iran until all 75 million Iranians are no more, but frankly that is a non-starter. Besides, we need to keep in mind that the agent of Iran, Hezbollah, is already imbedded deep in Latin America. We are not totally safe behind our ocean barriers.
And, here is a 2 March 2012 OpEd in The Washington Post, by Associate Professor Colin H. Kahl, of Georgetown University, and from 2009 to 2011, Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense (DASD) for the Middle East. The concluding paragraph reads:
Barely a week after the Osirak raid, [Israeli Prime Minister] Begin told CBS News that the attack “will be a precedent for every future government in Israel.” Yet, if history repeats itself, an Israeli attack would result in a wounded adversary more determined than ever to get a nuclear bomb. And then the world would face the same terrible choices it ultimately faced with Iraq: decades of containment to stall nuclear rebuilding efforts, invasion and occupation — or acquiescence to an implacable nuclear-armed foe.There are no easy choices out there. I think that now is the time to talk and wait, looking for an opening. Now is the time for both the US and Israel to wait.
There are no good choices right now. Let us wait for a good choice to develop.
Regards — Cliff
1 comment:
For every anti-bomb-Iran proponent, there are nearly a one-to-one ratio of other retired Colonels who maintain we have no choice. So much for a consensus of the "experts."
What seems to fall through the cracks of polarized discussions is the fact that the USSR represented a far greater threat to the US than Iran can ever hope to pose. AND, we managed to convince the extremists in the Kremlin that it would be a genuinely fatal decision for them to employ ANY of their weapons against the US as the result would surely be MAD.
I submit, we are not using that same methodology with Iran....dealing with them from a position of overwhelming strength and apparent resolve to employ that strength. Instead, we are showing them little more than hesitation, compromise, dithering, and demonstrating those factors by reducing our military capability in dramatic ways. Iran figures that they can win...if not with outright action...then by simply developing a capability that we fear.
The REAL enemy facing the United States is our very own population and its government leadership.
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