Don’t Bomb, Bomb Iran - For now, we should avoid a smoking Tehran.

National Review Online ^ | August 31, 2007 | Victor Davis Hanson

[sauropod]

review

[RichInOC]

I’ll take the VD Hanson/Michael Ledeen tack on this...in other words, let’s hold the nukes as a last resort for now, but let’s see what we can do to make the regime’s implosion go a little faster, please.

[Ragnar54]

"That option is still down the road."

Yes, but why give the Iranians a chance to smuggle nukes into this country? If we can't control what they are carrying into Iraq, there is no reason to think that they will find our border with Mexico impenetrable. For that matter, the Canadians have created a Muslim magnet (oil fields, lax immigration) and we don't defend that border. Just to be on the safe side, we should eliminate the Iranians. That would be far more effective than any "humiliation" of the mullahs. There is nothing hypothetical about the Carthaginian solution.

[stevie_d_64]

I see some comments about what would happen if we did “fail” in Iraq...

Well we know the big obvious about that one...

But what is really behind that???

If we cut and run and Iraq and all the effort and sacrifice in lives and trying to build some stability in the region would come to a crashing and tragic halt...The new Iraqi government has proven time and time again that they are incapable, without us totally committed to getting it done for them...

So who really wins if we cut and run??? I would say a big winner would be Iran...

They would no longer be effectively stopped in expanding their influence and territorial desires...This is all a very obvious future, if the political climate over here changes that favors this outcome...

It would be safe to say that all those that opposeus taking care of the problem in the Middle East all these long years, woudl benefit, because of the vacumm of influence, both politically and economically benefit those who want to get in there aqnd sleep with the tyrant(s)...

This was true before we got into Iraq and Afganistan, and it will be true after we leave before the job is done...

And its going to take a lot more that OBL’s head on a stick, to win...

[stevie_d_64]

Can you imagine if some “other” country were to tell us that if we (USA) don’t go nuclear on Iran, they will...

That idea came to me from a book I read last year...

It was made upon some immediacy, or emminent attack that they Iran were staging...

Actually this is a mix of stories...In the book (The Last Jihad) it was Iraq, but in real life it could be Iran...

Stay tuned I suppose...;-)

Just some stuff to add to the nightmare list I guess...

[familyop]

Herr Hanson:

You vaffle zis vay, and you vaffle zat way. You veasel round und round and avay from ze topic at hand.

S. Korea, U.S. verifying reports on test of new N.K. missile in Iran: source
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1834307/posts
(4,000 kilometer range—will reach London and the Vatican—May 16th, 2007)

Ve vait, if you like, and ve neo-cons vill get our vay even more so. Oil will go much higher for much longer after Iran has nukes. And so will the War to come.

[neverdem]

Thanks for the link.

[familyop]

You’re welcome. And BTW, my silly phonics attempt was not an effort to equate German people with Nazism. Hanson’s probably more Danish, anyway, and west Germany leans against Nazism more than most others do. My commentary—crudely stereotyping—was intended to be critical of overly bland, verbose, tangential writing styles.

[Tolik]

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[Last Dakotan]

We have no leverage with China and Russia, of course.

Sure we do - there is just too much money to be made selling Chinese goods.

[Billthedrill]

Of course, there is no reason yet to believe that Iran’s megalomaniac plans are stalled.

Therein lies the rub. Possession of nuclear weapons changes this equation dramatically - not necessarily to the benefit of Iran immediately inasmuch as the horror of its neighbors (including Russia and China, IMHO) will outweigh the power conferred by the possession of one or two weapons. But the ability to produce more than that shifts the equation ineluctably toward the mullahs over time.

Such programs are not always successful - the expensive failure that is the North Korean attempt should provide a warning to the Iranians who are not unaware of its details. Ahmadinejad's personal political currency is running lower by day, and he may provide a convenient scapegoat to throw to world opinion should the sanctions begin (as they already are) to bite. But the possession of nuclear weapons and credible delivery vehicles are counters in an international game that goes well beyond the megalomaniacal desires of one bearded nutcase. Their associated programs may well be slowed and opened up to limited inspection but they will continue.

There are two possible routes for remediation - first, open and complete regime change that sends the mullahs back to the mosques where they belong (and if a few of them end up dangling from lamp-posts along the way one cannot say it wasn't deserved). Second, a tactical retreat on the part of the corrupt and now fantastically wealthy theological upper class that will allow it to rot more or less quietly until the Iranian people finally pick it and toss it into the trash. That process may take years or even decades.

I am not personally inclined toward an immediate bombing because I don't think the progress of their programs is sufficient to take that drastic step - yet - and because bombing will tend to strengthen the mullahs. But it is an option that should absolutely remain open. One worry is that a possible Democratic administration will close it in an attempt at cheap posturing as "peace-loving." Cheap posturing in foreign policy is, after all, what the previous two Democratic administrations were all about. To a degree we are where be are because of that. Electing practically any Republican on the current roster will avoid that. An awful lot of eyes are going to be on the election in 2008. The stakes are very high.

[djf]

Iran was a true ally of the United States for many years. In my younger days, I knew many Iranians, under the Shah they were encouraged to go to the west for education and to adopt western business and cultural models.

Of all the countries in the mideast, I’m inclined to think that the greatest hope for western ideals is Iran and Lebanon.

[onedoug]

Ahmadinejad flies around on a Boeing 747-SP, which is an American made aircraft.

If we could figure out a way to bring him down (literally), think of how many lives might otherwise be saved overall.

[do the dhue]

Next time we sell him one, we should have the TNT built into the aircraft with a charge that detonate via a phone call.

Then all we have to do is make a phone call.