Caught Between a Nuke and a Desert Quagmire
The cover story of the Sept. 25 issue of Time magazine suggests that a war with Iran may be more likely than people realize, and possibly inevitable.
Iran has ambitions to become the major power in the Middle East, and acquiring nuclear weapons would enable them to achieve those ambitions. Such weapons would also allow Iran’s crackpot president to deliver on his promise to wipe Israel off of the map. So, really, Iran doesn’t have a lot of motivation to forego the manufacture of nuclear weapons.
With the U.S. military committed quagmires in both Iraq and Afghanistan, I don’t see how we can mount an effective military campaign against Iran as well. But I also don’t see how we can live with a nuclear Iran. Deterrence and containment may have worked against the Soviet Union, but I think the Soviets were a bit more pragmatic than the nutballs who run Iran.
Talk about a rock and a hard place.
September 20th, 2006 at 12:07 am
I don’t think it will require much of our military to do what we may need to do in Iran.
Destroy the nuclear installations. Bury them. If anyone tried to dig them up, send cruise missles over.
A total air campaign. We aren’t trying to take them over.
Now they might attack our troops in Iraq in retaliation. Potentially that would be serious trouble…but maybe not. It might unite the Iraqis lijke nothing else. and since the Iraq army was able to fight iran to a stalemate for years I don’t think our troops would lose.
We could also POUR arms into Iran to support the various anti-government factions. They probably can’t win but they can cause trouble.
Wish it dodn’t come to this–Persians are great people–but a nuclear Iran has too much potential for disaster.
September 20th, 2006 at 11:19 pm
Bill, I’d encourage you to read the Time article if you haven’t already. Some military experts, like General Anthony Zinni, believe destroying Iran’s nuclear capability would be a difficult task. Air strikes could at best set Iran’s nuclear program back a few years, and that’s assuming we could find every installation. The only permanent solution would be regime change, and that would require ground troops.
As for Iran’s ability to make trouble for our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan, remember how Hizbollah stood up to the Israeli army? They didn’t do it alone. Iran’s reach extends far outside of its own borders.
They could also strike at us on our own soil. Major attacks like the planned bombings of airliners traveling from the U.K. to the U.S. require a lot of manpower and “moving parts,” and are easier to spot than, say, a suicide bomber who straps dynamite to himself and sets it off in a crowded area. I wouldn’t be surprised if Iran retaliated with smaller terrorist attacks that claim far fewer lives than the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, but spread an equal amount of fear.
Finally, we tried arming an insurgency in Afghanistan. We succeeded in helping them repel the Soviet occupation, but we ended up with Al Qaeda as a result. Pouring arms into the hands of Iranian rebels might be very risky.
I’m not saying that doing nothing is an option. I’m just saying that I don’t believe there are any solutions that will allow for a clean outcome. Unless we can somehow convince Iran to stand down voluntarily — something I don’t believe is likely — this is going to be one very messy situation.
September 30th, 2006 at 12:37 am
Oh I agree, there’s no clean way out of this. I don’t fear that Iran would attack us at home; they HAVE to know that this would potentially bring the wrath of God down on them. If we invaded iraq on just the suspicion of ill intent, what would we do to an actual antagonist?