Some Thoughts On Iran

Several people have asked me in recent months what we should do about Iran. Unfortunately, I am forced to admit that there is no clear path forward. Iran presents a real dilemma. Nevertheless, there are some options. So let’s talk about the Iranian problem.

For starters, we need to acknowledge some of the facts. First, let’s consider Iran’s perspective:

Motivation: Iran has genuine motivations that we need to consider -- they are not just causing trouble, which is the false narrative adopted by our media. Geographically, Iran is easily the most important country in the region. It is a large country that dominates the Persian Gulf. It sits between the combustible Middle East, the combustible Afghanistan, the combustible Pakistan, and the ever-more important India. And it is the most populous country in the region. Iranian influence runs throughout the region and, without the United States as a counter-balance, Iran would be the biggest player.

Historically, Iran views itself as the cradle of civilization. At one point, it was far advanced compared to the Western World, and it, i.e. the Persian Empire, spread from Iran to Greece to Libya to China and well into India. Thus, Iran has a proud and ancient history. But the Persian Empire fell and the region came to be dominated by foreign powers -- from the Ottomans to the British. That colors their present thinking, as they see themselves as a much more significant force than they have become, and they bristle at the idea of outsiders controlling them.

Legitimate Reasons To Go Nuclear: Our media likes to paint Iran’s civilian nuclear ambitions as false, and it wonders why the Iranians would want nuclear power when they sit on so much oil. The answer is simple -- they can’t use the oil they have. Iranian oil is “sour crude” meaning that it is polluted and difficult to refine. Iran has no refineries that can handle this type of crude. Thus, despite sitting on all that oil, Iran suffers from gasoline and fuel shortages. Adding civilian nuclear energy actually makes sense for them.

Nuclear Rights And Wrongs: Many countries object to the idea that the rest of the world can tell them whether or not they can have the right to develop nuclear power. And indeed, even under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, any member can develop nuclear energy for civilian purposes.

Now let’s consider the counter argument:

Civilian Use My Glowing Green Ass: Despite their assertion that they are only looking to develop nuclear power for civilian purposes, the evidence is overwhelming that the Iranians are developing nuclear weapons. They have been caught working on triggers for bombs, trying to enrich uranium far beyond civilian usefulness, and skillfully hiding everything they’ve been doing. There is no definitive proof yet that they have an active weapon’s program, but you’d have to be an idiot not to see what they are doing.

Madness In Their Method: If Sweden went nuclear, few would be concerned. But Iran is not being run by stoic Swedes. Iran is being run by insane as~holes. From their crazy Ayatollahs to the fruity Ahmadinijad, these are guys who would clearly like to use an atomic weapon. From their sponsorship of Hezbollah, to their war with Iraq, to the terrorist bombings to which they’ve been linked, to the shooting of British cops from their embassy in Britain, to their involvement in the bombing of a Jewish community center in Argentina, to their repeated hostage taking, these guys have shown no restraint. They’ve even taken recently to murdering demonstrators and opposition candidates. Combined with Ahmadinijad’s repeated threats to wipe Israel off the map, these guys are simply too insane to let them have an atomic bomb.

Now we come to the real problems in terms of making policy.

Away With The Bombs: A lot of people have suggested bombing Iran. But the problem with this approach is that we don’t know where their facilities really are. And for those of you who say, “oh, we really know,” we really don’t. Our intelligence people have admitted as much by failing to present more proof of Iran’s activities to the IAEA and by being caught by surprise by Iran’s recent announcement of a facility that no one had ever heard of before.

Our generals have publicly estimated that it would take us thirty-days of constant bombing to be sure that we got everything. . . which means that they are guessing. And if you will recall from Iraq, a country that we thought we knew every inch of, months after we took over the country, we were still finding hidden facilities and discovering that things we thought we knew were mockups.

Moreover, how well is this going to work if the Iranians hide their facilities under hospitals or mosques or inside schools? How long will public opinion last with pictures of Iranian children being blown to bits -- whether we did it or not? And what would be the price we pay throughout the world?

Not to mention that while the leadership is weak now, any attack would strengthen the leadership immeasurable and would buy them time and support from their own people. That’s the natural and inevitable reaction when outsiders attack. . . no matter how nasty the infighting was before the attack.

The short answer is that bombing is simply not an option. We don’t know what to strike, we can’t control the collateral damage, and we could never be sure that we hit what we needed. We simply can’t take the chance of missing something after taking such a provocative act.

Boots On The Wrong Ground: Invading the country may be our best military option. But we can’t do this. Why? Because we don’t have the troops we would need because they are busy propping up the Afghan government. Also, going the invasion route would cause a huge publicity problem as we invaded a third Muslim country in ten years. If we do this, we better expect that we would face an all-out Muslim war, fought in many countries, and likely many western cities.

Insurrection: We can’t openly support the Iranian opposition. They have made it very clear that any help from the West would lose them support, not help them.

The Iranian Sanction: Wait for sanctions we’re told. But it’s not clear that sanctions can work. They would work in a democracy where various interest groups would pressure the government to bend. But dictators are not subject to such pressures. Moreover, the current sanctions regime is a joke. Not only does it not even include weapons, but Iran’s biggest supporters refuse to join the sanctions, e.g. China, North Korean, Russia. Even Brazil told Hillary Clinton this week that they would make up their own mind about sanctions against Iran, and likely would not join them.

The dilemma defined.

Thus, we have a dilemma. We cannot allow this regime to go nuclear. But we can’t work toward regime change, we can’t bomb them, and we can’t invade them. Sanctions also appear ineffective, at least in their current form. So what do we do?

Here is probably the best solution.

Like all attempts to motivate, we need to figure out what we ultimately want and then we need to figure out the best combination of carrots and sticks to get us there. In this case, the best long term solution would be to replace this regime with one that isn’t insane. We should probably admit right now that (1) we’re not going to get a happy democracy, (2) we’re not going to get a pro-American government, and (3) we’re not going to stop them from developing civilian nuclear power, so I'd abandon that thinking at the door.

The Carrot: So let’s start by offering the following carrots. We would happily work with any new government to help the Iranians develop civilian nuclear power. Of course, we’ll decide later if the new government is acceptable, but there’s no need to mention that right now. As part of this, we could re-offer the current offer by France to refine Iran’s uranium for them, with the idea being that Iran would not be in the business of refining uranium, and thus could not build a bomb.

We could also promise further respectability for Iran, playing on their historical humiliations, but offering to create a counsel of five or some such thing to resolve Middle East issues. . . with Iran to be offered a seat at this table once it gets a new (read: acceptable) government.

We also need to stop talking about invading or attacking Iran, because this plays into the hands of their current government. Don’t feed the trolls.

The Sanctions Stick: If we are serious about sanctions, and I certainly think they are a good idea no matter what else we try, then we need to make them enforceable. That means throwing around American weight. Team Obama is currently getting the Saudis to bribe the Chinese to participate, but I don’t think that will be fruitful.

Rather than begging the Russians or Chinese to help us, we should (1) draw up a list of goods and services that are vital to keeping Iran’s government functioning, e.g. weapons, vehicles, fuel, base metals, technology, etc., and (2) pass a law imposing such sanctions, and (3) pass an additional law that requires the President to prohibit the importation of any goods and services from any country that is found to have dealt with Iran in these items. Such a law would cause the export dependent sectors of countries like China and Russia to do the lobbying for us, as those countries would now pay a price for going against our embargo.

The Military Stick: If none of this works, then we need to consider military options because the alternative is simply too horrific to allow. Unfortunately, neither air strikes nor invasion appear viable. Thus, we may have no choice but to eliminate their leadership through other means. I wouldn’t announce this publicly and I certainly wouldn’t take credit for it. But if the choice comes down to the elimination of Ahmadinijad and a few of his deputies or letting them turn a city to ash, then the choice is obvious.

Finally, if none of this works, then we need to think about bombings and invasions.


Are these the best approach? I think so. Will they work? I don't know. But there is no reason we couldn’t try each of these in turn. One thing is for certain though, hope is not a strategy and a handful of ineffective sanctions are not a deterrent. The longer we wait to get serious, the fewer options will be available to us. And if we wait too long, millions of people won’t live to regret it.