Another war is not the answer
November 12, 2007 at 6:06 pm by Andisheh Nouraee in News
PHIL WILAYTO (from left), SIMIN ROYANIAN AND ROSTAM POURZAL ARGUE AGAINST WAR WITH IRAN AT GEORGIA TECH: Phil’s way less blurry in person.
With the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan going so gosh darned well, now’s the perfect time for the United States to expand the War On Terror™ franchise with an attack on Iran. The Iranian people are hankering for a heaping cup of regime-changey, smart-bombey goodness. They’ll greet us as liberators. It’ll be a cakewalk. A slam dunk. A cake dunk!
Unfortunately, not everyone agrees. Last Thursday, Friday and Saturday, three peace-loving killjoys gave five presentations around town arguing against a war with Iran. Rostam Pourzal, Simin Royanian and Phil Wilayto say there’s no evidence that Iran is pursuing nuclear weapons and that Iran is not a threat to the United States. They want the U.S. and Iran to settle their long-standing differences through — get this — negotiations. It’s just the sort of level-headed, fact-based approach to foreign policy that might end up ruining this country if we’re not careful.
November 12th, 2007 at 10:09 pm
Andisheh – what are your thoughts on Iran’s pursuit of uranium enrichment? I think Iran has already violated several conditions of the agreement they made in 2004 with the EU. In my opinion, negotiations will not persuade them to forgo their pursuit of uranium enrichment. I know I might be wrong, but if I had to bet that’s how I’d wager. If that’s the case is that acceptable?
I don’t know the answers to these questions myself, but I’d enjoy hearing your take on them.
A lot of good background can be found here:
http://www.cfr.org/publication/7730/iran.html
Is the Council On Foreign Relations worth listening to?
November 13th, 2007 at 11:18 am
My thoughts on Iran enriching uranium:
I think it’s a bad thing.
Iran is entitled, via the NPT, to do it, but I still don’t like it.
There’s evidence Iran has not fully cooperated with the NPT (not disclosing all of its operations) but no conclusive evidence that they have a nuclear weapons program.
Nevertheless, I believe they are in fact pursuing a nuclear weapon. It’s hard for me to conclude otherwise.
The prospect of a nuclear-armed Iran is frightening in some ways, but the idea that they’re going to give it to terrorists who’ll attack the U.S. or Israel is crap. Israel and the U.S. have land, sea and air-based nukes. Any nuclear attack will be met with complete annihilation of Iran. Iran’s autocrats are like autocrats anywhere. They don’t want to die. They want to stay in power.
If Iran is pursuing nuclear weapons, the biggest danger in my mind is an accelerating arms race in the region. Saudi Arabia will want a nuke, etc.
The Bush Administration is hugely at fault.
The abiding lesson of the Bush Administration’s War On Terror regime-change policy is “Hey, world, we’ll only attack you if you can’t fight back.”
Pakistan met and meets all of the criteria the Bush Administration (falsely) used to justify the Iraq invasion. Yet we didn’t invade because the cost would have been too high and they have nukes.
We continue to negotiate with North Korea because the price of invasion (Seoul and Tokyo on fire) is too high. When Bush started calling Kim Jong Il a pygmy, North Korea hunkered down and accelerated it’s nuclear program. It wasn’t until they finally exploded a nuke last year that the U.S. got serious about negotiating with them. The lesson: The U.S. government will not negotiate with you if you are too weak to hit back.
Iran is surrounded by U.S. troops taking orders from a President who has repeatedly threatened to invade them and never offered to negotiate. I believe they want a nuclear weapon to guarantee the U.S. or Israel will not attack. I don’t like it, but it’s not an irrational position.
November 13th, 2007 at 12:11 pm
Andisheh – I think you are dead on, except your point egarding the autocrats in Iran being the same as the autocrats in, say, France or Venezuela. I would like to think you are correct on that point, but those pesky “Death To Israel” and “Drive The Jews Into The Sea” slides keeps popping up in their PowerPoint presentaitons.
November 13th, 2007 at 12:16 pm
One other thing, Bush has to talk to the Norks, thanks to Presidents Clinton and Carter giving them the technology which greatly accelerated their program. Wouldn’t it be better to have prevented the nuclear arming of North Korea? That is what the world is trying to do in Iran.
Also, don’t forget that within a day or two of pulling Saddam out of his spider hole, Quadaffi invited the UN to inspect hsi country and verify that he was voluntarily giving up his uke/chem/bio programs. The Bush policy worked becasue Quadaffi is not insane like Kim Jong Il or deluded like the Iranian mullahs who pull Ahmadinejad’s strings. I am sure I butchered the mans name.
November 13th, 2007 at 2:03 pm
Dale – your first reponse is like saying Iran’s autocrats are different than Venezuela’s because some prefer beards while others like mustaches. Andy never compared their rhetoric or radical stances (although all autocrats have them), only their need to stay in power. Just want to be clear here.
November 13th, 2007 at 2:15 pm
Kim Jong-Il and the Iranian ruling class are cruel, corrupt autocrats. What about them makes them insane or delusional. Kim played the Bush Administration quite skillfully. And the Iranian regime cooperated with the war in Afghanistan and offered “everything on the table” negotiations with the U.S. in 2003.
I don’t like the Iranian regime. Much of my family suffers under its rule. But where’s the delusion? Where have they demonstrated a lesser understanding of geopolitical chess than the U.S.?
November 13th, 2007 at 3:15 pm
Mr T – good point on Andy’s meaning
Andisheh – A person can be delusional and still be capable and cunning, especially in a cult of personality.
The chess prowess is only evident at the end of the match. I can hang with Kasparov for a while, but he has the ability to destroy me and the longer we play the easier it is for him o do it.