Dr. Podhoretz, or: how I learned start worrying and hate the bomb
Even as Ahmadinejad was speaking at Columbia University some analysts were already making the case for attacking Iran. The neoconservative periodical Commentary carried a front page article written by neoconservative Norman Podhoretz entitled “The Case for Bombing Iran” and several other prominent neoconservatives have already voiced their support for the idea. Considering the administration’s strong alignment with this kind of ideology and how little they have left to lose in the way of public opinion, it is possible we will be bombing Iran by the end of the year. The question is: Should we be?
A nuclear Iran would be a serious threat, despite what gainsayers might think. Former French President Jacques Chirac typified the skeptics when he let slip to the New York Times he wasn’t worried about a nuclear Iran because he thought Iran would be deterred by the thought of an Israeli counterstrike (although he later retracted the statement after it aroused controversy). This is classic Cold War style thinking which should have been put out to pasture with the fall of the Soviet Union.
During the Cold War, the primary threat to national security was other nations. With only a few major players on the field it was easy to employ deterrence because states had a clear target to counterattack. That has changed. With so many terrorist organizations that hate Israel and unaccounted-for nukes floating around since the collapse of the Soviet Union, Iran has plenty of deployment options available that would conceal Iranian involvement.
This is a nation that funds terrorist organizations, whose leaders have repeatedly called for the destruction of Israel, whose president was seen chanting “Death to America” just 48 hours before his little chat at Columbia. Are we so confident in the rationalism of Ahmadinejad that we would trust him, and all future leaders of Iran, with nuclear weapons?
If Iran goes nuclear, the most volatile region in the world will be inhabited by a power with the capability, motivation and stated intention of destroying one of its neighbors and slaughtering millions of innocent people. The problem the neoconservatives are addressing here could not be more real, but their solution is ill advised.
To begin with, a bombing campaign would probably not accomplish its objective. Iran learned well from Israel’s 1981 bombing of an Iraqi nuclear reactor, and an Iranian resistance group recently claimed that a tunnel complex beneath an Iranian mountain is being outfitted for “military nuclear activity.” Such a site would be very difficult to destroy with conventional weapons. Moreover, Iran has almost certainly stockpiled back-up materials in case of such an attack and could rebuild. It’s likely they have facilities of which the United States is not aware.
Next we need to consider the results of such a move. An attack would doubtlessly provoke a response from Iran, which would escalate the situation. Even in the very best case scenarios, things would rapidly go from bad to worse in Iraq. Recruitment for terrorist organizations would blossom.
International public opinion (something which we should never follow unconditionally but cannot afford to ignore) would become even more hostile to the United States. Surveys conducted by WorldPublicOpinion.org indicate that 79 percent of citizens polled from Morocco, Pakistan, Indonesia and Egypt believe one of the goals of the United States is to “weaken and divide the Islamic world.” About half already support attacks on U.S. troops, with three in 10 opposed.
Again, the problem here is that neoconservatives are still thinking in terms of World War II and the Cold War (Norman Podhoretz explicitly makes this comparison). They seem to think the opinions of a country’s people don’t matter as long as their governments don’t take action. But governments are no longer the only players. Public opinion can and does translate into terrorist group funding and recruitment. So bombing Iran would likely fail to disable their nuclear capabilities, enrage the Iranian people, tick off the Middle East and substantively increase global terrorism, and we’d have to be really lucky to pull it off without further alienating our allies.
So what’s the solution? I honestly don’t know. Diplomacy and economic sanctions don’t seem to be working. Iran has rejected every benefits package and bribe offered to entice them to drop their nuclear program. Over half of Iranians support the development of nuclear weapons, and with the press firmly under the thumb of the government that won’t likely change anytime soon.
Our best hope is that the threat of force will eventually convince them to back down, but it’s starting to look like things in the Middle East are preparing to depart the proverbial frying pan and erupt into flames.
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