Daniel R. Coats and Charles S. Robb are correct that a nuclear-armed Iran would be intolerable and would cause a domino effect of further nuclear weaponization in the region.

But there is NO evidence that Iran is making HEU. Only LEU.

However, in any case, to deal properly with Iran, one must not overhype the threat but rather attempt to understand Iran's motivations, something that the National Defense University at Fort McNair has done.

A 2005 NDU study concluded that Iran desires nuclear weapons mainly because it feels strategically isolated and that "possession of such weapons would give the regime legitimacy, respectability, and protection." In other words, Iran desires nuclear weapons for the purpose of deterrence, just like every other nuclear-armed nation. The NDU study continued, "[W]e judge, and nearly all experts consulted agree, that Iran would not, as a matter of state policy, give up its control of such weapons to terrorist organizations and risk direct U.S. or Israeli retribution." And it said the "United States has options short of war that it could employ to deter a nuclear-armed Iran and dissuade further proliferation."

The most sensible way to approach the Iranian nuclear issue would be to work seriously toward confidence building and eliminating nuclear weapons from the entire Middle East.

Again, there is NO evidence that Iran has a CURRENT nuclear weapons program whatsoever. None.

Else, anyone, please show me the EVIDENCE of a CURRENT nuclear weapons program.

First of all, thank you for a sane voice. Having become a reader of the Jerusalem Post these last weeks, it is bloody scary to look the Israeli psychosis in the eye. Thank goodness for US jews who remain sane.

But, having said that, there is one real kick in the nuts wich could be delivered to Iran: Demand that western oilcompanies do not deal with them, and punishment of any third party who does. Getting legitimacy for this would require Israel to offer up Dimona for inspections, though. And Israel is never going to do that. Hell, they just kicked both the US and the EU in the teeth in the same week.

They argue that keeping the threat of force "on the table" is the only way to achieve a diplomatic solution, but they also make it clear that they favor bombing Iran if diplomacy fails. In their words, "making preparations now will enable the president, should all other measures fail to bring Tehran to the negotiating table, to use military force to retard Iran's nuclear program."

Isn't this Obama's long held position as well? Are you calling Obama a Neocon?

"In an interview with Newsweek on Saturday when asked about war with Iran, Obama made it clear that he did not take any options off the table. I've been very clear that I don't take any options off the table with respect to Iran. I don't take options off the table when it comes to US security, period," said Obama."
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=95022&sectionid=351020101

It's equally unsurprising that the United Jewish Communities sponsored an "Iran Advocacy Day" in Washington yesterday

Damn those Jews...I mean Zionists. I note that they were urging sanctions not war--the same position as those neocon Zionist controlled governments of France and Germany. Remember those Jews control the world and are way more powerful than European governments when it comes to implementing sanctions.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/28/world/middleeast/28iht-nukes.html

Wouldn't any country that had been attacked in this fashion try to obtain the means to prevent a repeat in the future? Wouldn't we? Pointing a gun at their heads merely reinforces their desire for a reliable deterrent, and probably strengthens the hand of any Iranian officials who think they ought to get a bomb as soon as possible.

So Iran is building a nuclear weapon because we might attack it if it builds a nuclear weapon? Do you see how stupid that reasoning is? If Iran wasn’t enriching uranium no one would even be discussing sanctions let alone a possible attack.

What there is no sign of, is Iran possible using nuclear energy in a peaceful way because it has not developed or spent the massive amounts of money on the infrastructure required to use it.

It may still come to that -- which would force us to fall back on deterrence and containment -- but following the hawks' prescription makes that outcome more likely.

While you say containment is a fallback position, what you really mean is that containment is the ONLY position and that your position is that Iran should be allowed to get the bomb. At least be intellectually honest enough to say that.

Can you tell me what negotiating tactic, without any threat of force, the US could possibly use to get Iran to stop its nuclear program or at least get the IAEA full access to its nuclear program as Iran is required to do?

What negotiating tactic can you possibly use when Iran refuses to open any discussion on its nuclear program.
http://www.reuters.com/article/gc08/idUSTRE58217720090903

there is still no sign that it has an active weapons program

You really need to check the facts of your sources especially when you just use random bloggers who happen to agree with your premise.

"The Bundesnachrichtendienst (BND), Germany's foreign intelligence agency, has amassed evidence of a sophisticated Iranian nuclear weapons program that continued beyond 2003. This usually classified information comes courtesy of Germany's highest state-security court. In a 30-page legal opinion on March 26 and a May 27 press release in a case about possible illegal trading with Iran, a special national security panel of the Federal Supreme Court in Karlsruhe cites from a May 2008 BND report, saying the agency "showed comprehensively" that "development work on nuclear weapons can be observed in Iran even after 2003."

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124803669414063037.html

Let's examine this: Israel is NOT a member of the NPT AND it has NUKES. Yet we worry about Iran which is only making LOW enriched U for nuclear fuel and is under NPT/IAEA safeguards?

Pathetic. Read this letter in FT:

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/2725a9fc-a467-11dc-a28d-0000779fd2ac.html

We need to overhaul what is a flawed non-proliferation treaty

Published: December 7 2007 02:00 | Last updated: December 7 2007 02:00

From Dr Yousaf Mahmood Butt.

Sir, David Miliband (“Why we must not take the pressure off Iran” December 5) is correct to point out that the Iranian uranium enrichment programme remains a concern despite the just-released US National Intelligence Estimate suggesting that Iran suspended its nuclear weapons programme in 2003.

However, no amount of “diplomacy with teeth” can compensate for what is fundamentally a flaw in the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT): signatory nations (such as Iran) are allowed by law to enrich uranium – ostensibly for peaceful uses – and thus collect the raw material needed, should they wish, for a bomb.

Instead of the selective application of United Nations sanctions to nations perceived to be unfriendly or unco-operative by the west (eg, No to Iran, Yes to Brazil for uranium enrichment), it would make more sense to overhaul the 1970 NPT; and, while at it, also make sure that the new treaty punishes more aggressively those (predominantly western) nations that do not abide by their arms-reduction obligations in the current NPT.

“If someone asks me to disarm and keep a slingshot while he comes at me with a cannon, what good does that do?” Brazillian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has said of the NPT; but it could well be said by the Iranian government in reference to Israel, which is openly allowed by the west to stockpile 200 or so nuclear warheads in the region.

It is telling that President Ford, in 1976, encouraged Iran (then under the US-backed shah) to build both uranium enrichment as well as plutonium processing plants. How is it that what was permissible then under the 1970 NPT, has now become forbidden – under the very same treaty – to the point that there are cries for further UN sanctions against Iran?

The answer is to be found in Mr Miliband’s article: we don’t trust Iran and it is not our friend. Unfortunately, if international law is to be taken seriously, it must be blind.

Yousaf Mahmood Butt,
Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics,
Cambridge, MA 02138, US

How about we examine the Brazilian U enrichment program?

It is too easy to dismiss the prospect of nuclear armed Iran.

Noone knows what current intentions are, pro or con. And, no one knows how intentions could or would morph, pro or con.

Nuclear power is not a great outcome in itself, but historically, nuclear power has been associated with weapons programs in many if not most locales (possibly).

Iran does currently actively encourage, fund, train militias that do initiate attacks on Israeli civilians. Its also unknown to what extent Hamas and Hezbollah are proxy or entirely independent.

The world changes.

One former argument of mine that is now irrelevant, is the one relative to cost, that the $1 trillion that the US spent in Iraq was a severe economic drain. It certainly was, but with the federal government willing to spend multiple billions to bail out Wall Street firms and to fund unknowable health care costs into the future, the military expenditure is less daunting, sadly.

I prefer the expenditure to be damaging as a valid argument against.

The only valid basis to go to war is as the lesser of two evils.

Well, we definitely have the two evils. (Notwithstanding the pollyanish, "Iran only demonstrates good intentions" repetition.)

I actually just simply don't understand how this is meant:

If he's not careful, Obama's initial efforts to put relations with Iran on a new trajectory will morph back into the same strategy that the Bush administration followed, and will achieve the same results.

That's not meant to dismiss it as impossible, just to say in what respects will they revert to Bush strategy (ie total isolation)? Also, how does this: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/12/world/middleeast/12nuke.html?_r=1&hp relate to that prediction? Does it refute it, as it seemingly would, or does it actually buttress it in some way?

...the plan I'm proposing will cost around $900 billion over ten years - less than we have spent on the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, and less than the tax cuts for the wealthiest few Americans that Congress passed at the beginning of the previous administration. OBAMA

Keep that in mind when your local school district is forced to cut a few more programs or lay off a few more teachers, when your car hits another pothole on a bridge that needs repair, when your public transit system cuts service or raises fares, and when the federal budget deficit continues to rise. Stupid foreign policy decisions don't just cause problems overseas; they undermine our quality of life here at home. And as I said once before, it remains a puzzle why the GOP is eager to tax us to pay for ambitious social engineering projects in faraway lands, yet loathe to fund programs designed to benefit Americans here at home. It's equally puzzling (to me at least), why Americans have gone along with this idea. So far. WALT

Let us re-read the Walt's and Obama's concerned words from a previous post and now take a brief look at the concerns of Coats', Robb's. and General Chuck Walt.

Here we are at a critical juncture in a most central feature of normal civilized life, the security of our families health&finances, and yet we appear to be tottering on the edge of disaster for ourselves and for our families, because of the greedy politics of two oligarchies: the insurance-medicine cartel and the Israel-Israeli Lobby cartel.

One would have us believe that socialism is to make a Putsch in the USA and the other that Israel is about to be pushed into the sea. So few commentators seem willing to label this hysteria as what it is: Fear-Hate mongering of the foulest form.

The question for today is: Has the USA become ungovernable, a nation simply unable to deal with its priorities for its own average citizens, but led by the nose around by the fanaticism of two small oligarchies.

The chances for socialism or Iran are almost zero..but apparently the media and the congress have been so bribed and intimidated by the War Party and the Money Party that we are been forced to choose between the life&health of our families and the organized madness of those who will tell us that we Americans have a first duty to consider the wild delusions of Israeli families before our own children in Topeka, Kansas.

Listening to the Wall Street Journal trio one wonders what passes for normal mental health among our leaders. How is it possible for these three to present a view which in effect puts the average American family and the average soldier in harm's way?

When I was in a Jesuit high school 100 years ago, I recall the teacher explaining the psychology of the Christian Crusade. The priest said that then there was the conviction that the Moslems were dishonoring the Catholic Church and therefore God....that it was thought that to slaughter the infidels was God's Holy Will! (His point of course was we no longer believed such craziness.)

Of the our two Oligarchies, the fanaticism of the Zionist Crusade is by far the more dangerous. At the very center of their pathology is the thought that death or injury to any Israeli is the beginning of the Second Holocaust!!!

In effect, the Wall Street Journal trio have become True Believers, foolishly and ridiculously praying to the Heavens: Our Country and Interests, right or wrong.

But Coat and Robb and General Walt are normal (supposedly) AMERICANS, NOT Israelis or members of the AMA.

Professor Walt has mentioned the abandonment of Van Jones but has not really correlated it with the foreign policy discussion within the USA.

As long as Americans are not allowed to revisit and question some of the fundamental assumptions of the War on Terror, the Neocon discourse associated with misguided George W. Bush administration adventurism is guaranteed to persist: Taming Obama by Pruning Advisers.

Bloody neocons, I was hoping that 2006 would marginalize them.

There is no doubt that the emergence of the right-wing Iran-bombing group as described in some detail by Walt today is primarily due to the timid approach to everything Israeli- oriented by Obama and his advisers. These warmongers see a weak administration which was never anticipated 9 months ago after all the election hype and which should have been the reason for silencing these people forever. But that has not been the case. While Obama continues to tolerate the likes of Dennis Ross in his employ, nothing will ever change. While he also does not demand the clear distinction between the loyalties of Israelis living in the US as Americans and the true patriots who make decisions based on what is best for the US, then this will continue.
Soon we will see the old tried but untrusted Neocons emerging from their underground caves feeling that the climate is now right to start again spreading their mis-information, naturally receiving their operating instructions from AIPAC. The saddest point here is that all this is happening just 10 months after a new administration, promising so much, entered in to the homes of cheering crowds of average people, not politicians with their dirty record of graft and AIPAC largesse, not the big money spinners in the banking and allied industries, but average people whose expectations seem now to have been dashed by a timid President, lacking the courage to address the matters that are dragging the country towards second-rate status.
He has had the time to at least have a policy.
History has shown that foreign policy blunders, or in the case of Israel, 40 years of blind, mindless support, have a flow on effect on the standard of living for everyone. Imagine what one could have done with all that 'aid' given to Israel over time, year after year by governments tainted by the election largesse and holocaust blackmail so conveniently accepted by willing politicians.
THAT MUST STOP before we can move one step further. When it does, this may silence the likes of the war hawks so confidently spruiking their trade mark hate and willingly, in some cases, supported by the tainted US press, just another group who have a recent past with questionably loyalty.
That's what it is all about...Loyalty. Do you think of America as your country, as a country worth supporting or do you see it as a country with an insidious Israeli appendage attached. Sooner or later it will come to a decision on this single point. Why engage in chest thumping, flag waving and promoting national pride when the person standing next to you has an entirely different set of loyalty values and America is not on the top of that list.
That is what everyone has to ask their elected representative….....who are you working for?

Lots of armchair generaling. I love me some napalm in the morning!

Mr. Walt's analysis is what I would expect from a high school student..... a mediocre one at that.

He lumps a bunch of people together as "neocons", not coincidently mostly Jewish people, using the term as a pejorative so he needn't deal with the substance of their ideas, opinions, or conclusions.

Most of the people he accuses of being 'neocons' are in fact not and he just misuses the term to somehow combine any number of people who have merely converged on 1 or 2 policies but in fact have no cohesive ideology and have a range of ideologies.

Israel and the AIPAC driven fear mongering that is allowed to happen in the US media are the ones trumpeting the so called Iran threat. Iran is not threat to the US. The Iran issue is 100% Israeli created.

When Iranian nukes are mentioned the double standard with Israel should be immedietly pointed out.

The US needs to stop the foreign policy hypocrisy. Israel pre-emptively invades their neighbors and is the unstable, belligerent, aggressive, apartheid force in the Middle East.

Demonizing and warmongering Iran to protect Israel is wrong. Again, the Iranian 'issue' is 100% Israeli.

Unlike Iran, Israel simply has way too much to hide and wants to keep it that way.

When is Israel going to sign the NNPT and allow IAEA inspections ? Which Iran has done.

The US and Israel want Iraninan nuclear transparency? Then Israel better be just as transparent.

America's silence about Israelis nuclear weapons and lack of membership to the NPT while maintaining such harsh rhetoric towards Iran's nuclear program, which is legally allowed to enrich uranium as a NPT member is an example of the kind of outright double standard BS that the United States has been following in its foreign policy.

When will Obama hold Israel to the same standards that Israel is demanding of Iran and anyone else who threatens Israel's hegemonic agenda? Level the nuclear playing field or get rid of it.

It is in line with Israeli rhetoric to demonize Iran. It takes the focus off them and it’s their intention to agitate elsewhere so the world does not focus on their ulterior hegemonic motives.

Let's not forget, whatever Israel accuses another country of doing you can bet they themselves have already done it.

To wit, Mordecai Vanunu provided info and photos to the London Sunday Times in 1986 about Dimona.

During the Kennedy years,Israel allowed American nuke scientists to make ‘visits’ to Dimona but these proved to be so ineffective they were eventually discontinued.

When the scientists were allowed into the plant they were rushed through and never allowed to see what they needed to see to confirm that Israel was not developing nuclear weapons.

Of course, a full inspection of the Dimona plant would have revealed that this was exactly what Israel was doing.

Tel Aviv needs to be dealt with before Tehran.

International bankers are probobly funding both sides. Anyway, Iran is pumped up with Chinese oil money and Russian made missiles!

http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1910669,00.html

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7496765.stm

But there is also something else you should know!

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/3568139.stm

Both sides, Iran and Israel are being playing against each other! They dont want Iran to get the S-300 missile defence. You see, an Iranian missile defence might actually STOP a world war from happening! You see they dont want that! There happy with Iran having Russian built missiles with chemical and nuclear warheads! When Israel strikes Iran, they will just hit them back, and start WW3! They dont want Iran to get any short of good Russian air defence! A real DEFENCE could actually stop a war from happening, wich they dont like! But they wont mind Israel waisting it's bucks on the "defence" industry that they happen to own!

http://www.spacewar.com/reports/Arrow_2_test_failure_a_serious_setback_999.html

They want any exuce to start a (world)war now! And the nuclear issue might be just be what there looking for!

http://www.spacewar.com/reports/Iran_ready_to_talk_but_not_on_nuclear_issues_Ahmadinejad_999.html

Both countries are simply used as pawns to pump up the global price of oil. World war would also lead to atleast a limited nuclear exchange. This along with the current economic turbulance will set off a massive wave of economic retaliation and protectionism!

http://www.sinodaily.com/2006/090912025144.xa2sb0s2.html

http://www.terradaily.com/reports/US_decides_to_slap_duties_on_Chinese_steel_pipes_999.html

Both sides in this "war" are simply being manipulated! People in the west must stand up and DEMAND that Nato be disintegrated, since it is now being used by the forces of evil! The current system can only breed more war! It must be dismantled just like the USSR before it, or otherwise it will only lead to more war, global poverty and misery! Nothing good can anymore be gained by keeping Nato alive! It must be dismanteled, and and will also serve as a powerfull motivator for the Americans to scrap there own military industrial complex, and return to "splendit isolation" Globalism an it's current course must be abolished, or it will only lead to more WAR!!!

jpsummers is a moron, who, likely, has NEVER heard the maxim put forth by Clausewitz: that war is the result of failed diplomacy.

Wishful thinking about them is not an answer.

Habitual aggression is not an answer.

jstrummer "I'm perplexed about why I, sitting in North Carolina, should give a rats ass. This is totally perplexing to me."

I'm sitting in Boston and wondering the same thing. especially while we are already in the middle of two wars and a massive financial crisis

Yes, it's like one of those Hollywood thrillers where the villain repeatedly appears to have been vanquished/killed only to be resurrected for yet another death match. I particularly remember one of Arnold's films where all that remained of the android villain was the very upper part of the torso, its head and one arm (all leaking hydraulic fluid profusely) and yet it "came back to life" and grabbed Swartzenaggers leg as he carelessly walked by. Ultimately Arnie had to either run it through a crusher machine or throw it in a vat of molten something-or-other. I can't remember which (or even the name of the movie), but I'm pretty certain it was the 80s. What a decade!

Wanted to attack Iran, I think they already would have. Going after Iran is a fools game. It would destabilize the Middle East more than it is now, thereby putting Israel in danger. the best plan, (and even that plan is not a good one), is to get Russia to stop sending uranium to Iran.

betz55, you're totally wrong. We don't need to worry about Israel because Israel is not the problem.