Barnett has been catching a lot of flak about Iran. He has several posts up. Here is his latest.
Reading the comments on Iran
I like Lexington Green's point that nothing stops us from the usual threat of turning Iran into a parking lot if they were ever to threaten anyone with the bomb, once achieved.
To me, that approach is taken for granted, because we've used it successfully throughout history.
But the counter is that Ahmadinejad is nuts and we can't trust nuts. Here I go back to the point that Ahmadinejad is nowhere near the final word on anythiing of that importance in Iran. That's the Supreme Leader. How come the Supreme Leader becomes meaningless when the big-mouth Ahmadinejad is in power, when everyone noted he was the Supreme Leader when reformist Khatami was president? How does that work? Or is it just another example of Americans going ape-shit over propaganda statements, a trap we fall into time and time again (Castro and Chavez are great at this as well)?
The reality is, the Grand Ayatollah let Khatami come to power and then kept him on a relatively short leash. There is no evidence that the situation is any different with Ahmadinejad (indeed, a careful reading of Ahmadinejad's intra-governmental clashes says his leash is very short in terms of pushing his decisions). Where Ahmadinejad is given leeway is in flapping his mouth over the nuke issue, and that's a function of our letting our entire non-relationship with Iran be defined by that.
Show me an Iran with the bomb in five years and Ahmadinejad clearly in control of them and that's another matter. But that matter would have Europe, China, India and Russia clearly interested in taming that situation--unless we push them all to the side going nuts on Iran in the meantime.
Again, this is why I argue for locking in China now over North Korea, making them feel very secure in Asia, and then getting their buy-in for longer-term security solutions in the Gulf.
None of our usual options goes away by temporizing the situation with Iran now. We just choose more wisely to focus on North Korea and China today.
No serious discussion starts with us holding onto the hard-kill option with Iran. We simply cannot do it. Saying we have no option but war to stop this development isn't an option. With our standing in the world right now, we don't have the allies to pull off the hard-kill and I know we can't do it alone given the situation in Iraq.
The political realities for us is that Bush won't be allowed to wage another war on his watch. Talk all we want, that's the reality. Unless someone runs on war with Iran, it's not in the cards for a new administration that inherits an Iran within 24 months of the bomb. That administration will be forced to do then what seems inconceivable now: figure out how to live with that reality.
If you tell me that we have to do this and do it now or Israel will, then I say let Israel do it and live with the consequences. I simply wouldn't sacrifice any American lives on that scenario, any more than I would to keep Taiwan "independent" of China. I don't believe in fighting inevitabilities where the downside comes nowhere near the obvious losses in attempting the upside.
Going hard on Iran kills the Big Bang in the Middle East. Going hard on North Korea makes it possible to end the threat of great power war for good in Asia.l One isn't worth the inescapable costs, the other is.
thomaspmbarnett.com |
