Michael, I hate to break the news to you, but Iran's nuclear ambitions and actual, concrete efforts pre-exist the Bush Administration.
They were ongoing during the Clinton Administration, causing a lot of friction between the US and Russia. Unless the Mad Mullahs had divine guidance, they had no way of knowing that Bush II was on the way. Or that they needed nuclear weapons to deter a US conventional attack based on American disregrad for international law. But, hey, if that the spin that floats your boat, be my guest.
If you talk about Iranian deterrence, to be credible you must acknowledge that it dealt primarily with deterring its long time enemy, Iraq, which was known to have taken serious steps towards arming itself with nuclear weapons. And Israel, of course, which is using its own nukes as a deterrent.
Ish is therefore correct. Because Iranian nuclear activity predated the Bush Administration, your contention that it is designed to deter against W's current disregard for international law is simply not borne out by the facts, though it does fit nicely with a certain simplistic "Bush a chimp, him bad" viewpoint.
The Nuclear Threat Initiative, funded by Ted Turner just in case you want to attack its bona fides, has an excellent timeline on Iranian nuclear activity. It started in earnest much before the current Administration was a gleam in the Mad Mullahs' eyes.
I'd recommend NTI as the starting point of any serious study of non-proliferation issues:
nti.org |
