The Toughest Option Of All For Iran

Where are all the progressive bloggers and pundits who should be writing about Iran? Sure it's easy and fun to write about the Abramoff scandals or Snoopgate but neither of those are going to kill American citizens! Yet the progressive grassroots seem to have left the field open to the hawks of the Right and the hawks in the Democrat leadership. I want to begin to remedy that lack, so here's something to think about

Who does Condi Rice think she is to be demanding anything of anyone over Iran? Has she forgotten that she was the one who ruled out American involvement in negotiations when the EU3 and Iran most wanted U.S. input? Even the rightwingers who normally believe that the sun rises and sets only at Mad King George's behest are pissed at his administration's utter lack of open involvement in negotiations, Condi and pals being content to pull strings and exert pressure behind the scenes.

The failure to craft an effective Iran policy has plagued this administration, and indeed the entire American political class, for five long years. Calls of "faster, please" were dismissed, in large part because they failed to resonate in the policy community, aside from a few brave souls in Congress (Jon Kyl, John Cornyn, Rick Santorum, Sam Brownback, Illeana Ros-Lehtinen come to mind. No thanks to the nominal leaders, Henry Hyde and Richard Lugar, both in full denial, in lockstep with Foggy Bottom and Langley).

Now Condi is in a position where the Europeans are "mulling a Russian proposal to the International Atomic Energy Agency -- the U.N. nuclear watchdog based in Vienna -- that would stop short of formally referring Iran to the council." That won't suit the chickenhawks who want their war and they want it now!

Invasion of Iran to protect America from nuclear attack, and preserve our freedom, counts as a major war.

This would, however, make absolute hash of the Bush administration's quite fictitious future budget estimates, which are the reason why it refused to significantly expand our ground forces after 9/11 though such was obviously necessary. Those phony budget estimates are arguably the biggest obstacle to our invasion of Iran this year. Iran’s mullahs might even have counted on this in timing their breakout to public nuclear weapons possession.

And if we don't invade this year, it won't matter much after that. We'll be in the worst case scenario. And President Bush will be reviled as America’s worst President – the one who through inaction cost us our freedom.

In their eagerness to have a disasterous war, they are even willing to finally see the light on Dubya. It's a gen-u-wine fucking miracle!

Yet the warmongers will get their war. King George wants it even if the wingnuts are annoyed at him because he hasn't delivered fast enough, Rumsfeld wants it and is busy talking up the Pentagon's ability to wage it, the neocons want it. The "culture-war class" crowd want it so much they are hard for it because it will give them the war of civilisations they have spoken about so long. The religious right think that war of religions will bring about the end times, the conversion of the non-radioactive Jews to Christianity and the eventual Rapture so they want it most of all.

When it happens, a whole bunch of the Democrat leadership will want it too and will vote for it before changing their minds later when it becomes a debacle. Hillary Clinton wants sanctions - not because we thinks they will work but because she thinks being soft on Iran will lose her votes from security moms. The woman has self-promoted herself well beyond her own competence. Other Dem leaders are following suit or insisting that the military option must be kept open, for the same vote-chasing reasons if any of them have an ounce of belief in what they have been saying about being lied into war in Iraq. They've all seen the recent Pew poll that says the Dems are ahead on Iraq and foreign policy and fear losing that lead so much that their ambition is making cowards of them all. It is not brave men who strike out without reason, but cowards and bullies who think they can get away with it.

And every single one of them is saying "we know it's just like Iraq but we are right this time...trust us!"

I don't.

I don't because there is no credible evidence that Iran is pursuing nuclear weapons. Every single reason for believing they are comes down to either paranoia, a lust for Iranian blood based on a warped appreciation of recent history or a mindless trust in the assertions of the Islamist/Marxist opposition-in-exile which is led by a certifiable nutcase even more insane than the worst estimates of the current Iranian President's state of mind. Iran's nukes are as chimerical as Iraq's in 2002.

I don't because all the hawks know sanctions would be useless even if Iran were pursuing a nuclear weapon - which makes them just a stepping stone on the way to the war they want the most.

I dont because any military option would have the gravest of consequences for the region and the world.

Regime change by covert action? Give me a break. The only alternative regime is an even worse one - that afore-mentioned gang of terrorist nutcases which the neocons have been grooming for years and whom they would love to unleash on Iran. The "democratic opposition" in Iran is an Islamic and Iranian nationalist one. It will not throw it's weight behind a betrayal of it's nation.

So what is the answer? Well, as The Guardian's Simon Jenkins puts it:

Iran is the regional superstate. If ever there were a realpolitik demanding to be "hugged close" it is this one, however distasteful its leader and his centrifuges. If you cannot stop a man buying a gun, the next best bet is to make him your friend, not your enemy.

So just maybe progressives should be listening to the voice of my favourite Texan libertarian:

Iran was the birthplace of Western civilization. It is a sophisticated nation of almost 200 million(Libertas amends this figure in comments -it's actually 64.5 million - C) well-educated inhabitants. So why do Belgium and Portugal have more to say about global affairs than Iran? Because we continue to perceive this world power as if it were an ill-mannered colonial stepchild. It is not. Iran is going to be one of the world’s most influential players in the 21st century and the sooner we realize this the better. Instead continuing a feeble and fruitless policy of trying to keep Iran a eunuch nation, we should be intent on trying to help develop and direct Iran peaceably into its rightful place as one of the preeminent players in world affairs.

In other words change the Iranian regime by changing the actual regime rather than swapping it for another which would be even worse.

Just because this option doesn't involve dropping bombs on anyone it will be decried as "wimpish" and "appeasing". That is more an indictment of the mindset that believes all tough choices can be answered with mayhem than of the option itself.