Wednesday, February 08, 2006

Bombing Iran is batsh*t crazy

There's a good internal dustup at Same Facts over the wisdom of America's bombing Iran soon or in several years to prevent it from acquiring nuclear weapons. I agree with the "it's batsh*t crazy" faction (this post also pulls together the various arguments and responds to them).

The few points I can add:

  • I don't see any strategic or political advantage in the US attacking Iran instead of Israel - the attacking nation will get the majority share of terrorist retribution, so I can see why Israel might want us to do it, but not why we would.
  • The major problem with a nuclear Iran isn't that Israel couldn't respond to an overt, Iranian nuclear attack but rather an "unclaimed" nuclear bomb would explode in Israel. There's a way to handle it though. If I were Israel's prime minister, I would right around now use a communication channel to Tehran to tell them that if an Israeli city gets nuked by any unexplained bomb, Israel will pin the blame on Iran with real or fake evidence and retaliate massively. The slight upside from this will be that Iranian secret police will end up helping stop the potential flow of loose nukes from Pakistan or the former soviets.
  • My tied-for-best point - we'll be locked into a long-term bombing campaign against Iran if we start. Even assuming that Iran doesn't retaliate with terrorists, I give no chance that they'll abandon their nuclear program. Every five years, we'll have to do it again.
  • Other best point - the not-attacking Iran option is the only one that leaves open the possibility that no innocent people die. Not something we should throw away unless we really have no choice.

No comments:

Post a Comment

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.