(Note: This post first appeared earlier this week and prompted an excellent, informative discussion among readers in the comments section. It has been updated in light of recent developments. I am particularly interested to know what your own proposed solution(s) to the Iranian nuclear crisis might be. — MS)
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Wednesday marked the appearance of Real Security: The Democratic Plan to Protect America and Restore Our Leadership in the World. It is an admirable effort by Congressional Democrats to express a national security platform that is “both tough and smart”. It is what Democrats need going forward into this year’s midterms and the next presidential election.
On Page 4, we find this: Democrats will “[r]edouble efforts to stop nuclear weapons development in Iran and North Korea”. Right now, let’s think about what to do about Iran.
According to the L.A. Times, “Iran is moving faster than expected and is just days from making the first steps toward enriching uranium”.
What does this mean? — “If engineers encounter no major technical problems, Iran could manufacture enough highly enriched uranium to build a bomb within three years, much more quickly than the common estimate of five to 10 years.” Which means that, all of a sudden, we’ll have to deal with this much sooner than expected.
Iran denies that it intends to build nuclear weapons (and there’s even been an anti-weapon fatwa from Iran’s religious leadership), but its unwillingness to use Russian-enriched uranium suggests otherwise. The U.S. and the major European powers “believe Iran intends to build nuclear weapons”. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, a populist firebrand, has suggested that Iran could export nuclear technology to other Muslim states. And experts are seriously pondering the prospect of a nuclear Iran. All in all, not good.
Is a diplomatic solution possible? Perhaps, but is Iran even willing to give up control of its nuclear program, or at least over the enrichment of uranium? That seems unlikely, given its moves to date. Could Iran be bought off? Perhaps, but what would it take? North Korea wants aid, that much is clear, but does Iran? In addition, who would lead the diplomatic effort? Whatever consensus there is on the U.N. Security Council is fragile. “The European Union and the Americans want to exert vigorous pressure on Iran… The U.S. and EU are willing to use a U.N. procedure that gives Security Council resolutions the force of law, and to impose sanctions.” But “Russia and China would be willing to allow Iran to retain a small cascade of centrifuges for research purposes”.
Before there can be a diplomatic solution to this escalating crisis, there needs to be some sort of agreement between the U.S. and the E.U. on one side and Russia and China on the other. Without the latter, forget the former. And I mean a real agreement, a united front, something with muscle.
On Wednesday, according to The Washington Post, the U.N. Security Council “unanimously approved a statement” demanding that “Iran suspend uranium enrichment, the first time the powerful body has directly urged Tehran to clear up suspicions that it is seeking nuclear weapons”. That sounds good, but the statement “is not legally binding,” Russia and China continue to oppose sanctions, and the only real effort to do anything lies with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) will “report back in 30 days on Iran’s compliance with demands to stop enriching uranium”. But then what? Will Iran already have a centrifuge up and running? Will the U.N. take a harder line? Or will there be yet more procrastination and stonewalling?
Diplomacy is my preferred option, but how long would such diplomacy take? If Iran is already close to being able to enrich its own uranium, there isn’t much time. And that — if we’re serious about stopping Iran from becoming a nuclear state (and I, for one, agree with Slate‘s Fred Kaplan that a nuclear Iran is simply not an acceptable option) — brings us to the prospect of non-diplomatic measures. And that invariably means either sanctions or military action of some sort. (Back in January, Kaplan considered various military options, none of which seem terribly appealing.)
I’m less and less confident that diplomacy will work. Sanctions won’t work if the major powers can’t even get on the same page, and there’s nothing to suggest that either Russia or China would enforce sanctions at all. So are we ready to consider military options, such as tactical strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities?
The U.S. is bogged down in Iraq, to be sure, and the situation in Iraq limits America’s flexibility, but the Iranian threat simply cannot be ignored. We must come up with a way to deal with it.