Iran: Confront Now, or They WIll Confront The World Later

Nice folks: Iran Threatens U.S. With 'Harm and Pain'. Kind of like the criminal threatening the cop who brings him in for trial. Just the sort of folks we'd want to have nuclear weapons.



I do not want to get into an actual war with Iran. The US does not want to get into a war with Iran (far as I can tell, EU is only dangerous in the same way as Mellon, one of my two little dachshunds. She'd never have the guts to bite anyone - but she might accidentally drown them). But the Iranian government seems to be banking on the fact that the rest of the world is in denial about what they intend. Put their intransigent attitude together with the propaganda they are feeding their own people and the fact that they actually bragged about sandbagging the atomic negotiations and the fact that they are furnishing arms to the insurgents in Iraq, and what have you got? What situations similar to this have we seen within the last couple of millennia?



To deny that Iran is intending to acquire nuclear weapons is no longer tenable. To deny that the Iranian government has ambitions beyond their current borders is to ignore their actions of the last twenty-eight years, as well as their stated intentions. I happen to believe that they mean what they say, and that there is more than ample evidence of this. Which is better: dealing with them now when they don't have nuclear weapons, or dealing with them later when they do? I'm becoming more certain every day that that is the choice we have, and given that choice, I'll take the former, thank you very much.



I believe that the US can conquer, and can afford to occupy Iran, but more importantly, I do not believe the American public is willing to occupy Iran. Given this situation, the only way to deal with the situation is smash the government and the atomic capabilities, then leave. Net result: Americans are the bad guys, Iran spends the next twenty years playing a somewhat friendlier version of Aftermath, millions may die of starvation and similar basic causes despite the best efforts of world charities, and there's another country full of people with good reason to hate the American government. It would make them our permanent enemies. World oil prices also shoot up, but that's hardly worth mentioning on the scale of the other problems mentioned. My guess is that Russia would move in, as well. Putin would see opportunity to further his nationalist ambitions. The Russians have always had interests in the region, and there is no reason they can't want to expand those interests.



The second option is conquest and occupation followed by rehabilitation along the same lines as Iran's neighbors. It'd take more troops than Afghanistan or Iraq, as Iran is a much larger country with many more people. It would also take a firmer hand, and as a result of this, casualties would also be much higher. On the other hand, the Iraqis and possibly the Afghanis might be willing to help, even if no one else will. Assuming we have the intestinal fortitude to see it through (which I do not believe to be the case), end result is another country with a basically positive outlook on the US. Millions don't die, and there's a democratic government in place. Against that, this costs several tens of thousands of US casualties.



Third option is keep making concerned noises like we are, but sit on our thumbs and not do anything. If public Iranian statements are to be believed, end result is Israel nuked, and our friends and allies all around Iran (Turkey, Iraq, Afghanistan, and India, among others) menaced by Iranian nukes. Perhaps Armenia, as well, if for no other reason than that they're christian, have a historical dispute with Azerbaijan (a muslim nation) and in range. Not to mention that any revolution aimed at replacing the mullahs that doesn't capture the entire country at once gets nuked itself, because you can bet that the folks controlling the nukes will be the most fanatical available. The world wants to do anything about the situation then, nukes will be a necessary component, and not all of the nuclear traffic will be flying one way. That's kind of the idea of dealing with it before it gets there. Note that this is the default situation at this point in time. If we don't do what is necesary to prevent this, it's what we are going to get.



This is a bad situation. But moaning about it won't produce anything positive. I'd prefer occupation, but that's easy for a fat middle aged man sitting at a keyboard to say. If we want something other than a nuclear armed Iran governed by a proselytizing Islamic theocracy (i.e. a jihad government), we need to do something about it now, or at least before they get nukes, because once they have nukes (or the world believes they have nukes) the situation becomes a lot more dicey.



In other words, we do nothing, in about five years we're going to have to deal with a situation that's a lot worse than it is now, and it's going to grab us by the least convenient body part and demand we pay attention.