Nuclear Poker

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Nuclear Poker
By Victor Davis Hanson
February 10, 2005

Despite the bleak preventative options, no one wants to permit Iran to go nuclear. Yet if strategists despair over the methods of stopping Iran's bomb, few have explicitly outlined why we should even try.

First, a nuclear Iran would ignite a new arms race in the Middle East. The nuclear guild started amid the ashes of World War II, when the Soviet camp and the West first squared off. Since then new members like India, China and Pakistan expanded the dangers of Armageddon, but at least created a sort of regional deterrence against one other. India was checked by Pakistan and vice versa. China angulated with the Soviets, India and America. All four at times were not necessarily friendlier to any one of the quartet than another, but they matured and showed restraint in their escalating rivalries.

But if Iran has nuclear weapons — the first Middle Eastern and Islamic dictatorship to obtain them — then a Saudi Arabia, Egypt or Syria might rush in to obtain nuclear capability and thus restore a regional balance of power.

Arab pride will not tolerate an exclusive Persian bomb, despite all Teheran's rhetoric about a shared anti-Israeli mother of all Islamic weapons. Thus the Middle East will inevitably witness the instability of mutual escalation not unlike the arms race during the early Cold War.

Second, nuclear proliferation is now spiraling out control and spreading to third-rate states that are far more numerous and often more reckless than traditional world powers. The Soviet Union and China were historic heavy weights, so were France and England. India has over a billion people. But once Pakistan and North Korea obtained nukes, a dangerous new era was ushered in: Any scary nation could claim a right to the bomb, despite its own global strategic insignificance, lack of conventional power and failed economy.

Third, autocracy and WMDs are a lethal mix. Many Arab nations point to Israel and allege Western hypocrisy, since it is small and alone in the Middle East with nuclear capability. Well aside from its unique creation from the ashes of the Holocaust and the proven record of its neighbors' efforts to destroy the Jewish people, Israel — unlike North Korea and Iran — is also singularly democratic in the region.

Because consensual governments, as a rule, are hardly likely to attack like kind, their possession of terrifying weapons tends to prove less of a threat to global peace. The old Soviet Union was more dangerous than is contemporary Russia, despite a mostly intact nuclear arsenal. China's liberalization raises the hope that its nukes are less prone to be dropped today than during Mao's Great Leap Forward. A nuclear Iran of any sort is a problem. Yet, a nuclear theocratic Iran is a disaster since its zealous mullahs are unaccountable to either an electorate or censorious press. They are fueled by religious extremism and publicly have praised nuclear martyrdom. One or two such extremists in their dotage could well decide that an entire state should play the role of the lone suicide bomber so frequently canonized in that part of the world.

Fourth, Iran is even more likely than a volatile Pakistan to arm terrorists. A nuclear Iran might prove tantamount to an atomic Hezbollah or al-Qaida — nihilists whose current problem is not their intent, but only their capability, to annihilate.

Fifth, if the West allows roguish nations like North Korea or Iran to become or remain nuclear, then humane, powerful states like Brazil, Germany, Japan, South Korea and Taiwan sooner or later will demand the same latitude, if not out of pride, then at least for their own national security.

Japan will not be perpetually bullied by a North Korea. Nor can Germany be expected to be shaken-down by blackmailing imams because Iranian missiles can in theory incinerate Berlin in 10 minutes. Can a vast Brazil stomach Iran receiving bribes and deference as a regional power in the Middle East while it receives nothing in South America for its relatively sober restraint?

There is something perverse about the Europeans paying bribes to oil-rich Iran in hopes that it does not cobble together a bomb from bought or stolen expertise — when Germany in six months could produce 5,000 nukes and simply warn the Iranians that such weapons would be as reliably built and delivered as a Mercedes or BMW.

Sixth, it is hard enough now to anticipate all the potential conflagrations arising from eight or nine nuclear powers. But each time a new wild card flips over, the odds only increase that an accident, coup or revolution will lead to manmade carnage worse than the natural nightmare of the recent tsunami.

True, there are no good choices in dealing with Iran at this late stage in the game. Yet the very worst alternative is allowing it to go nuclear.
 
Less leverage If Trump rolls back Iranian nuclear deal...
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George Mitchell: If Trump rolls back Iranian nuclear deal, he has limited leverage
Saturday, Dec 3, 2016 - The former senator and diplomacy expert talks to Salon about Iraq and Afghanistan, and why Obama was wrong on Syria
Distinguished diplomat George Mitchell, a former Democratic Majority Leader who also brokered peace in Northern Ireland and served as a special envoy to the Middle East for President Obama, said he hopes that incoming President Trump doesn’t fulfill his campaign promise to scrap the Iranian nuclear deal designed by the Obama administration. “I believe if he does that, that it would be a tragic mistake that will have serious, adverse consequences for the United States and all around the world,” Mitchell said in a Salon Talks interview about the book, “A Path To Peace: A Brief History of Israeli-Palestinian Negotiations and a Way Forward in the Middle East.”

“The United States joined with five other countries — Russia, China, Britain, France and Germany — in reaching a negotiated agreement with Iran over their nuclear program. It is supported by almost every country in the world. The reason the agreement was reached was because sanctions were imposed on Iran that adversely affected their economy. The reason the sanctions worked is because they were universal. They were not just United States sanctions,” Mitchell continued.

“When the agreement was reached, those five countries made it clear that they would not continue the sanctions if the United States rejected the treaty. So the argument by the President’s critics, in Congress and elsewhere that we should have just walked away and increased the sanctions was a false argument,” he added. “Because the sanctions were effective, primarily because they were universal. We could have upped the sanctions but the other countries who joined us made clear that they would not continue.”

As liberal critics decry Trump’s cabinet selections for defense and national security as Islamophobic, these critics also fail to grasp the long-term historical view of Islam. Mitchell, a more moderate Democrat who served as Senate Majority Leader, offers a more tempered understanding, citing Pew data showing how there are now 1.7 billion Muslims in the world, or roughly one out of five people, yet by 2060, when the world’s population edges towards 10 billion, one in three will be Muslim.

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Senate Votes Unanimously to Renew Iran Sanctions Law
Dec 02, 2016 | WASHINGTON — The Senate moved to renew a decades-old sanctions law that lawmakers said gives the United States the clout to punish Iran.
The Senate moved decisively Thursday to renew a decades-old sanctions law that lawmakers said gives the United States the clout to punish Iran should it fail to live up to the terms of the landmark nuclear deal. Senators passed the bill unanimously, 99-0, two weeks after the House also approved the legislation by an overwhelming margin of 419-1. The bill to grant a 10-year extension of the Iran Sanctions Act will be sent to President Barack Obama, who planned to sign it. The White House deemed the bill unnecessary but said it didn't violate the international accord meant to slow Iran's ability to make nuclear arms. Seeking to address Iran's concerns, White House officials emphasized that the administration can and will waive all the nuclear-related sanctions included in the renewal.

The officials weren't authorized to comment by name and spoke on condition of anonymity. Lawmakers view the sanctions law, which is set to expire at the end of the year, as an important tool for holding Iran accountable for any violations of the nuclear agreement and also as a bulwark against Tehran's aggression in the Middle East. The law, first passed by Congress in 1996 and renewed several times since then, allows the U.S. to slap companies with economic sanctions for doing business with Iran. In exchange for Tehran rolling back its nuclear program, the U.S. and other world powers agreed to suspend wide-ranging oil, trade and financial sanctions that had choked the Iranian economy. The White House has been concerned that renewing the sanctions could give Iran an excuse to scuttle the deal by saying the U.S. had reneged on its commitments to sanctions relief.

Last month, after the House passed the renewal, Iran's top leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said Iran would be forced to react if the sanctions were renewed. White House officials said Thursday that Obama remained fully committed to implementing the deal and that the renewal would have no effect at all on the sanctions relief Iran is receiving. But congressional Republicans and Democrats view the law as valuable leverage and criticized the Obama administration for not being tougher with Iran. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said Thursday that preserving the sanctions law is critical to blunt Iran's "persistent efforts to expand its sphere of influence" throughout the Middle East. He also criticized the administration for allowing itself to be "held hostage" by Iran's threats to withdraw from the nuclear agreement.

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Iran says extension of sanctions by U.S. violates nuclear deal: TV
Friday 2nd December, 2016 - Iran's Foreign Ministry said on Friday, December 2 that the U.S. Senate's vote to extend sanctions against the Islamic Republic for 10 years violated a historic nuclear deal reached
"The extension of sanctions by the U.S. congress is a violation of the deal. We will report it to Iran's committee, assigned for monitoring the implementation of the deal," according to a statement by Foreign Ministry spokesman Bahram Ghasemi read on television. Congress members and U.S. officials said the renewal of the Iran Sanctions Act, which was passed unanimously on Thursday, would not violate the nuclear agreement, under which Iran curbed its nuclear-power program in return for lifting sanctions.

Iran's top authority, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, warned in November that an extension would breach the deal and threatened retaliation. "The American government is responsible of carrying out its international commitments ... The U.S. president has accepted to use its authority to prevent such measures," Ghasemi said, according to the state news agency IRNA.

The ISA will expire on December 31 if not renewed. The White House had not pushed for an extension, but had not raised serious objections. Some congressional aides said they expected President Barack Obama to sign it. U.S. President-elect Donald Trump railed against the deal during his campaign for the White House.

Iran says extension of sanctions by US violates nuclear deal TV
 
The US gov should mind it's own business and stay out of everyone else's business.

Sadly warmongers must warmonger.
 

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