Zack Miller's naively hawkish assertion that the United States must attack Iranian nuclear facilities is an example of the rare bad idea that pushes better ones off the table and represents the worst possible response to Iranian nuclear ambitions ("Addressing a Nuclear Iran," Feb. 22).
Miller is right that sanctions have never worked alone. However, the threat of military action did not make Saddam Hussein leave Kuwait, nor did it restrain Slobodan Milosevic or persuade the Taliban to hand over Osama Bin Laden. Potential military strikes only convince states to refocus on their objectives in anticipation of the inevitable assault.
Clearly, Iran must not get nukes. This development would destabilize the Middle East, encouraging widespread proliferation while emboldening Iran to be even more provocative. But a strike would only entice Iran to focus on obtaining a weapon. And no matter how many scientists we kill or centrifuges we destroy in a futile game of Whack-a-Mole, Iran will still have the capability to eventually create a weapon.
Besides galvanizing Iranian leadership, an attack would unite the restive Iranian people around their government. Iran's largely pro-American populace has cried in the streets for freedom, watches "American Idol" illegally on satellite TV and holds the regime, which recently banned "subversive" Western haircut styles, in contempt. However, even the democratic opposition sees nuclear research as a national right. Bombing would send this nascent goodwill up in smoke, uniting the people around a regime just at the point of fracturing and foundering.
A strike could also increase Iranian influence, even if it slowed the enrichment process. Iran proper hasn't invaded anyone in centuries. Instead, it projects power through proxies, such as Syria and Hezbollah. A strike on Iranian nuclear facilities would encourage international sympathy for Iran, which would be seen as an unjust victim. The resulting support would shelter their proxies to act with impunity, and Iran could leverage power much as it could with a bomb but without the international condemnation.
Finally, the Iranian "threat" is neither serious nor immediate. November's International Atomic Energy Agency report and 16 U.S. intelligence agencies found no concrete evidence that the program has been active since 2003. With no weapons program, what would justify a strike?
Unfortunately, the current debate creates a false dichotomy between the two undesirable options of sanctions and a strike. This perspective eliminates the only action that can permanently prevent a nuclear Iran besides a prolonged occupation: a negotiated political settlement to demonstrate to Iran that a bomb is not in its own interest. Occupying a country infinitely larger and more complex than Iraq and Afghanistan shouldn't even be up for discussion after the sacrifices our military has already made.
Despite the shrill headlines, the window for diplomacy remains quite open. Russia recently introduced the first step-by-step plan to cap enrichment in exchange for a lifting of sanctions, which European Union Foreign Affairs Chief Catherine Ashton has cautiously approved. Iran's Supreme National Security Council, chaired by Ayatollah Khamenei, recently approved a similar plan last fall. Furthermore, diplomacy beyond sanctions offers Iran the coveted chance to return to the world community. Cooperation could lead to nuclear fuel guarantees, collaboration on Afghanistan and drug trafficking, a regional security dialogue and even World Trade Organization membership, according to the Arms Control Association's Peter Crail.
The West's refusal of Khamenei's eminently reasonable proposal is symptomatic of the larger problem behind this debate. The hysteria surrounding this crisis, magnified by electioneering, creates an environment in which no political speech can be taken at face value. The difficulty of making a settlement becomes far higher when this failure to distinguish between rhetoric and reality seeps into the mainstream. When front pages ask not how to negotiate a lasting peace but how many 30,000-pound bombs would be necessary to penetrate a mountain, our discourse has taken a seriously wrong turn.
In a heated environment, speech on both sides can tilt more toward the bombastic than the pragmatic. Unfortunately, Miller, among other voices, has conflated rhetoric and reality. Let the more rational among us hope these voices are able to make this distinction in the future.
