Iran

Fire of Liberty

As I noted with some disappointment in an earlier post on Iran, the White House seems to be going wobbly and offering to join in the talks with the Mullahs over their nuke program. Well, Jeffrey Bergner has a interesting article over @ The Weekly Standard on the various options that the US can take with Iran. Amongst the many options available, Bergner has decided to focus on four specific options.

The First option is the current "good cop, bad cop" option, were the European three continue to hold talks while the US stands on the sidelines and voice a strong hand against the nuclear program. Such a policy seems wise but the Iranians will continue to build nuke, blame America for it, pull the coalition between the US and the EU3 further apart. The Second option that the US could take with Iran is the much bandied EU3 plus the US, in which the three nations and the US come together and talk with the Mullahs. Along with the direct involvement of the US, they're would also be offers of various bargain chips to Iran (No-Aggression Pact- not likely with #1 sponsor of terror, WTO offering, lifting of sanctions). As with the "good cop, bad cop" option, this EU3+US would yet again fail because the Iranians will not give up their nukes and they'll blame the US hardline for such failures. Even worse, the US could provide all kinds of inducements and Iran would still do nothing. (We compromise our position of strength by talking with Iran with our hat in hand). This pushes us to the third option which is the "EU3+US plus Sanctions" option. Under this option, the US and its European partners would sit down with the Iranians but if they failed to get the Iranians to agree to dismantle the program they would push for UN sanctions. The only problem is that the regime in Iran knows that if they call off negotiations they still win because they have the vetoes of China & Russia in the Security Council when it comes to sanctions. Without the UN signing on, the US runs into the problem of the EU being reluctant to impose sanctions. Even if you slapped sanctions on Iran, they still wouldn't stop trying to build their weapons to destroy the "Great Satan" and "Little Satan." With all of these failed options, Bergner offers a fourth option of "military strikes." Under this option, the US would bomb the various elements of Irans nuke program. The only problem with this, is that by launching such strikes they would wreak the ire of the World and lose the democratic movement of Iran. (people get nationalistic when you attack their homeland). While it would bring about anger, Bergner argues that it could destroy the nuke program.

As you know, I've promoted a fifth option, which is "Regime Change." If the US just voiced a demand for democracy in Iran via a national referendum (Do you wants the theocrats running the show or a Democratic government, yes or no?) I'd also suggest that the President continues a call for freedom in Iran. If he provides vocal, financial as well as moral support for the underground democracy movement in Iran he would make his goal of ending Iran's burgeoning nuke program by creating a democracy in Iran. We see the people power at work in Lebanon, Iraq and Afghanistan, why not Iran. If I was advising the President, I'd tell him to push option five (regime change) but also reserve the right to use option 4 (military strike). Whatever he does, he shouldn't buckle or back down from his "nuke-free" Iran policy by appeasing the Mullahs with gifts.