Nuclear Buildup Would Lead To Diplomatic Isolation
Virtually every nation that has fielded nuclear weapons has done so to counter a perceived threat. Iran apparently wants to be the exception. Arming itself with nukes isn't merely unnecessary -- it could do irreparable harm to its international standing and strategic security.
From a strategic point of view, a nuclear Iran makes no sense. It would make the country a pariah in the West and a target of fear and suspicion by every Middle Eastern power.
Iran is arguably much safer than it was a decade ago. The Soviet bear has been de-clawed. Russia's military poses no threat. The Taliban is gone, and a friendly warlord sits on the Afghan-Iranian border. Saddam Hussein, who once led an invasion of Iran, has been deposed. Turkey certainly isn’t interested in attacking. Even Israel may make peace with the Palestinian Authority, leaving Iran scant justification for portraying that conflict as a causus belli.
Ironically, all these developments can in great part be attributed to the policies of the United States -- which, it can be argued, has done more to make the world safe for Iran than all the mullahs in Tehran.
Iranians might argue that they have to defend themselves against the United States. After all, the president did list their country as part of an axis of evil. But Iran is on the list only because it has backed terrorists and pursued weapons of mass destruction. A nuclear weapons program, which is more likely to gain Washington's ire than its indifference, doesn't seem like a good idea for a country that wants to enhance its security.
A nuclear program would be logical only if Iran wants a stick that it can use to bully neighbors and raise its standing in the Islamic world. But wait -- Pakistan tried that route. All it managed to achieve was a nuclear standoff that threatens to kill millions of people if somebody makes a mistake or gets an itchy trigger finger.
Even if Iran builds a nuclear capability, it can rest assured that, like North Korea, it will get more attention from the United States than it wants. It also will risk isolating itself diplomatically and economically from the nations that can help meet the aspirations of young Iranians who wish to see their country grow and prosper.
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As events in the country of Georgia show clearly, the Russian Bear has NOT been declawed.
It is not the Iranian youth who run the Iranian government or military.
Religious hatred against what Islamic believers consider the filth of Jews inhabiting a sliver of what was once Arabia is a deeper source of motivation than diplomatic niceties.
Your liberal mindset that "talk-nice" will dissuade people who have openly declared their intentions and stated their deepest motivations for their intended actions is a malady that needs a research foundation of its own to find a cure.
That cure is philosophy which tells us what kind of universe we live in, what kind of beings we are, what principles should guide our actions so that we can live well here. In world culture there is only one voice that offers a demonstrated cause for peace among men. That is found in the philosophy of mankind's greatest moral teacher, Ayn Rand. I point you to Atlas Shrugged, the most inspiring novel ever written.
Since when did diplomatic interchanges between nations become "wimpishness" or "surrender."? Barack Obama is the voice of reason when he argues that it is sine qua non to face your adversary and to listen to their side of the issue and then lay it on the line to them what we will and will not tolerate. But to precipitously threaten to bomb them to extinction is no polity; it is pure testerone of an adolescent nation (yes, us, the U.S.) to yell, scream, use epithets and propaganda, and then to blast them physically.
Persuasion only works when both sides are committed to using reason to resolve their differences. From its inception the Islamic Republic of Iran has been committed to the use of violence against the US. They are religious fanatics who explicitly reject reason. Their faith tells them that we are evil and should be destroyed. They have attacked us repeatedly, and we have repeatedly responded by trying to reason with them. But we will never reason them out of a position that is grounded in religious fantacism. Our only option, if we value our existence, is to destroy them before they acquire the means to destroy us.
>>From a strategic point of view, a nuclear Iran makes no sense. It would make the country a pariah in the West and a target of fear and suspicion by every Middle Eastern power.
The same could be said for the 1939 Russo-German invasion of Poland: "It would make the country a pariah in the West and a target of fear and suspicion by every [European] power.
We should try to remember that the Iranian mullahs, like Hitler and Stalin, are mystical, uneducated power-lusters. Logical analysis isn't necessarily in their ken.