Classical Values :: Fearing the fear of fear?

Fearing the fear of fear?

The Philadelphia Inquirer's Trudy Rubin is blaming the Iranian nuclear program on the war in Iraq (the latter is a "quagmire" of course):

President Bush's gross miscalculations about Iraq have emboldened Iran's mullahs. The cost of these mistakes was in full view this week.

Iranian leaders defied U.S. and European warnings and restarted early stages of producing nuclear fuel that can be diverted to make atomic weapons. They believe the Iraq quagmire has deprived the United States of the option of bombing their nuclear facilities.

They are right.

I'm curious about a couple of assumptions there. First, is there a quagmire? While I've discussed the "quagmire" topic previously, I'm still curious about these assumptions. First, is there a quagmire? Second, if there is, precisely how has it "deprived" U.S. forces of their ability to bomb Iranian nuclear facilities.

I guess I'll have to read on.

There is good reason to be worried about Tehran's nuclear program, despite Iranian claims it is only for peaceful energy purposes.
No expert I've talked to doubts Iran wants to develop at least the capacity to manufacture weapons. Iran's ruling clerics hid key parts of their nuclear program for years. Add to that the fact that Iran helps groups that commit terrorist acts, such as Hezbollah and Hamas.

This is not a country that the world should want to see in possession of nuclear bombs.

Agreed. I'm glad to see such apparently unanimous agreement on such a crucial point, and I'm hoping to see Ms. Rubin on the roof of the Inquirer building rejoicing (ululating would be a bit much to expect, I suppose) as soon as the first reactor is bombed!

Will it happen now? Or do we need a female president with the balls do do it?

But the U.S. presence in Iraq has made it more, not less, likely that Iran would go all out to develop weapons. Hawkish U.S. pundits boasted that Iran was the next regime that would topple after Saddam fell. Iraq was seen as a perfect base for overt or covert pressure on Tehran. Iraqi democracy was supposed to inspire Iran's restless Shiite population to topple the mullahs.
Given such predictions, and 140,000 U.S. troops next door, it's little wonder Iran is determined to produce fuel that could be used for nuclear weapons - and has so far rejected offers by the European Union to trade economic goodies for an agreement to stop producing that fuel.

Wait a second. Is the Iraq War really the motivation for Iranian development of nuclear weapons? Even assuming that Iran feels threatened by U.S. troops, of what tactical use are are nuclear missiles against conventional forces in the field? I think it's far more likely that the weapons would be intended as a blackmail device vis-a-vis Israelis nukes -- or to be diverted to terrorists for use in the United States. More likely, the Iranian goal is along psywar lines. They claim it's unfair that the Israelis have nukes, and they could use their leverage in an attempt to force "nuclear disarmament in the Mideast." Whether the mullahs are insane enough to supply nukes to terrorists or actually deploy them against Israel is of course unknown. But neither of these scenarios strike me as connected to the Iraq War. Considering that the current Iranian nuclear program dates back to the 1980s, I think they'd be doing exactly what they are doing now, even if Saddam Hussein were still in power.

With Saddam still in power, the mullahs might be working even harder. As the last article points out, Saddam Hussein's forces destroyed Iran's nuclear reactors in the 1980-1988 war. While his capabilities were substantially impaired by the United States after Gulf War I, there's no question that he was still in power, and a growing threat, with a documented history of aggression towards Iraq.

Now, I know it's tough to know exactly what is going on in the minds of the mullahs. But I think it's a mistake to see everything in the context of this war without considering the not-so-distant past. It could just as easily be argued that leaving Saddam Hussein in power might have provided a stronger impetus for nuclear development than the current scenario. In any case, it would be logically impossible to look at Iran's decades-old, ongoing nuclear program, and lay blame on the current situation in Iraq.

Ms. Rubin (obviously a competent analyst) must realize this, so she offers more:

But there are additional reasons why the Iran theocracy feels it can take this gamble. For one thing, flawed elections just returned a conservative new president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. The Iranian public has shown no interest in an uprising; they fear Iraq-style chaos.

No interest? There are some 75,000 Iranian bloggers now, along with countless activists agitating tirelessly against the mullahcracy. While one can debate the precise meaning of demonstrations like this, to maintain that there is "no interest" in an uprising, and to blame this on "fear" of "Iraq-style chaos" only seems to reinforce the mullah view that the demonstrators are "anarchists." But regardless of the strength of the mullahcracy's opponents, where's the tie-in between that and the nukes? The goal is toppling the mullahs, and I don't see Iranian anti-nuclear activism as being much of a cause there. The people who are agitated want freedom and democracy. If they get it, I'm sure they'd be just as amenable to having nuclear power as any other country. Whether they'd want nuclear weapons is probably about as relevant to them now as cloning sheep. Somehow, I just can't see the mullahs' covert nuclear development decisions being influenced in any way by worries about reactions in the Iranian "street."

Another reason for nuclear development is said to be Iran's ability to harm U.S. troops in Iraqi (and other) battlefields:

For another, Iran's regime has thousands of agents inside Iraq who could cause havoc for U.S. troops there if they chose to. They could do the same in Afghanistan.

Sorry, but they (working in alliance with al Qaida) are already causing havoc for U.S. troops in Iraq. Ms. Rubin has just made a good case for invading Iran (much less taking out the nukes), whether she admits it or not. Far from being a deterrent, Iranian activity in Iraq should in theory make a U.S. strike more, not less, likely.

Unless, of course, the Iranians are defeating us with psywar tactics. Again.

Which leads to one of Ms. Rubin's best points:

And then there is the fact that Iraq's government has developed the closest of ties with Tehran. Iraq's Shiite leaders know they'll need Iranian support if U.S. troops leave - to prevent a return of Sunni Baathists.

Iraqi Prime Minister Ibrahim Jaafari, who stood beside President Bush in the White House, recently visited Tehran and signed a raft of economic and military agreements. Iraqi Vice President Adel Abdel Mahdi told me in Baghdad last month: "Iran is very important for us. Any negotiations between Iran and the United States affect us, because both are our partners."

In other words, Iraq's Shiite majority would vehemently oppose any U.S. strikes against Iran. Nor would the United States win international support for bombing Iranian installations, especially since the bomb threat doesn't appear urgent.

American intelligence agencies - burned by their Iraq experience - just issued a cautious assessment on when Iran will have weapons, saying it probably won't get nukes until early in - or the middle of - the next decade. Previous U.S. estimates - and those of Israel - had placed the likely date sooner.

Vice President Cheney has suggested that Israel might "decide to act first" against Iranian sites. Israeli sources tell me that is unlikely.

At best, international pressure may get Iran to restore a temporary freeze on producing nuclear fuel. But the chance of halting the Iranian program probably ended with the Iraq invasion. Another unintended casualty of miscalculations about Iraq.

Much as I see the point (and much as I think it's a good one), I don't think any of this United States paralysis was caused by the Iraq War.

Rather, the United States is pathologically afraid of Iran, and I think it comes down not to real strengths and capabilities, but to the success of the Iranian psychological warfare machine. If the United States is in fact unable to do anything about the nukes, about Iran's involvement in Iraq, it is because time and time again we have allowed ourselves to be beaten by a system based on medieval but magical superstitious nonsense dating back to the arrival on a plane of that psychotically religious man, (quite possibly half British, as Stephen Green notes), the Ayatollah Khomeini.

Our world hasn't been the same since.

Too bad the Iranians didn't laugh the son of a bitch out of their country.

His rotten corpse lives on.

Magic works that way.

(And I'm afraid it may take a female president to have the balls it takes to go after a dead white man.)

MORE: Via Michael Totten, guest blogging at InstaPundit, I see that Iranian proxies are growing bolder by the day, and this time they've seized Baghdad's municipal government. Via Drudge, I see that Iranian proxies are terrorizing merchants by means of "militant vice squads."

I'm not surprised by any of this. It is to be hoped that U.S. forces will at least fight the mullahs' proxies in Iraq? (After all, didn't they really start this whole thing nearly 26 years ago?)

Comments

I never dreamed that the Ayatollah Khomeini, that Grand Muslim of all Muslims, would be son of of a British father named William Richard Williamson. I guess you learn something new every day, as they say. I shouldn't be too surprised. After all, we've had Johnny Walker Lindh and others like him, and I think this is only the beginning. Which proves once again that Islam is an ideology, not a "race", as the Leftists (incapable of thinking in any terms other than money and "race") would have us believe. Anyway....!

You are absolutely right that we must destroy the Ayatollahs of Iran before they get the Bomb and destroy us. My criticism of President Bush, ever since this whole War began, is that he is way too soft on our enemies. Saudi Arabia, too. The Leftists, the peaceniks, are absolutely wrong when they say "you hawks never criticize Bush". To the contrary, I have criticized him many, many times for appeasing our enemies, both without and within. The problem with we Americans is that we keep electing likeable Presidents, Presidents who like to be liked, even by treasonous university professors.

Steven Malcolm Anderson the Lesbian-worshipping man's-man-admiring myth-based egoist · August 10, 2005 04:50 PM

The worst thing we can do is get scared and give away the farm. Lets cut through the tough talk and look at the facts. US and Israeli intelligence analysts estimate that Iran is years away from a nuclear weapons capability. North Korea is very likely to be overstating its nuclear capabilities, and will not cease its program no matter what we give them.

What we have today is a crisis in diplomacy. It is impossible to reach a compromise when the intentions of the negotiating parties are mutually exclusive. But despite another failed relationship therapy session, nothing has changed in the capabilities reality.

This time, we must stand firm with the realization that the more we give, the more we fuel the fire.

Kira Zalan · August 10, 2005 10:34 PM

My understanding is that Saddam wanted the US to think he had weapons just to keep Iran scared of him. If that is the case, it certainly seems likely that reciprocal fear existed and that Iran would be working on a nuclear program if we hadn't gone to war with Iraq.

Jon Thompson · August 10, 2005 11:26 PM