The Iranian Conundrum In Nuclear Disarmament

In his usual blunt diplomacy, Russian President, Vladimir Putin warned Israel not to jump into immediate action against Iran, citing precedence to Iraq and Afghanistan; as he said, “to do something without knowing the final consequence is not that smart.”  This came during his visit to Israel last week, and after repeated threatening remarks by Israeli leadership to take military action if Iran does not halt its nuclear enrichment.

Would an attack on Iran delay a nuclear program?

Downsides of threatening Iran: Iran is rooted in nationalism, therefore, to threaten it would potentially take away from its own citizenry defying nuclear enrichment, and instead the country would come together to thwart off an outside attack.  Right now, it is imperative for Iranian citizens to initiate a collective stance against the enrichment program.  If the people of Iran gain an influential voice against this and if internal legitimacy is compromised in this aspect, Iran will be left with little options but to cooperate with both its people and the international community on its nuclear facilities.  Ofcourse, this isn’t a roadmap to what will happen, but it can remain a hopeful option. 

Iran Is Unphased by the Saber Rattling

Regarding nuclear weapons, the US message to Iran has been “do as we say, not as we do.” We tell Iran that they cannot have nuclear weapons, but we do so in the context of relying upon these weapons for our own security and being silent about Israel’s nuclear arsenal. This is clearly an irksome double standard for Iran, one that would be far easier to tolerate if the US showed it was serious about eliminating its own nuclear arsenal and pressuring the other nuclear weapons states, including Israel, to do the same.

Further, Iran was one of three countries, along with Iraq and North Korea, named by George W. Bush as belonging to an Axis of Evil. We invaded Iraq, which had no nuclear weapons, and negotiated with North Korea, which does have them. Our behavior, on its face, would seem to be an incentive to countries not on friendly terms with the US to develop nuclear arms and justify their actions in the name of national security.

US saber rattling must give pause to Iran and, for that reason, Iran will likely stop short of actually creating nuclear weapons. On the other hand, it seems that Iran is motivated to continue to push the envelope. Its leaders most likely believe that the strategic costs to the US of attacking Iran would be too great for the US to actually initiate an attack, particularly since it is still engaged in wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The bigger danger to Iran is an Israeli attack on its nuclear facilities, but it is doubtful that Israel would act without approval by the US. A preventive Israeli attack on Iran would be far more complicated and far less likely to succeed than its 1981 attack on Iraq’s Osirak reactor. An attack by Israel could result in a more general war in the Middle East, which would be disastrous for the region and would almost certainly lead to restricting Middle East oil exports with consequent global economic chaos.

Scenarios For Nuclear Catastrophe

In a recent article that I wrote, “British Petroleum, Imagination and Nuclear Catastrophe,” I argued we should use the occasion of the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico to imagine scenarios in which a nuclear catastrophe could take place. The reason for imagining such scenarios should be obvious: to keep them from occurring.

Here is a proposition: Continued offshore oil drilling runs the risk of future offshore oil leak catastrophes that will destroy large aquatic and shoreline habitats. Applied to nuclear weapons, the proposition could be restated in this way: Continued reliance on nuclear weapons runs the risk of future nuclear catastrophes that will destroy cities, countries and civilization.

In my article, I proposed four of many possible scenarios that could be envisioned. These scenarios involved a terrorist bomb on a major city somewhere in the world; an Indo-Pakistan nuclear war; an accidental nuclear launch by Russia, leading to a nuclear exchange with the US; and a nuclear attack by North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il on Japan and South Korea.

Mairead Maguire's "Tribute to the People of Gaza"

I never cease to be amazed at the power of the human spirit to survive. During my last visit to Gaza in October 2008 I was amazed and deeply moved by the power of the people I witnessed. In a triumph of hope over adversity and tremendous suffering, love still abides.

Gaza comprises a small strip of land 27 miles long and 6 miles wide. This coastal strip is bordered by Israel on the one side, the Mediterranean Sea on the other and to a lesser extent by Egypt at the southern end. With one and a half million inhabitants Gaza is the fifth most densely populated place on the planet, 50% of which are under the age of 18. Two thirds of the total population hold refugees status, and comprise the victims and their descendants of previous acts of Israeli aggression.