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The Abandonment
(Washington Post) Charles Krauthammer - President Obama declares the Iranian program intolerable - "I do not have a policy of containment; I have a policy to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon" - yet stands by as Iran rapidly approaches nuclearization. Such a policy is a declaration of weakness and passivity that can increase the chance of war. It creates, writes Anthony Cordesman, "the same conditions that helped trigger World War II - years of negotiations and threats, where the threats failed to be taken seriously until war became all too real." The director of national intelligence testified to Congress at the beginning of the year that sanctions had zero effect in slowing the nuclear program. Now the International Atomic Energy Agency reports (Aug. 30) that the Iranian nuclear program is actually accelerating. Cordesman argues that the only way to prevent a nuclear Iran without war is to establish a credible military threat to make Iran recalculate and reconsider. That means U.S. red lines: deadlines beyond which Washington will not allow itself to be strung, as well as benchmark actions that would trigger a response.