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How Bush Let Iran Go Nuclear
(New York Times) Ari Shavit - If a deal on Iran's nuclear program is signed, it would represent an Iranian victory - and an American defeat. The Iranians would be able to maintain their nuclear program and continue to enrich uranium, while the Americans and their allies would loosen the economic siege on Iran and allow Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the economic oxygen needed to sustain his autocratic regime. Yes, Iran's race to the bomb would be slowed down - but an accord would guarantee that it would eventually cross the finish line. The Geneva mind-set resembles a Munich mind-set: It would create the illusion of peace-in-our-time while paving the way to a nuclear-Iran-in-our-time. The Bush administration's decision to go after Iraq rather than Iran was a fatal one. By doing so, it created a climate that made it very difficult to target Iran today. By the time American resolve was needed to fend off a genuine global threat, the necessary determination had been wasted on the wrong cause. After Iraq, America is a traumatized nation, with a limited attention span for problems in the Middle East. It has lost the ardor and wisdom needed to deal with the most dangerous of the world's evil powers. The writer is a senior columnist at Ha'aretz.