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Is the White House Emboldening Iran?

(American Enterprise Institute) Michael Rubin - Successful nuclear deterrence requires that the Iranian leadership prioritizes the lives of Iranian citizens above its geopolitical or ideological goals, and that the White House is willing to kill hundreds of thousands of Iranians should authorities in Tehran or their proxies ever use nuclear weapons. The president, however, is not. During his campaign for president, Obama criticized Sen. Hillary Clinton for declaring that the U.S. could "obliterate" Iran should the Islamic Republic use nuclear weapons. After such a reaction, neither the Supreme Leader nor any of his senior advisors believes Obama is willing to pull the retaliatory trigger. Realists who suggest that Mutually Assured Destruction worked should reread history. Deterrence almost broke down on several occasions, bringing the U.S. and Soviet Union to the brink of nuclear war: The Berlin crisis and the Cuban missile crisis each nearly escalated beyond control. Simply put, the world got lucky, and that was with only two main nuclear powers: Any Iranian bomb would trigger a cascade of proliferation that would lead to half a dozen nuclear Middle Eastern states. The Islamic Republic ascribes to a value set far different than our own. Iranians may not be suicidal, but the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps who would have custody over Iran's nuclear program may be far more willing to absorb mass death. It may be comforting to believe that the U.S. can contain or deter Tehran's worst ambitions but, absent any preparation to do so, the White House instead emboldens the Islamic Republic. Every war in the Middle East has as a common variable the aggressor's overconfidence. The writer is a resident scholar at AEI.
2010-04-09 09:21:39
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