Tuesday, April 18, 2006
Enlarge the Problem?
Tigerhawk points you to Edward Luttwak's compelling and fact-rich analysis of Iran, its history as a natural US ally and concludes that, while the military option may be critical eventually, it is still too early. Luttwak does rely on some intuition which at heart requires accepting significant risk -- namely, that Iran is far closer to procuring nuclear capability than he has judged to be the case. It would be a shame if he was wrong, but his intuition and expertise is compelling.
Besides, there is a problem related to Iran that begs to be addressed as well that may have much lower cost, and still weaken the Mullahcracy and damage its prestige --that is its satellites Syria, Hezbollah and its budding relationship with Hamas. (As an aside, leave it to the Palestinians to pick another long term loser to hook up with, right? Egypt? Jordan? Iraq? To say nothing of the USSR. And now Iran. The first two picked fights with Israel as Palestinian sponsors, then Iraq and Iran messed with the US. To say the least, it has not worked out to the benefit of the Palestinian people. Has there ever been a group who so tenaciously bet on and held the losing hand?).
The US appears to have adopted Luttwak's strategy -- at least to date. By sponsoring the EU-3, I think the US essentially dissed Iran and tried to ignore them. So the Mullahs put in place a clear and compelling nutter as President, and still the US seems almost complacent in its approach to Iran. Luttwak's most interesting logical assertion is that we must have excellent human intelligence inside of Iran telling us the status of their nuclear development. Syria hs been another matter. The US (and, to their credit, France) squeezed very hard to get Syria out of Lebanon and shut them down in western Iraq. And it seems mostly to have worked. The question remains -- should the US continue to erode Assad's power and threaten the stability of his regime as it more closely aligns itself to Iran? And should the US really tighten the screws on Hamas (or encourage/allow Israel to do so) as further manuevers to weaken Iran regionally while essentially not taking the bait to attack Iran itself?
It is hard to conclude differently than what Luttwak's piece suggests -- that the Iranian leadership is begging for American bombing runs to enhance their domestic legitimacy and afford them the further opportunity to "circle the wagons" at home -- a place where they seem to be increasingly weak. But should we be more active with its satellites?
5 Comments:
By 
TigerHawk, at
Tue Apr 18, 01:11:00 PM:
Partner, that's some great thinking. I have been noodling around this idea for a while, but you crystalized it well, I think.
By Cardinalpark, at
Tue Apr 18, 01:34:00 PM:
Thanks. I wish I could say it was original, but just look at what we did in WWII (after we finally got involved). Japan attacks us, and we island hop in the Pacific, enaging in places like the Philippines (and avoiding Japan). Then we go to North Africa. Then Italy. All the while avoiding Germany.
Now we seem to be at it against the Jihadis -- first in Afghanistan, then Iraq, maybe Syria and Lebanon and Palestine, along the way (and let's not forget Libyan capitulation without a shot fired), avoiding Iran for a later day. As we see today, I am sure many questioned the wisdom of our tactical avoidance of "the big dance" (for lots of different reasons), including why we chose not to fight the Soviet Union in 1945.
Of course, we've lost far fewer people this time...thankfully...
By 
, at
Tue Apr 18, 03:11:00 PM:
There is a lot to be said for _not_ bombing Iran, if it can possibly be avoided. The Iranian regime is taunting the US, in the hope of being attacked. This would greatly increase anti-American feeling around the world. It is also worth remembering the mass suicide tactics that were used in the Iran-Iraq war - the regime has no compunction in sacrificing millions of its own people. Can anyone think of a good way to prevent them from acquiring nuclear missiles, other than dropping bombs?
By , at
Tue Apr 18, 06:28:00 PM:
It's simply amazing to watch the Bushhitler and his cohorts suffer thru a scandal/politicalhack/internationalcrisis a week and remain on point and successful. Cheers to them and you(all) for a job in progress and well done.....
dorf
By Assistant Village Idiot, at
Tue Apr 18, 09:58:00 PM:
Yeah, it's amazing how we keep winning without any all-stars.
