An Arms Race is the Way of the Future

I have officially flip-flopped. That’s right, I’m changing my position on Iran’s alleged nuclear program. Somebody call Dick Cheney!

For almost the entire year to date I have been beating the drum, clanking pans together and jumping all about trying to tell anyone that will listen that we’re headed to Iran for a “pre-emptive war” on the auspices of preventing nuclear weapons proliferation. The opinion that most people writing about Iran as well as myself held is that the mullahs were going to do one of two, or both options.

The first theory goes that the mullahs were just dying to get their mitts on enough ingredients to construct a nuclear bomb and just as soon as they did, they would strap it to the nearest Shahab-3 or 4 and lob it at Israel. Regardless of how many peaceniks, isolationists and anti-Semites there are in this country, this would have precipitated a real, live nuclear war between the West and the Middle East.

The other big scary story we’re told and I’ve been repeating is that Iran will make a bomb, give it to Hezbollah or Al Qaeda and somehow, someway, they’ll use it to blow up a city in the US, or once again, our good friend Israel. Obviously I was one of the many in the chorus singing loud and proud that this nightmare scenario needed to be prevented at all costs. Revolution in the Iranian streets; that was the ticket for me as well as others.

I’ve changed my mind. Now I think not only SHOULD Iran have a bomb but also I believe every relatively secure country in the world should have a nuclear arsenal, complete with ballistic missiles of their very own. From North Korea to Iran, from France to China, from East Timor to Sudan, from Argentina to Mexico, let’s all have nuclear weapons!

I’ve come to the conclusion that the best opportunity for lasting peace on earth is for the entire world to have a good old fashioned arms race. I’ll give you a minute to let that sink in…

…

…ready now? Good, let me explain how I got to this point.

According to an article I read in Reuters, ”Iran is determined to acquire nuclear weapons and the United States may find it less costly to deter a nuclear-armed Iran than to dismantle its weapons program, according to two U.S.-funded researchers who advise the Pentagon.

"Can the United States live with a nuclear-armed Iran? Despite its rhetoric, it may have no choice," concluded the report by Judith Yaphe and Air Force Col. Charles Lutes, which was released on Thursday.

The potential for rolling back Iran's program, once it produces a nuclear weapon, "is lower than preventing it in the first place and the costs of rollback may be higher than the costs of deterring and containing a nuclear Iran," they said.”

The three most powerful and important men running the United States right now are, Mr. Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, are all former CEO’s (well Bush ran and eventually sold his own oil company but that’s close enough) and as we all know about CEO’s they will always choose the cheapest option. Economics first, safety last, that’s their motto. The Bush administration has already shown that it’s not interested in winning the War or Terror or actually preventing any more terrorists attacks. It is has already shown that it’s not interested in dismantling the “web of terror,” as it’s called. They attacked Afghanistan strictly because of 9/11 and they got their boogeyman in Iraq. They’ve proven that those two conflicts are all they had on the agenda for dealing with Islamic terrorism.

Now I know what you are thinking. You’re saying to yourself that not even the Bush administration is so incompetent that they’d let Iran arm itself and become another North Korea. You are saying that not even the Bush administration would let Iran acquire nuclear bombs that they could give to Hezbollah and kill us all with. Well I have faith in this administration that where they can do the worst possible job, they will. But that’s not why I’ve changed my position.

I think this opinion of the mullahs, that their crazy enough to initiate a real live nuclear war with the west, all in the name of Mohammed, may peace and blessings be upon him, is nothing more than well crafted American mass marketed propaganda (which we do so well). Don’t get me wrong, I do agree that the mullahs hate the US and want us dead, but hey, so do the French!

But seriously folks, the mullahs have everything to lose by going nuclear against us, Israel or anyone else on the planet. They have everything to gain by just having the “threat” of nuclear missiles and then sending their tired, angry and hungry to kill American soldiers with just a Kalashnikov assault rifle and the promise of a pleasant afterlife. If there’s one thing I’ve learned about people in power, their convictions, religious or otherwise come second to their desire to stay in power. In short, if the mullahs attacked the West with nuclear bombs, directly or indirectly, the Middle East would be uninhabitable for the next 100 years or so. If you think that a nuclear terrorist attack on, at the very least, American soil wouldn’t immediately garner a response to annihilate every city in Iran, then pass me what you’ve been smoking because it’s clearly good stuff.

Now I’m not revealing any big secrets here. Despite their own rhetoric and such, the mullahs in Tehran know which side their bread is buttered on. It’s the same thing in Damascus and Riyadh. The Saudi Royal family and the Assad family only have power so long as they don’t push the US too far. As mush as I think this administration can’t seem to do anything right, if Mecca, Riyadh, Medina and Damascus were left standing in light of a nuclear attack on the US, there wouldn’t be a Washington DC left to defend as we’d burn it to the ground on principle. This is not news. Everyone from DC to Tehran is well aware of how nuclear war would play out an in reality, nobody in power really wants it.

Mutually assured destruction (MAD) works, quite simply. It worked after World War II between the US and the Soviets. Some would argue that the mullahs are not Stalin nor Khrushchev and I would say balderdash to that. People are people, and when you’re in charge, that’s all you’ll ever want to be. Another good example is India and Pakistan. More has been to work toward peace between those two countries and on Kashmir since they both acquired nuclear arms. Half of Western Europe has nuclear weapons, including France, but nobody has ever used them no matter what conflict arose on that continent. The North Koreans allegedly have nuclear arms and all we get from that place is a lot of hot air (because anything more would then threaten China and that’s not going to happen). MAD works folks, don’t let anybody tell you otherwise.

Another story in the news states, “Former members of the Russian military have been secretly helping Iran obtain the technology needed to make missiles capable of hitting European capitals, a British newspaper claimed yesterday.

Citing anonymous "Western intelligence officials," the Sunday Telegraph said the Russians were go-betweens as part of a multi-million-pound deal they negotiated between Iran and North Korea in 2003.” Source

Now you see that this effort to stop Iran from having a bomb can’t and won’t be done. So rather than just spinning our wheels or engaging in yet another poorly planned war, let’s go with a strategy that worked for over 50 years. Let’s have another arms race!