During the Cold War, the two most heavily armed militaries the
world had ever seen stared each other down, and neither fired a
shot. During the current quasi-Cold War between India and Pakistan
over Kashmir, two of the world’s most bitter enemies have
come to the brink of nuclear war, and neither has pulled the
trigger. So, as the U.N. Security Council readies to discuss the
Iran nuclear crisis this week, can someone explain to me why
we’re all so worried about Iran getting the bomb?
Being terrified of nuclear weapons has been ingrained in the
American consciousness since the “duck-and-cover”
drills of the 1950s. It was surely an unsettling thing to know that
the Soviets could strike at any time and that there was no way for
the U.S. to defend itself; our only recourse was to declare that if
they destroyed us, we’d destroy them.
A nuclear crisis or two later, most Americans seem terrified of
nuclear weapons, even our own. The theft and usage of a nuclear
weapon by terrorists against Americans was even a major plot
element of the last season of “24,” as ridiculous and
implausible as that scenario may be.
We are right to be terrified of the potential power of nuclear
weapons; they are the most destructive force the world has ever
seen. But we remain the only nation to have ever used one in
combat. The deterrent force of other nations having nuclear weapons
that they could fire at you if you ever used one against them has
been enough to keep nine nations, several of whom hate each other,
from pulling the nuclear trigger in over 60 years.
According to a transcript on UC Berkeley’s Institute of
International Studies Web site, Kenneth Waltz, a political
scientist, in the Berkeley series “Conversations with
History,” put it this way: “No matter how often the
Bush administration people say “˜containment and deterrence do
not work,’ it works as well as it ever did (in the Cold War).
… One of the striking things about nuclear deterrence is that it
has worked, no matter what country we’re talking about, no
matter what kind of government the country has, no matter what kind
of ruler the country has had.”
Waltz’s argument is essentially this: People in power want
to stay in power. Any nation that uses a nuclear weapon on another
nation is guaranteeing, if not its total destruction, a removal of
its government from power by the U.S. and other nuclear nations. So
why would a nation with a nuclear weapon ever use it? A
country’s most likely reason for wanting to have the bomb in
the first place, then, is not to make war, but to get other
countries to take it seriously.
And thus we come to Iran. Iran’s announcement recently
that it has successfully enriched uranium is a step toward having
the capacity to develop its own nuclear bomb. Experts say that Iran
is still years away from being able to enrich uranium to the point
necessary to make it “weaponizable.”
The Security Council has called for Iran to stop enrichment and
is considering sanctions if Iran continues to ignore its requests.
Although Iran said that its only objective is to have nuclear
energy, not nuclear weapons, it remains a good idea to act on the
assumption, as most countries are, that Iran would like to have the
bomb.
But let’s think this through. Waltz said, “If a
country … badly wants nuclear weapons, it is almost impossible in
the long run to prevent that country from acquiring nuclear
military capability.” Threatening Iran is only going to make
it want a nuclear bomb more.
The most obvious threatened party would be Israel. But Israel is
believed by everyone to have its own nuclear weapons, even though
it has never made a stockpile public.
The mullahs may want to wipe Israel off the map, but it’s
a big stretch to simply assume that they would be willing to
sacrifice their entire country for that goal in what would likely
be a massive return strike from Israel’s secret stash of
nuclear weapons.
Iraq is most likely Iran’s other potential target in the
Middle East, since those two countries have been fighting for many
years, but Iraq is now protected by the United States.
It makes no sense for Iran to take any nuclear action against
either country, because to do so would assure its own complete
destruction. No government has ever been willing to take that step,
so why are we so quick to assume that Iran will be?
Iran wants the status and the security associated with being a
nuclear power. It has already rebuffed the United Nation’s
demands for it to stop enriching uranium, and the situation is
accelerating toward Gulf War III (the prewar intelligence will
certainly be easier; no need to convince everyone of Iran’s
nuclear status with unconvincing-looking documents from Niger and
satellite photos of barns like the last time we went to war over
this).
Is it worth storming into another quagmire when the thing
we’re trying to prevent might not be a measurable threat in
the first place?
Or might it perhaps be a better idea to take a more cautious
approach, offering incentives for Iran to stop its activity instead
of basically calling its nuclear bluff?
There’s an argument to be made that the world would be
safer if, indeed, every nation had a nuclear bomb. You might not
agree with that, but it’s worth wondering if, perhaps, we
might not be just as safe if there were, at least, one more in the
club.
The question should be: Would you personally be willing to go to
war in Iran in order to prevent its acquisition of a nuclear
weapon?
The answer should be: no.
E-mail Atherton at
datherton@media.ucla.edu. Send general comments to
viewpoint@media.ucla.edu.