Antinuclear

On not bombing Iran, and the difficult road to alternatives

How About Not Bombing Iran? NYT, Bill Keller, January 22, 2012,  If you need more convincing of the grave risks of a preemptive bombing attack on Iran, I recommend these freshly published arguments from Colin H. Kahl, who was until recently Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for the Middle East in the Obama administration; R. Nicholas Burns, who was Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs in the George W. Bush administration; and my Times colleague Roger Cohen, who
sums it up this way:

Here’s the bottom line: an Israeli attack unites Iran in fury, locks in the Islamic Republic for a generation, cements the Syrian regime, radicalizes the Arab world at a moment of delicate transition, ignites Hezbollah on the Lebanese border, boosts Hamas, endangers U.S. troops in the region, sparks terrorism, propels oil skyward, triggers a
possible regional war, offers a lifeline to Iran just as Europe is about to stop buying its oil, adds a Persian to the Arab vendetta against Israel, and may at best set back Iran’s nuclear ambitions a couple of years.

But if not bombing, then what?……
http://keller.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/01/22/how-about-not-bombing-iran/

January 24, 2012 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized