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Next Stage on Iran Could Hold Real Peril

(New York Times) John Vinocur - A month ago, one of the officials developing the allies' strategy to halt Iran's drive to make a nuclear weapon described their governments' discomfort about soon having to move beyond attempts to engage the mullahs. "Sometimes one might perhaps have to accept the answer's 'no' when the answer's 'no'," the official said. "But we don't want to acknowledge that the answer's 'no,' because we are afraid of the consequences." The diplomat's remarks reflect an obvious truth: months of outstretched Western hands have brought nothing in return from Tehran. The consequences require a tone of confrontation involving tougher sanctions and, considering the sanctions' high potential for failure, follow-up efforts to contain and deter Iran as it moves closer to a nuclear weapon. That new approach might be widened over weeks and months to come to include more direct support for the opposition to the mullahs on Tehran's streets, and open consideration (or private threats) of a military option. Mark Fitzpatrick, senior fellow for nonproliferation at the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London and a former State Department expert on nuclear issues, said sanctions by the U.S. and EU affecting Iran's imports of gasoline could be enacted, but he doubted their effectiveness in stopping the Iranian drive towards nukes. If that is the case, Fitzpatrick said, "threatening military force" may be the way forward. "Iran has to know it's a real possibility." Fitzpatrick believes Iran's stockpile of low-enriched uranium, which he now estimated as sufficient for one and a half bombs when enriched, "will be the equivalent of three or four sometime next year."
2009-12-22 08:04:06
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