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No More Incentives for Iran

(Commentary) Michael Rubin - Does Iranian behavior suggest that incentives work? The answer is no. Since 1992, successive generations of European and American governments have been trying to entice Iran, trying to buy Iranian compliance. While the Iranian regime was always willing to encourage a sweetening of the pot, at no time has its behavior suggested that such a strategy will work. Indeed, the obsessive American approach to trying to bribe Iran only humiliates the U.S. in the eyes of Iranian officials. The Iranian government has repeatedly approached talks insincerely, and has no intention of forfeiting its illicit nuclear weapons program. After two decades of diplomacy, Iranian authorities know what they need to do. It is time Western diplomats underline a choice: Tehran can abandon its nuclear program, or they can face the consequences. The writer, a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, served as a staff adviser for Iran and Iraq at the Pentagon between 2002 and 2004.
2013-04-04 00:00:00
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