Daily Alert Archives

Don't Forget Iran

[Wall Street Journal] Christopher Hitchens - The absurdly politicized finding of the National Intelligence Estimate - to the effect that Iran has actually halted rather than merely paused its weapons-acquisition program - has put the U.S. in a position where it is difficult even to continue pressing for sanctions, let alone to consider disabling the centrifuge and heavy-water sites at Natanz, Arak and elsewhere. Iran is running on two timetables. The first one is the gradual but definite emergence of a democratization trend among the young and the middle class. The second one - the process by which a messianic regime lays hold of the means to manufacture apocalyptic weaponry - could move rather faster, and is partly designed in any case to insulate the mullahs from regime change. Can the U.S. regain the initiative that has been lost to it by the actions of its own intelligence bureaucracy? Consider our advantages. To begin with, all visitors to Tehran report an extraordinary level of sympathy with the U.S. among the general population. Our ability to demolish the Taliban and the Saddam Hussein tyrannies, Iran's two most hated enemies, has greatly impressed many Iranians. Iran may be floating on a lake of oil, but still conducts much the same backward, rug-and-pistachio economy that it was operating when the mullahs seized power almost 30 years ago.
2008-02-19 01:00:00
Full Article