Iran is in the dock over its uranium enrichment program, which it insists is for peaceful purposes.
Mohammed El-Baradei, director general of the nuclear watchdog the IAEA, is naturally unable to guarantee that Iran isn’t pursuing nuclear weapons.
The US, Britain and France are pushing the UN Security Council to approve a Chapter VII resolution that could see Iran subjected to sanctions or military action. It’s an anxious time for the region.
There are many possible scenarios, some more likely than others.
Iran could, of course, back down but given the fierce rhetoric coming from President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and the pride with which ordinary Iranians have greeted their country’s scientific achievements that option is looking ever more unlikely.
The Security Council is expected to vote on the US-inspired resolution as early as next week but, thus far, China and Russia - both veto holders - are decidedly lukewarm.
In any event were such a resolution to be passed, its primary backers would suffer huge increases in oil prices and possibly even the destabilization of their own economies with others falling like dominoes.
Let’s suppose the resolution is blocked by China, Russia or both. The US, France, Britain and other allies could impose sanctions on Iran, but that would be futile as oil prices would rocket, Iran would continue selling to its friends, with the result the Iranian government would be laughing all the way to the bank.
What options are left to those who are determined to see Iran falling into line?
The US could of course, call upon the good old “coalition of the willing” to help launch strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities. Although after the Iraq debacle there will be few nations queuing to repeat the same mistakes.
Indeed, US allies have been pulling out of Iraq in droves and even British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw has suggested that military strikes on Iran would be “madness”.
Alternatively, the US could go it alone. But without a Chapter VII UN resolution, labeling Iran a danger to the international community and in the absence of direct aggression from Tehran, Washington would be flouting international law as well as the UN Charter. As former US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright recently pointed out, “You can’t go to war with everybody you dislike”.
If the US cannot persuade Russia and China to sign on to its proposed resolution, then Washington could decide to push the issue on to the backburner just as it did with North Korea.
Even if Iran were developing a bomb, the finished product is likely to be ten years away, so the US could continue down the diplomatic route or, alternatively, come to terms with a nuclear armed Iran.
However, as various pundits have highlighted, this option would leave the all powerful White House looking weak and ineffectual in the eyes of the world, especially after so much anti-Iran bluster.
There are also fears that other countries in the neighborhood would look to develop nuclear weapons if Iran were to get away with it.
But there is another scenario - the most dangerous of all — being contemplated by region watchers. It’s one that involves Israel.
Rosa Brook writing in the Los Angeles Times holds the view that when “the war begins, it will be between Iran and Israel.” She believes Israel will strike sometime “between now and September” when Iran is expected to deploy Russian-made Tor air-defense missiles around sensitive sites.
In this case, the US will have little choice but to jump into the fray, which Brook says, “may set the whole Middle East on fire...leaving a legacy of instability that will last for generations and permanently ending a century of American supremacy”.
This is a distinct possibility. If Israel launches a first strike on Iran, it will claim its very existence has been imperiled by threats out of Tehran. It will tell the international community that it couldn’t wait around while Ahmadinejad plans to wipe Israel off the map.
Then as soon as Israel ignites the conflagration, presented with a fait accompli, the US will ride on its back into the flames, claiming all the while that it knew nothing of Israel’s intentions.
Israel has shown over and over that it cares not one jot about the rest of the world. It has ignored more than 30 Security Council resolutions; it has built what it terms “a separation fence”, waving aside international censure; it has continues unchallenged with its covert WMD programs and is open concerning its policy of extrajudicial assassinations.
It is reasonable to assume, therefore, that Israel is the one country that attacks Iran with impunity as far as the UN is concerned. Israel is the wild child that isn’t even expected to play by the rules.
It’s further reasonable to assume that the US would be left with little option than to join in using Israel as the big bad front guy. George W. Bush has promised to defend Israel no matter what on various occasions. And last week Republican Sen. John McCain while admitting that military action against Iran would be very complicated, the US couldn’t risk a nuclear Iran exterminating Israel.
In the meantime, Israel’s Prime Minister-designate Ehud Olmert is working the crowds, psychologically preparing the international community for the inevitable perhaps.
“Ahmadinejad speaks like Hitler before taking power. He speaks of the complete destruction and annihilation of the Jewish people,” he recently told a German paper.
A growing chorus of Americans are wondering whether US saber rattling against Iran has more to do with Israel’s security than their own, a trend which is bothering American Jewish groups.
In an article titled “Iran-Israel linkage by Bush seen as threat” published in a New York publication The Jewish Week, James D. Besser and Larry Cohler-Esses say this:
“President Bush is risking a backlash that could injure the Jewish community - and his own cause - by repeatedly citing Israel as his top rationale for possible US military conflict with Iran, Jewish leaders and Middle East analysts warned this week”.
“Bush’s repeated, sometimes exclusive, focus on Israel could spark public fury against the Jewish state and Jews if US military action is accompanied by skyrocketing gas prices, terrorism at home or fallen GIs, who might be seen as dying for Israel,” they say. Indeed!
In the final analysis, there is no perfect outcome to this impasse other than a completely nuclear-free Middle East, a proposal previously advanced by Tehran and ignored. Well, we can dream can’t we?
