Evidence: Recently Added
With regard to Iran, there is no reason to believe that an attack on the facilities in Bushehr, Arak, or Natanz would have any different consequence than the Osirak example. Such an attack would likely embolden and enhance Iran's nuclear prospects in the long term. In the absence of an Iranian nuclear weapon program, which IAEA inspectors have yet to find, a preemptive attack by the United States or Israel would provide Iran with the impetus and justification to pursue a full blown covert nuclear deterrent program, without the inconvenience of IAEA inspections. Such an attack would likely be seen as an act of aggression not only by Iran but most of the international community, and only serve to weaken any diplomatic coalition currently available against Iran.The most troubling aspect of such a scenario is that, unlike Iraq in 1981, Iran is not dependent on foreign imports for nuclear technology and already has available the raw materials, and most of the designs and techniques, required to pursue a nuclear weapons program. Iran has the necessary know-how and has already produced every stage of the nuclear fuel cycle.[31] Furthermore, Iran has uranium mines in Yazd and is in the process of constructing milling plants to manufacture yellow cake uranium and conversion plants that convert it to UF6 gas.[32] Iran has also begun manufacturing its own gas centrifuges used to enrich uranium. Even if Natanz, Arak, and Bushehr were destroyed in a preemptive strike, Iran probably has duplicate equipment that can be activated and has the know-how to produce more, to pursue a more vigorous and unabated nuclear weapons program in the long term.
Yet another way Iran could drive up oil prices is by threatening free passage of oil through the Straits of Hormuz or by engaging in naval mining in the Gulf (by its surface fleet of fast boats or with its smaller submarines) and other key locations (as it did in the late 1980s). Iran has already deployed anti-shipping missiles at Qeshm, Abu Musa Island, and on Sirri Island, all of which are in range of shipping through the Strait. It has also occupied and fortified three islands inside the shipping lanes of the Strait of Hormuz -- Abu Musa, the Greater Tunbs, and the Lesser Tunbs. Given that one-fifth of the world's oil flows through the Straits (as well as roughly a quarter of America's supply of oil) and that no other nation has fortified its shores near Hormuz, an Iranian threat to disrupt commerce there would have to be taken seriously by commercial concerns (e.g., insurers and commodity markets) and other nations.
It appears that Iran, unlike Iraq or Israel, does not have a dedicated crash program to build a nuclear bomb. Iran’s strategy is more cunning—and more difficult to stop. Iran seems to be following the Japanese model, trying to acquire all the capabilities necessary to build nuclear weapons should it make a decision to do so sometime in the future. The fact that the NPT allows states to acquire these duel-use capabilities is one of the greatest weaknesses of the current non-proliferation regime. Iran is now exploiting this legal loophole.Thus, Iran may not be conducting any weapon-specific research now, for fear that discovery of such activity would, as the United States hopes, bring united international condemnation, a cut-off of all nuclear assistance, and economic sanctions. But is is doing everything short of that. Now that its clandestine program has been disclosed, Iran is trying to minimize embarrassing disclosures of past weapons-related activities, persist in its fuel production activities, and force the rest of the world to accept a fait accompli.
One of the reasons Iran refuses to accept guaranteed nuclear fuel from Russia is the fear of becoming energy dependent and thus subject to the whims of the fuel providers. However, as discussed above, Iran does not have sufficient uranium ore reserves to secure energy independence for any significant amount of energy generation. A complete domestic fuel cycle is not a requisite for having a strong and efficient civilian nuclear program. In fact, although 31 countries are currently operating 440 nuclear reactors and 56 countries have 284 research reactors, only 8 countries enrich uranium on an industrial scale. Most countries buy their fuel from these fuel-producing countries. It does not make economic sense for any nation to invest the billions of dollars needed for indigenous fuel fabrication unless the national infrastructure consists of 20 or more nuclear reactors. Iran has yet to begin operation of its first reactor. Its original plans detailed the construction of 7 reactors by 2020. Only when this economic fact of nuclear life was pointed out by critics of the Iranian program did officials quickly revise their plans to include 20 reactors by 2030.
So although a renewed Shiite messianism does create some cause for concern about the potential uses of an Iranian bomb — in particular because it suggests that Ahmadinejad may be more a utopian than a realist — it is almost certainly a mistake to anticipate that Iran would use its nuclear power in a way that would provoke large-scale retaliation and assured self-destruction. Iranian leaders have been more than ready to sacrifice their own citizens in large numbers. During the Iran-Iraq war, major efforts went into recruiting young boys to the Basij militias, which were then sent to the front lines on what were essentially suicide missions. Religion played the central part in motivating the teenage soldiers, and it is reasonable to believe that religion helped salve the consciences of those who ordered these children into battle. Yet even this discounting of the value of human life — in a war started by Saddam Hussein, not by Iran — fell short of voluntarily putting an entire nation at risk. Ahmadinejad surely understands the consequences of using a nuclear bomb, and Shiite Islam, even in its messianic incarnation, still falls short of inviting nuclear retaliation and engendering collective suicide.
Aggressive democracy promotion undermines the great power cooperation on which nonproliferation success ultimately depends. Any strategy to persuade or coerce a country to reverse a program that has neared the capability to build nuclear weapons requires the full support of all the major powers. The best way to achieve international unity is through the United Nations Security Council. Security Council resolutions made under Chapter VII are mandatory for all states to uphold. But Russia and China hold veto power in the UN Security Council, and they will most likely refuse to support sanctions that would be needed to coerce Iran or other countries to give up nuclear activities so long as they believe that the deeper aim of the United States (and the West) is regime change.
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