Iran Must Not Get The Bomb
Lately in Middle East news it seems that all you hear about is Iran and their attempt to acquire a Nuclear Bomb. There is also a lot of talk about a possible Israeli strike on Iran, and it may seem that a nuclear armed Iran would pose a threat to Israel alone. In fact, this is not the case. A nuclear armed Iran poses a threat to the entire Middle East region, Europe, the United States of America, and indeed, the entire world. Iran is considered the worlds largest state sponsor of terror by the U.S., and they have attacked us in the past through their proxy terror organizations. Iran was found to have aided Al Qaeda in the 9/11 attacks by a Manhattan District Court Judge in 2011. A nuclear armed Iran would also set off a nuclear arms race in the most volatile region in the world, with other Arab states following in an attempt to combat Iranian dominance. Americans are tired of a decade of war in the Middle East and we do not want to become embroiled in a conflict with Iran that would undoubtedly be much bigger than Iraq and Afghanistan. But we have learned our lesson in WW2 that U.S. isolationism is a failed policy, and we must accept our role as world leader no matter how painful it may be at times. Hopefully a military conflict can be avoided, but we cannot let one of the most dangerous regimes acquire the most dangerous weapon on earth; That scenario would be much worse for everyone. Remember that Iran’s hateful speech refers to the U.S. as ‘The Big Satan’ and Israel as ‘The Little Satan’. A nuclear armed Iran is a threat to the entire world, Israel just happens to be first in their sights.
Our shaky relations with Iran stem back to the 1979 Iran Hostage Crisis, when the U.S. embassy in Tehran was stormed, and 52 American hostages were held for 444 days. This attack scarred our country, and introduced us to the extremist elements inside of Iran. Anyone who watched the movie ‘Argo’, will partially know the trauma that those Americans trapped in Iran felt, as the terror comes alive on screen. Iran supports many global terrorist groups through funding and training. One of these terror groups is Hezbollah, which has carried out attacks against the United States. In 1983 Hezbollah used suicide bombers to attack the United States Embassy in Lebanon killing 63 and wounding 120. That same year Hezbollah used suicide bombers to attack the U.S. Marine Barracks in Lebanon, killing 241 Americans. In 1985 members of Hezbollah and Islamic Jihad hijacked TWA flight 847, holding the hostages for 3 days and killing U.S. Navy diver Robert Dean Stethem. In 1992 Iran backed terror groups used suicide bombers to attack the Israeli embassy in Buenos Aires killing 29 and wounding 242. A 1994 attack on the AMIA building in Buenos Aires killed 85 and wounded over 300. In 1996 Iran was again linked to the bombing of the Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia, in which 19 U.S. servicemen were killed and 372 were wounded. For many years Hamas, Islamic Jihad and Hezbollah have indiscriminately attacked the civilian population of Israel with rockets funded and provided by Iran. The links to Iranian terror do not stop there however.
More recently, Iran has been tied to the deaths of countless U.S. servicemen in Iraq and Afghanistan, with their funding and arming of insurgents. Former United States Director of National Intelligence Michael McConnell has stated “The Iranians today, we have clear evidence, are providing the very weapons that are causing U.S. servicemen and women to die. That’s clear, that’s not refuted, that’s not hawkish, that’s not shaded. That is the fact.” In 2011, Iranian linked agents attempted to assassinate the Saudi Ambassador in Washington D.C. using explosives, in a plot that sounds like a movie script. Most striking of all, Iran was found to have played a role in the 9/11 attacks, by a federal district court in Manhattan in December 2011. In Havlish v bin Laden, Judge George B. Daniels ruled that “Iran and Hezbollah meterially and directly supported al Qaeda in the September 11, 2001 attacks and are legally responsible for damages to hundreds of family members of 9/11 victims who are plaintiffs in the case.” This is quite a shocking revelation, and one which might not be known by the general public. Could you imagine a nuclear weapon in the hands of those who helped attack us on 9/11? As if all of that wasn’t enough, there are actually more reasons why Iran must not have a nuclear weapon.
Besides their history of state sponsored terrorism against U.S. interests and allies, Iran getting a nuclear bomb would set off a nuclear arms race in the most volatile region in the world. Sunni Saudi Arabia would seek to acquire the weapon to counter the power of their Shia Iran neighbors, followed by Egypt, Syria, Libya and any other tin pot dictator who wanted the protection that a nuclear weapon provides. The fear is not so much that Iran would actually use the bomb once they have it, but that the weapon would find it’s way to the hands of one of the terrorist groups they support. In the event of a nuclear attack on U.S. interests in the Middle East, Iran would have plausible deniability, and claim they had no part in it. This nuclear umbrella, which would be provided to Iranian backed terrorists across the Middle East, would embolden radicals and threaten moderates. Our moderate Gulf State allies face a direct threat from Iran who is trying to assert it’s dominance in the region. According to wikileaks documents, in 2008 Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah urged a strike on Iran’s nuclear program to “cut off the head of the snake.” According to a 2010 Reuters report on the leaks and what they exposed about moderate Gulf State’s sentiments regarding Iran “The Bahraini king also said Iran’s nuclear programme should be halted by any means, and the crown prince of the emirate of Abu Dhabi saw “the logic of war dominating” when it comes to dealing with the Iranian threat.” We must stand by our moderate friends in the region against the attempt by Iran at regional hegemonic power; They will be the first to suffer from a nuclear armed Iran.
After WW1 Americans were sick and tired of wars abroad, and were much more concerned with fixing our economic problems at home. The United States remained neutral during much of WW2, until the battle came to us on December 7, 1941 in the form of Pearl Harbor. Again, war came to us on September 11, 2001. We did not ask for it, but we will fight. The urge to turn our backs and leave the Middle East to take care of its own problems is not a responsible endeavor. It assumes that if we leave the world alone, the world will leave us alone. We have to really open our eyes to the possibility that not all people seek peace, and that evil really does exist in the world. Nazi Germany taught us that real evil does exist, and that we must fight it wherever it rears its head. It is hard for many of us to come to grips with this idea while we live in America, a land of peace and freedom rivaled by few nations in the world. However, there are those out there who would kill us simply because of our freedoms. The Iranian people have tried to rise up against their brutal, dictatorial, theocratic regime in 1999, in 2009, and again in 2011. Each time they were met with bullets. Our fight is not with the people of Iran, it is with the mad men who run their country. The only peaceful solution is for their leaders to reverse the country’s nuclear position, or for the people of Iran to successfully topple their government, neither of which seems plausible. The time for action is drawing near as they get closer to completing their weapon. Do not be fooled; There is only one nation that can confront the threat. It is the United States of America, not Israel, and not the moderate Gulf States. We will be challenged again as we have in the past. Will we turn our backs and hope for peace, allowing a brutal terrorist regime to acquire the most lethal weapon ever created? Or, will we harden our resolve and stand up to evil once more as we have in the past. The choice is yours.
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