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This is a poll with only two options.
In case Iran appears to be in the brink of acquiring nuclear weapons, such as testing a nuke but still not able to minituarize it for ICBM delivery, but about to complete the whole thing and become capable of delivering the weapon, what should the United States do?
1. Start a pre-emptive war and blow into pieces all components of Iran's nuclear program, regardless of the costs in American lives and treasury, regardless of collateral damage to civil populations, and regardless of international support by allies or lack thereof. The objective would require a major ground invasion to be able to find and destroy underground structures, there would be lots of American soldiers killed.
2. Diplomacy, sanctions, international pressure, whatever else but war, even if the efforts show more and more to be ineffective. Avoiding war at all costs, is what this option is, including, letting them be and allowing them to develop freely their nuclear weapons.
I'm not interested in hearing about intermediate positions like some limited military strikes against them, followed by diplomacy. I'm not interested in conditionals such as "war but only if we have support from a large coalition of allies." This poll is about war or no war, and it's about the United States doing it, even if alone.
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My own vote is for war. I'm fully aware that it's the same risky path adopted with Iraq, which resulted in a disaster and a quagmire, actually for nothing (it turned out that they didn't even have WMDs). I'm fully aware that pre-emptive wars are rather criminal and I'm not a neocon.
The reason why in the case of Iran I'd be for the ultimate solution, is that I think it is thoroughly unacceptable for Western countries to live with the risk posed by a nuclear armed Iran. It's much worse than North Korea, because although the North Korean dictator is extremely cruel, he isn't a religious fanatic and his only concern is regime survival.
In Iran, the regime is concerned about survival as well... but is ALSO concerned about bringing death to the infidels, death to America, death to Israel, all that crap. I'd be afraid that if in the future their regime crumbled due to internal pressures, they'd launch their entire arsenal at Western large cities, just to fulfill what they think is Allah's wish and to go down in a blast of glory, to then go to Muslim Heaven and enjoy their 72 virgins. They'd likely also diffuse their technology and nuclear weapons to other rogue groups and terrorists, who would then attack Westerners by proxy.
So, for me, I'd prefer diplomacy, but this poll supposes that diplomacy has already failed and their nuclear threat is imminent. In this case (and this case only) if they can be only stopped by war, so be it.
I think that if we spend trillions in a war and suffer thousands of casualties and inflict hundreds of thousands of casualties, it is still less bad than having nuclear mushrooms on top of Washington DC, New York City, London, Paris, Rome, and Berlin.
In case Iran appears to be in the brink of acquiring nuclear weapons, such as testing a nuke but still not able to minituarize it for ICBM delivery, but about to complete the whole thing and become capable of delivering the weapon, what should the United States do?
1. Start a pre-emptive war and blow into pieces all components of Iran's nuclear program, regardless of the costs in American lives and treasury, regardless of collateral damage to civil populations, and regardless of international support by allies or lack thereof. The objective would require a major ground invasion to be able to find and destroy underground structures, there would be lots of American soldiers killed.
2. Diplomacy, sanctions, international pressure, whatever else but war, even if the efforts show more and more to be ineffective. Avoiding war at all costs, is what this option is, including, letting them be and allowing them to develop freely their nuclear weapons.
I'm not interested in hearing about intermediate positions like some limited military strikes against them, followed by diplomacy. I'm not interested in conditionals such as "war but only if we have support from a large coalition of allies." This poll is about war or no war, and it's about the United States doing it, even if alone.
-------------
My own vote is for war. I'm fully aware that it's the same risky path adopted with Iraq, which resulted in a disaster and a quagmire, actually for nothing (it turned out that they didn't even have WMDs). I'm fully aware that pre-emptive wars are rather criminal and I'm not a neocon.
The reason why in the case of Iran I'd be for the ultimate solution, is that I think it is thoroughly unacceptable for Western countries to live with the risk posed by a nuclear armed Iran. It's much worse than North Korea, because although the North Korean dictator is extremely cruel, he isn't a religious fanatic and his only concern is regime survival.
In Iran, the regime is concerned about survival as well... but is ALSO concerned about bringing death to the infidels, death to America, death to Israel, all that crap. I'd be afraid that if in the future their regime crumbled due to internal pressures, they'd launch their entire arsenal at Western large cities, just to fulfill what they think is Allah's wish and to go down in a blast of glory, to then go to Muslim Heaven and enjoy their 72 virgins. They'd likely also diffuse their technology and nuclear weapons to other rogue groups and terrorists, who would then attack Westerners by proxy.
So, for me, I'd prefer diplomacy, but this poll supposes that diplomacy has already failed and their nuclear threat is imminent. In this case (and this case only) if they can be only stopped by war, so be it.
I think that if we spend trillions in a war and suffer thousands of casualties and inflict hundreds of thousands of casualties, it is still less bad than having nuclear mushrooms on top of Washington DC, New York City, London, Paris, Rome, and Berlin.
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