Iran and Nukes

According to Robert Baer, Bush already vetoed Israel's desire to bomb Iran's nuclear facilities.

I suppose he doesn't get any credit for that from the left...who insist Bush wants an excuse to bomb Iran. Nevertheless, I suspect Baer is right: a deal can be cut. We're clearly already working with the Iranians to stem the violence in Iraq. Long ago, I proposed a grand bargain with the state.

Clearly, the Iranians have a good deal of leverage right now. If they are at all pragmatic, they must recognize this and be willing to negotiate. Or maybe they think by getting nukes at the moment, they'll have more long term leverage. They look at Iraq and see a weak rival. They look at oil revenues and see riches and future riches and they see the possibility of having a nuke and being a world power.

But they also must look at two long term issues: the sustainability of oil revenue and their more liberal younger generation. Islamic rule is not popular with the younger generation of Iranians and unlike Iraq, where Saddam ran the place like a demented prison, Iran's demographic future has promise. There are clearly at least some liberal and less hardline voices in within Iran. So the long term game may favor us - as new technologies arise, our dependence on oil should drop and hurt the Iranian economy. And in 20 years, a new generation of Iranians will be coming to power, presumably more liberal than the current generation. In Iran, unlike in Iraq, time may be on our side.

And a country vying to become a world power has something to lose - so our strategy becomes military containment, protecting our ally (Israel), sewing seeds of liberalism among the young, and waiting it out.

Well...at least it's an idea.