January 22, 2012

http://keller.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/01/22/how-about-not-bombing-iran/

How About Not Bombing Iran?

If you need more convincing of the grave risks of a preemptive bombing attack on Iran, I recommend these freshly published arguments from Colin H. Kahl, who was until recently Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for the Middle East in the Obama administration; R. Nicholas Burns, who was Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs in the George W. Bush administration; and my Times colleague Roger Cohen, who sums it up this way:

Here’s the bottom line: an Israeli attack unites Iran in fury, locks in the Islamic Republic for a generation, cements the Syrian regime, radicalizes the Arab world at a moment of delicate transition, ignites Hezbollah on the Lebanese border, boosts Hamas, endangers U.S. troops in the region, sparks terrorism, propels oil skyward, triggers a possible regional war, offers a lifeline to Iran just as Europe is about to stop buying its oil, adds a Persian to the Arab vendetta against Israel, and may at best set back Iran’s nuclear ambitions a couple of years.

But if not bombing, then what?