Blog-on-Blog: About Jeffrey Goldberg Blog Bashing Roger Cohen
Posted by K.E. White on March 17, 2009
Summary: Let’s move on from debates over the character of the Iranian regime; it gets us no closer to the real questions: 1) how best to deter Iran from going nuclear and 2) if Iran develops nuclear weapons, how best to prevent catastrophe.
Yesterday Jeffrey Goldberg dedicated his Atlantic blog entry to exposing NYTimes columnist Roger Cohen’s shallow conception of the Iranian threat faced by Israel. You can read/watch the ‘Cohen evisceration’ here in full, but here’s boiled down version:
-Roger Cohen debated Rabbi David Wolpe; the topic: Iran and Israel
-Wolpe insists Cohen imagine a time when the balance of power between Iran and Israel flips: meaning when Iran has nuclear weapons/equal or greater conventional military capabilities. Add to this that Hamas and Hezbollah are Iran proxies, and thus would reap direct benefits from such strategic flip.
-Cohen waffles—says some things about stopping Iran from getting The Bomb. Audience laughs.
The problems with this semantic takedown (even if Contentions gives it kudos):
A. Iran gaining non-nuclear parity with Israel
While Israeli armed forces are more sophisticated, Iran could already damage Israel with a combo-punch of ballistic missiles and, yes, funded terrorist attacks on Israel
Why hasn’t this happened?
The Israeli nuclear shield: If Iran ever made such a unilateral move, the regime would be over.
B. But what if Iran gets The Bomb?
The counter to the Goldberg/Wolpe point: couldn’t a nuclear Iran and nuclear Israel follow general deterrence theory?
Yes, one could believe that Iran really wants to destroy Israel no matter the price—even if the price is the destruction of Iran itself. But if such a fanatical approach was true, why wouldn’t Iran do it now? Heck, even if they just try to get Israel to launch enough nuclear weapons—the after-effects of the attack could do the trick.
C. Defensive Reasons for an Iranian nuclear weapons program
Not unlike Russia responding to the American nuke, China responding to nuclear bullying, or Pakistan reacting to the India’s nuclear acquisition, there are rational and defensive reasons for Tehran to seek The Bomb. Israel is a nuclear-weapons state, and the Iranian regime has learned (thanks to Iraq) that actually having weapons is the best defense from regime change. And, yes, on top of that a nuclear Tehran would most likely become the hegemon of the Arab world.
These benefits go away if Tehran either attacks Israel, or hands off a nuclear suitcase to Hamas. If India and Pakistan could stop themselves from pressing the button, Iran and Israel can do the same.
D. Reasons to Fear a Nuclear-Armed Iran/What We Should Be Talking About
I am not fan of a nuclear-armed Iran. The current Iranian regime is an unstable, autocratic and exceeding dangerous one.
But my concerns over a nuclear-armed Iran are as follows:
- It could lead to a massive nuclear build-up between Israel and Iran
-plunge the Middle East into a nuclear proliferating arms race
-result: greatly increase the likelihood of a nuclear accident or nuclear misread
These are the reasons to fear a nuclear-armed Iran, not the Wolpe/Goldberg thesis. And if they really want to find a problem with Cohen’s position, they should read Daniel Drenzer’s blog at FP.
the real debate isn’t over the attitude of the Iranian regime (a murky, passionate and—at heart—subjective debate), but how to effectively deter Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon. And how best to prepare the global community for an Iranian nuke would be a good backup discussion.
