With the Iranians well on their way to developing long-range nuclear missiles, the Bush administration is faced with another pre-emptive war. Forget Liberia -- Iran should be the next target. Iran would be a better target than Iraq was: Iran is a major terrorist center, Iran is destabilizing the Iraqi reconstruction, Iran will certainly develop weapons of mass destruction in the near future, and the Iranian people are already pressing for their liberation.
But will the Bush administration push for war or play the waiting game? So far, the waiting game looks like the solid bet. The Washington Post reported on June 23 that the Bush administration is pursuing a policy of working within the United Nations and the international community to stymie Iranian nuclear efforts.
Pundits hope that the Iranian regime spontaneously combusts. Middle East expert Michael Ledeen of National Review says that "the regime is in a real jam." But will the obvious unrest in Iran translate into the drastic action necessary to not only topple the current regime but end the Iranian threat?
Without strong American involvement in any regime change, will the threat of Iranian military aggression be subdued? A new regime does not necessarily mean a pro-American regime. If America takes an active role in toppling the mullahs, perhaps Iranian anti-government feeling can be parlayed into pro-America sentiment. If not, any newly instituted Iranian regime could take the same foreign-policy tack as the current government.
The wait-and-see policy also holds the danger that no regime change will occur; the mullahs will have bought themselves months or years in which to manufacture nuclear weapons. Intelligence already shows that the Iranian government is dispersing its nuclear weapons program, making it virtually invulnerable to a 1981 Israeli-style pre-emptive bombing attack.
It is not comforting to see the Bush administration relying on the United Nations and International Atomic Energy Agency to shut down the mullahs. These organizations didn't get the job done in Iraq or North Korea, and Iran is infinitely more dangerous than either of those countries. Playing the waiting game is not a viable option.