Some in the U.S. want peace. I guess no one else gives a shit and is just going to jettison us into a war for millennia.
Copy and paste this nonsense argument for Iraq 3 trillion dollars ago.
Put another way: if you want to call it appeasement, fine, it has worked for a long time. On the other hand, "peace via war" has a terrible track record.
The US clearly does not believe they have operational nukes, or we would not have bombed them today. The actions undermine the official statements.
Put in realpolitik: would it be worth the US spending an Iraq War's expenditure of lives and $3 trillion to prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon?
Why?
What makes this moment the place where the working approach of the last half-century simply cannot work another day?
The question is only, did they have the means to, and was there an indication they were? The answer is yes. They were enriching uranium at levels that go beyond anything non-nefarious. Their lead nuclear scientists were going to be meeting with their ballistic missile scientists (according to the dossier.)
On would it be worth it: nuclear proliferation is probably the most dangerous existential threat that humanity faces that is completely preventable. Iran is the most destabilizing country in the region and the cascade of nuclear proliferation that would occur if they succeeded would be a nightmare. That is easily worth $3T.
You misspelled Israel, and a reminder that Israel is the only nation in the region with multiple nuclear warheads.
https://carnegieendowment.org/emissary/2025/06/israel-iran-w...
Nonproliferation via war is not a viable approach.
This reminds me to read more on the game theory aspect of nuclear states. But I do find it fascinating that no nuclear-armed states have ever been in a shooting war. Interesting to speculate whether the Middle East could have seen less bloodshed over the decades if all the players had been armed since near the beginning of the nuclear age.
It is not safer for more states to have nukes simply because it introduces more variables that are hard or impossible to control.
And accidents/mistakes/miscommunications account for most (all?) of our closest calls with nukes.
But it is also clear that enforcement of nonproliferation without similarly muscular enforcement of sovereignty in general creates a huge incentive for proliferation.
If we truly want nonproliferation, it simply follows that powerful nations must stop actions like the Russian conquest in Ukraine and whatever Israel is doing in Iran. Every government at base has an incentive to do everything possible keep bombs from falling on its cities, and a demonstrated nuclear capability is the only proven way to do that in a regime where nuclear powers are allowed to act with impunity.
Maybe we are detracting from some regional terrorism at the margins while increasing incentives for nuclear proliferation. I don’t think that’s a smart trade off, but that’s where we are headed.
And there's the answer: on the world stage, you’d better be close friends with someone who has nukes, have your own, or be forced into a client state.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1953_Iranian_coup_d%27%C3%A9ta...
Yes. Do not proliferate nuclear weapons. It’s not a big ask.
> you’d better be close friends with someone who has nukes
This is a completely acceptable and reasonable solution. It is how most of Europe operates.
It's a very big ask to not proliferate nuclear weapons, because nukes correlate with sovereignty. You didn’t address that point at all.
> This is a completely acceptable and reasonable solution. It is how most of Europe operates.
US friendship in the case of Iran means a puppet ruler (Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, the last Shah of Iran). And now Europe is in the process of decoupling itself from the US. Not to mention how the US completely dropped support for Ukraine. Turns out relying on an "ally" for defense like this is not such a great idea.
Israel also understands this, and so has multiple nukes in its arsenal. Why did Israel "simply" not proliferate nuclear weapons even when it enjoyed the protection and support of the US?
Given the track record in the region and the relationships involved, not getting a nuke seamless will lead to getting bombed with almost 100% certainty over a long enough period.
If they botch the quiet part, they'll almost certainly get bombed in the short term, which may or may not lead to the end of the project. But then will almost certain prevent getting bombed more in the future.
A nuclear armed Iran - and remember that in vast swathes of the middle east, Iran is considered a very dangerous enemy - would lead to the rest of the middle east rapidly pursuing their own nuclear weapons.
Last night I tried to explain to my MIL that Iran did not do 9/11 (after she claimed this was finally payback for that). She responded that I was wrong because I listen to the liberal media. It was like a cartoon, I felt like a crazy person. she was so convinced that if Iran got nuclear weapons they would immediately use them on US soil. When I pointed out that would be suicide for them, and accomplish absolutely nothing, she said they aren’t rational, they just want to end the world.
Her only news source is Fox, so that must be who’s peddling this nonsense.
There’s an optimist in me that says, maybe by some small miracle that given enough time in a cold-ish war current Iranian regime will get replaced by something democratic and stable. Probably a pipe dream the way things are going, but not impossible.