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Iran Shows Its Cards

Mon, 14 Jul 2008 21:05:02 -0700

Iran Shows Its Cards
by Scott Ritter

There can no longer be any doubt about the consequences of any U.S. and/or Israeli military action against Iran. Armchair warriors, pundits and blustering politicians alike have been advocating a pre-emptive military strike against Iran for the purpose of neutralizing its nuclear-related infrastructure, as well as retarding Iran’s ability to train and equip “terrorist” forces on Iranian soil before dispatching them to Iraq or parts unknown. Some, including me, have warned of the folly of such action, and now Iran itself has demonstrated why an attack would be insane
I’ve always pointed out that no plan survives initial contact with the enemy, and furthermore one can never forget that, in war, the enemy gets to vote. On the issue of an American and/or Israeli attack on Iran, the Iranian military has demonstrated exactly how it would cast its vote. Iran recently fired off medium- and long-range missiles and rockets, in a clear demonstration of capability and intent. Shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, regional oil production capability and U.S. military concentrations, along with Israeli cities, would all be subjected to an Iranian military response if Iran was attacked.
The Bush administration has shrugged off the Iranian military display as yet another example of how irresponsible the government in Tehran is. But the Pentagon for one has had to sit up and pay attention. For some time now, the admirals commanding the U.S. Fifth Fleet in the Persian Gulf have maintained that they have the ability to keep the Strait of Hormuz open. But the fact is, the only way the United States could guarantee that the strait remained open would be to launch a massive pre-emptive military strike that swept the Iranian coast clear of the deadly Chinese-made surface-to-surface missiles that Iran would use to sink cargo ships in the strategic lane. This strike would involve hundreds of tactical aircraft backed up by limited ground action by Marines and U.S. Special Operations forces which would involve “boots on the ground” for several days, if not weeks. Such a strike is not envisioned in any “limited” military action being planned by the United States. But now that it is clear what the Iranian response would entail, there can no longer be any talk of a “limited” military attack on Iran.
The moment the United States makes a move to secure the Strait of Hormuz, Iran will unleash a massive bombardment of the military and industrial facilities of the United States and its allies, including the oil fields in Iraq, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar. American military bases in Iraq and Kuwait, large, fixed and well known, would be smothered by rockets and missiles carrying deadly cluster bombs. The damage done would run into the hundreds of millions, if not into billions, of dollars, and hundreds, if not thousands, of U.S. military personnel killed and wounded.
To prevent or retard any Iranian missile attack, the United States would have to commit hundreds of combat sorties, combined with Special Operations Forces, to a counter-missile fight which would need to span the considerable depth of the Persian landmass from which missiles might reach potential targets. While there has been some improvement in the U.S. military’s counter-missile capability, one must never forget that in 1991 not a single Iraqi Scud missile was successfully interdicted by any aspect of American military action (airstrike, ground action or antiballistic missile), and in 2003 the U.S. military had mixed results against the far less capable Al-Samoud missiles. Israel was unable to prevent Hezbollah from firing large salvoes of rockets into northern Israel during the summer 2006 conflict. There is no reason for optimism that the U.S. and Israel have suddenly found the solution to the Iranian missile threat.
There is virtually no chance the U.S. Navy would be able to prevent Iran from interfering with shipping through the strait. There is every chance the Navy would take significant casualties, in both ships lost and personnel killed or wounded, as it struggled to secure the strait. There would be a need for a significant commitment of ground forces to guarantee safe passage for all shipping, civilian and military alike. The longer ground forces could operate on Iranian soil, the better the chances Iranian missiles would not be able to effectively interdict shipping. Conversely, the longer ground forces operated on Iranian soil, the greater likelihood there would be of decisive ground engagement. With U.S. air power expected to be fully committed to the missile interdiction mission, any large-scale ground engagement would create a situation in which air power would have to be redirected into tactical support, and away from missile interdiction, creating a window of vulnerability which the Iranians would very likely exploit.
Iran has promised to strike targets in Israel as well, especially if Israel is a participant in any military action. Such Israeli involvement is highly unlikely, since to do so in any meaningful fashion Israel would need to fly in Iraqi air space, a violation of sovereignty the Iraqi government will never tolerate. The anti-American backlash that would be generated in Iraq would be immediate and severe. In short, virtually every operation involving the training of Iraqi forces would be terminated as the U.S. military trainers would need to be withdrawn to the safety of the fortified U.S. bases to protect them from attack. U.S. civilian contractors would likewise need to be either withdrawn completely from Iraq or restricted to the fortified bases. All gains alleged to have been made in the “surge” would be wiped away instantly. Worse, the Iraqi countryside would become a seething mass of anti-American activity, which would require a huge effort to reverse, if it ever could be. Iraq as we now know it would be lost, and what would emerge in its stead would not only be unsympathetic to the United States but actually a breeding ground for anti-American action that could very well expand beyond the boundaries of Iraq and the Middle East.
The chances of preventing an Iranian-Israeli clash in the event of a U.S. strike against Iran are slim to none. Even if Iran initially showed restraint, Hezbollah would undoubtedly join the fray, prompting an Israeli counterstrike in Lebanon and Iran which would in turn bring long-range Iranian missiles raining down on Israeli cities.
Neither the Israeli nor the American (and for that reason, European and Asian) economy would emerge intact from a U.S. attack on Iran. Oil would almost instantly break the $300-per-barrel mark, and because the resulting conflict would more than likely be longer and more violent that most are predicting, there is a good chance oil would top $500 or even more within days or weeks. Hyperinflation would almost certainly strike every market-based economy, and the markets themselves would collapse under the strain.
The good news is that the military planners in the Pentagon are cognizant of this reality. They know the limitations of American power, and what they can and cannot achieve. When it was uncertain how Iran would respond to a limited attack, either on their nuclear facilities or bases associated with the Revolutionary Guard Command, some planners might have thought that the U.S. could actually pull off a quick and relatively bloodless attack. Now that Iran has made it crystal clear that even a limited U.S. attack would bring about a massive Iranian response, all military planners now understand that any U.S. military attack will have to be massive. Simply put, the United States does not now have the military capacity in the Middle East to launch such a strike, and any redeployment of U.S. forces into the region could not go undetected, either by Iran, which would in turn redeploy its forces, or the rest of the world. Because a U.S. attack against Iran would have such horrific detrimental impact on the entire world, it is hard to imagine the international community remaining mute as American military might is assembled.
Likewise, despite the disposition of Congress to either remain silent on the issue or actively facilitate military action against Iran, it would become increasingly difficult for American lawmakers to ignore the consequences of a military strike on Iran, economically and politically. The same can be said of both major presidential candidates. The decision by Iran to show its hand on how it would respond to any American aggression has cleared the air, so to speak, about what is actually being discussed when one speaks of military action against Iran. In many ways, the Iranian missile tests have made it less likely that there will be a war with Iran, simply because the stakes of any such action are so plainly obvious to all parties involved.
Iran continues, based upon all available intelligence information, to pursue a nuclear program which is exclusively intended for peaceful energy purposes. Any concerns which may exist about the dual-use potential of Iran’s uranium enrichment programs can be mitigated through viable nuclear inspections conducted by the International Atomic Energy Agency. IAEA inspections should be improved upon by getting Iran to go along with an additional inspection protocol, rather than pursuing military action which will destroy the inspection process and remove the very verification processes which provide the international community with the confidence that Iran is not pursuing a nuclear weapons program.
The reality is that Iran’s nuclear program is here to stay. Iran has every right under international law to pursue this program, and regional and global tensions would be greatly reduced (along with the price of oil) if American policies, and in related fashion U.N. Security Council mandates, were adjusted accordingly. Israeli paranoia — derived not so much from any genuine Iranian threat but rather an affront to Israeli nuclear hegemony in the Middle East — must in turn be subdued. This can be done through a mixture of international pressure designed to punish Israel diplomatically and economically for any failure to adhere to international norms when it comes to peaceful coexistence with its neighbors, and international assurances that Israel’s sovereignty and viability as a nation-state will forever be respected and defended.
Of course, there can be no meaningful international pressure brought to bear on Israel without American participation, and herein lies the crux of the problem. Until the U.S. Congress segregates legitimate national security concerns from narrow Israeli-only issues, the pro-Israel lobby will have considerable control over American national security policy. The American Israel Public Affairs Committee’s continued push for congressional action concerning the implementation of what is tantamount to a naval blockade of Iran (and as such, an act of war) by pushing H. Con. Res 362 and S. Res 580 is mind-boggling given the reality of the situation. Congress must stop talking blockade, and start discussing stability and confidence-building measures.
There has never been a more pressing time than now for Congress to conduct serious hearings on U.S. policy toward Iran. Such hearings must not replicate the rubber-stamp hearings held by the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives in the summer of 2002. Those hearings were simply a facilitating vehicle for war with Iraq. New hearings must expand the body of witnesses beyond administration officials and those who would mirror their policy positions, and include experts and specialists who could articulate a counter point of view, exposing Congress to information and analysis which might prompt a fuller debate. This is the last thing AIPAC and the Bush administration want to see. But it is the one thing the American people should be demanding. Only an irrational person or organization could continue to discuss as viable a military strike against Iran. Sadly, based upon past and current policy articulations, neither AIPAC nor the Bush administration can be considered rational when it comes to the issue of Iran. It is up to the American people, through their elected representatives in Congress, to inject a modicum of sanity into a situation that continues to be in danger of spinning out of control.
Scott Ritter was a U.N. weapons inspector in Iraq from 1991 to 1998. He is the author of “Target Iran” (Nation Books, 2007).

US/IRAN: Fearing Escalation, Pentagon Fought Cheney Plan

Thu, 12 Jun 2008 09:20:34 -0700

Analysis by Gareth Porter

WASHINGTON, Jun 6 (IPS) - Pentagon officials firmly opposed a proposal by Vice President Dick Cheney last summer for air strikes against Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) bases by insisting that the administration would have to make clear decisions about how far the United States would go in escalating the conflict with Iran, according to a former George W. Bush administration official.

J. Scott Carpenter, who was then deputy assistant secretary of state in the State Department's Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs, recalled in an interview that senior Defense Department (DoD) officials and the Joint Chiefs used the escalation issue as the main argument against the Cheney proposal.

McClatchy newspapers reported last August that Cheney had proposal several weeks earlier "launching airstrikes at suspected training camps in Iran", citing two officials involved in Iran policy.

According to Carpenter, who is now at the Washington Institute on Near East Policy, a strongly pro-Israel think tank, Pentagon officials argued that no decision should be made about the limited air strike on Iran without a thorough discussion of the sequence of events that would follow an Iranian retaliation for such an attack. Carpenter said the DoD officials insisted that the Bush administration had to make "a policy decision about how far the administration would go -- what would happen after the Iranians would go after our folks."

The question of escalation posed by DoD officials involved not only the potential of the Mahdi Army in Iraq to attack, Carpenter said, but possible responses by Hezbollah and by Iran itself across the Middle East.

Carpenter suggested that DoD officials were shifting the debate on a limited strike from the Iraq-based rationale, which they were not contesting, to the much bigger issue of the threat of escalation to full-scale war with Iran, knowing that it would be politically easier to thwart the proposal on that basis.

The former State Department official said DoD "knew that it would be difficult to get interagency consensus on that question".

The Joint Chiefs were fully supportive of the position taken by Secretary of Defense Robert Gates on the Cheney proposal, according to Carpenter. "It's clear that the military leadership was being very conservative on this issue," he said.

At least some DoD and military officials suggested that Iran had more and better options for hitting back at the United States than the United States had for hitting Iran, according to one former Bush administration insider.

Former Bush speechwriter and senior policy adviser Michael Gerson, who had left the administration in 2006, wrote a column in the Washington Post Jul. 20, 2007 in which he gave no hint of Cheney's proposal, but referred to "options" for striking Iranian targets based on the Cheney line that Iran "smuggles in the advanced explosive devices that kill and maim American soldiers".

Gerson cited two possibilities: "Engaging in hot pursuit against weapon supply lines over the Iranian border or striking explosives factories and staging areas within Iran." But the Pentagon and the military leadership were opposing such options, he reported, because of the fear that Iran has "escalation dominance" in its conflict with the United States.

That meant, according to Gerson that, "in a broadened conflict, the Iranians could complicate our lives in Iraq and the region more than we complicate theirs."

Carpenter's account of the Pentagon's position on the Cheney proposal suggests, however, that civilian and military opponents were saying that Iran's ability to escalate posed the question of whether the United States was going to go to a full-scale air war against Iran.

Pentagon civilian and military opposition to such a strategic attack on Iran had become well-known during 2007. But this is the first evidence from an insider that Cheney's proposal was perceived as a ploy to provoke Iranian retaliation that could used to justify a strategic attack on Iran.

The option of attacking nuclear sites had been raised by President Bush with the Joint Chiefs at a meeting in "the tank" at the Pentagon on Dec. 13, 2006 and had been opposed by the Joint Chiefs, according a report by Time magazine's Joe Klein last June. After he become head of the Central Command in March 2007, Adm. William Fallon also made his opposition to such a massive attack on Iran known to the White House, according Middle East specialist Hillary Mann, who had developed close working relationships with Pentagon officials when she worked on the National Security Council staff.

It appeared in early 2007, therefore, that a strike at Iran's nuclear programme and military power had been blocked by opposition from the Pentagon. Cheney's proposal for an attack on IRGC bases in June 2007, tied to the alleged Iranian role in providing both weapons -- especially the highly lethal explosively formed projectiles (EFPs) -- and training to Shiite militias appears to have been a strategy for getting around the firm resistance of military leaders to such an unprovoked attack.

Although the Pentagon bottled up the Cheney proposal in inter-agency discussions, Cheney had a strategic asset which could he could use to try to overcome that obstacle: his alliance with Gen. David Petraeus.

As IPS reported earlier this week, Cheney had already used Gen. David Petraeus' takeover as the top commander of U.S. forces in Iraq in early February 2007 to do an end run about the Washington national security bureaucracy to establish the propaganda line that Iran was manufacturing EFPs and shipping them to the Mahdi Army militiamen.

Petraeus was also a supporter of Cheney's proposal for striking IRGC targets in Iran, going so far as to hint in an interview with Fox News last September that he had passed on to the White House his desire to do something about alleged Iranian assistance to Shiites that would require U.S. forces beyond his control.

At that point, Adm. Fallon was in a position to deter any effort to go around DoD and military opposition to such a strike because he controlled all military access to the region as a whole. But Fallon's forced resignation in March and the subsequent promotion of Petraeus to become CENTCOM chief later this year gives Cheney a possible option to ignore the position of his opponents in Washington once more in the final months of the administration.

Mythmaking for the next war

Fri, 6 Jun 2008 13:24:20 -0700

Steve Chapman, Chicago Tribune, May 22, 2008 
[snip]
But it's worthwhile to remember that even bad regimes sometimes have understandable motivations. The United States helped overthrow a democratically elected Iranian government in 1953 and provided aid to Saddam Hussein during the Iran-Iraq war of the 1980s. If Iran sees an interest in bleeding the U.S. military, that is likely a defensive response to the presence of an avowed enemy on its border rather than a sign of aggressive intent.
[snip]
 At the height of the Cold War, the Soviet Union had some 45,000 nuclear warheads. At the moment, Iran has none. But when Barack Obama said the obvious-that Iran does not pose the sort of threat the Soviet Union did- John McCain reacted as though his rival had offered to trade Ft. Knox for a sack of magic beans. "Such a statement betrays the depth of Sen. Obama's inexperience and reckless judgment," exclaimed McCain. "These are very serious deficiencies for an American president to possess."  But if Iran is the Soviet Union, I'm Shaquille O'Neal. There is nothing reckless in soberly distinguishing large threats from small ones, and there is something foolhardy in grossly exaggerating the strength of your enemies. As military powers go, Iran is a pipsqueak. It has no nuclear weapons. It has a pitiful air force. Its navy is really just a coast guard. It spends less on defense than Singapore or Sweden. Our military budget is 145 times bigger than Iran's.  By contrast, the Soviets had far more nuclear weapons than we did, a blue-water navy, formidable air power and ground forces that dwarfed ours. In a conventional war, it was anything but certain that we could prevail, and in a nuclear exchange, it was clear they could destroy us.  Iran is a very modest adversary. Of course, even a Chihuahua can bite. The U.S. government claims Iran has provided arms and training to Iraqi insurgents-never mind that it is allied with the government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki.  But it's worthwhile to remember that even bad regimes sometimes have understandable motivations. The United States helped overthrow a democratically elected Iranian government in 1953 and provided aid to Saddam Hussein during the Iran-Iraq war of the 1980s. If Iran sees an interest in bleeding the U.S. military, that is likely a defensive response to the presence of an avowed enemy on its border rather than a sign of aggressive intent. ... Even if Iran were to acquire atomic bombs, there is no reason to think it would use them or turn them over to terrorists. McCain, however, insists that Iran has "a commitment to Israel's destruction," and appears to think its leaders cannot be contained because of their religious fanaticism.  But as University of Michigan Middle East scholar Juan Cole has explained, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad never vowed to "wipe Israel off the map"-an oft-quoted phrase that Cole says is a mistranslation of the milder words he used. In fact, he says, "Ahmadinejad has never threatened Israel with physical aggression," however much he would welcome its collapse.  Even if the Iranians would like to destroy Israel, they face a powerful disincentive: the prospect of radioactive incineration. The Tehran government has been intimidated by less. Israeli historian Gershom Gorenberg writes in the May/June issue of Foreign Policy magazine: "Iran agreed to a cease-fire in the war with Iraq once Iraqi missiles began falling on Tehran. The ayatollahs were willing to sacrifice soldiers-but not to pay a higher price." Even fanatics have their limits.  Nor would Iran be so irrational as to give nukes to a terrorist group. That would be the worst of both worlds-giving up control of those weapons, while inviting annihilation the moment they are put to use.  But there is no reasoning with McCain and his allies, who yearn for the simple clarity of the Cold War. If we don't have an enemy on the mammoth scale of the Soviet Union, they will take a pint-sized one, inflate it beyond recognition and pretend that military confrontation is the only way to deal with it.  That was how we got into the war in Iraq and how, under a McCain presidency, we are liable to end up in a war in Iran. If he's looking for reckless judgment, he should look in the mirror.

Tehran Urges New Round Of Talks

Wed, 21 May 2008 21:20:52 -0700

Robin Wright,
Washington Post, Wednesday, May 21, 2008; A09  As the presidential candidates debate whether to deal with the Iranian regime, Tehran has called for new international talks on political, economic and security issues, including its controversial nuclear program and the Arab-Israeli peace process, according to a copy of the proposal released yesterday.  The proposal, attached to a May 13 letter from Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki to U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, includes cooperation spanning nuclear disarmament, peaceful nuclear technology, improved supervision by the U.N. nuclear watchdog, and establishing "fuel production consortiums" in several countries, including Iran. It also urges wide-ranging negotiations to help the Palestinians achieve a "sustainable, democratic and fair" solution?and calls for joint efforts to strengthen democracy in the Middle East, the Balkans, Africa and Latin America. The proposal also calls for collaboration against terrorism, drugs and illegal immigration.  Iran's proposal comes as the world's six major powers are set to offer Tehran revised incentives to suspend uranium enrichment, including access to new aircraft and negotiations on critical issues that will include senior U.S. diplomats.  But Iran's plan makes no pledge to suspend uranium enrichment, a process for both peaceful energy and weapons development - and at the heart of an international effort to ensure that the country does not develop a nuclear capability.  The Bush administration is studying the proposal and is consulting with Russia, China, France, Britain and Germany, while working on a date for European Union foreign affairs chief Javier Solana to present the incentives to Iran, the State Department said. But Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates yesterday questioned dealing with the regime of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad because of the "resurgence of the original hard-line views of the Islamic revolutionaries." Gates told a Senate panel: "The key here is developing leverage, either through economic or diplomatic or military pressures on the Iranian government, so that they believe they must have talks with the United States." ... In his letter, Mottaki said Iran believes "reasonable and just negotiations without preconditions and based on mutual respect is the basic solution for the promotion and improvement of international situations." He did not mention Iraq and Afghanistan, but noted that Iran can aid regional stability.  The proposal and letter were published by the Institute for Science and International Security. ISIS President David Albright said it would be a mistake to dismiss Iran's offer. "I see it as a way to start negotiations," he said, "albeit with the two sides far apart."

A Plea To Quiet Drums On Iran, And Try Talk

Mon, 12 May 2008 18:38:59 -0700

Stephen Kinzer,
Chicago Tribune, May 11, 2008  [Kinzer teaches at Northwestern and is the author of "All the Shah's Men: An American Coup and the Roots of Middle East Terror." He will testify Tuesday before a Chicago City Council committee considering a resolution urging negotiations with Iran.]  The ominous sound of war drums is once again echoing from Washington. Hardly a day goes by without new and more vivid threats against America's newest supposed enemy, Iran. It seems almost unbelievable that the United States, so bloodied and weakened by its adventure in Iraq, would contemplate an attack on another Middle Eastern country. Yet some American leaders seem bent on it.  Just a few months ago, the prospect of an American attack on Iran appeared to recede after U.S. intelligence agencies released an "estimate" asserting that Iran is not seeking to build nuclear weapons. In recent weeks, though, the Bush administration has come up with a new argument. The U.S. must consider attacking Iran, it now says, because Iran is stirring up trouble in Iraq.  It may well be true that groups in Iran are training guerrillas to cross into Iraq and fight U.S.-sponsored factions there, even killing American soldiers. Logic also suggests that Iranian leaders, under constant threat from two nuclear-armed powers, the U.S. and Israel, might wish to develop nuclear weapons of their own.  Americans have every reason to fear these developments. An angry, anti-American Iran with nuclear ambitions could gravely threaten Israel and U.S. interests in the Middle East. Attacking Iran, however, would intensify rather than ease those threats.  It is easy to foresee some of the results that might follow an American bombing campaign against Iran. They include a wave of revenge attacks on U.S. soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan; a surge of terrorism against Western targets; a retaliatory Iranian attack on Israel; a closing of the Strait of Hormuz, through which 20 percent of the world's oil passes; and rage in neighboring Pakistan, a frighteningly unstable country that has both nuclear weapons and powerful political factions sympathetic to the Taliban and Al Qaeda.  An American attack on Iran also would greatly strengthen President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who is now so unpopular among Iranian voters that he may not even seek re-election next year. People everywhere rally behind their leaders when their country is attacked. It is contrary to U.S. interests to take steps that would strengthen the Ahmadinejad faction, which makes no secret of its contempt for reason and the rule of law.  In the face of an imminent threat from Iran, and in the absence of alternatives, the U.S. might be justified in risking even these awful consequences. But there is an alternative, one the U.S. has never tried: direct, bilateral, comprehensive and unconditional negotiations.  It is by no means certain that negotiations with Iran would succeed. Before taking military action, however, the U.S. should at least offer to talk. Attacking Iran without exhausting all peaceful alternatives would not only be immoral, it would further isolate the U.S. and thereby weaken its national security.  If negotiations with Iran begin, the U.S. might soon discover that these two countries share many security interests.  Iran can help stabilize Iraq and Afghanistan. Iran is Al Qaeda's bitter enemy. Iran is terrified of instability in Pakistan. Iran wants to limit Russian influence in the Middle East. Iran's oil infrastructure is in a state of collapse and needs billions of dollars in investment, something the U.S. is well-positioned to provide.  Unlike most other countries in the region, Iran, with a constitution that dates back to 1906 and a long tradition of competitive elections, is fertile ground for democracy. Negotiations that draw Iran back into the world community could not only help defuse a crisis that threatens to spiral into catastrophe but might also lead ultimately to the emergence of a peaceful and prosperous Iran. That is why all of Iran's pro-democracy campaigners, from exiled dissident Akbar Ganji to heroic Nobel Peace Prize winner Shirin Ebadi, are pleading with Washington to abandon its snarling threats and test the negotiating option.  Some in Washington, however, evidently believe that the U.S. should do nothing to promote the emergence of nationalist democracies in the Middle East that might be reluctant to do Washington's bidding. This is a terribly short-sighted policy. Iran has always had and will always have influence in the Middle East. The United States should accept that fact and work to create an Iran that pulls the region toward democracy. Otherwise Iran will choose another big-power partner, most likely Russia or China-not a desirable outcome for the U.S.  There are three possible ways for the U.S. to deal with growing threats from Iran. One is to do nothing, which will allow Iran to intensify its nuclear program in ways that could profoundly threaten the region and global stability. The second is to launch a military attack, which would have devastating "blowback" consequences for the U.S., Israel and the Western world. The third is negotiation. This option is so low-cost that it seems folly not to try.