Bill Keller, "Bomb-Bomb-Bomb, Bomb-Bomb-Iran?": Clueless

Bill Keller, formerly executive editor of The New York Times, left his top dog position to become a full-time writer. Given the insight, or lack thereof, of his latest Times op-ed, "Bomb-Bomb-Bomb, Bomb-Bomb-Iran?" (http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/23/opinion/keller-bomb-bomb-bomb-bomb-bomb-iran.html?pagewanted=1&ref=opinion), perhaps he should have remained executive editor. Keller writes:

"The point of tough sanctions, of course, is to force Iranians to the bargaining table, where we can do a deal that removes the specter of a nuclear-armed Iran. . . . But the mistrust is so deep, and the election-year pressure to act with manly resolve is so intense, that it’s hard to imagine the administration would feel free to accept an overture from Tehran. Anything short of a humiliating, unilateral Iranian climb-down would be portrayed by the armchair warriors as an Obama surrender. Likewise, if Israel does decide to strike out on its own, Bibi Netanyahu knows that candidate Obama will feel immense pressure to go along.

That short-term paradox comes wrapped up in a long-term paradox: an attack on Iran is almost certain to unify the Iranian people around the mullahs and provoke the supreme leader to redouble Iran’s nuclear pursuits, only deeper underground this time, and without international inspectors around. Over at the Pentagon, you sometimes hear it put this way: Bombing Iran is the best way to guarantee exactly what we are trying to prevent."

"It’s hard to imagine the administration would feel free to accept an overture from Tehran"? Sorry, Bill, but the US is not going to receive any such overture. Rather, the US should expect more games involving contradictory declarations (see: http://jgcaesarea.blogspot.com/2012/01/david-ignatius-iran-gets-message-from.html) and brinksmanship from Iran, which is intent upon acquiring nuclear weaponry.

Keller claims that "Mahmoud Ahmadinejad does a good impression of an evil madman, but Iran is not suicidal." Oh really? As observed by Michael Oren (http://www.commentarymagazine.com/article/seven-existential-threats/), who knows a bit more about this situation than Keller:

"Some Israeli experts predict that the Iranian leadership would be willing to sacrifice 50 percent of their countrymen in order to eradicate Israel."

Evidence of Iran's willingness to martyr its citizenry? One need only look to its war with Iraq from 1980-1988, which resulted in between 500,000 and a million Iranian fatalities, and during which Iran used human-waves of children to clear minefields.

"An attack on Iran is almost certain to unify the Iranian people around the mullahs and provoke the supreme leader to redouble Iran’s nuclear pursuits, only deeper underground this time, and without international inspectors around"? Sorry, but this is not what happened when Israel Israel leveled the Syrian Al Kibar reactor in Operation Orchard in 2007, or when Israel bombed the Osirak reactor in Iraq in 1981, much to the world's relief, in Operation Opera.

No, I'm not advocating an immediate attack on Iran. Let's first see how Europe's decision to boycott Iranian oil (see: http://www.jpost.com/IranianThreat/News/Article.aspx?id=254780) affects the Iranian economy. The value of the Iranian rial is crumbling, and this will seriously impede Iranian funding of Hezbollah in Lebanon and Islamic Jihad in Gaza.

"Election-year pressure to act with manly resolve"? How about plain and simple resolve. If Obama had been astute enough to see through Iran's masquerade at the beginning of his term, instead of seeking to prove the fallacy of Bush's Axis of Evil, he would not be dealing with this current dilemma. Always ready in the past to draw a new line in the sand, Obama is now facing unwavering demands from Saudi Arabia and the UAE to put an end to the Iranian threat. There is no more room to procrastinate, wiggle and play nice.

Regarding Israel, Keller is even more in the dark.