Page 2 of 2 SPEAKING FREELY The benefits of a nuclear Iran
By Aetius Romulous
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For both China and India, an Iranian bomb would mean security for
their oil resources and investments. Without one, each would have to make
decisions about threats to their oil supplies - as they do now. It also helps
to have a well-defended oil head that is willing to defend their price point
interests as well. Having access to oil is one thing, being able to pay for it
is another.
Russia does not want Iran to have the bomb. Russia is in the enviable position
of being a world leader in both the bomb and oil. They have loads of each. By
supplying Iran with technological
support for their "civilian" nuclear program, the Russians are taking care of
business on several different fronts. If a bomb were built in Iran, it would
cause instability in the short run, and that would help support the oil prices
Russia needs to maintain its own progressive economic agenda. Furthermore,
Russia can mitigate the speed and scope of Iranian nuclear development, a fact
not unknown to American statesmen.
For Russia, the Iranian bomb thingy is a perfect bargaining chip for use in
extracting both geographic security and open markets from the Americans. If the
Iranians are going to develop a bomb, they figure, it might as well be with
them. It's good business and it extends Russian influence into the Middle East
through the regions latest hegemon.
Russia shares nuclear proliferation concerns with America, however. It is
absolutely essential that the former Cold War enemies contain the spread of
bomb-equipped nations. Each is facing crippling expense in building and
maintaining vast, unnecessary nuclear arsenals. Game Theory demanded an
ever-increasing build up in arms to maintain the deterrent value and effect.
The point at which theory left and insanity stepped in is hard to discern,
however contemporary leaders in both America and Russia are learning that as
long as each reduces arms at a rate that does not disturb the equilibrium, both
can save a bunch of time, trouble and money. The increase in nuclear states
threatens to keep this threat floor artificially high, and eat into projected
billions of dollars saved.
It would be tough to decide who needs oil more, America or China. Each is
approaching the issue from different directions. China is quietly using its
Goliath state industries to buy up the resources of the Earth necessary to
power its future. It can do this because capitalism is becoming no match for
state-controlled resource acquisition. At the same time, America has been
foiled in its attempt to use its super power status and invincible military
machine to project influence over the most important sources of ready oil in
the world.
Addicted to oil, America depends solely on the strength of free markets now to
keep a tenuous grip on its future supply. America needs not just oil, however,
but politically predictable prices for oil to defend its economy and the US
dollar that the economy supports.
America has an arsenal of bomb and bomb-like technology that has become so
large it has made its investment pointless. Even an untoward glance towards the
button, and an economic thermal nuclear explosion would blow through every
household in America. $7.00 a gallon gasoline. War-making in America is
approaching a trillion dollars a year and it has done nothing to protect
America's most strategic asset, the oil it needs but doesn't have.
America is also friends with both the Saudis and the Israelis, each of whom are
sworn enemies of each other. America exchanges military hardware and their
nuclear umbrella over the Saudis in exchange for oil, unfettered access to
history's most epic sinkhole of energy, and simply scads of money. The Saudis
need this protection from its neighbors, the late, great Saddam Hussein and his
heretical secularist Islamic state, and the dreaded Persians. The shield is
useless against a bomb-laden Israel though.
Israel is justifiably nervous about the geographic reality the British left
them in 1948. Israel imports absolutely everything of value, oil included. It
also sits atop the most irrationally contested real estate in all of human
civilization. Attacking threats without the bomb mercilessly has proven to be
well worth the penalties on every occasion. That is because the penalty for
attacking an existential threat that can unleash holy hell on its principal
ally is several orders of magnitude greater. An Iranian nuclear response to an
aggressive Israel would have ramifications that no theory of games could ever
envision. Absolutely no one is in a position to imagine what may come next.
What would China do about its investment in Iran? India? How would Pakistan
react to India? What would the Russians do - sit back and watch the show, the
price of their massive oil supplies rocketing skyward? What on earth would the
Americans do? Who can tell and what's more, who wants to find out? Nobody.
America should simply give Iran the bomb. That is the rational solution to the
problem. Iran could most possibly get one regardless, and if it does it would
lean on Russia for support. A nuclear Iran would restore parity to the insanity
of nuclear gamesmanship, and provide everybody with the same rational
consequence to its foreign policy decisions. Being supported by America, an
Iranian nuclear program would be inoculated against a very real and probable
Israeli threat.
Iran would have no further use for its traditional tools of regional power like
Hezbollah in Lebanon. This also guarantees China and India oil security, and
checks the expansion of Russian influence over Iran which, incidentally, sits
between Iraq and Afghanistan. America exchanges arms for oil market stability,
and everybody wins.
But of course that won't happen, and for reasons that we all share intuitively,
and for which we need no explanation. It simply won't. Instead, something else
will happen. Something else unsustainable and inequitable, something that
leaves a Versailles-sized hole in it. Despite the desperate situation the Earth
finds itself in, where exponential growth demands exponential depletion of
resources, a series of decisions will cause a series of actions that have more
to do with dogma, religion and nationalism than any kind of rational realism.
Just like it has always been, with the exciting addition of Game Theory and
nuclear warheads. Ugh.
Aetius Romulous is a freelance contributor based in Canada.
Speaking Freely is an Asia Times Online feature that allows guest writers to have
their say. Please
click hereif you are interested in contributing.
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