Attack Iran? Don't Even Consider It

U.S. Rep. Ron Paul, a conservative champion of free markets and limited government, told us in 2007 how our government's foreign policy would inevitably get us into war with Iran. Paul, of course, opposes interventionist wars.

As a nation, we can hope the wise physician was wrong. More and more, he looks like a prophet.

Newspapers throughout the country carried an Associated Press story Monday about an interview CNN conducted with Michael Hayden, former head of the CIA under president George W. Bush. Hayden said a U.S.-led attack on Iran was low priority during his tenure. Today, said the AP story, Hayden believes war with Iran is "inexorable."

A spokesperson for Hayden later said the statement was misrepresented; Hayden meant Iran's completion of a nuclear program, not war with Iran, seems inexorable. Either way, considering U.S. policy regarding the Middle East, an intervention in Iran seems likely. As Paul said in 2007: "I think if our policies don't change it's about as inevitable as you can expect because we're unwilling to talk to them and every week we're passing more sanctions and rules and intimidations and accusations and provocations.... The American people don't know how we have been involved since 1953 in interfering with their government and it has hurt us."

Hayden predicts Iran will build its nuclear program to the point where it's just below having weapons. That would destabilize the region, he said.

Considering the fact U.S. foreign policy is first and foremost obsessed with more stability in the Middle East, not less, it's hard to imagine President Barack Obama, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, the Department of Defense and our allies will resist the urge to use force. U.S. officials have said as much, assuring the world that military action remains on the table if sanctions continue failing to deter Iran — which they will.

So the writing is on the wall. Iran continues advancing a nuclear program the United States will not tolerate and our foreign policy has become no less interventionist under Obama and Clinton.

Let's hope our nation's leaders will let facts stand in their way. Here are the facts: 1) We cannot afford another war because we are far beyond broke, buried under debt. 2) Iran would be a more difficult foe than Afghanistan or Iraq. 3) The wars we're fighting have crippled our economy and taken the lives of American men and women for little in return. 4) A nation cannot prosper while remaining in a perpetual state of war because death and destruction, while sometimes essential for a nation's survival, do not produce wealth. The list could go on.

Iran will have nuclear capacity and we must accept that fact. Fortunately, the United States, Israel and other U.S. allies are capable of deterring aggression with threats of retaliation so forceful it's unthinkable. We cannot afford to impose our agenda on every rogue nation that develops nuclear power. If we do, we will destroy ourselves Soviet style. We will fritter time, energy and wealth on interventionist adventures. Attack Iran preemptively? No way.

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