Awkward Utopia

This week’s topic: Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s speech, and how to deal with Iran.

We began with debates over such questions as: What is terrorism? Who has been the bigger supporter of terrorism, Iran or Iraq? In what country does the most terrorism take place? And ultimately: Should we attack Iran, and should we have let Ahmadinejad speak at Columbia University last week?

FC: We’re complicit in human trafficking. The nature of monetary transactions makes it hard to know who you’re supporting.

LG: We’re still involved in Iraq. Our military isn’t capable of another successful invasion right now.

BL: Isn’t that what Israel is for?

FC: We should just have Israel bomb their nuclear facilities as soon as they are built.

MM: The American people wouldn’t support an attack of Iran without some catastrophic 9/11-like event.

Frank B: What would be the point? Eliminating their nuclear capabilities? Regime change? They have hundreds of facilities, some built into the mountains. Israel could not disable their nuclear capabilities without American support. Maybe not even with American support.

CW: We could stop them from acquiring nuclear weapons at least. Israel is more than capable of taking them out. Matt is right. Is funneling weapons and supporting the insurgency an act of war? Not as long as you don’t get caught. They should be allowed to have nuclear power — But they want to convert the enriched uranium. And they probably will. I just don’t know if it’s worth a strike right now.

JN: We could wipe them off the map if we wanted to.

LG: The U.S. military is not good at peacekeeping. Air strikes are different from deploying and occupying force.

VR: There is currently no draft. We could get more warm bodies if we needed them.

LG: People are dying on their second and third tour of Iraq. They’re not fighting at their best, nor are the young soldiers who aren’t receiving proper training.

FC: The military was not built to “shake hands and give out lollipops.” We have a conventional army, designed to destroy things. It will take time to adapt. The counterinsurgency doctrine is still being written.

BL: We could reasonably occupy a country if the military was not already so banged up. Not that we should nation-build, but we have in the past (eg. post-war Germany). You just can’t try to do it on the cheap (eg. present-day Iraq).

CW: This has been disastrous. Getting rid of the organizational elements of Iraq’s army was stupid. They were easy to invade. Iran or North Korea would have much higher casualties. There would be increased death and destruction. It might be possible to occupy Iran, but we shouldn’t. Our peacekeeping capabilities are not that poor.

DG: It would be much harder to invade Iran than it was to invade Iraq. They have ~50 million inhabitants. It’s a real country.

RY: Iran is different than post-war Germany or Japan. They were devastated. The civilians might be more willing to resist.

Frank L: Do we need to, though? We’re already in the Middle East. They already hate us. How would it help us? What else could we do to curb their nuclear aspirations? Is there a peaceable solution?

SS: Again, the political reality is that invading and occupying another country is not an option on the table.

FC agrees: It’s not feasible. Also, it would create a power vacuum as it did in Iraq.

LG: We are not meant to do reconstruction and peacekeeping, especially in a country that’s really more like three.

FC: The mission of the military is to do its duty. They will adapt.

LG: The way we prepare our soldiers doesn’t prepare them for this kind of war.

FC: Yes, it will take time, but that doesn’t itself mean we shouldn’t try.

DG: Ahmadinejad is very unpopular, in part because of the sanctions. The current course isn’t NOT working.

JN: We should remove the sanctions. If we allow their economy to grow, it will and the people will revolt.

SS: I wish people would stop saying we don’t know how to peacekeep. We do. My dad did it in Panama. It’s the public, not the military stopping us.

FB: But it seems like Iraq is different. There are three groups fighting amongst each other, plus the outside influences. It’s a cultural hurricane. And we can’t even speak Arabic. People did not listen to Ahmadinejad when he came before. They don’t respect him. But they don’t want to invade his country, either.

FC: us letting him come and what he said helped him back home, where Iran’s media used it to make him look good. Us insulting him also helped him.

LG: I hope they didn’t pay him. But it could be good that we allowed him to come. We support civil dialogue, and he made a clown of himself.

CW: Frankly, it’s not our business. Columbia is a private university. He looked like an idiot to people here. The media will always try to make him look good over there. Khatami, a relative moderate, won two elections. Ahmadinejad won’t get elected again. The clerics can’t throw the election this time. He wants to wipe Israel off the map. If he can, we need to take notice.

DG: The president of the university whining and acting disrespectful was embarrassing.

CW: He was trying to placate his donors.

Mark: We don’t trust ourselves with nuclear energy; we’re not going to trust them.

—

“We choose the order and certainty of petty despots over the uncertainty and chaos of developing democracies.” Jed Bartlet, The West Wing