@Setanta,
Quote:I don't see any reason why the United States has any business trying to "squeeze" Iran. Something it seems many Americans are unable or unwilling to see is that there are just some things, many things, which are beyond the reach of our influence, and beyond the threat of our military power. The internal affairs of Iran are such an area, up to and including their nuclear program.
You may consider that the US has neither the inherent right, nor, ultimately, the ability to influence the internal affairs of Iran, but it's interests are certainly impacted by Iranian internal affairs, and that is particularly so when those affairs include the intent to secure nuclear arms.
No one can predict with certainty what will happen if and when Iran is armed with nukes, but it's a safe bet US interests will not be served, and a possibility that military involvement will be required. This makes it US
business to persuade or coerce Iran into abandoning their nuclear ambitions.
I don't think there are many who believe that additional nuclear players on the world's stage is a thing to be desired
"The spread of nuclear weapons or the theft of nuclear material could lead to the extermination of any city on the planet..."
-Barack Obama-
"(Nuclear terrorism is) the most immediate and extreme threat to global security."
-Barack Obama-
"Iran's nuclear and ballistic missile activity poses a real threat, not just to the United States, but to Iran's neighbors and our allies."
-Barack Obama-
Some argue that the spread of these weapons cannot be stopped, cannot be checked -- that we are destined to live in a world where more nations and more people possess the ultimate tools of destruction. Such fatalism is a deadly adversary, for if we believe that the spread of nuclear weapons is inevitable, then in some way we are admitting to ourselves that the use of nuclear weapons is inevitable.
-Barack Obama-
"(Iran could have "peaceful" nuclear power) but not a military nuclear capability and they have to accept this."
-Nicolas Sarkozy-
“We cannot allow them to have a hundred nuclear weapons. We cannot allow a country to, in effect, become the bomb-seller of the world because they're in a snit, and because they can't grow a crop.”
-Bill Clinton-
"Every time I get a chance to talk to them (leaders of Third World nations who may be seeking nuclear weapons), I try to dissuade them of that. And I make the point that I think that it's a wasted investment in a military capability that is limited in political or military utility,
and that we have ways of responding and punishing conventionally that you would not wish to see us use." (emphasis added)
-Colin Powell-
"We can't allow the world's worst leaders to blackmail, threaten, hold freedom-loving nations hostage with the world's worst weapons."
-George Bush-
"For the risks that the leaders of a rogue state will use nuclear, chemical or biological weapons against us or our allies is the greatest security threat we face."
-Madeleine Albright -
“The international community must continue to act uncompromisingly to prevent a nuclear Iran and end its activities that assist terror organisations and destabilise the Middle East.”
-Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman-
"They (Iran) are very aggressive in their pursuit of nuclear weapons, in their interference with other countries’ internal affairs, with their funding and deployment of terrorists like Hamas and Hezbollah to further Iranian aim. Most of the people in the region who have to live with Iran every day are extremely worried by Iranian actions. We share those worries. Europe and NATO are also with us on that. "
-Hillary Clinton-
"I know that there’s an ongoing debate about what the status of Iran’s nuclear weapons production capacity is, but I don’t think there is a credible debate about their intention. Our task is to dissuade them, deter them, prevent them from acquiring a nuclear weapon, which given the range of the missiles they currently have access to threatens Europe and Arab neighbors in the Gulf..."
-Hillary Clinton-
“That strategy will... seek to end Iran's ambition to acquire an illicit nuclear capability and its support for terrorism.”
-US Ambassador to the UN Susan Rice-
"...that their attacks or -- or their -- their financing of terrorist organizations like Hezbollah and Hamas, the bellicose language that they've used towards Israel, their development of a nuclear weapon or their pursuit of a nuclear weapon -- that all of those things create the possibility of destabilizing the region and are not only contrary to our interests, but I think are contrary to the interests of international peace.”
-Barack Obama-
"If the radiance of a thousand suns were to burst forth at once in the sky, that would be like the splendor of the Mighty One...I am become Death, the shatterer of worlds."
-Bhagavad Gita-