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A Volatile Nuclear Cocktail: Iran, Syria, Pakistan and North Korea
Guest Column | By KT McFarland | April 29, 2008
While America’s attention is focused elsewhere – on the Democrat primaries or even the polygamist cult in Texas – several Middle East
countries are quietly and inexorably marching ahead in their quest to
possess nuclear weapons. If we don’t focus, make some difficult
decisions, and devise a plan of action soon, within a few years some of
the most unstable countries in the world, in the most volatile part of
the planet, will possess the most catastrophic weapons mankind has ever
devised.
Sound
scary? Well, it is. It is a volatile nuclear cocktail none of us want
but all of us will be forced to drink. Right now, or more realistically
right after the election, we must find a way out of the incessant petty
and partisan bickering that consumes the public discussion and deal
with nuclear proliferation.
Look at the events of the past few months. Take Iran. Although they refuse to acknowledge it, Iran does have
a nuclear weapons program which is well underway. Experts disagree on
how long it will be before Iran succeeds in developing nuclear weapons,
but most believe it is somewhere between two and ten years, if they
continue at their current pace.
And if Shiite, radical Iran has nuclear weapons, it won’t be long before the Sunni states in the region, such as Saudi Arabia or Egypt, feel compelled to “go nuclear” themselves. A nuclear Iran could set off an arms race – a NUCLEAR arms race – throughout the entire Persian Gulf.
Or take Syria.
Last week, American intelligence agencies briefed Congress on an event
long whispered about in national security circles – that the mysterious
Israeli bombing raid on Syria
last September destroyed a nuclear reactor which the North Koreans had
helped build. The reactor was apparently within weeks of going
operational and the Israelis leveled it, much as they had a similar
nuclear facility in Iraq
a decade before. Now, having an operational nuclear reactor is still a
long way from having nuclear weapons, but it is an essential first step
down that road.
Or take Pakistan. Lying just across the Afghan border, Pakistan is the first Muslim nation to have nuclear weapons. Pakistan
has weathered its most recent constitutional crisis, and now has a
stable democratic government which remains pro-U.S. But Taliban-like
extremists are active there and are thought to have supporters in Pakistan's military and intelligence services. Pakistan’s
northwest tribal regions are home to Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda, who
have been trying to get their hands on nuclear weapons for years.
Or take North Korea. While not in the Middle East, North Korea
does have trade relations with several counties in the region and it
exports only one thing – weapons – both missiles and nuclear
technology. Negotiations aimed at dismantling North Korea’s nuclear weapons program and halting their weapons exports are currently stalled.
Ten
years ago, national security experts were concerned about nuclear
proliferation and terrorism, but it was a back-burner issue. Not any
longer. Increasingly, they’re taking about not if, but when, and how, a
nuclear weapon might be detonated – either by a terrorist group or a
rogue nation bent on destroying a neighbor.
Last
month, Harvard Professor Ashton Carter testified before the Senate
Homeland Security Committee and described in bone-chilling detail what
would happen if a nuclear weapon detonated on an American city. It was
horrifying beyond imagining.
We kept the peace during the Cold War by deterrence. For decades America had massive amounts of nuclear weapons and so did the Soviet Union.
Each country knew that if it were to attack the other, it would face
certain retaliation and destruction on an even greater scale than it
had meted out. Therefore, both sides were deterred from starting such a
war. Deterrence made for an uneasy peace, but it worked.
We
are now on the brink of a much more dangerous world where rogue or
unstable nations possess nuclear weapons, and where sub-national
terrorist groups – like al Qaeda – operate worldwide using whatever
lethal weapons they can get their hands on.
In 2005 former Senator Sam Nunn, one of America’s
most respected senior statesmen, asked the question, “On the day after
a nuclear weapon goes off in an American city, what would we wish we
had done to prevent it?” That’s the question we need to address now,
not somewhere down the road. It’s not a Democrat issue or a Republican
issue; it doesn’t just affect Red States or Blue States. It affects the United States. Let’s hope America
elects a candidate with the wisdom and experience to deal with nuclear
proliferation, and recognizes that the time to do so effectively is
running out.
FamilySecurityMatters.org Contributing Editor KT McFarland is a former top Pentagon official in the Reagan Administration and a frequent television and radio commentator on national security issues and foreign affairs.
Guest columns do not necessarily reflect the views of Accuracy in Media or its staff.
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