Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addresses the U.S. Congress, July 24, 2024. (Amos Ben-Gershom/GPO)
Michael Oren: A Very Perilous Window
Thanks to Clarity with Michael Oren
“In the Middle East, Iran’s axis of terror confronts America, Israel and our Arab friends,” Israeli Prime Minister declared in the first paragraph of his speech to the Joint Session of Congress. “In the Middle East, Iran is virtually behind all the terrorism, all the turmoil, all the chaos, all the killing.” Not unexpectedly, he revived his longstanding call for concerted action to prevent Iran from breaking out and producing nuclear weapons. Such action, though, might become necessary in the very near future, between today and January, 2025.
In a previous Clarity article (“Who Should American Jews Vote For?”), I described how, on October 5, I told an audience in Dallas that Israel would soon be at war. The main reason, I explained, was the Biden Administration’s well-intentioned attempt to broker a peace agreement between Israel and Saudi Arabia, a treaty sweetened with the provision of American nuclear power to Riyadh. “If anybody thinks that Iran will sit passively while Saudi Arabia goes nuclear, they’re kidding themselves. Iran will start a war.” But there were other reasons as well: the political polarization-cum-paralysis in both the United States and Israel. Finally, there was the unfolding presidential elections. “The Iranians are watching the polls,” I concluded. “And they’re afraid of the return of Donald Trump.”
That line, when later recalled before liberal Jewish audiences, was denounced as an endorsement of the former president. No amount of elaboration sufficed. The facts nevertheless remained that Trump had pulled out of the Iran nuclear deal and Biden strove to restore it. Trump reimposed punishing sanctions on Iran while Biden released billions of dollars in frozen Iranian funds. Despite hundreds of attacks by Iranian proxies on U.S. forces and international shipping in the Middle East, the Biden administration refused to retaliate against Iran itself. Trump ordered the assassination of Qasem Soleimani, Iran’s highest-ranking military official. Biden, from an Iranian perspective, was totally predictable; Trump disturbingly the opposite. Precipitating a war with Israel was cost-free for Iran under Biden. Under Trump, the price could prove prohibitive.
Determined to block the proposed Israel-Saudi agreement, encouraged by the disarray within both Israel and the United States, the Iranians also concluded that they had roughly a year in which to act. And they did, sowing unprecedented instability throughout the Middle East, bloodying and isolating Israel and showcasing the West’s reluctance to project power.
A Harris White House, the Iranians might reasonably assume, would likely uphold the Obama and Biden administrations’ policies toward the Islamic Republic. Still, the Ayatollahs cannot rule out the possibility that the Trump-Vance team will prevail. Not surprising, then, was the recent revelation of U.S. intelligence of an Iranian plot to assassinate Trump.
If victorious, the Republican administration would not assume office until this January. From now until then, the Iranians believe, there is still a window for opportunity.
But an opportunity for what? Having already benefited materially from the wars both in the Middle East and Ukraine, what more do the Iranians possibly have to gain? The answer is terrifying simple: the bomb.
Iran today stands at complete threshold capacity, with enough highly-enriched uranium to produce at least three nuclear weapons in as little as several weeks, if not shorter. It has a proven delivery system on the same rockets that have propelled its satellites into space. Missing only is the warhead which the Iranians have been secretly producing, camouflaging its construction in various university laboratories. Iran is merely a single decision away from emerging as a full-blown nuclear power.
Making that decision has proven difficult, however. Some Iranian officials have argued, quite compellingly, that Iran now has all the advantages of the bomb without actually possessing one. Its achievement of “Japan-like capabilities”—Japan is a threshold state—has helped Iran gain admission to the prestigious group of BRIC countries, and cemented Tehran’s alliance with both Russia and China. Making a bomb, these officials warned, might provoke preemptive Israeli or even American action. And once Iran has the bomb, other Middle Eastern states will rush to acquire one as well.
Other Ayatollahs, however, held that merely achieving threshold capability was insufficient. “Look what happened to Iraq, Libya, and Ukraine,” they recalled. “All three gave up their nuclear dreams and each was successfully invaded.” By contrast, North Korea produced a nuclear arsenal and remained virtually invulnerable. But there was also an emotional component. “How is it possible that the Indians, the Pakistanis, and the Israelis have the bomb?” they asked. “How is it possible that we, the Islamic Republic, do not?”
The debate within Iran might have stretched on inconclusively if not for the presidential elections. By next January, the decision of whether or not to break out and produce nuclear weapons may well become moot. The open window has given a tailwind to those Iranians pressing for immediate nuclearization.
How would this work? It is, in fact, already working with the escalation of attacks on Israel by Hezbollah, Iraqi militias, and the Houthis. International courts continue to criminalize Israel and the White House persists in sanctioning Israeli citizens, possibly even government ministers. Much of the media, meanwhile, is focused almost exclusively on the political situation in the United States. No one is looking. No one, especially not U.S. forces in the region, seems poised for large scale military action to stop Iran in its nuclear tracks.
For Israel, then, the next six months are exceedingly perilous. A nuclear Iran will irrevocably alter the balance of power not only in the Middle East but in the entire world. It will vastly restrict Israel’s ability to deter Iran’s many proxies which, henceforth, will operate under a deadly nuclear umbrella. And, yes, other countries in the region, not all of them friendly to Israel or even stable, will soon obtain Iran-like capabilities.
Israel must be vigilant, and Israel must be prepared. In his speech to the Joint Session of Congress, Prime Minister Netanyahu again stressed the need for America and, indeed, the entire free world, to prevent Iran from nuclearizing. It was a forceful call to action. But calls, no matter how muscular, cannot substitute for concrete measures.
Such steps may become imperative in the period before January. At any moment, upon receiving intelligence on an Iranian decision to break out and nuclearize, the IDF must be able to strike. Windows, the Ayatollahs will learn, are two-way. They not only afford access to our enemies, but to the forces dedicated to defeating them.
