Michael Rubin
Key Points and Summary – Following US strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities, Russian official Dmitry Medvedev hinted that countries like Russia or North Korea might supply Iran with nuclear warheads directly.
-This threat should be met with a firm US response based on strategic brinksmanship.
-If Russia or its allies provide nuclear weapons to Iran, a state that has serially violated the Non-Proliferation Treaty, President Trump should make it clear that the United States will, in turn, provide nuclear weapons or station intermediate-range nuclear missiles in Russia’s own neighboring countries, such as Ukraine, Poland, or Kazakhstan, to re-establish deterrence.
The Iran Nuclear Threat Isn’t Gone Just Yet
The Islamic Republic may have lost its prize nuclear facilities, but the delays caused by American handwringing mean that it very likely salvaged much of its enriched uranium. Iranian nuclear engineers could now likely reconstitute a nuclear weapon should they so choose.
Many American officials and their European counterparts hope to end the military conflict by getting Washington and Tehran to commit to a diplomatic process.
Some American officials might also exaggerate the impact of the strikes to please President Donald Trump or to justify their calls for a complete cessation of hostilities.
And while it is true that the destruction of Natanz and Fordow could have set the Iranian program back years, the assumptions behind such an estimate matter: Are analysts assuming a completely indigenous Iranian program or do they factor in the possibility that Iranian allies could help Iran rebuild core components of its program without reinventing the wheel?
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