Paul R. Pillar
Joining in Israel’s aggression against Iran would hurt, not advance, U.S. interests and international security.
This should not be surprising, given that support for U.S. interests and international security was not what led to Israel’s launching of the war. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu argues that Iran’s nuclear program poses a threat to America and not just Israel, but the nuclear issue was not the main motivation behind Israel’s attack, as reflected in a target list that goes far beyond anything associated with Iran’s nuclear program.
Israel’s principal motivations for the war include ones peculiar to Israel and that the United States does not share, including the sabotaging of U.S. diplomacy with Iran. Another Israeli motivation is to distract the attention of not just the United States but the rest of the world from what Israel is doing to the Palestinians. Some of the most blatant killing of famished residents of the Gaza Strip who were seeking food aid has occurred since the start of the Israeli offensive against Iran.
President Donald Trump’s public statements about Israel’s war have evolved quickly from apparent detachment to enthusiastic support, extending even to use of the first person “we” when claiming air superiority over Iran. As Charlie Stevenson of Johns Hopkins University observes, Trump evidently is experiencing FOMO (fear of missing out) and seeks to claim credit for ending a purported Iranian nuclear threat.
What are either declared objectives (destroying Iran’s nuclear program) or widely assumed ones (regime change in Tehran) of the war are among the criteria according to which possible U.S. involvement in the war should be judged. But so are other consequences, as mentioned below.
The war, with or without U.S. involvement, will not make an Iranian nuclear weapon less likely and might make it more likely. War was not necessary to avoid an Iranian nuclear weapon. The prewar judgment of U.S. intelligence was that Iran was not building a nuclear weapon. Iran was willingly negotiating with the United States, with serious intent, to reach a new agreement that would preclude such a weapon.
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