A strong national defense is essential to America. Our Founders believed in the importance of a strong national defense so much that they included the right to “provide for the common defense” in the preamble of the Constitution. National defense is a primary responsibility of our federal government. During last night’s GOP debate Ron Paul asserted “that a war with Iran would be an absurdly dangerous undertaking and an overreaction to the apparent threat Iran poses.” The problem with this assertion is that Ron Paul consistently underestimates and even underreacts to the point in which he has dismissed the fact that Iran is a threat. He even asserted that there is “no 
evidence” that Iran is pursuing a nuclear device. That assertion is false.
No responsibly sane person wants to engage another country in war or thinks that war is a good thing but rather sees war as being a necessary option used as a last resort for our common defense when a legitimate threat is posed against the United States. A war can be a mechanism used for freeing a people from a tyrannical, brutal dictator and the outcome can be good but the war in and of itself is not good. Is it possible for the war to be just? Yes. But even if a war is considered just that doesn’t mean that the war is good.
A responsible commander-in-chief needs to be willing to have all options on the table, even war as a last resort. For Ron Paul to dismiss Iran as a threat and believe that we should extend our hands in friendship like our relationship with Iran is on a firm footing is absurdly naive thinking for a possible future commander-in-chief.
Having war as an option in case the U.S. needs to respond to a threat that a nuclear Iran would pose to Israel, the West, and the United States if Iran attained nuclear weapons capabilities is not an “establishment” position but rather is a position which is consistent with our constitution.
Ron Paul has claimed that the IAEA report is war propaganda and outright dismissed the report’s accuracy. That’s really quite ironic since he didn’t dispute the accuracy of their findings in 2003 when the IAEA claimed that there was no evidence that Iran was building a bomb, even though that claim turned out to be erroneous.
The facts indicate that the “IAEA, the United Nations nuclear watchdog, issued a report in November that concluded that Iran has acquired the technology to design a nuclear weapon and would require about six months to enrich uranium to the quality needed for a bomb.” In addition the report points out that “intelligence provided to U.N. nuclear officials shows that Iran’s government has mastered the critical steps needed to build a nuclear weapon, receiving assistance from foreign scientists to overcome key technical hurdles, according to Western diplomats and nuclear experts briefed on the findings.” A nuclear physicist, named David Albright who is a former weapons inspector, has stated that at the current rate it “would likely take Iran till the end of 2013 to enrich enough 20 percent uranium to be further processed for use in one bomb. If Iran could get three sets of new generation centrifuges working at two sites, it “could produce enough material by the end of next year that could be further enriched to weapons-grade.”
This is not something to be dismissed with an “if we were nicer to them they’d be nicer to us” attitude. That is ignoring the reality of the situation. That type of attitude exudes a dangerous naiveté. The method Paul advocates has been tried under the Obama administration and has failed. Iran’s rhetoric has only gotten more vitriolic toward the U.S.
Michele Bachmann did exaggerate a bit when she claimed that Iran is “just months away from getting a nuke.”
Ron Paul even dismisses sanctions as an option to deter the Iranians from seeking nuclear weapons capabilities. In this exchange with Chris Wallace Ron Paul claims that the United States needs to extend a hand in friendship to Iran. The problem with Ron Paul is that he is ignoring reality, the pure unadulterated hatred that Iran has for the U.S. because of our support for Israel. He is ignoring the fact that this madman Ahmadinejad does not want to negotiate with the U.S., does not want to coexist with the West and does not want to avoid war but rather wants to escalate tensions and start a war.
Rick Santorum understands the reality of the threat that Iran poses to not only the United States and Israel but the whole world should they attain nuclear weapons capabilities.
Filed under: Conservatism, Constitution, Terrorism, War Tagged: common defense, Constitution, dangerous, foreign policy, Iran, isolationist, Michele Bachmann, naivete, national defense, nuclear, nuclear bomb, nukes, Rick Santorum, Ron Paul, war
