David French remains an incorrigible defender of illegal aggression:
While it’s far too soon to tell whether Israel’s military strikes will cripple or even substantially set back Iran’s nuclear program, the necessity of stopping Iran’s march to a bomb [bold mine-DL] is far more clear today than it was even three years ago.
Iran was not “marching” to get a bomb when Israel attacked. There was no “march” to be stopped. The Iranians were involved in negotiations in which they were willing to accept significant restrictions on their nuclear program to guarantee that it would remain peaceful. There was no need for the Israeli government to strike, and they had no right to attack in any case. Israel’s new war against Iran is as unnecessary and unjust as can be.
I keep dwelling on these points because there is a concerted effort to whitewash Israel’s aggression. French’s column is one example of that effort. His entire argument is an elaborate exercise in blaming the victim. He conjures up scenarios of what Iran might do at some point in the future in the event that it acquired its own nuclear weapons at the same time that he is cheering on the current aggression committed by Israel, a rogue nuclear weapons state.
French writes:
Now, imagine Iran with even a modest nuclear arsenal. Even if it didn’t try to obliterate Israeli cities, it could use its arsenal to grant it a freedom of action in conventional war that it currently lacks.
Of course the point is that we would have to imagine Iran with such an arsenal, because it doesn’t have one and isn’t trying to build one. In this imaginary world, Iran wouldn’t launch a first strike on Israel, because Israel has a rather sizable nuclear arsenal. Supposing that a nuclear arsenal would grant Iran greater freedom of action in conventional war, Iran would have to be in the habit of fighting conventional wars, and the last one of those that they fought was when Iraq invaded. The entire justification for attacking Iran is based on a fantasy.
Read the rest of the article at Eunomia
Daniel Larison is a contributing editor for Antiwar.com and maintains his own site at Eunomia. He is former senior editor at The American Conservative. He has been published in the New York Times Book Review, Dallas Morning News, World Politics Review, Politico Magazine, Orthodox Life, Front Porch Republic, The American Scene, and Culture11, and was a columnist for The Week. He holds a PhD in history from the University of Chicago, and resides in Lancaster, PA. Follow him on Twitter.
