obama good - iran

8/14/2019 Obama Good - Iran

1/31

SDI 08

Elections Impact Iran

Obama Good Iran

Obama Good Iran.................................................................................................................................................................................... ..1Iran 1NC........................................................................................................................................................................................ ........ ......2Iran Internal Obama Will Engage.......................................................................................................................................................... ....4Iran Internal Obama Will Engage.......................................................................................................................................................... ....5Iran Internal McCain will strike................................................................................................................................................... ........ .....6

Strikes Bad - Afghanistan...................................................................................................................................................... ......... ......... ....7Strikes Bad Economy/oil shocks....................................................................................................................................................... ........8Strikes Bad - Nato.................................................................................................................................................................................. ......9Strikes Bad - Russia........................................................................................................................................................................ ........ ...10Strikes Bad South Asia.................................................................................................................................................................... ........11Strikes Bad Succession....................................................................................................................................................... ......... ........ ...12Strikes Bad - Terrorism................................................................................................................................................................ ........ ......14Strikes Fail 2NC......................................................................................................................................................................................... 15A2: Israeli Strikes Worse.......................................................................................................................................................................... .16Engagement Good Iran Prolif........................................................................................................................................... ......... ........ .....17Ext Iran Prolif Impact........................................................................................................................................................ ......... ......... ...18Engagement Good Leadership.............................................................................................................................................. ......... .........19Ext Engagement Solves Leadership......................................................................................................................................... ........ .......20Engagement Good Democracy............................................................................................................................................................. ...21Engagement Good Iraq....................................................................................................................................................... ......... ........ ...23

Ext Engagement Good Iraq...................................................................................................................................................... ........ ....24Engagement Good Russia...................................................................................................................................................... ........ .........25A2: Engagement = Appeasement.............................................................................................................................................. ......... .......27A2: Engagement Incentivizes Prolif...................................................................................................................................................... ....28A2: Engagement Empowers Hardliners................................................................................................................................... ........ .........29Iran Says Yes........................................................................................................................................................................................... ...30A2: Say No Ahmadinejad..................................................................................................................................................................... ..31

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1


2/31

SDI 08


Iran 1NC

McCain will strike Iran

Clemons, 08 (Steve, editor of Washington note, huffington report, www.huffingtonpost.com/steve-clemons/john-mccain-maverick-man-_b_84951.html)On Iran and its nuclear program, McCain has been so flippantly bellicose -- singing "Bomb bomb bomb bomb Iran" to the Beach Boys tune

-- that some conservatives have warned that a President McCain would take America to war with Iran.McCain last Sunday said: "There's going to be other wars... I'm sorry to tell you, there's going to be other wars. We will never surrender butthere will be other wars."Presumably, McCain was suggesting his view that a war with Iran was inevitable. When asked by Joe Scarborough about McCain'sstatement, Pat Buchanan replied: "That is straight talk... You get John McCain in the White House, and I do believe we will be at war withIran." Buchanan said, "That's one of the things that makes me very nervous about him," adding, "There's no doubt John McCain is going to

be a war president... His whole career is wrapped up in the military, national security. He's in Putin's face, he's threatening the Iranians,we're going to be in Iraq a hundred years."

Strikes cause Syria to retaliate against Israel with smallpoxCorsi 07 (Jerome,- writer for Wordnet daily, citing Jill Bellamy-Dekker, director of the Public Health Preparednessprogram for the European Homeland Security Association under the French High Committee for Civil Defense Syria readywith bio-terror if U.S. hits Iran http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=54542)

An American biodefense analyst living in Europe says if the U.S. invades Iran to halt its nuclear ambitions, Syria is ready torespond with weapons of mass destruction specifically biological weapons."Syria is positioned to launch a biological attack on Israel or Europe should the U.S. attack Iran," Jill Bellamy-Dekker told WND."The Syrians are embedding their biological weapons program into their commercial pharmaceuticals business and their veterinary vaccine-research facilities. The intelligence service oversees Syria's 'bio-farm' program and the Ministry of Defense is well interfaced into the effort."Bellamy-Decker currently directs the Public Health Preparedness program for the European Homeland Security Association under the FrenchHigh Committee for Civil Defense.

She anticipates a variation of smallpox is the biological agent Syria would utilize .

The impact outweighs nuke warSinger 01 (Clifford,- is a professor of nuclear engineering and director of the Program in Arms Control, Disarmament,and International Security at the University of Illinois at UrbanaChampaign Will Mankind Survive the Millennium?http://www.acdis.uiuc.edu/research/S&Ps/2001-Sp/S&P_XIII/Singer.htm)In recent years the fear of the apocalypse (or religious hope for it) has been in part a child of the Cold War, but its seeds in Western culture goback to the Black Death and earlier. Recent polls suggest that the majority in the United States that believe man would survive into the futurefor substantially less than a millennium was about 10 percent higher in the Cold War than afterward. However fear of annihilation of thehuman species through nuclear warfare was confused with the admittedly terrifying, but much different matter of destruction of a dominantcivilization. The destruction of a third or more of much of the globes population through the disruption from the direct consequences of

nuclear blast and fire damage was certainly possible. There was, and still is, what is now known to be a rather small chance that dust raised byan all-out nuclear war would cause a so-called nuclear winter, substantially reducing agricultural yields especially in temperate regions for ayear or more. As noted above mankind as a whole has weathered a number of mind-boggling disasters in the past fifty thousand years even ifolder cultures or civilizations have sometimes eventually given way to new ones in the process. Moreover the fear that radioactive falloutwould make the globe uninhabitable, publicized by widely seen works such as "On the Beach," was a metaphor for the horror of nuclear warrather than reality. The epidemiological lethal results of well over a hundred atmospheric nuclear tests are barely statistically detectable

except in immediate fallout plumes. The increase in radiation exposure far from the combatants in even a full scale nuclearexchange at the height of the Cold War would have been modest compared to the variations in natural background

radiation doses that have readily been adapted to by a number of human populations. Nor is there any reason tobelieve that global warming or other insults to our physical environment resulting from currently usedtechnologies will challenge the survival of mankind as a whole beyond what it has already handily survived through thepast fifty thousand years.

There are, however, two technologies currently under development that may pose a more serious threat to humansurvival. The first and most immediate is biological warfare combined with genetic engineering. Smallpox is the most

fearsome of natural biological warfare agents in existence. By the end of the next decade, global immunity tosmallpox will likely be at a low unprecedented since the emergence of this disease in the distant past, whilethe opportunity for it to spread rapidly across the globe will be at an all time high. In the absence of othercomplications such as nuclear war near the peak of an epidemic, developed countries may respond with quarantine andvaccination to limit the damage. Otherwise mortality there may match the rate of 30 percent or more expected inunprepared developing countries. With respect to genetic engineering using currently available knowledge and technology,the simple expedient of spreading an ample mixture of coat protein variants could render a vaccination response largelyineffective, but this would otherwise not be expected to substantially increase overall mortality rates. With development of

new biological technology, however, there is a possibility that a variety ofinfectious agents may be engineeredfor combinations of greater than natural virulence and mortality, rather than just to overwhelm currently

available antibiotics or vaccines.There is no a priori known upper limit to the power of this type of technologybase, and thus the survival of a globally connected human family may be in question when and if this isachieved.

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http://www.huffingtonpost.com/steve-clemons/john-mccain-maverick-man-_b_84951.htmlhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/steve-clemons/john-mccain-maverick-man-_b_84951.htmlhttp://www.acdis.uiuc.edu/research/S&Ps/2001-Sp/S&P_XIII/Singer.htmhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/steve-clemons/john-mccain-maverick-man-_b_84951.htmlhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/steve-clemons/john-mccain-maverick-man-_b_84951.htmlhttp://www.acdis.uiuc.edu/research/S&Ps/2001-Sp/S&P_XIII/Singer.htm


3/31

SDI 08


3


4/31

SDI 08


Iran Internal Obama Will Engage

Obama Will engage Iran Including security guarantees

Seale, 2/14/08(Patrick, leading British writer on the Middle East, and the author of The Struggle forSyria; also, Asad of Syria: The Struggle for the Middle East; and Abu Nidal: A Gun for Hire,

alJazeera magazine, http://www.aljazeera.com/news/newsfull.php?newid=89966)

There are welcome signs of a coming thaw in Americas hostile and ice-bound relations with Iran -- if not in the remaining months ofGeorge W. Bushs presidency then under his successor. For the first time in many years, such a possibility is being actively debated and envisaged by Americanpolicy-makers and influential think-tanks.Washington sources report that leading politicians of both the Democratic and Republic parties are beginning to explore the possibility of a radical shift in American policy towardsthe Islamic Republic, once a new Administration takes office in January 2009.

BarackObama, a leading contender for the Democratic nomination, has said that, if elected President, he would seek to engage Iran in a wide-rangingdialogue.This is only one aspect - - although one of the most important -- of the break now in preparation with some key features of Bushs foreign policy, notably his global war on terror,which is widely credited with having increased rather than diminished the terrorist threat to the United States and its allies.Driving the need for a change of direction is the growing realization that Bushs foreign policy towards the Arab and Islamic world -- largely influenced by pro-Israeli neo-conservatives -- has been a catastrophic failure. It has undermined Americas credibility around the world and aroused immense distrust.Bushs wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have been -- and continue to be -- costly disasters. In addition, in spite of his call for a Palestinian-Israeli settlement before the end of hismandate, Bush has not actually advanced the cause of peace by even the smallest degree. On the contrary, he has aroused Arab, Iranian and Muslim outrage by supporting Israelstwo ill-conceived wars against Hizbullah and Hamas: The first led to massive destruction and loss of life in Lebanon, and the second to the cruel siege of the entire Gazapopulation -- a continuing collective punishment in blatant violation of international law.Another spectacular failure has been Bushs effort to force Iran to suspend its uranium enrichment programme. Quite the reverse, Iran has redoubled its enrichment efforts byinstalling an advanced centrifuge at its Natanz nuclear complex. Meanwhile, American-led sanctions against Iran, its attempts to undermine the Iranian banking system andeconomy, allied to the threat of military attack, have triggered a patriotic Iranian backlash, so that the nuclear programme has become a national cause.

Just this week, on the anniversary of Irans 1979 Islamic revolution, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad told a million-strong rally in Tehran: "They should know that the Iraniannation will not retreat one iota from its nuclear rights." Standing up to the United Stated and Israel on the nuclear issue, as well as on I raq and Palestinian, has greatly contributed toenhancing Irans regional influence.A crucial contribution to the debate over what to do about Iran will be a report by Muhammad al-Baradei, director of the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency, duefor publication on 20 February. It is expected to contain answers to questions by the IAEA about Irans clandestine nuclear activities in the 1980s and 1990s.Baradeis report will be scrutinized to see whether it confirms or disputes Americas National Intelligence Estimate, which concluded last December that Iran had halted its militarynuclear programme in 2003.Hawks in the U.S. Administration -- and in Israel -- fear that if the IAEA gives Iran a clean bill of health, the prospect will evaporate of imposing tougher sanctions on Iran bymeans of a third UN Security Council resolution. China and Russia, as well as non-permanent members of the Council such as South Africa, have already indicated that they areunlikely to assent to such a resolution.As for the Arab world, it is already abundantly clear that American attempts to mobilize so-called moderates in an anti-Iran coalition have also failed. Egypt, the Gulf States, andSaudi Arabia have all made clear that they have no intention of participating in any such American-led campaign.In an interview on 31 January with La Repubblica, Italys largest circulation daily, President Husni Mubarak of Egypt was asked, "Did Bush ask you to forge a common frontagainst Iran?"Mubarak replied: "This is not the time for resorting to threats or to the use of force. That would serve solely to set the Gulf, the Middle East and the whole world on fire. What isneeded, rather, are dialogue and diplomacy.

"The U.S. Intelligence report on Irans nuclear ambitions lends itself to opposing interpretations, but in any case it paves the way fordiplomacy. Greater transparency is needed on Irans part and greater flexibility is needed on the part of the international community."When asked whether Egypt was considering resuming diplomatic relations with Iran, broken off since the 1979 revolution, Mubarak relied: "There are various issues on the table,but once they have been resolved, we are prepared to es tablish diplomatic relations once again."Far from isolating Iran, Egypt is forging ties with it. This is a development of very considerable importance.There is a good deal of latent distrust and antagonism between Shia Iran and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, a pillar of Sunni Islam. But from a cautious beginning in 1998, dtentehas been flourishing between the two regional powers to the extent that something like a new spirit of coexistence has taken hold. The Kingdom has also made great efforts to drawits own Shia minority, mainly located in the eastern province, into the national community.As for the Gulf States, they are busy trading with Iran and are totally opposed to an American policy of confrontation and coercion. Speaking at a conference this month on Iran atWashingtons Middle East Institute, Dr. Ibtisam al-Kitbi, a professor of political scene at the United Arab Emirates University, reminded her audience that about 10,000 Iranianfirms were operating in the Emirates, that Iranian assets in the UAE were estimated at $66 billion, and that Iran was the Gulfs biggest trading partner.

It is against this background of American failure that voices are being raised in the United States in favour of a "grand bargain" with Iran,beginning with unconditional comprehensive talks in order to resolve differences and normalize bilateral relations.At the same MEI conference, Hillary Man Leverett, a former State Department and National Security Council official, outlined some of theconditions for a strategic understanding between Washington and Tehran.The United States would need to recognize the Islamic Republic and establish diplomatic relations with it; acknowledge Irans role in theregion; terminate Irans designation as a state sponsor of terrorism; lift U.S. unilateral sanctions; and commit not to use force to changeIrans form of government, but on the contrary agree to begin an ongoing strategic dialogue with Tehran.In return, Iran would need to provide a "definitive resolution" of U.S. concerns about Irans possible pursuit of weapons of mass destruction, whether nuclear, chemical or

biological. Iran would need to ratify and implement the IAEAs Additional Protocol, which provides for intrusive and unannounced inspections. It would need to help intransforming Hizbullah into a purely political and social movement. It would need to work for a stable political order in Iraq. And it would need to declare that it was not opposedto a negotiated settlement of the Arab-Israeli conflict.

Such a blueprint for a new relationship between the United States and Iran would require great courage and vision on both sides. It is a taskfor the next American president. If implemented, it would transform Americas image in the world and make an immense contribution toresolving conflicts in Iraq, Lebanon, Pakistan, Afghanistan and, above all, that between Israel and its Arab neighbours, which is the most

poisonous and long-running conflict of them all.

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5/31

SDI 08


Iran Internal Obama Will Engage

Obama will engage Iran and give conditional security guarantee

Koogler 07 (Jeb Koogler has worked at the Middle East Peace Project, theNew America Foundation's 'American Strategy Program', the Project on Middle

East Democracy, and the Watson Institute. Articles of his have beenpublished at The American Prospect Online, Die Welt (a German paper), andAtlantic Community (a Berlin-based thinktank). Foreign Policy Watch

November 2nd --http://fpwatch.blogspot.com/2007/11/logic-of-obama-plan.html )

The New York Times ran a front-page articletoday about Obama's plan to aggressively pursue diplomacy with Iran over the nuclear issue.The approach that Obama detailed is quite logical: unconditional negotiations, better carrots, harsher punishment for non-compliance, and areduced American presence in the Persian Gulf. This is very much the type of common sense approach that we've called for here on this

blog; unfortunately, not everyone in the blogosphere had such a favorable opinion.Ed Morrissey, a well-known conservative blogger who writes at Captain's Quarters,expressed his disapproval with the plan by suggestingthat it is nothing that hasn't been tried before:...it's hard to believe that neither Obama nor Michael Gordon or Jeff Zeleny recall that the EU-3 and the US made precisely that offer toIran in the summer 2005 round of negotiations between the Europeans and Iran. The Bush administration even made the offer publicly insupport of the European peace initiative, and even talked openly of restoring diplomatic and trade relations with Iran.

Did it work? No, it did not. Iran had more interest in pursuing nuclear weapons than in WTO membershi ormalized relations -- becauseIran considers itself at war with the United States. It doesn't want normal trade; Iran wants regional hegemony over the Middle East, afterwhich it can demand trade on whatever terms it likes with the entire world.Actually, Obama's plan is not a repeat of the 2005 proposal. Indeed, Morrissey's analysis failed to recognize one of the most importantelements of the Obama plan: security guarantees. Unlike the 2005 EU3 offer, which did not include a specific non-aggression pact fromWashington, Obama's approach would effectively eliminate many of the key security concerns of the Iranian regime. Dave Schuler, over atthe Glittering Eye blog,sensibly argues this same point:With all due respect to Ed Morrissey, what Sen. Obama is proposing is not a rerun of offers made in 2005. The part that caught my eye inthe article in the NYT are the words security assurance. To the best of my knowledge thats a dramatic departure from present U. S.

policy with respect to Iran.Schuler's right - Obama's emphasis on security guarantees would represent a significant and important change in American policy. As TheWashington Post reported last year, the Bush administration has consistently refused to offer "a guarantee against attacking or underminingIran's hard-line government in exchange for having Tehran curtail its nuclear program." Condoleezza Rice, in May of 2006, affirmed this

point: "Iran is a troublemaker in the international system, a central banker of terrorism. Security assurances are not on the table."

Obama Will EngageNYT, 11/2/07SenatorBarack Obama said he would engage in aggressive personal diplomacy with Iran if elected president, and would offer economicinducements and a possible promise not to seek regime change if Iran stopped meddling in Iraq and cooperated on terrorism and nuclearissues.In an hourlong interview on Wednesday, Mr. Obama made clear that forging a new relationship with Iran would be a major element of whathe pledged would be a broad effort to stabilize Iraq as he executed a speedy timetable for the withdrawal of American combat troops.Mr. Obama said that Iran had been acting irresponsibly by supporting Shiite militant groups in Iraq. He also emphasized that Iranssuspected nuclear weapons program and its support for terrorist activities were serious concerns.But he asserted that Irans support for militant groups in Iraq reflected its anxiety over the Bush administrations policies in the region,including talk of a possible American military strike on Iranian nuclear installations.Making clear that he planned to talk to Iran without preconditions, Mr. Obama emphasized further that changes in behavior by Iran could

possibly be rewarded with membership in theWorld Trade Organization, other economic benefits and security guarantees.We are willing to talk about certain assurances in the context of them showing some good faith, he said in the interview at his campaign

headquarters here. I think it is important for us to send a signal that we are not hellbent on regime change, just for the sake of regimechange, but expect changes in behavior. And there are both carrots and there are sticks available to them for those changes in behavior.

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http://fpwatch.blogspot.com/2007/11/logic-of-obama-plan.htmlhttp://fpwatch.blogspot.com/2007/11/logic-of-obama-plan.htmlhttp://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/02/us/politics/01cnd-obama.html?_r=2&ex=1351656000&en=6e53bced62b78a88&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss&oref=slogin&oref=sloginhttp://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/02/us/politics/01cnd-obama.html?_r=2&ex=1351656000&en=6e53bced62b78a88&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss&oref=slogin&oref=sloginhttp://www.belgraviadispatch.com/2007/11/post_112.htmlhttp://www.captainsquartersblog.com/mt/archives/015795.phphttp://www.captainsquartersblog.com/mt/archives/015795.phphttp://www.captainsquartersblog.com/mt/archives/015795.phphttp://www.captainsquartersblog.com/mt/archives/015795.phphttp://theglitteringeye.com/?p=3266http://theglitteringeye.com/?p=3266http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/05/21/AR2006052100369.htmlhttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/05/21/AR2006052100369.htmlhttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/05/21/AR2006052100369.htmlhttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/05/21/AR2006052100369.htmlhttp://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/o/barack_obama/index.html?inline=nyt-perhttp://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/international/countriesandterritories/iran/index.html?inline=nyt-geohttp://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/international/countriesandterritories/iran/index.html?inline=nyt-geohttp://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/w/world_trade_organization/index.html?inline=nyt-orghttp://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/w/world_trade_organization/index.html?inline=nyt-orghttp://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/w/world_trade_organization/index.html?inline=nyt-orghttp://fpwatch.blogspot.com/2007/11/logic-of-obama-plan.htmlhttp://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/02/us/politics/01cnd-obama.html?_r=2&ex=1351656000&en=6e53bced62b78a88&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss&oref=slogin&oref=sloginhttp://www.belgraviadispatch.com/2007/11/post_112.htmlhttp://www.captainsquartersblog.com/mt/archives/015795.phphttp://www.captainsquartersblog.com/mt/archives/015795.phphttp://theglitteringeye.com/?p=3266http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/05/21/AR2006052100369.htmlhttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/05/21/AR2006052100369.htmlhttp://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/o/barack_obama/index.html?inline=nyt-perhttp://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/international/countriesandterritories/iran/index.html?inline=nyt-geohttp://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/w/world_trade_organization/index.html?inline=nyt-org


6/31

SDI 08


Iran Internal McCain will strike

McCain makes attack likely

Guardian, 6/22/08But there is another, very different side to John McCain. Away from the headlines and the stirring speeches, a less familiar figure lurks. It is

a McCain who plans to fight on in Iraq for years to come and who might launch military action against Iran. This is the McCain whosecampaign and career has been riddled with lobbyists and special interests. It is a McCain who has sided with religious and politicalextremists who believe Islam is evil and gays are immoral. It is a McCain who wants to appoint extreme conservatives to the SupremeCourt and see abortion banned. This McCain has a notoriously volatile temper that has scared some senior members of his own party. IfMcCain becomes the most powerful man in the world it would be wise to know what lies behind his public mask, to look at the dark side ofJohn McCain.John McCain is an American hero in an age of war and terrorism. As young Americans return in bodybags from Iraq and Iranian mullahscook up uranium, an old soldier like McCain seems a natural choice in a dangerous world. He is the son and grandson of warriors. Both hisfather and grandfather were four-star admirals. He was even born on a military base, on 29 August 1936, in Panama. And his life storyreads like a movie script. The young, rascally McCain, nicknamed 'McNasty' by his classmates, attended the elite United States NavalAcademy in Annapolis, Maryland. He became a navy pilot, long before Tom Cruise made 'Top Guns' famous, and began his first combatduty in Vietnam in 1966, carrying out countless missions. Then came disaster. He was shot down and held prisoner for five years by brutal

North Vietnamese captors. In his stiff gait and damaged arms, he still bears the scars of their tortures. His CV for the White House iswritten in his suffering as much as in his career as a senator.That military legacy has made John McCain a legend. But it has not turned him into a peacemaker, at a time when most Americans

desperately want the war to end. Anyone hoping for a new president who will quickly bring America's troops home from Iraq had betterlook elsewhere. McCain has always supported the invasion of Iraq and he wants to support it until at least 2013, or perhaps for many years

beyond. He believes withdrawal would be a surrender to terrorists.That warlike spirit was on full display in Denver when McCain's speech was interrupted repeatedly by anti-war protesters. They stood up,unfurling banners and shouting for a withdrawal from Iraq. When it happened a third time, McCain had had enough. In a voice suddenlyfilled with steely resolve, McCain broke from his carefully scripted speech and gripped the lectern. He looked out at the audience andspoke slowly. 'I will never surrender in Iraq,' he rasped. 'Our American troops will come home with victory and with honour.' The crowdcheered and chanted: 'John McCain! John McCain!' It was a perfect moment for unrepentant supporters of the Iraq invasion and a McCainwho still smarts from defeat in Vietnam. No retreat. No surrender. This time America will win.McCain believes in projecting American military power abroad. So it is no wonder that the neoconservatives who pushed for war in Iraqhave now regrouped around him. McCain's main foreign policy adviser is Randy Scheunemann, who was executive director of theshadowy Committee for the Liberation of Iraq. Other leading neocons on board include John Bolton, America's belligerent former UNambassador, Bill Kristol, editor of the Neocon bible the Weekly Standard, and Max Boot, who has pushed for a US version of the oldBritish Colonial Office. Another close McCain adviser is former CIA director James Woolsey, who has openly advocated bombing Syria.Such a group of warlike counsellors has raised fears that McCain may strike Iran to stop its suspected quest for a nuclear weapon,

triggering a fresh war in the Middle East. The Republican candidate has openly joked about bombing Tehran. It was just over a year ago, inthe tiny borough of Murrells Inlet in South Carolina, and McCain faced a small crowd in one of his characteristic town hall meetings. AsMcCain stood on the stage, one man asked him about the 'real problem' in the Middle East. 'When are we going to send an airmail messageto Tehran?' the man pleaded. McCain laughed and - to the tune of the Beach Boys' classic 'Barbara Ann' - began to sing: 'Bomb bomb

bomb, bomb bomb Iran.' But some think McCain's joke may well become policy. 'I think a McCain presidency would be very likely tostrike Iran,' says Cliff Schecter, author of a new book, The Real McCain

6


7/31

SDI 08


Strikes Bad - Afghanistan

Iran will destabilize Iraq and AfghanistanBrookes 06 (Peter,- Senior fellow @ Heritage 1-23 Iran: Our Military Optionshttp://www.heritage.org/Press/Commentary/ed012306a.cfm)

But it's unlikely to be that simple. After an assault, Iran might lash out with a vengeance. We'd have to be

fully prepared for some nasty blowback.Tehran and its terrorist toadies can brew up some serious trouble for both America and Israel or anyone else thatsupported an attack on the fundamentalist Islamic state.

The Iranian regime is already up to its neck in the insurgencies in Iraq and Afghanistan. It couldcertainly increase its financial/material support to the Sunni insurgents, Shia militants, al Qaeda, and the

Taliban to destabilize the new Baghdad and Kabul governments and kill Coalition forces.

Afghanistan goes nuclear

Kavanagh 07[Trevor, esteemed Journalist and Political Editor @ the Sun Times, We need to win hearts and minds at home too, Jan 22, ln]The headlines focus on brutality in Baghdad, but the overwhelming majority of Iraqis are better off than ever before. In Afghanistan, two out of three are

building a new life and hope the Taliban will never return. They don't want the burka back. But these fragile improvements are an affront to mullahs,who lose poweronce people develop a mind of their own. If we allow them to fail, the price will be incalculable. A return to Taliban rule in

Afghanistan would almostcertainly put the skids underPakistan's "moderate"PresidentMusharraf.

That could set the stage for the first nuclear war -between Pakistan and India - dragging in Chinaand the USA. We are at a dangerous crossroads. Western security services are under no illusion thatfanaticsare radicalising young men at an alarming pace. At home and abroad we are competing for the hearts and minds of sensible,

decent Muslims who are being bullied and intimidated in the name of extreme Islam. In many ways we are in their hands.Only they can stand in the way of a virulent spread of terror.

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8/31

SDI 08


Strikes Bad Economy/oil shocks

Strikes powerbomb the economy and cause oil shocksLang and Johnson 06 (Patrick,- former head of Middle East Intelligence at the Defense Intelligence Agency Larry C,-served in the CIA and the State Department 3-1 Contemplating the Ifshttp://nationalinterest.org/General.aspx?id=92&id2=12186)

Iran can also play the oil card. If Iran were attacked, Iran could halt its oil exports and thereby immediately impact the global price. It

would be unwise to hope that Iran, as part of its national security plan, is not willing to shut down Persian Gulf oil exports. Iran is well equipped toshower Persian Gulf states and oil fields with missiles, or to shut down exports with a variety ofother military, terroristor political methods. At a minimum , aU.S. military aircampaign, even if successful in wrecking the Iranian nuclear program, would severelydisrupt oil markets for at least six months. Such a disruption would hurt the world economy, not just that of the United States. In addition,there are countries sympathetic to Iran, such as Venezuela, that have indicated they are more than willing to cut off their oilsupply to the United States. The United States could find itself facinga 20-30 percent shortfall in oil imports (and that estimateassumesthat theSaudi fields are untouched and that oil imports continue to flow unimpeded).

Nuclear warMead, 92 (Walter Russell, fellow, Council on Foreign Relations, New perspectives quarterly, summer pp. 28)But what if it can't? What if the global economy stagnates - or even shrinks? In that case, we will face a new periodof international conflict : South against North, rich against poor. Russia, China, India - these countries with theirbillions of people and their nuclear weapons will pose a much greater danger to world order than Germany and Japan didin the '30s .

8


9/31

SDI 08


Strikes Bad - Nato

Iran strikes end NATO, US-EU relations and EU Unity

Tisdall, 2007(Simon, writer for The Guardian 2-7 Merkel goes in search of a new German miracle lexis)"The common glue of the cold war has gone. The fight against terrorism has not replaced it. As for Iran, of course we are

worried. Nobody wants a nuclear Iran. But our American friends have made major mistakes . . . We oppose militaryaction. During the cold war, we talked to the communists. Now we must talk to the Iranians."All Ms Merkel's efforts to make Europe an equal partner with the US could be destroyed in a moment by a US militaryattack on Iran, Prof Sandschneider said. EU unity would also shatter. " It would be the end of Nato. It would be the end ofthe US-European consensus on how to deal with security threats. It would be disastrous."

The impact is global warBinnendijk and Kugler 03 (Hans,- Director of the Center for Technology and National Security Policy andRichard L,- Distinguished Research Professor at CTNSP Dual-Track Transformation for the Atlantic Alliancehttp://www.ndu.edu/inss/DefHor/DH35/DH35.htm)

The biggest loser would be not the United States but Europe. NATO collapse would result in a major U.S. political andmilitary withdrawal from the continent. The United States might retain a foothold through bilateral ties with Britain and other countries, but it nolonger would play a multilateral leadership role. Along with this withdrawal would come removal of the many valuable strategic roles that the United States playsbehind the scene. The United States continues to provide extended nuclear deterrence coverage over virtually all of Europe, a still-vital protection in this era ofnuclear powers and proliferation. As shown in the Kosovo war, U.S. conventional forces provide about three-quarters of NATO military power-projection assets forcrises and wars on Europe's periphery. These nuclear and conventional contributions, moreover, enable Europe to defend itself with annual defense budgets that are$100-150 billion smaller than otherwise would be the case. In effect, the United States is helping fund the European Union, because these savings equal the EUbudget.Perhaps the Europeans could fund a big defense buildup to compensate for loss of American military guarantees, but the price could be quite high, because aEuropean buildup absent NATO would be costlier than a buildup under its auspices; NATO offers many economies of scale and opportunities to avoid redundancythrough integrated planning. In addition, a European military buildup would be controversial. How would Europe erect an umbrella of nuclear deterrence? How would itprepare for crisis operations on its periphery? What would be the European reaction if Germany were compelled to build nuclear forces and a large mobile military?A European military buildup, however, seems unlikely. Is there any reason to believe that European parliaments would surmount their current anti-military attitudes tofund bigger defense budgets? Their reaction might be to slash budgets further on the premise that the collapse of NATO made defense strength less necessary andthat Europe could avoid war through diplomacy. As a result, Europe might withdraw into a disengaged foreign policy. Even if bigger budgets were forthcoming,European militaries no longer would enjoy U.S. help in developing new-era doctrines, structures, and technologies. In the military transformation arena, they would beleft on the outside looking in. Without U.S. contributions, they could be hard-pressed to muster the wherewithal to deploy missile defenses to shield Europe from WMDattacks. Developing serious forces for power-projection outside Europe also would be difficult, without American help in such critical areas as C4ISR, strategic lift, and

logistic support. Overall, the collapse of NATO could leave Europe more vulnerable to threats across the spectrum fromterrorism to WMD proliferation and less able to exert influence in the regions that produce these threats.In addition to these adverse military consequences, American political contributions to European unity, peace, andprosperity would decline precipitously. For the past fifty years, America's constant presence has assured smallEuropean countries that they will not be dominated by powerful neighbors. Italso has helped guarantee that thecontinent will not slide back into the competitive geopolitical dynamics that produced two world wars in the20th Century. The U.S. presence helped Germany find a welcome role in an integrating Europe and permitted leadership bythe so-called "Quad" (the United States, Britain, Germany, and France) in a manner that gained the support of other NATO

members. Recently, the United States has been a leading advocate of NATO enlargement and European unification. In theabsence of NATO, the European Union itself might be weakened, especially if the United States decided to selectively seekallies among EU members. Nor would EU influence on world affairs be likely to increase. Indeed, the opposite could be thecase.

A NATO that can project power and purpose outside Europe will greatly enhance the odds of preserving worldpeace while advancing democratic values. The simple reality is that the United States cannot handle the globalproblems of the contemporary era alone, and neither can Europe. Together, however, they can succeed. This is amain reason for keeping NATO alive and healthy, and for transforming it in the ways needed to perform new missions. Thechallenge facing the Atlantic Alliance is to pursue these goals in an effective manner that both the United States and Europewill support.

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Strikes Bad - Russia

Strikes cause war with RussiaTarpley 05 (Webster Griffin,- activist and historian, 8/29/http://inn.globalfreepress.com/modules/news/article.php?storyid=743)Competent US military commanders dread the prospect of war with Iran. Iran is four times the area of Iraq, and has three times the population.Its infrastructure was not destroyed during the Kuwait war in the way that Iraq's was, and Iran has not been subjected to 13 years of crippling

UN sanctions on everything, including food and medicine. The Iranian military forces are intact. In case of war, Iran could be expected to useall means ranging from ballistic missile attacks on US and Israeli bases to asymmetrical warfare. The situation of the US forces already in Iraqcould quickly become extraordinarily critical. Shamkhani alluded to this prospect when he said that "The U.S. military presence will notbecome an element of strength at our expense. The opposite is true because their forces would turn into a hostage." Just as Chinese entry intothe Korean conflict in late November 1950 created a wholly new and wider war, Iranian entry into the US-Iraq war would have similarlyincalculable consequences. The choices might quickly narrow to the large-scale use of nuclear weapons or defeat for the current US hollowarmy of just 10 divisions. ANOTHER STEP TOWARDS WORLD WAR III In the case of Iran, the use of nuclear weapons by the US would have a

dangerous complication:Iran is an important neighbor and trading partner of the Russian Federation, which is helping withIrans nuclear power reactor program.The threatened US/Israeli raid on Iran might kill Russian citizens as well. Such a US attack onIran might prod the Russian government into drawing its own line in the sand , rather than sitting idle as the tide ofUSaggression swept closer and closer to Russias borders, as one country after another in central Asia was occupied. In other words,a US attack on Iran bids fair to be the opening of World War III , making explicit was already implicit in the invasion of Iraq. TheIran war project of the neocons is the very midsummer of madness, and it must be stopped.

ExtinctionBostrom 02

(Nick, PhD Philosophy Oxford U., Existential Risks,http://www.nickbostrom.com/existential/risks.html)A much greater existential riskemerged with the build-up of nuclear arsenals in the US and theUSSR. An all-out nuclear war was a possibility with both a substantial probability and withconsequences that mighthave been persistent enough to qualify as global and terminal. Therewas a real worry among those best acquainted with the information available at the time that anuclear Armageddon would occur and that it might annihilate our species or permanentlydestroy human civilization.[4] Russia and the US retain large nuclear arsenals that could be used ina future confrontation, either accidentally or deliberately. There is also a risk that other states mayone day build up large nuclear arsenals. Note however that a smaller nuclear exchange, betweenIndia and Pakistan for instance, is not an existential risk, since it would not destroy or thwarthumankinds potential permanently. Such a war might however be a local terminal risk for the citiesmost likely to be targeted. Unfortunately, we shall see that nuclear Armageddon and comet orasteroid strikes are mere preludes to the existential risks that we will encounter in the 21st century.

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Strikes Bad South Asia

Strikes cause nuke war in South AsiaHallinan 07(Conn, foreign policy analyst for Foreign Policy in Focus1-17http://www.antiwar.com/orig/hallinan.php?articleid=10337)

But the long-term impact ofa nuclearstrike on Iran is likely to be catastrophic, and not only because it would enrage Shi'ites in Iraq. Parry suggests that localU.S.-backed dictators might find themselves facing unrest as well. If Hezbollah rocketed Israel,Tel Aviv might decide to invade Syria, igniting a full-scale regional war. It is even possible thatPakistan's PervezMusharraf might fall, says Parry, "conceivably giving Islamic terroristscontrol of Pakistan's nuclear arsenal." In that event, India would almost certainly intervene, which could spark anuclear war in South Asia. India and Pakistan came perilously close to such an exchange in 1999.

ExtinctionCaldicott, 2002,Founder of Physicians for Social Responsibility[Helen, The New Nuclear Danger: George W. Bushs Military-Industrial Complex, p. X]

The use ofPakistani nuclear weapons could trigger a chain reaction. Nuclear-armed India, an ancient enemy, couldrespond in kind. China, India's hated foe,could reactif India used her nuclear weapons, triggering a nuclear holocauston thesubcontinent.If any ofeither Russia or America's 2,250 strategic weapons on hair-trigger alert were launched eitheraccidentally or purposefully in response,nuclear winter would ensue, meaning the end of most life on earth.

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SDI 08


Strikes Bad Succession

Iran strike causes violent Kurdish secession triggering massive instability specifically incentral asia

Stanton 06 (John,- writer for Global Research Strike Iran, Watch Pakistan and Turkey Fallhttp://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=STA20060422&articleId=2319)

So, as the bombs fly over Iran, the Kurds would be likely to seize the day and fight for the recognition of a Kurdish

state that deletes portions of present-dayTurkey, Iran, Syria and Iraq from the map. This is no idle dream. The Americanbased KNC openly advocates a United Free Kurdistan. One day, there will be a Kurdish state. That could be done in a non-violent

fashion rather than as a consequence of a misguided military adventure against Iran. Finally, an invasion of that countrywould likely involve Turkish assets of some kind. As a member of NATO, Turkey houses tactical nuclear weapons and, asreported by Ramin Jahanbegloo in the Daily Star, Participation by Turkey in a US/Israeli military operation is also a factor

[concerning Iran], following an agreement reached between the Turks and Israelis. Central Asia and the Middle East wouldbecome a bloodbath one minute after an attack on Iran.

The impact is nuclear conflictBlank 2K(Expert on the post-Soviet world at the Strategic Studies Institute, 2000 Stephen J., US Military Engagement with

Transcaucasia and Central Asia, June, http://www.milnet.com/pentagon/Russia-2000-assessment-SSI.pdf)In 1993 Moscow even threatened World War III to deter Turkish intervention on behalf of Azerbaijan. Yet the new Russo-Armenian Treaty and Azeri-Turkish

treaty suggest that Russia and Turkey could be dragged into a confrontation to rescue their allies from defeat. 72 Thus many of the conditions forconventional war or protracted ethnic conflict in which third parties intervene are present in the Transcaucasus. For example,manyThird World conflicts generated by local structural factors have a great potential for unintended escalation. Big powers often

feel obliged to rescue their lesser proteges and proxies. One or another big powermay fail to grasp the other sides stakessince interests here are not as clear as in Europe. Hence commitments involving the use ofnuclear weapons to prevent a clients defeatare notaswell established or apparent. Clarity about the nature of the threat could prevent the kind of rapid and almost uncontrolled escalation we saw in 1993when Turkish noises about intervening on behalf of Azerbaijan led Russian leaders to threaten a nuclear war in that case. 73 Precisely because Turkey is a NATO

ally, Russian nuclear threats could trigger a potential nuclear blow (not a small possibility given the erratic nature of Russias declarednuclear strategies).The real threat of a Russian nuclear strike against Turkey to defend Moscows interests and forces in theTranscaucasus makes the danger of major war there higher than almost everywhere else.

Independently Violent Kurdish secession ends the US-Turkey alliance the impact is Trade, Hegemony, Terrorism, Iraqi

and Energy instability and Middle East war

Menon and Wimbush 07(Rajan,- Adjunct Fellow at Hudson Institute Enders,- Director of Hudson Institute's Center for Future SecurityStrategies The US and Turkey: End of an Alliance?http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/section?content=a779309405&fulltext=713240928) If Turkey, a key friend and ally, turns away from theUnited States, the damage to American interests will be severe and long lasting. Turkey remains exceptionally important to the United States,

arguably even more so than during the Cold War. Turkey is the top of an arc that starts in Israel and wends its way through Lebanon, Syria, Armenia, Georgia, Azerbaijan and Iran. Itabuts, or is proximate to, countries pivotal to American foreign policy and national security, whether allies and friends, adversaries, orloci of instability.Turkey's critical location means thatinstability within it could spill beyond its borders, with unpredictable effects ripplingacross its neighbourhood,particularly the Middle East.Turkey sits astride critical waterways and narrows (the Caspian Sea, the Black Sea, theMediterranean, and the Bosporus and Dardanelles) that are channels for trade and the flow ofenergy to global markets.Turkey's Mediterraneanport of Ceyhan is the terminus of the Baku-Ceyhan pipeline.Turkey is therefore essential to American efforts to reduce the dependence ofAzerbaijan, and potentially Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan, on Russia's energy pipelines.Turkey's substantial economic and political ties with Georgiaand Azerbaijan contribute to the stability of these countries, whose strategic significance far exceeds their standing in commonplace measures ofpower. Georgia is a corridor for the Baku-Ceyhan pipeline, andits stability is under threat because of its testy relationship with Russia and its conflicts withthe Russian-supported secessionist statelets Abkhazia and South Ossetia. Azerbaijan is not onlya major energy producer,but also a fellow Turkic country,whose territorial dispute with Armenia overNagorno-Karabakh could boil over into war, just as it did in the 1990s, possiblyigniting a widerconflagrationdrawing in Turkey (Azerbaijan's ally) and Russia (Armenia's patron) and putting the Baku-Ceyhan pipeline at risk.Turkey is ademocratic and secular Muslim state, and its alliance with the United States helps demonstrate that the United States canmaintain friendly and productive ties with an array ofMuslim countries - that America does not oppose Islam per se, but rather the violent extremists whoinvoke it to justify their violence against innocents and their retrograde, intolerant agenda.This is crucial if theAmerican campaign against terrorism isnot to be seenby the world's 1.3 billion Muslims, as Islamic terrorist groups would like it to be, asa war against Islam itself.Turkey'scooperation is essential to any durable politicalsettlement in Iraq, particularly because it borders Iraq's Kurdish north and fears that the emergence there ofa Kurdish state would increase the already-considerable violence and resilient separatist sentiment in its own Kurdish-populated southeast. The fragmentationof Iraqcould thereforeprompt Turkish military intervention, which in turncould deal a death blow to the US-Turkishalliance,perhapseven culminating in Turkey's exit from NATO. (Turkish forces intervened in northern Iraq to attack the camps of the Kurdish separatist guerillas in the aftermath of the 1991Gulf War; in March 2003 roughly 1,500 Turkish troops entered this region; and Turkish Special Forces have reportedly carried out covert operations in post-Saddam Iraq.)Turkey'sdisillusionment with the West could prompt a reorientationof its foreign policy away from the United States, the European Union andNATO, and toward a new strategy that looks to China, India, Iran, Russia and Syria. Such a shift is a lready being discussed in Turkey, and the assumption that it amountsto bluff and bluster may prove short sighted. The new strategic landscape created by the end of the Cold War may pose new threats to Turkey, but it also provides it a choice of newpartners as well. While a rethinking of Turkish grand strategy need not in itself undermine the alliance between Turkey and the United States, it could certainly do so if the force driving

it is an anti-Western nationalism.Turkey and the United States both face the threat of terrorism, andTurkey's cooperation is essential to any trulyeffectiveAmericanpolicy against globalterrorist networks. More specifically,Turkey could also serve as a corridor for militantIslamists to

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Elections Impact Iraninfiltrate Iraq and Turkey's otherneighbours.Turkey's participation in the International Security Assistance Force inAfghanistan, a militarycoalition that for a time was commanded by a Turkish general, demonstrates that Ankara and Washington can cooperate inpromotingstability andenabling economic development in war-torn countries, although Turkey's military forces in Afghanistan are small and are not deployed in the south, the centraltheatre of the anti-Taliban war. (Turkey is no different in this respect than the vast majority of other contributors to the force). Turkey is a member of NATO, andthe air bases in its southeast, primarily Incirlik but also Batman, Diyarbakir, Malatya and Mus, remain important to the United States. The value of Turkishairfields was revealed after the 1991 Gulf War, when a no-fly zone was established over northern Iraq to protect the Kurds from Saddam Hussein's militarymachine. Moreover, despite Washington's inability to open a second front from Turkish territory against Iraqi forces in March 2003, American aircraft were

permitted to use Turkish airspace for operations in Iraq, and Turkish installations are important forproviding logistical support to US forces in Iraq.

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SDI 08


Strikes Bad - Terrorism

Strikes end cooperation with Muslims on the war on terrorLarrabee 06 (Stephen,- Corporate Chair in European Security @ RAND 3-9 Defusing the Iranian Crisishttp://www.rand.org/commentary/030906OCR.html)

Moreover, the political costs would be very high. A military strike would unleash a wave of nationalism and

unite the Iranian population behind the current regime, ending any prospect of internal changein the

near future and ensuring decades of enmity from the Iranian middle class and youth, who are largelyopposed to the current regime. It would also provoke outrage in the Muslim world, probably making anyattempt to obtain the support of moderate Muslims in the war on terror impossible.

Thats the vital internal link to solving terrorismAFP 05 (http://www.terradaily.com/2005/050603134817.rjtw3m11.html)

The United States must use its "soft power" to gain the trust and confidence of Muslims worldwide ifit is to "prevail over terrorism", Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said Friday. Opening an internationalsecurity conference, Lee said one reason why many moderate Muslims are reluctant to condemn and disown religiousextremists was the "wide gap that separates the US from the Muslim world". He said the large-scale US assistance toIndonesia, the world's biggest Muslim nation, in the aftermath of the December 26 tsunami disaster had not completelyerased the resentment many Muslims feel toward the United States. "The sources of this Muslim anger are historical andcomplex, but they have been accentuated in recent years by Muslim perceptions of American unilateralism and hostility tothe faith," Lee told the audience, which included US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. Lee cited a survey that found that

in 2000 three quarters of Indonesians said they were "attracted" to the United States but that by 2003 the number had fallento just 15 percent. Lee said US help to bring relief assistance to the tsunami victims in Indonesia had touched the hearts ofmany Indonesians. "But this singular event has not eliminated the antipathy that many Muslims still feel towards the US," hesaid. He cited demonstrations worldwide, including in Jakarta and Kuala Lumpur, following a report by the US magazineNewsweek that US interrogators at the Guantanamo Bay detention centre had flushed a copy of the Koran down the toilet.

Newsweek later withdrew the report, saying they could not confirm the story with their source. "The US needs to makemore use of its 'soft power' to win over international opinion, correct misperceptions and build trustand credibility, especially in the Muslim world," Lee said. "In the long term this is vital if the US is toprevail over terrorism, and to maintain its position of global leadership."

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SDI 08


Strikes Fail 2NC

Iran already has the required uranium hidden and Iran will prolif after strikesFitzpatrick 07 (Mark,- senior fellow at the International Institute of Strategic Studies Can Irans Nuclear Capabilitybe Kept Latent? Survival, March, InformaWorld Online)

At best, air strikes will only delay the programme a few years, and probably not at all , unless the United States or Israel were prepared toextensively widen the bombing campaign and to repeat it in a few short years - in effect, to launch an interminable war against a Middle East foe stronger,

larger and more cohesive than Saddam's Iraq. America's disastrous experience in Iraq after Saddam should make such a scenario unacceptable. Iran'snuclear facilities are more dispersed than were Iraq's in 1981, the time of Israel's pre-emptive air strike, popularly credited with having significantly set

back an Iraqi nuclear-weapons programme. In any case, as Richard Betts convincingly argues, the Israeli 1981 example is a fallacy: destroying the nuclearreactor at Osirak did not delay Iraq's nuclear programme and probably accelerated it.17After the bombing, Saddam increased the budget and number of

scientists dedicated to the programme twentyfold.18Without accurate intelligence about Iran's dispersed nuclear facilities and hidden equipment,air strikes that only target the known facilities will not cripple the nuclear programme . An unnamed senior US official said on 7 November 2006:'We do not have enough information about the Iranian nuclear program to be confident that you could destroy it in a single attack. The worst thing you could

do is try and not succeed.'19The uranium-conversion plant at Esfahan is vulnerable, but Iran may no longer need it for a small weapons programme,having already produced enough UF6 for at least 30 bombs. According to a knowledgeable Western official, the UF6 produced to date is ofsufficientpurity forIran's initial purposes and is stored in dispersed locations safe from air strikes .20Iran could also build smalleruranium-conversion facilities elsewhere, if it has not already done so. The above-ground pilot enrichment plant at Natanz, with its 360 installed centrifuges, is alsovulnerable. Bombing Natanz, however, would not destroy Iran's other centrifuges and centrifuge components . Iran may already have up to2,000 centrifuges stockpiled in unknown locations.21 By accelerating to round-the-clockproduction, Iran could conceivably triple the 70-100

per month centrifuge production rate at which it was known to have operated two years ago, and replace the 360 centrifuges at Natanz within twomonths. Iran would also have to build a new facility and equip it with replacements for the autoclaves, piping and other equipment in the Natanz

plant,but it is prudent to assume that Iran already has a replacement facility being readied. Above all, short of commando operations to targetscientists and engineers, bombing would not destroy the knowledge in nuclear and related sciences and engineering skills that Iran hasamassed to date.

Strikes cant solve prolif 3 reasons-Wont destroy human capital or tech-Cause public support for nukes and the regime-Makes enforcing non-prolif standards unpopular

Ochmanek 07 (David,- senior defense analyst at the RAND Corporation . March, Coping with Iranhttp://www.rand.org/pubs/conf_proceedings/2007/RAND_CF237.pdf)

Second, even a highly effective attack on Irans nuclear infrastructure will not destroy the human capitaland the technology base needed to reconstruct the program. Like the Iraqis after Israels attack on the reactorcomplex at Osirak, the Iranians should be expected to rebuild their program postattack in a more

dispersed, covert, and survivable form. Third, popular support for the program within Iran wouldprobably be high. Historically, short bombing campaigns have typically prompted citizens of thevictimized country to rally around their government, and the majority of Iranians should be expectto do just that. The regime would point to the U.S. attack as an example of the sort of thing anuclear capability is intended to deter. Of course, reactions to an attack on Iran would spread far beyond Iran andthe gulf. Jihadist elements worldwide would characterize the attackthe United States third on a Muslim country since2001as further evidence that the United States is engaged in an all-out war on Islam. As such, the attack would beexpected to boost support for radical Islamist groups. Notwithstanding the concerns that countries of the GCC have about

Iranian power, opinion among the gulf Arabs would be overwhelmingly against the United States. This would make itmore difficult for these governments to cooperate openly with Washington on a variety of issues.And, to the extent that the U.S. attack would be seen as legitimating Irans claims that it needsstronger deterrent capabilities, it might make it harder to enforce restrictions on Irans access totechnologies related to nuclear, missile, and other weapons.

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SDI 08


A2: Israeli Strikes Worse

Multiple reasons Israel wont strike without the US-Alliance with the US -Flyover permission-Implications for US assets

Levy 07 (Daniel,- Senior Fellow and Director of the Prospects for Peace Initiative at The Century Foundation and a SeniorFellow and Director of the Middle East Initiative at the New America Foundation Op-Ed on Iran, Originally appeared inHaaretz, October 19, http://www.prospectsforpeace.com/)

Most senior U.S. military are known to be actively opposed.The option of independent Israeli action against Iranis largely a myth. The long-standing "no surprises" commitment, the likely need for U.S. flyoverpermission, and almost certain targeting of U.S. assets in retaliation, makes any Israeli militarycalculation very much a joint affair. No military plan guarantees success, and the almost certaindevastating consequences make the idea very ill-advised. An attack would likely provoke a military responsein the region and beyond, notably in Iraq and Afghanistan, wreak havoc on oil supplies, enrage the Muslim (including Sunni)world, be a gift to jihadi recruitment, create new enemies and harden hatreds. Israel would face a particularly fiercebacklash, conceivably for generations.

[Dont read if youre reading Israel strikes in the 1AC]

Israel will opt for diplomacy or deterrenceIndyk 07 (Martin http://www.rand.org/pubs/conf_proceedings/2007/RAND_CF237.pdfIf it has no other choice, the United States can live with an Iran armed with nuclear weapons (for example, it lives with anuclear China, Pakistan, North Korea, and India). For Israel, however, this is an existential dilemma. Even Rafsanjani statedthat Iran does not have to worry about Israel, that only one weapon would be needed to destroy it. Having to live with the

threatof nuclear destruction can have a very negative psychological effect on Israel. However, the Israeli primeminister stated recently that the Iranians have exaggerated how far along they are and that there isstill time for economic sanctions and pressure to work. Israel is interested in seeing the diplomaticstrategy succeed and is thinking about whether MAD is indeed an option, particularly under a U.S.security umbrella. Therefore, while this is a serious dilemma, it does not mean that Israel will use force topreempt the Iranian program.

Youre evidence is just rhetoricPorter, historian and national security policy analyst,07(Gareth, Israeli Realism on Iran Belies Threat Rhetoric, January 30, http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=36369)WASHINGTON, Jan 30 (IPS) - When Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert declared last week at the Herzliya conference thatIsrael could not risk another "existential threat" such as the Nazi holocaust, he was repeating whathas become the dominant theme in Israel's campaign against Iran -- that it cannot tolerate an Iran with thetechnology that could be used to make nuclear weapons, because Iran is fanatically committed to the physical destruction of

Israel. The internal assessment by the Israeli national security apparatus of the Iranian threat,however, is more realistic than the government's public rhetoric would indicate. Since Iranian PresidentMahmoud Ahmadinejad came to power in August 2005, Israel has effectively exploited his image as someone who isparticularly fanatical about destroying Israel to develop the theme of Iran's threat of a "second holocaust" by using nuclear

weapons. But such alarmist statements do not accurately reflect the strategic thinking of the Israelinational security officials. In fact, Israelis began in the early 1990s to use the argument that Iran isirrational about Israel and could not be deterred from a nuclear attack if it ever acquired nuclear weapons,according to an account by independent analyst Trita Parsi on Iranian-Israeli strategic relations to be published in March.

Meanwhile, the internal Israeli view of Iran, Parsi told IPS in an interview, "is completely different."

Parsi, who interviewed many Israeli national security officials for his book, says, "The Israelis know that Iran is arational regime, and they have acted on that presumption." His primary evidence of such an Israeliassessment is that the Israelis purchased Dolphin submarines from Germany in 1999 and 2004 which have been reported tobe capable of carrying nuclear-armed cruise missiles.

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SDI 08


Engagement Good Iran Prolif

Engagement and security guarantee solves Iran prolif

Perthes and Wegner, Director and Post-Doc Scholar, both at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs,

06

(Volker and Eva, Enriching the Options: Europe, the United States, and Iran, Discussion paper for the 4th Annual GMFThink Tank Symposiums in Vienna, June 11-12, http://www.swp-berlin.org/en/common/get_document.php?asset_id=3019)

Second - and perhaps most importantly - there needs to a more serious contribution from the United States. Negotiations with Iran will notcome to any sustainable result unless the United States comes in directly or indirectly on the security question. Primarily, Washington willhave to make clear that its goal in the process is indeed the same as that of the Europeans, the IAEA, and the rest of the international community :limiting the proliferation of WMD and maintaining the non-proliferation regime, not regime change in Tehran. The prospect of some formof explicit or implicit American security guarantees would arguably help a lot to bring a new round of negotiations to a successfulconclusion. In the words of a prominent member of the "realist" group in Tehran: "If major powers gave us security assurances this wouldhelp us to give you guarantees that all nuclear issues are peaceful [...] and there would not even be a theoretical need to divert the

programme for military purpose21. Obviously, these major powers are not the EU-3. Washington would not be asked to promise or guarantee morethan it did in regard to North Korea which was assured in writing in September 2005 that the US "had no intention to attack or invade the D.P.R.K. withnuclear or conventional weapons"22. Certainly, the regime in Tehran is not more of a rogue than that in Pyong Yang.

Iran Prolif Causes Rapid Regional Proliferation and Nuclear Terrorism

McInnis, 05 (Kathleen, Coordinator Project on Nuclear Issues @ CSIS, Washington Quarterly, Summer)

The emergence of a nuclear Iran would undoubtedly send shockwaves through the region that could result in a nuclear domino effect.Therein lies the crux of the problem: If Saudi Arabia were to follow Iran's proliferation route, that would again change the calculations ofevery other state in the region in a cumulative and potentially dangerous manner. Continuing with Egypt, and with other dominos such asTurkey and Syria poised to fall, the proliferation challenge in the Middle East is uniquely daunting. Perhaps most worrisome is that the UnitedStates is left, at present, with few good options in the region to thwart this dangerous trajectory Unlike in Asia, where the U.S. deterrent umbrella is more

credible, in the Middle East the Iranian proliferation problem presents a different set of challenges. Not only do Iranian connections with terroristorganizations significantly raise fears of nuclear terrorism, but state-based proliferation is more dangerous in this already volatile region.Both concerns present significant, long-term challenges to U.S. security and involvement in the region, especially as extended deterrence may notsucceed in assuring regional allies.

Nuclear War

Rosen, Director of the John M. Olin Institute for Strategic Studies at Harvard University, 2006

(Stephen Peter, Foreign Affairs, Sept/Oct,http://fullaccess.foreignaffairs.org/20060901facomment85502/stephen-peter-rosen/after-proliferation-what-to-do-if-more-states-go-nuclear.html gjm)

Nuclear-armed countries in the Middle East would be unlikely to display such restraint. Iran and Iraq would be much too suspicious of eachother, as would Saudi Arabia and Iran, Turkey and Iraq, and so forth. And then there is Israel. Wariness would create the classic conditionsfor a multipolar arms race, with Israel arming against all possible enemies and the Islamic states arming against Israel and one another.Historical evidence suggests that arms races sometimes precipitate wars because governments come to see conflict as preferable tofinancial exhaustion or believe they can gain a temporary military advantage through war. Arguably, a nuclear war would be so destructivethat its prospect might well dissuade states from escalating conflicts. But energetic arms races would still produce larger arsenals, making itharder to prevent the accidental or unauthorized use of nuclear weapons.

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18/31

SDI 08


Ext Iran Prolif Impact

Iranian nuclearization will cause global proliferation and nuclear war none of the normal

deterrence arguments apply.

Wimbush, 2007(S. Enders,- senior fellow at Hudson Institute and director of its Center for Future Security Strategies, The End of Deterrence: A

nuclear Iran will change everything, January 11th

, http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/013/154auoqp.asp?pg=1)

Iran is fast building its position as the Middle East's political and militaryhegemon, a position that will belargely unchallengeable once it acquires nuclear weapons. A nuclear Iran willchange all of the critical strategicdynamics of this volatile region in ways thatthreaten the interests of virtually everyone else . The outlines of some of thesenegative trends are already visible, as other actors adjust their strategies to accommodate what increasingly appears to be the emerging reality of an unpredictable,unstable nuclear power. Iran needn't test a device to shift these dangerous dynamics into high gear; that is already happening. By the time Iran tests, the landscape willhave changed dramatically because everyone will have seen it coming. The opportunities nuclear weapons will afford Iran far exceed the prospect of using them towin a military conflict. Nuclear weapons will empower strategies of coercion, intimidation, and denial that go far beyond purely military considerations. Acquiring the

bomb as an icon of state power will enhance the legitimacy of Iran's mullahs and make it harder for disgruntled Iranians to oust them. With nuclear weapons,Iran will have gained the ability to deter any direct American threats, as well as the leverage to keep the United Statesat a distance and to discourage it from helping Iran's regional opponents. Would the United States be in Iraq if Saddam had had a few nuclear weapons and the ability todeliver them on target to much of Europe and all of Israel? Would it even have gone to war in 1991 to liberate Kuwait from Iraqi aggression? Unlikely. Yet Iran is

rapidly acquiring just such a capability.If it succeeds, a relatively small nuclear outcast will be able to deter a mature nuclearpower. Iran will become a billboard advertising nuclear weapons as the logical asymmetric weapon of

choice for nations that wish to confront the United States. It should surprise no one that quietdiscussions have alreadybegun in Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Turkey, and elsewhere in the Middle East about the desirability of developing national

nuclear capabilities to blunt Iran's anticipated advantage and to offset the perceived decline in America's protective

power.This is just the beginning. We should anticipate that proliferation across Eurasia will be broad and swift,creating nightmarish challenges. The diffusion of nuclear know-how is on the verge of becoming impossible toimpede. Advanced computation and simulation techniques will eventually make testing unnecessary for some actors,

thereby expanding the possibilities for unwelcome surprises and rapid shifts in the security environment. Leakage of

nuclear knowledge and technologies from weak states will become commonplace, and new covert supply networks will

emerge to fill the gap left by the neutralization of Pakistani proliferator A. Q. Khan. Non-proliferation treaties, never effective inblocking the ambitions of rogues like Iran and North Korea,will be meaningless. Intentional proliferation to state and non-state actors is virtuallycertain, as newly capable states seek to empower their friends and sympathizers.Iran, with its well known support of Hezbollah,is a particularly good candidate to proliferate nuclear capabilities beyond the control of any state

as a way to extend the coercive reach of its own nuclear politics. Arsenals will be small, whichsounds reassuring, but in

fact itheightens the dangers and risk. New players with just a few weapons,including Iran, will be especially dangerous.Cold War deterrence was based on the belief that an initial strike by an attacker could not destroy all an opponent's nuclear weapons, leaving the adversarywith the capacity to strike back in a devastating retaliatory blow. Because it is likely to appear easier to destroy them in a single blow, small

arsenals will increase the incentive to strike first in a crisis. Small, emerging nuclear forces could

also raise the risk of preventive war, as leaders are tempted to attack before enemy arsenals grow bigger and

more secure. Some of thenew nuclear actors are less interested in deterrence than in using nuclear weaponsto annihilate their enemies. Iran's leadership has spoken of its willingness--in their words--to "martyr"the entire Iranian nation, and it has even expressed the desirability of doing so as a way to accelerate an

inevitable, apocalyptic collision between Islam and the West that will result in Islam's final worldwide

triumph. Wiping Israel off the map--one of Iran's frequently expressed strategic objectives--even if it results in an Israelinuclear strike on Iran, may be viewed as an acceptable trade-off. Ideological actors of this kind may be very different

from today's nuclear powers who employ nuclear weapons as a deterrent to annihilation. Indeed, some of the new actors may seek to

annihilate others and be annihilated, gloriously, in return. What constitutes deterrence in this world? Proponents of new non-proliferation treaties and many European strategists speak of "managing" a nuclear Iran, as if Iran and the new nuclear actors that will emerge in Iran's wake

can be easily deterred by getting them to sign documents and by talking nicely to them. This is a lethal naivet. We have no idea how to deterideological actors who may even welcome their own annihilation. We do not know what they hold dear enough to be

deterred by the threat of its destruction. Our own nuclear arsenal is robust, but it may have no deterrent effect on a

nuclear-armed ideological adversary. This is the world Iran is dragging us into. Can they be talked out of it? Maybe. But it isgetting very late to slow or reverse the momentum propelling us into this nuclear no-man's land. We should be under no illusion that talk

alone--"engagement"--is a solution. Nuclear Iran will prompt the emergence of a world in which nucleardeterrence may evaporate, the likelihood of nuclear use will grow, and where deterrence, once

broken, cannot be restored.

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19/31

SDI 08


Engagement Good Leadership

Engagement with Iran Key to US Leadership

Ackerman, Representative from New York, 07, Gender paraphrased(Gary, Federal News Service, January 31, Lexis)

Although our military options are dismal, the Bush administration seems intent on charging full speed ahead towardsconfrontation. If we had a credible diplomatic alternative that we were pushing the Iranians towards, such gambling might make sense. Without adiplomatic backstop, however, it is merely reckless. Without question, face-to-face dialogue, as the chairman has suggested, with the Iranians would be

difficult, unpleasant, and I believe also likely to fail. However,if there are no talks, a negotiated resolution of either the Iranian nuclearproblem or the instability and violence in Iraq is essentially impossible. I would add here thatthis administration's incessantpractice of subcontracting to other countries the most vital question of our national security represents one of the mostegregious and shameful failures in the history of American foreign policy. Achieving success in negotiations with Iran maynot be possible. But without making the attempt, without demonstrating that America is doing its utmost to resolve theseregional crises -- apart from applying more and more force --our ability to attract and hold allies will be greatly diminished.Other nations expect us to lead, not to lecture. Painful as it may be for some to acknowledge, the United States has a credibilityproblem. There once was a Republican president who warned us to "speak softly, but carry a big stick." Instead of blusteringabout Iran while hollowing out our military in Iraq, we need to get serious about achieving some of the very simple butdifficult goals: first, bringing our catastrophic adventure in Iraq to a conclusion that will not turn Iraq's civil war into a regional war; second, restoring the

strength and credibility of our already overextended armed forces; and, third, engaging our European allies in a strategic plan to convince Iran that its bestinterests require a satisfactory resolution to the nuclear issue.Anyone who believes we can achieve any of this agenda without engagingthe Iranians ourselves on the fundamental questions of regional security is foolingthemself[himself].

The impact is global nuclear war.

Khalilzad 95(Zalmay, RAND Corporation, Losing The Moment? Washington Quarterly, Vol 18, No 2, p. 84)

Under the third option, the United States would seek to retain global leadership and to preclude the rise of a global rival or a return to multipolarity for theindefinite future. On balance, this is the best long-term guiding principle and vision. Such a vision is desirable not as an end in itself, but because a world inwhich the United States exercises leadership would have tremendous advantages. First, the global environment would be more open and more receptive toAmerican values -- democracy, free markets, and the rule of law. Second, such a world would have a better chance of dealing cooperatively with the world's

major problems, such as nuclear proliferation, threats of regional hegemony by renegade states, and low-level conflicts. Finally ,U.S. leadership wouldhelp preclude the rise of another hostile global rival, enabling the United States and the world to avoid another global cold orhot war and allthe attendant dangers, including a global nuclear exchange. U.S. leadership would thereforebe more conducive to global stability than a

bipolar or a multipolar balance of power system.

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20/31

SDI 08


Ext Engagement Solves Leadership

Engagement with Iran is key to shore up US hegemony.

Leverett, Senior Fellow at the New American Foundation, 06(Flynt, Dealing with Tehran: Assessing US Diplomatic Options Toward Iran, American Century Foundation Report,

http://www.tcf.org/publications/internationalaffairs/leverett_diplomatic.pdf)

This argument is best understood in historical perspective. Irans location, the size of its population, and a comparatively strong national identitymake it, under virtually any circumstances, an important player in the regional balance of power. Since the advent of the Islamic Republic in1979, Iran has used its strategic energies and resources in ways that have worked against American interests in a number of fronts . As a result,American administrations have sought to contain Iran in various ways.13 At the same time, Irans undeniable importance in the regional balance of

power has always made the U.S. strategy of containing and isolating the Islamic Republic seem a somewhat unnatural posture. For thisreason, as was noted above, the Reagan, George H. W. Bush, and Clinton administrationsand, as will be discussed below, the current Bush Administration

all sought to explore possibilities for some kind of opening to Iran, either through limit

obama good - iran

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