Who Are You Calling "Unserious"? Posted by Michael Cohen

A couple of days ago I wrote about the ill-considered recommendation of military force against Iran that is increasingly being sounded by neo-conservatives. And when I say ill-considered I don't mean because it's a bad idea (which of course it is) but instead I was speaking of the the complete lack of "consideration" underpinning these bellicose cries. Case in point, yesterday's editorial in the Wall Street Journal, which had the temerity to call President Obama "unserious" in dealing with the Iranian nuclear program:

President George W. Bush will share responsibility for a nuclear Iran given his own failure to act more firmly against the Islamic Republic or to allow Israel to do so, thereby failing to make good on his pledge not to allow the world's most dangerous regimes to get the world's most dangerous weapons. But it is now Mr. Obama's watch, and for a year he has behaved like a President who would rather live with a nuclear Iran than do what it takes to stop it.

To be clear when the WSJ suggests doing "what it takes to stop it" it is of course talking about the use of force against Iran. But not surprisingly, at no point do the Journal's editorial writers take the time to consider the full implications of what using force against Iran might mean. 

As I wrote the other day, bombing Iran's nuclear facilities would be an unmitigated disaster for the region, for the global economy, for US interests and even global stability. And once again it would make the US a pariah state isolated from the global community. Now the Wall Street Journal might be unconcerned about that - or might even see it as a political plus - but for the folks in the Obama Administration these are precisely the issues that will have to wrestled over before the use of force can be considered. Bombing any country is hardly a consequence free activity.

But the Journal and others seem to view attacking Iran as an event that will occur in vacuum with few consequences for the region and the United States. At the very least, they've shown in this editorial no interest in wrestling with the implications of the use of force against Iran. As my good friend Andrew Exum notes, there are more than a few questions that have to be considered: 

If you're going to make a case for the use of violence to realize a political end, you're not going to find me in the back of the room wearing a Code Pink t-shirt and waving a banner. But you will find me with my hand politely raised asking how, exactly, the use of force is meant to achieve the political end. What are the interests at stake? What are the resources available? What are the desired end states? What are the risks and possible unintended effects? How are we mitigating those risks and unintended effects, and what contingency plans are we developing for when things go wrong? (And things will go wrong.) And what is your plan, by phase, for how force will be used? By all means, let's have a conversation about the use of force. But it has to be a mature discussion, and you better think through the questions I just asked. Because hope is not a method -- not for the Obama Administration, and neither for those who casually recommend the use of force in the political sphere.

I couldn't agree more with this sentiment (even the Code Pink reference) and it is worth noting that none of these questions were asked or answered in the run-up to the Iraq War . . . and I'm not so sure they were asked and answered properly in the period preceding the Afghan escalation. 

And look maybe those advocating for strikes against Iran are correct, but it's very easy to liberally recommend the use of military force; it's far more difficult to game out the consequences of such actions and the implications on US national interests. To do the former - loudly, abrasively and accompanied by calls of appeasement - without soberly considering the latter is not only unserious, it's the height of irresponsibility.

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