fbpx
Politics Foreign Affairs Culture Fellows Program

How to Judge a Nuclear Deal

Hawkish measures historically backfire, so hawkish denunciation is a sign of possible success.
us iran negotiations

Graham Allison explains how a nuclear deal with Iran should be judged. Here he draws lessons from dealing with North Korea:

-Under which treatment – agreements or confrontation – did North Korea conduct a nuclear weapons test? Answer: confrontation.

-Under which treatment – negotiations or confrontation – both in the Clinton–Bush and Obama periods did North Korea build its nuclear arsenal of more than a dozen weapons that it has today, according to U.S. intelligence estimates? Answer: confrontation.

I have mentioned this before, but as the nuclear talks with Iran are drawing to a close this week these facts are worth bearing in mind. Iran hawks continue to insist that more pressure, increased sanctions, or the threat of attack (or some combination of these) is what the U.S. ought to use to compel Iran to make more concessions. Yet the experience with North Korea tells us that resorting to coercive measures backfired spectacularly and produced the outcome that hawks claimed they wanted to avoid. There is good reason to expect that the same treatment of Iran would yield much the same result. Perversely, the Iran hawks that have insisted on impossible goals and additional sanctions during the negotiations often cite the North Korean example as a cautionary tale against diplomatic engagement, yet it was the very pressure tactics that many of the same people favored last decade and still favor today that led to North Korea’s withdrawal from the NPT and the testing of nuclear weapons.

While they profess concern about the proliferation of nuclear weapons, hawks are reliably in favor of backing policies that make other states more likely to pursue them, and they have consistently dismissed the diplomatic efforts that have had the greatest success in limiting the nuclear programs of possible proliferators. Assuming that there is a deal struck with Iran this week, it’s important to remember that many of its loudest detractors and opponents have been wrong about how to deal with Iran’s nuclear program just as they were wrong about how the U.S. and its allies should have handled North Korea’s. When they pronounce a nuclear deal to be “bad” or unacceptable, that is one sign that it is probably the best one that could have been reached.

Advertisement

Comments

Become a Member today for a growing stake in the conservative movement.
Join here!
Join here