Iran claims it doesn’t plan to build any nuclear weapons. They say they only want nuclear technology for energy. The United States and lots of other folks believe it’s all a trick to get nuclear weapons and hand them out to terrorists, or possibly just nuke Israel for fun.
I’m a distrustful, cynical guy, so my first impulse is to assume the Iranians are lying. But that would require me to believe that my own government is telling the truth, and that’s a tough sell too. I’m genuinely embarrassed to admit that it’s a toss up.
The part that really threw me is that the President of Iran says that their ruling mullahs have issued a fatwah (ruling) that says Iran won’t build nuclear weapons. I’m going to surprise you by saying that I think they mean it. I base that opinion on the following:
I think that the Iranian religious leaders value their credibility with their own people. It’s one thing to make outrageous and unsupportable claims about your enemies; that stuff is generally believed and has a low risk of being discredited within Iran. But it’s a risky lie to tell your citizens you aren’t building a nuke and then suddenly include one in the next parade. That’s flat-out lying, and it would make a mockery of the whole fatwah system.
This is not to say the Iranian nuclear efforts are innocent. I spent 16 years in corporate America and I can spot weasel-words half a world away, even in Farsi. I think the truth is that the Iranians plan to build all the capability to quickly slap together a nuke, but stop short of assembling and testing it unless there is a specific threat. That gives the mullahs some wiggle room to later issue another fatwah saying the situation has changed and now it’s okay to build some nukes for self defense. And they never need to lie.
In summary, I don’t think they’re lying when they say they have no plans to make nuclear weapons. But it’s a weasel truth. They’d be very happy to have the capability and components sitting around waiting to be assembled. And in the meantime the nuclear program is very popular within the country. They win all around.
My next prediction is that the United States and Iran will become friendly in the next five years, similar to the way the Cold War ended. I don’t think we’ll see Iran in NATO, but I’m expecting embassies and trade and maybe some help rounding up terrorists. And I think those Iranian almost-nukes will make this all happen. Iran will move from a mischief-making renegade country to a respected world power and they’ll see the benefit of acting responsibly.
Or not.