22 de agosto

La vez pasada comentaba que, a pesar de su dramatismo, tal vez el conflicto de Israel y Hezbollah en el Líbano sea una monumental distracción y que el verdadero problema de la región son las aspiraciones nucleares de Irán.

Insisto con lo mismo, espero estar equivocado de cabo a rabo, pero me temo que a esta altura del partido un enfrentamiento entre Israel e Irán es inevitable. Me parece que los únicos que nos empeñamos en no darnos por enterados somos nosotros en Occidente. Los iraníes no se cansan de dejarlo en claro cada vez que tienen la oportunidad.

Hoy leo esta columna, del WSJ, de Bernard Lewis en lo de Ramiro Recortes y la verdad es que es para preocuparse. Que lo diga un autor de su talla es para tomarlo en serio. De todos modos, vuelvo a repetir, espero sinceramente que Don Lewis esté profundamente equivocado en su apreciación y que tengan razón los partidarios del “amor y la compresión”:

During the Cold War, both sides possessed weapons of mass destruction, but neither side used them, deterred by what was known as MAD, mutual assured destruction. Similar constraints have no doubt prevented their use in the confrontation between India and Pakistan. In our own day a new such confrontation seems to be looming between a nuclear-armed Iran and its favorite enemies, named by the late Ayatollah Khomeini as the Great Satan and the Little Satan, i.e., the United States and Israel. Against the U.S. the bombs might be delivered by terrorists, a method having the advantage of bearing no return address. Against Israel, the target is small enough to attempt obliteration by direct bombardment.

It seems increasingly likely that the Iranians either have or very soon will have nuclear weapons at their disposal, thanks to their own researches (which began some 15 years ago), to some of their obliging neighbors, and to the ever-helpful rulers of North Korea. The language used by Iranian President Ahmadinejad would seem to indicate the reality and indeed the imminence of this threat.

Would the same constraints, the same fear of mutual assured destruction, restrain a nuclear-armed Iran from using such weapons against the U.S. or against Israel?