I disagree, given the high probability they were going to do it anyway. They built Natanz enrichment in secret, they built Arak in secret, they built Fordow in secret, not to mention the more recent violations of the NPT to which they're still a signatory. They've violated the NPT over and over and over again. Why would one more agreement make any difference to their clandestine program?
This is the thing Western liberals need to understand. The leaders of these despotic regimes don't think like you. They don't intend to adhere to the agreements like you would. Their psychology is different to your psychology. And you can't make a unilateral agreement with a party like this. The agreement becomes a weapon to creep forward and present the world with a fait accompli at a future date.
> "Western liberals" aren't stupid or naive, they're just seeking a peaceful solution if possible.
They're not stupid, but they are naive. Look at UN Resolution 1701. Hezbollah agreed to disarm. Then, they just ... didn't.
Predictably, there was no self-reflection among the people that believe in the primacy of diplomacy. This chain of events may as well have not even happened in their minds.
Then when Hezbollah attacks Israel, the same people call for more diplomacy, instead of telling Israel to just win the war against the group that has proven to be unwilling to adhere to agreements.
Then when Israel won the war, finally there was a reconstitution of the Lebanese sovereignty over South Lebanon, which would not have occurred under any diplomatic solution. But predictably, still no self-reflection from any of the people that tried to pursue diplomacy.
I also disagree they want peace. They want "peace", meaning appeasement and kicking the can down the road, and meaning they don't have to be bothered hearing about this stressful news cycle anymore.
> This is the thing Western liberals need to understand.
First Western liberals needed to understand that Ukraine shouldn't have given up its nukes. Now they need to understand that Iran shouldn't have tried to get them.
The Ukraine situation proves my point, though. Russia was a signatory to an agreement with Ukraine to not do what they're doing. You can't make unilateral agreements with parties that have no intention of holding to them, as much as you would like to wishcast a different reality. The only option is a military one.
Oh, I've seen this one before! Then you install a police state, back it up with foreign weapons you sell to the police state in exchange for taxpayer money, forcibly "disappear" any disagreeable types and make the entire population hate your country for centuries to come!
All observers to trials since 1965 have reported allegations of torture which have been made by defendants and have expressed their own conviction that prisoners are tortured for the purpose of obtaining confessions. Alleged methods of torture include whipping and beating, electric shocks, the extraction of nails and teeth, boiling water pumped into the rectum, heavy weights hung on the testicles, tying the prisoner to a metal table heated to white heat, inserting a broken bottle into the anus, and rape.
Did "western liberals" get all that? Oh, I forgot this line by mistake!
SAVAK was established in 1967 with help from both the CIA and the Israeli intelligence agency, Mossad.
The false equivalency of destroying a democracy that had no nuclear ambitions, with attacking the nuclear facilities of a theocratic regime that has violated the NPT multiple times.
I disagree, given the high probability they were going to do it anyway. They built Natanz enrichment in secret, they built Arak in secret, they built Fordow in secret, not to mention the more recent violations of the NPT to which they're still a signatory. They've violated the NPT over and over and over again. Why would one more agreement make any difference to their clandestine program?
This is the thing Western liberals need to understand. The leaders of these despotic regimes don't think like you. They don't intend to adhere to the agreements like you would. Their psychology is different to your psychology. And you can't make a unilateral agreement with a party like this. The agreement becomes a weapon to creep forward and present the world with a fait accompli at a future date.