Should Iran have the bomb?

Ten days after the ceasefire between Iran and Israel the consensus among most observers, including the IAEA, is that Iran has saved enough fissile material and the capacity to enrich it to weapons-grade in a matter of weeks and months than years. Should it? Why would she do so? Considering that two nuclear powers collaborated to attack Iran in an unprovoked war lends itself to a widespread opinion in the global South that Iran must have all it needs to defend itself.

North Korea is invoked as an example of a state largely labeled rogue, yet because of its known inventory of a dozen nuclear bombs escapes the wrath despite its pariah status. When weaponised Iran too would be able to ward off any aggression, goes the rationale.

Iran, though, continues to be viewed with suspicion especially by Israel and its principal backer, the US. Iran's regime of the Ayatollahs displaced the Pahlavis, friends to the US, and in its wake earned the perpetual disdain of US. Her stance and declarations against Israel and support of those who lie in proximity in a struggle against Israel rankles and irks every living moment of the Israeli state.

Traditionally, Iran has been looked at with suspicion by its littoral neighbours across the Persian Gulf — the Arab sheikhdoms. Sect-based differences are reinforced with ethnic exclusivity, as indeed does the revolutionary streak of Iran's regime. History of Iranian civilisation shadows what has only recently begun to be realised as an Arab civilisation stoking civilisational wariness.

Recent strides in wealth through oil and material prosperity have enhanced Arab significance at the global level accentuated through close alignment with the West. Most Gulf sheikhdoms house US military bases perceptively oriented against any threat from Iran. Arabs and Iran therefore lie in two different camps rendering relations tenuous and speculative.

Were Iran to go nuclear, Saudi Arabia is sure to follow. It is widely reported that Saudi Arabia has been in talks with the US to acquire nuclear power plants — the drive for clean energy is a perfect garb. Russia is helping Iran set up a Heavy Water Plant at Bushehr, an Iranian town in its South, which though under IAEA safeguards can be a perfect veil for collecting residual Plutonium. The UAE has four Korean nuclear reactors supplying a quarter of its energy — Qatar has already objected to the UAE nuclearising Gulf.

Once in the field of enrichment and nuclear energy even if ostensibly for electrical power, a nation will inevitably chart a nuclear-weapon path over time. Iran is almost there though it needs serious consideration if it should. If Saudi Arabia follows, initially though on a declared peaceful path, there is no stopping from Gulf becoming the most rampantly nuclearised region of the world. With Pakistan and India already declared nuclear powers, all of littoral Persian Gulf and the Indian Ocean Region will be the most nuclearised region with inherent flashpoints which can rapidly and uncontrollably escalate to the point of annihilation. What this region instead needs is denuclearisation.

Arab-Israel dissonance needs to be repaired somehow. The US instituted the Abraham Accords to include and encourage Arab nations ready to formally accept Israel with a plan to advance the arrangement to those who remain on the fringe. Saudi Arabia has declared that she could consider the proposal only if Israel could cease its war in Gaza and accept the two-state solution where Palestinians could also have a separate homeland.

Most Muslim nations will subscribe to that stand. Middle east needs a comprehensive and wholesome settlement of open issues and conflicts that invariably involve Israel. Israel-Iran enmity too has roots in the same conflict. A viable and a lasting solution can greatly appease the discomfort and unease in the middle east.

If Israel is not at war with the rest of the middle east as has been the case since its inception as a separate state, should it still need nuclear weapons for its security and safety? What if both Israel and Iran together could be convinced to give up their nuclear weapons and aspirations and coexist as two responsible nations each with its own strength to contribute to the world?

Brazil, Argentina, South Africa and Ukraine have all given up nuclear weapons and nuclear-weapon programmes in the past to subscribe to a denuclearised world. With conflict as rampant, profusion of nuclear weapons in and around Gulf can only advance Armageddon. Following recent conflicts which almost pushed us to the brink of a widespread, total regional war, it is only imperative that peace is cemented with palpable, substantive and abiding solutions.

In another scenario imagine a link of continuum where adjoining states pursue the path to nuclear weaponisation in response to their threat assessment: Russia, China, India, Pakistan, Iran are all contiguous to one another and form what must be the chain of devastation. A nuclear war anywhere in the chain is sure to immerse adjoining states either in effect or in unison if not in extended conflagration.

With Iran will follow Turkey. As will Saudi Arabia and the UAE already on the path to that horrifying ultimate inevitability. USA is a virtual and a real neighbour to this region with its most dominating nuclear arsenal. Israel of course will only add to this fire. If this is not Armageddon, what is? The entire Eurasian landmass will be obliterated under an expanding engorgement of nuclear fires and radiation. Where to, will Europe escape? Germany, which gave up nuclear power plants has already indicated going back into the fold of nuclear energy after her gas pipelines from Russia were blown away. It will do so on a gallop under any right-wing government; it barely escaped having one in the last elections. Together, such an eventuality is humanity underwriting its own annihilation.

Yet humanity must benefit and not overlook what peaceful nuclear use can bring. Existing route to destruction of the climate comes from the use of fossil fuels. Humans, conscious of their misdeeds, are navigating a path to cleaner energy to save the planet. Nuclear power is an important cog in this plan. What it will need though to ensure disarmament is appeasement if not total elimination of conflict — especially where issues stand as explosive flashpoints — with resolution mechanisms that can be seen to be fair and equitable.

The world must believe in the value system which is rule-based and egalitarian. Estrangement and dismissiveness to project displeasure as is the wont of most global South is injurious. Instead, as a recourse the world at large must encourage Russia, China and the US to seize the moment and underwrite what must chart the path of coexistence for humanity in the next millennia. Collectivism than unilateralism must guide our responses to what threatens humanity. To that end pervasive peace remains the first step.