So, Iran gets the bomb. What's it going to do with it? Iran doesn't have ICBMs, so it's no threat to the west. The worst it can do is get into a nuclear standoff with nuclear-armed Israel, which would simply maintain the status quo.

Israel and Iran are two sides of the same coin. Rather than getting het up about the middle east, we're better off returning to a policy of containment and letting the savages beat each other with whatever weapons they can lay their hands on.

Iran probably does want the bomb as a protection against aggression. However, it definitely wants a civilian nuclear programme since it has a rapidly growing economy and large population with declining oil production. The more energy Iran can obtain from non-oil/gas sources, the longer it will have some left over for export - and that is vitally important to western economies!

Interestingly, a number of other Middle Eastern nations are now considering nuclear power despite the common argument that they have massive oil/gas reserves and so do not need this. See:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/middle_east/article624855.ece

If the west was really worried about an islamic bomb then they would have moved heaven and earth to rid Pakistan of its weapons. Remember that the regime in Tehran - that became so recognised for extremism with its fatwa on Salman Rushdie - was only reacting to demonstrations in Pakistan over his book. The fatwa was an attempt to retake leadership on this issue. The real whackos are in increasingly unstable Pakistan - so we already have a serious problem there. The beating of drums about Iran is just preparation for an attack to prevent the growth of Shia influence in the Gulf. There is a good review of recent events here:

http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2007/09/24/ahmadinejad/index_np.html

Good article.
I guess what it also shows is how incredibly complex the politics of the Middle East really are and that there are no simplistic binary solutions like the "axis of evil"

I would also say that there are just as many "religious" inspired loonies in the USA who are the mirror image of Iranian fanatics.
Recent and continuing stories re Christian fundamentalist efforts to "christianize" the USA armed forces at all levels is testimony to this. This phenomena being part of the frightfully psychotic end-time armageddon (second coming of "jesus") script that tens of millions of dreadfully sane USA citizens subscribe too.
A script that as far as I know has significant support at high levels of the Bush Administration.

For a different view of Iran's bomb read one of Israel leading military historians and scholars. Martin Van Creveld of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem has got both the knowledge and analytical skills to tackle the issue. As one of the world’s leading military analysts he has got a good track record of knowing what he is writing about. Best of all he is an Israeli patriot without an ounce of hatred or opposition to the United States. He cannot be accused of being an apologist for the unpalatable Iranian regime. His article was published yesterday in one of the world's best Jewish newspapers, the New York FORWARD.

The URL is http://www.forward.com/articles/11673/

The article is called : The world can live with a nyclear Iran

South Africa in the 1980s spent $300b dollars developing uranium enrichment and building 6 bombs. The cost of this exercise was probably a major contributing factor to the change of regime.

The building and running of neuclear power plants and running them can be a cost effective exercise as long as "cheap" enriched uranium is supplied by existing suppliers and the products removed and processed by the same.

The building and running of an enrichment process for such a small demand cannot be economically viable and thus can only be a cover for a weapons program.

As South Africa discovered, that there was no circumstance where using the weapon would be better than not using it, (and subsequently dismantled their weapons and program), so Iran, will probably find out in the next few years as their economy is erroded by sanctions, that the testosterone value is not worth the price of their very expensive hood ornament.

As the Iranians have deliberately spread their operations around, so making air strikes ineffective, short of an invasion, sanctions especially technical will probably be the most effective in the long term.

'A nuclear Iran's first effect will be on the region, risking triggering a dangerous race for the bomb all around the area.'

Really? How? Given that Israel already has a bomb wouldn't logic dictate the race has already begun and Iran is merely the second starter off the blocks?

..., but it certainly is manoeuvering its power breaking pawns on the board of the Middle East, covertly and expertly. Its involvement in last summer's war in Lebanon, as well as its history of state-sponsored terrorism in the region, and its perceived presence in both Iraq and Afghanistan, are testimony to the fact Iran doesn't passively observe developments in the area.'

Christ! Much the same could be said of similar actions by the only nuclear power in the region. But that power does 'openly embark on military adventurism'.

So who is the greater threat to peace in the region?

A nuclear power who indulges in military adventurism, occupies and suppresses it's neighbours, steals their land, sponsers and undertakes blatant acts of state terrorism, and uses it's links to the world's greatest power to covertly and openly boast it's military and expand it's borders.

Or a politically weak disorganised ineffectual aspiring nuclear power?

Articles such as this perpretrate the ongoing inbalance and instability in the mid east... and that only benefits the region's only nuclear power. Israel.