By Robert A. Manning
Iran getting the bomb won't set off an arms race in the region. But it might provoke some states, writes Robert Manning.
In an essay sparking debate amongst the chattering classes, Kenneth Waltz, one of the nation’s most prominent International Relations (IR) scholars and the doyen of the “neo-realist” school tries to make the case “Why Iran Should Get the Bomb” in the July/August issue of Foreign Affairs. With little optimism surrounding the next round of “5+1” talks set for next week (July 24th) the question seems particularly timely.
While in some respects, this provocation is an understandable counter to the end-of-the-world hysteria that often surrounds the Iran nuclear debate, Waltz’s essay suggests that IR theory suffers from a serious deficit of regional knowledge.
Waltz is best known for his classic 1981 essay, “Nuclear Weapons: More is Better,” in which he makes a compelling argument that nuclear weapons were a major reason why major powers have not gone to war since 1945. Certainly, the “balance of terror” created by the awesome destructive power of nuclear weapons was an important factor in keeping the Cold War ‘cold’.
Today, Waltz argues that Israel has had a nuclear monopoly that “has long fueled instability in the Middle East” and suggests that a nuclear Iran would become a stabilizing balance.
Read the full story at The Diplomat