Trump must put pressure on Iran to renounce nuclear ambitions

Times

2 days ago

Admiral of the Fleet Lord 'Jacky' Fisher, head of the Royal Navy during the naval race with Germany in the years before the First World War, had a simple prescription for dealing with a dangerous rival: 'Hit first. Hit hard. Keep hitting.' Donald Trump accomplished the first two of these conditions in his attack on Iran's subterranean nuclear enrichment programme at the weekend, but he has so far declined to follow up with the third.
The president of the United States is famously averse to extended overseas entanglements: he likes his military adventures to be short, sharp and, above all, successful. The problem is that ridding Iran of the means to make a nuclear weapon is not a task that can be accomplished with a single blow.
In his haste to declare victory and move on, Mr Trump is in danger of letting Iran's malignant ruling regime off the hook, allowing it to regroup, suppress any nascent uprising and begin the task of reconstituting its battered nuclear enterprise. As the dust settles over Fordow, Natanz and Isfahan, the question is: by demanding that both Iran and Israel cease hostilities, has Mr Trump granted the mullahs a lifeline, an undeserved reprieve?
Shortly after unleashing B-2 stealth bombers armed with bunker-busting bombs, Mr Trump jumped on to his Truth Social site to declare the attack 'very successful', adding 'NOW IS THE TIME FOR PEACE!' This blaring instruction to Iran and Israel to end 12 days of war was followed by an unusually foul-mouthed outburst from the president when for a moment they seemed to be defying his call for a ceasefire. While the Israelis had cause to be grateful for American support — their air force lacked the capability to attack such deeply-buried sites — the moral equivalence this intervention suggested was less welcome.
Israel, though armed with some 200 nuclear weapons, has never called for the complete ­destruction of Iran, or any other country for that matter. The regime in Tehran, on the other hand, has since its creation in 1979 consistently sought the liquidation of 'the Zionist entity'. By inserting himself into a war that began with Israeli airstrikes on Iran prompted by alarm that that country was on the verge of making a dash for an atom bomb, Mr Trump has been able to dictate its sudden end — one, though, that may prove to be premature.
• Does Iran have nuclear weapons — and did US strikes destroy them?
The regime in Tehran may be wounded but it is still dangerous. The White House has stamped on a leaked intelligence report suggesting that the B-2 operation set back Iran's nuclear programme only by a few months. Learning from Israel's surprise attack on Iraq's Osirak reactor in 1981, and aware of the potential for a sudden strike, Iran has presumably taken steps to secretly disperse its ­nuclear estate, be it enriched uranium, gas centrifuge cascades or scientists and technicians.
Having narrowly avoided destruction, the Iranian regime has three options: renounce its nuclear ambitions and throw open its doors to international inspection, make a clandestine dash for a bomb to equip itself with deterrent against ­renewed attack, or wait it out, hiding its surviving nuclear assets in preparation for quietly resuming work when the world has moved on.
To prevent these last two outcomes Mr Trump must ensure that Iran submits to a powerful and enduring inspection regime or face penal sanctions and more military action. While the Iranian regime continues to seek Israel's destruction and the means to achieve that end, it cannot possibly be trusted.