Too dire to contemplate.

I have said it before, and I will continue saying it: Iran is too unstable and irresponsible of a regime to be allowed access to nuclear technology.

I know I have friends, like Kill the Cat, who believe that, since we're the only nation in the world to have used nuclear weapons in any capacity, we are too irresponsible of a regime to be allowed nuclear technology.  I, of course, disagree.  

Yes, we did drop a large nuclear bomb on Hiroshima, Japan, and three days later, a smaller one on Nagasaki, Japan.  Yes, a lot of people died instantly, a lot more died a lot slower from the burns and blast damage, and still more died the most horrible deaths of all from the radiation.  I fully admit that we did drop the bombs, and as a consequence caused the devastation that still causes us, today, sixty-three years later, to recoil in horror from what we did.

That's my point: we didn't fully understand all of the long-term consequences of what we'd unleashed.  Not then.  And now, now that we understand, we are not likely to use nuclear weapons against a nation without both overriding need and just cause.  I'd say that this horror of what we unleashed makes us the most, not least, responsible nation regarding the possession of nuclear weapons.

Not so Iran.  

Iran is not, by any means, a rational regime.  Their hatred of Israel is completely unreasoning.  (I'm sad to say that I cannot say the same thing for their hatred of us.)  Israel knows that Iran wants the nation, and all of its inhabitants, wiped from the face of the earth, and how not, when the Iranian president has repeatedly said so?  Israel knows that, once Iran acquires nuclear technology, a bomb will soon follow.  They also know that the first bomb--maybe two, for good measure in taking care of the "one-bomb target" Iran has referred to their nation as--will be launched at them as soon as it is assembled.  They are willing to do whatever is necessary to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear technology.

Unfortunately, we are not in agreement.  We still believe, wrongly, that the answer lies in multilateralism, diplomacy, and deterrence.  Iran's president has said, outright, to us and to the UN, that the sanctions against them, and the technology embargoes put in place to prevent them from developing nuclear technology, have failed.  He understands that there is no nation on earth (with, perhaps, the exceptions of China and Russia) that will provide him with nuclear materials, and that Iran will have to mine and refine their own radioactive material for their plants.

He's right, too.  Europe is decidedly uneasy about Iran's interest in nuclear technology.  While they're not uneasy enough to be willing to do much, they will complain and pass resolutions that they cannot enforce.  

Right now, Iran is unable to reach Europe with a nuclear weapon.  Right now, there is no incentive, in the collective European mind, to do more than complain.  However, Iran's planning to change that: they're telling the world that they plan to launch an Iranian made satellite into high orbit with an Iranian made rocket.  With this technology, they could reach any nation in the world with a nuclear, chemical, or biological agent.  

That might change things a little.  After all, there are certain radical sects of the population that believes that Armageddon is coming, and that it's not something to be avoided, but embraced.  With a sect like that as a large and powerful a part of Iran as it is, I argue that Iran has not been, is not now, and without significant regime change, will not be in the foreseeable future, a sane and responsible enough regime to be allowed access to nuclear technology.

After all, that radical sect that wants to set off Armageddon runs the nation.