One year ago, Barack Obama convened his National Security Council in
the Situation Room in the basement of the West Wing to talk about war
with Iran. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was publicly
threatening to attack Iranian nuclear sites.
If
Netanyahu went ahead, the U.S. could be dragged into a war on Israel's
terms, long before options to avoid conflict had been exhausted. Under
fire from Republicans for being a fair-weather friend to Israel, Obama
had scheduled a speech to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee
(AIPAC) and an interview with an American reporter widely read in
Israel. The question in the Situation Room that day: What would happen
if Obama publicly committed to a war to keep Iran from getting a nuclear
weapon?
Obama had never made such a promise in
public, and he thought it would help persuade Netanyahu to step back
from the brink. But by speaking out, he would be putting the U.S.'s
credibility on the line in the global effort to prevent Tehran from
getting a weapon. If he promised to go to war and didn't follow
through, other nations in the region, distrusting American assurances
of protection, would start their own nuclear programs.
Obama
said that he was aware of the risk but that he wanted to draw the line
in public anyway. On March 4, 2012, Obama told the AIPAC crowd, "I
will not hesitate to use force when it is necessary to defend the
United States and its interests." In his interview with Jeffrey
Goldberg of the Atlantic, he said, "As President of the United States, I
don't bluff."
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