Iran must be prevented from obtaining nuclear weapons.

Cool history lesson…now to the arguments. C1: Existential Threat My opponent argues that Iran is not unique. The problem with this argument is that he uses false comparisons. First, we did try and prevent North Korea from obtaining nuclear weapons using strict sanctions. Second, the USSR’s nuclear timeframe was too short and unexpected for the U.S. to have done anything major against their nuclear proliferation. Moreover, the world was a bipolar system at that point where power was distributed pretty equally between the US and USSR. Iran cannot compare to the USSR in terms of global influence and conventional military power. Third, Pakistan was and is an ally. Whereas India was “nonaligned” (really they were supporters of the USSR) during the Cold War, Pakistan maintained an alliance with the US. Our aid to Pakistan and our continued alliance with them is essentially to buy protection for Pakistani nuclear facilities. Moreover, Pakistan is equally balanced with India and is for all intents and purposes contained in the region from doing anything too adventurous. Fourth, China and the US have an economic interdependency in which one catastrophe to a single party would inevitably damage the other. China, at this point, is not a threat to the US in terms of a security stature. There is strong competition between the US and China but this does not entail nuclear competition. Another problem with my opponent’s argument is that it fails to understand the strategic importance of Iran’s spying. It is not just the simple fact that there are Iranian spies, but rather what Iran is spying on. The evidence indicates areas of strategic economic and civilian populations. 2) Iranian ties to terrorismAgain my opponent mentions other countries, which are still false comparisons. On Saudi Arabia his argument is false because they are an ally, and Iraq is false because Saddam wasn’t a supporter of terror organizations that are direct threats to the US. Moreover, Al Qaeda has expressed the desire to use a nuclear weapon if it had access to one – but due to Pakistani restricted access (they are an ally) Al Qaeda has failed to acquire one. [1] http://in.reuters.com... My opponent’s first justification is that Iran hasn’t given terrorist groups airplanes. First, my question is why would they do that? Terrorist groups MO generally do not involve planes. Terrorists operate in ground force cells and work clandestinely. Using fighter jets or airplanes would be way too conspicuous for a terrorist. 9/11 would fit this MO because it was a clandestine and surprised hijacking. Second, Iran provides more than just funding – they also provide arms, sanctuary and training. The Revolutionary Guard has tained many terror groups which now operate in the Middle East. [2] http://www.cfr.org...- 2 - It would be a death wish to give terrorists the nuke. If a terrorist organization were to use an Iranian nuke on Israel or the US, the US and the rest of the world would retaliate as if it was the Iranians who carried out the attack themselves. This would quickly bring about the demise of those in power, so the leaders of iran have no incentive to put their state of rule in jeopardy and in the hands of terrorists who have nothing to lose. The Iranians would never give terrorists a nuke because they would essentially be digging their own grave, and wouldnt even have any control over who gets nuked, where, or when. My opponent’s second justification is that an Iranian nuclear attack would doom the regime to destruction. First, the level of Iranian nuclear security is unknown at this point. US policy cannot rule out the potential for nuclear theft by organizations like Al Qaeda. It must be noted that the relationship between Iran and Al Qaeda is only a relationship based in expediency. Iran uses Al Qaeda to leverage against the US and Al Qaeda uses Iran for sanctuary. If at any point Al Qaeda believes that its interests are better served from stealing nuclear material from an Iranian nuclear facility then there is nothing ideological preventing this from occurring. Al Qaeda would easily have the ability to leverage its hold on nuclear material as a chip against Iran. Second, my opponent assumes that the only threat is direct threats. Aside from a nuclear arms race which I discuss below, the other indirect harm which occurs is Iran’s nuclear umbrella which allows freedom of movement and activity for Iran and terror groups. To contextualize this with a modern example, let us look to North Korea. North Korea now has nuclear weapons which deters any retaliatory action from South Korea or Japan. North Korea sunk South Korean submarines and shelled an island with no effective response against it. Recently North Korea attempted to assassinate the South Korean Defense Minister. South Korea fears North Korean escalation which makes all South Korean responses moot. Now in reference to the Middle East, Hezbollah and Hamas would have a nuclear umbrella to work under while they systematically attempt to diminish Israeli and US influence in the region. Third, if my opponent’s rational calculus argument was valid then it would imply that Iran would not currently be acquiring nuclear weapons. Economically Iran has been crushed under sanctions – its currency is near worthless and inflation is rampant. This only makes the risk of popular discontent and revolution more likely, e.g. another Green Movement. In terms of regime survival everyday Iran risks a military strike from Israel or the US. However, Iran knows that once it reaches the blur point (where it is unknown whether Iran has the capability for a bomb or not) then they are untouchable. [3] http://mideast.foreignpolicy.com... Fourth, it wouldn’t be as simple as my opponent makes it seem. As mentioned by my opponent there are many countries, even non-stable countries with nuclear weapons. The US intelligence agency couldn’t tell us how radicalized the FLA in Libya was and yet he expects us to know exactly where nuclear material came from. If Iran sent over an ICBM then yes it would be pretty obvious, however a van with nuclear material inside would be much harder to track back to its beginning source. Who knows? It might have come from Pakistan or North Korea. 3) Regional arms raceMy opponent argues that Saudi Arabia needs only to seek US military aid and presence to counter the Iranian threat. My opponent makes the mistake of saying it is just one person in the regime – true but it is one of the heads of the military and Saudi Arabia’s intelligence service. But more importantly, the existence of US conventional military forces cannot counter-balance a nuclear Iran. A nuclear umbrella would have been created over the Middle East and Saudi Arabia which means that any seemingly aggressive US counter-balancing could be viewed as a threat to Iran. The example of Iraq is a false comparison because Saddam was threatening with conventional forces and their nuclear ambitions were low and not nearly as advanced as the current Iranian nuclear system. Moreover, Iranian nuclear capabilities offsets the current quasi-balance in the Middle East – Turkey/Saudi Arabia balances Iran. From a geopolitical and geostrategic standpoint Saudi Arabia and Turkey, even with US assistance could not compete with a nuclear Iran. Round 1 Links Sorry about that, I will use up characters here to compensate: http://homeland.house.gov... http://abcnews.go.com... http://www.irantracker.org... http://www.irantracker.org... http://www.guardian.co.uk...