This is by no means to be taken as “Iran is good actually” but this doesn’t seem much different than the US who loves to destabilize regions via proxies.

Current day Iran, as ironic as it is, is a direct product of this. Yemeni Civil war, with the Saudis and UAE propping up the PLC, both proxies of the US, Iran-Saudi proxy conflict with the US backing the Saudis, Israel-Palestine conflict, the former is heavily sponsored by the US, etc, etc and that’s just that region and current day.

There’s the whole Arab Cold War that originated a lot of the current day issues because the US didn’t want the USSR gaining influence because of scary socialist (yet secular) leaders gaining popularity in a lot of countries.

The same motivation lead to, what is euphemistically called “interventions”, by the US in Latin America, Africa and Asia.

Again, ironically, a good chunk of what is currently deemed “evil” is a direct product of these interventions like Iran, because it often either backfires or comes back to bite the US in the ass.

> Now some hope that nuclear armed states become "responsible" as a result of feeling safe, and don't sponsor terrorism. But that clearly didn't work with Pakistan (major backer of the talibans, and by extension of Al Quaeda) and North Korea (aggresses South Korea regularly and issues random threats to attract attention).

Funny you mention Pakistan and the Taliban, the latter very much a product of the US with the aid of Pakistan. Pakistan has been an important strategic ally to the US on and off, but the Islamization of Pakistan is again a direct result of US interventions, not in the least the US’ role in the 1977 coup.

North-Korea is a bit of an outlier and doesn’t fit the theme that well because of some complex pre-Cold war Japanese fascist influences and while there’s a kernel of truth in the anti-US propaganda they tell their citizens, based on the war crimes committed by the US that killed 20% of their population, it’s an entirely different beast for another time.

> And nuclear deterrence only works when the parties do no want to die. When their religion tells them it's great to die for Jihad, I don't think their is any deterrence, it's a completely different dynamic.

I think you make two main mistakes in this part of your comment and it comes across a little bigoted.
The first mistake is that you have this notion about a religion, a caricature if you will, and you’re applying it to this situation as if the religion you speak of is one big monolith, which it isn’t.
The other one is best described as underestimating the will to live of the people in power, regardless of whatever propaganda they might disseminate.

To put it directly: I don’t think the current leadership of Iran is any more eager to die then you or I.

Personally I’m in favor of total nuclear disarmament of all parties involved.
But until such a time, I don’t think it’s morally better for one side to have nukes over another side. All sides think they’re the paragon of virtue and have reasons to dislike the other.

All sides involved are also sovereign nations and as such none of them have an inherent right to inhibit the others when it comes to arming themselves imho.
Especially when taking into account that none of the main players on the stage have clean hands.