Let them have it

What’s the best way to stop Iran raining destruction on the Middle East with nuclear weapons? To let them have nuclear weapons, argues Haaretz’s defence correspondent Reuven Pedatzur.

Pedatzur’s argument may seem counter-intuitive, but it is essentially the same old mutually assured destruction (MAD) that prevented conflict during three decades of the cold war.

In essence, it argues that the strongest instinct of any state bureaucracy is self-preservation, and that no state would sanction a nuclear strike that would call down an equally fatal counterstrike on its own population.

guardian