"The administration has no coherent policy toward Iran."
Toward Iran?
HELLO!
Toward anything.
"The U.S. military can destroy a lot of military targets from the air, including most of Iran's nuclear infrastructure. But it can't remove the regime unless it is prepared to invade and occupy the country, at the cost of billions of dollars, thousands of lives and the destruction of Iran. The Iranian people would rally in support of their government if the U.S. attacked and the Iranian security apparatus would crush an internal rebellion."
"Such an effort would isolate the U.S. internationally; Russia and China would almost certainly lend diplomatic, material and military support to the regime. And Iran would likely move to ramp up its nuclear weapons program, this time with legitimate reasons and likely wider international support. Simply put, the use of military force or economic warfare to rid the Middle East of another government the U.S. doesn't like would leave behind one heaping hot mess."
"The U.S. does have an interest in containing Iran's influence in the region. But it has no stake in using military force against Iran unless it violates three core U.S. red lines: use of terror against the U.S. at home or in the region; interrupting the flow of oil; and breaking out to produce a nuclear weapon.
At the moment, Tehran is respecting these red lines. Threatening military force in response to verbal threats by Iran's leadership — as Trump did — is both ridiculous and reckless."
"War with Iran would be an unmitigated disaster. The U.S. military could do major damage, but Tehran has options to retaliate throughout the region against U.S. forces in Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan and our allies with conventional weapons, terrorism and cyberwarfare. Iran's Lebanese ally, Hezbollah, could unleash a ferocious war against Israel and rebel forces in Yemen allied with Iran could escalate missile attacks against Saudi Arabia."
"These attacks would kill many Americans and Israelis; seriously set back U.S. efforts to stabilize Iraq and Afghanistan and defeat jihadists in Syria; ignite a war between Iran and Saudi Arabia over Yemen; and destroy critical energy infrastructure in the Persian Gulf and seriously disrupt the flow of oil out of the region. The conflagration would cause a sharp spike in global energy prices and possibly trigger a global recession, depending on how long it takes to extinguish the firestorm."
I'm sorry, what was that?
Logic?
Reasoning?
No wonder the writers are not working at the White House.
Aaron David Miller (@aarondmiller2), a vice president at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars and a former State Department adviser and Middle East negotiator, is the author of The End of Greatness: Why America Can't Have (and Doesn't Want) Another Great President.
Richard Sokolsky, a nonresident senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, was a member of the secretary of state's Office of Policy Planning from 2005-2015.
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