A Nuclear Arms Race in the Gulf? Not So Fast

One of the legitimate worries about a nuclear Iran is that it will spark a regional arms race whereby Saudi Arabia and Egypt would seek their own nukes to deter Iran. This is in part the rationale behind Hillary Clinton's statement that the U.S. would put these nations and other allies in the gulf under the U.S. "defense umbrella" should Iran acquire a nuke.

Now Thomas Lipmann of the Middle East Institute is out with a report (pdf) on how Saudi Arabia might react to Iran's development of a nuclear weapon, and he pours some cold water on the idea that the Saudis would develop a weapon of their own (or import one "off the shelf" from Pakistan).

More broadly, aside from the fact that nuclear proliferation is a bad thing in and of itself, it's worth asking why we're particularly concerned with nuclear weapons in the hands of countries like Saudi Arabia and Egypt. Could it be that given the illegitimate nature of both governments and the anti-Americanism of both populations, we're worried about those weapons falling into the wrong hands? And shouldn't that give us pause before we rush in to defend these regimes from Iran?

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Photo credit: AP Photos