Free Unthinkable by Kenneth M. Pollack Page A

easily. There is a minimum of time, energy, and resources that we will have to devote to making containment work with Iran. We cannot specify it beforehand, but we should err on the side of caution until we can know for sure just where the threshold lies.
    Inevitably, taking a more aggressive or a more passive approach to containment at any given time will mean making trade-offs. The more aggressive we are, the more time, energy, and resources it will require us to devote to Iran. That is likely to be the case, in part, because the more assertive we are, the more that Iran is likely to lash out in response. Consequently, there may be times when we choose to throttle back on the more offensive elements of containment because other problems require American attention. However, we also need to recognize that at other times, containment may only be viable if we are willing to make a considerable investment in it. Sometimes, saving containment might even require a very assertive approach, either to push back on dangerous challenges from Iran or to reassure skittish allies. Containment cannot become a purely passive approach. If it does, it will wither. The real question we will constantly have to ask ourselves regarding containment of Iran is how much we are willing to invest in it.
    In all of these considerations, the key will be to focus ruthlessly on what is most important, the key problems of containment, without getting distracted by lesser concerns or impossible aspirations. What standsout among the goals of containment are preventing Iran from weaponizing, reassuring Israel and keeping the rest of the Middle East from acquiring nuclear arsenals of their own. If we can address these issues, containment will be significantly easier than if we can’t. This argues for offering Iran a less confrontational approach to containment if they don’t weaponize and warning them that we would adopt a no-holds-barred version if they did. For the most part, reassuring Israel and convincing the Gulf states not to proliferate will both require a more assertive, more offensively minded approach to Iran at least early on, to convince our allies that they do not need to stray into the dangerous terrain of trying to balance a nuclear Iran on their own.
    The USSR lasted for roughly seventy years. The Islamic Republic has already had more than thirty. It seems hard to imagine that it will hang on for as long as the Soviet Union. Yet it might. North Korea is much smaller and more self-destructive than the Soviets ever were and yet their regime is approaching seventy years, too. The United States can also do far more to try to hasten the political transformation of Iran than it could with the USSR or than it has wanted to try with North Korea. Yet we might end up containing a nuclear Iran for several decades. There is no reason that this cannot be done. But it will not be easy and it may not be cheap. And of greatest importance, we are going to have to constantly recalibrate our pursuit of containment to fit both our interests and developments in Iran, taking advantage of opportunities when they present themselves, trying to shape Iran’s behavior where we can, and reacting to Iranian moves as needed. In that sense, I agree with the proponents of containment that there is no reason to believe that it cannot work—and good reason to believe that it can—with Iran. However, I also agree with the critics of containment that its success is not assured, nor will it come easily.

Conclusion
CHOOSING THE LEAST BAD OPTION
    I f the previous thirteen chapters have demonstrated anything, it is that there are no good options left when it comes to dealing with Iran and its pursuit of a nuclear capability. That is not to say there aren’t options that are relatively better and worse, just none that are good in an absolute sense. There are none that are low cost, low risk with a high probability of success. Our choices are awful, but choose