China Confidential

As reported yesterday, US Senator Barack Obama, a Democrat from Illinois, who is campaigning for his party's Presidential nomination in 2008, has accused the Bush administration of "conflating Iran and Al Qaeda" and not giving diplomacy a chance with respect to stopping Iran's nuclear program. Obama's remarks, made in the context of what was billed as a major foreign policy address Wednesday during a campaign stop in Iowa, place him squarely in the anti-war, appeasement camp with respect to the nuclar-arming Islamist regime. Following the advice of Zbigniew Brzezinski (scroll for the story below), Obama has broadened his opposition to the Iraq war to include Iran.

But three years ago, US Senate candidate Obama expressed hawkish views on Iran. As a Democratic state senator seeking national office, Obama strongly suggested that the US might have to attack Iran--and Pakistan--to prevent Islamists from getting control of nuclear bombs.

On September 25, 2004, just three days after Iran began converting tons of uranium into gas--a crucial step in making fuel for an atomic reactor or an atomic bomb--Obama told the Chicago Tribune that the US should first take the issue to the United Nations Security Council and try to persuade the international community to apply economic sanctions on Tehran.

However, if those measures fall short, the US should not rule out military strikes to destroy nuclear production sites in Iran, Obama said.

He asked: "The big question is going to be, if Iran is resistant to these pressures, including economic sanctions, which I hope will be imposed if they do not cooperate, at what point are we going to, if any, are we going to take military action?"

Missile strikes might be a viable, though not "optimal" option, he said, adding that the war in Iraq more or less ruled out the possibility of a land invasion of Iran.

Senate candidate Obama: "In light of the fact that we're now in Iraq, with all the problems in terms of perceptions about America that have been created, us launching some missile strikes into Iran is not the optimal position for us to be in.

"On the other hand, having a radical Muslim theocracy in possession of nuclear weapons is worse. So I guess my instinct would be to err on not having those weapons in the possession of the ruling clerics of Iran. ... And I hope it doesn't get to that point. But realistically, as I watch how this thing has evolved, I'd be surprised if Iran blinked at this point."

A coup in Pakistan, which could put the nation's nuclear weapons in hands of Islamists, would compel the US to consider military action, Obama said.

Obama described radical Islam as a radically different sort of enemy than the Cold War-era Soviet Union.

"With the Soviet Union, you did get the sense that they were operating on a model that we could comprehend in terms of, they don't want to be blown up, we don't want to be blown up, so you do game theory and calculate ways to contain," Obama said. "I think there are certain elements within the Islamic world right now that don't make those same calculations."