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Open to Debate

Can America and Its Allies Tolerate A Nuclear Iran, or Is It Time to Stop Them Now?

Open to Debate

Open to Debate

Education, Society & Culture, News, Government, Politics

4.5 • 2.1K Ratings

🗓️ 10 January 2025

⏱️ 51 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Iran is getting closer to developing its first nuclear weapon. With tensions rising in the Middle East, should the U.S. and its allies take a stand? Those calling to stop Iran now argue this is a “now or never” moment for the region. Those calling for tolerance say while it’s not ideal, it is manageable, and maintaining diplomacy should be the focus. Now we debate: Can America and Its Allies Tolerate A Nuclear Iran, or Is It Time to Stop Them Now?  Arguing STOP NOW: Behnam Ben Taleblu, Senior Fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies  Arguing TOLERATE: Barbara Slavin, Distinguished Fellow at the Stimson Center    Emmy award-winning journalist John Donvan moderates  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0

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0:32.7

This is open to debate. I'm John Donvan. Hi, everybody. There was a time when the United States was the only nuclear power on Earth, but that was a short-lived period of time. The Russians got one four years after the United States, and eventually several more states elbowed their way into the so-called nuclear club. There was France. there was Britain, China, Israel, South Africa, India, Pakistan, North Korea.

0:58.4

And what has turned out to be true, especially in regard to the nations we tend to have stressed relations with, North Korea,

1:04.6

is that once these nations go nuclear, we just have to live with the fact.

1:08.5

We can't make them un-nuclear.

1:10.6

Being nuclear is its own protection.

1:13.4

The nation that is not quite there yet

1:15.1

but appears to be accelerating towards the nuclear club is Iran.

1:19.2

According to U.S. Secretary of State Tony Blinken, speaking in 2024,

1:23.0

Iran at present could put together a testable nuclear weapon

1:25.7

in a matter of a week or two.

1:27.8

Where we are now is not in a good place. Iran, because the nuclear agreement was thrown out,

1:34.6

instead of being at least a year away from having the breakout capacity of producing fissile

1:39.4

material for a nuclear weapon is now probably one or two weeks away from doing that.

1:44.2

Now, they haven't developed a weapon itself.

1:46.4

One or two weeks.

1:47.3

One or two weeks is probably what the realistic breakout time is.

1:50.7

They haven't produced a weapon itself, but that's something, of course, that we track very, very carefully.

...

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