A Nuclear Iran Could Lead to Nuclear Middle East

March 9, 2006 — -- If Iran develops a nuclear bomb, we could be looking at a "nuclear Middle East," warned Thomas Friedman, foreign affairs columnist for The New York Times. But stopping Iran from developing these weapons won't be easy, and the U.S. will need help from Russia, China and India.

"If they say we're going to join the international sanctions against you -- by the way, we are half the world -- only that will stop Iran," Friedman, author of "The World Is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-first Century," said today on "Good Morning America."

The fear of those sanctions -- and Vice President Dick Cheney's vow not to allow Iran to have a nuclear weapon -- led Iran to threaten the U.S. with "harm and pain" if it tries to use the 35-nation U.N. Security Council to punish Iran for its suspected nuclear program.

"The idea of Iran getting a bomb is very popular with the Iranian people, even those who don't like the regime," Friedman said.

Tehran now has enough nuclear material to make up to 10 atomic bombs, and in January, Iran took the provocative step of breaking International Atomic Energy Agency seals on one of its nuclear facilities.

"The Iranians have looked around, hmm … George Bush has this list of Axis of Evils, North Korea got a bomb, Iraq didn't. I think they think it is life insurance for the Mullah regime in Iran," he added.

But a nuclear Iran could have a domino effect.

"If Iran gets a bomb," he said, "Saudi Arabia is going to want one, Egypt is going to want one. We're going to have a nuclear Middle East."

Yesterday, at a meeting of the 35-nation board of the IAEA, Iran made its threat against the U.S. But how Iran can inflict "harm and pain" on the U.S. is limited in the short term, Friedman said.

"Iran does not have a missile that can hit the U.S.," he said.