David Broder's Iran Argument and its Critics

David Broder, a normally sane veteran political analyst for the Washington Post, seems to have stirred up a hornet's nest (at least Inside the Beltway) with his Sunday column, which included the following argument:

What else might affect the economy? The answer is obvious, but its implications are frightening. War and peace influence the economy.

Look back at FDR and the Great Depression. What finally resolved that economic crisis? World War II.

Here is where Obama is likely to prevail. With strong Republican support in Congress for challenging Iran's ambition to become a nuclear power, he can spend much of 2011 and 2012 orchestrating a showdown with the mullahs. This will help him politically because the opposition party will be urging him on. And as tensions rise and we accelerate preparations for war, the economy will improve.

I am not suggesting, of course, that the president incite a war to get reelected. But the nation will rally around Obama because Iran is the greatest threat to the world in the young century. If he can confront this threat and contain Iran's nuclear ambitions, he will have made the world safer and may be regarded as one of the most successful presidents in history.

He says he "is not suggesting, of course, that the president incite a war to get reelected." Really? That's certainly what it sounded like. Broder is a savvy political analyst, but here I think he falls into the Washington habit of assessing everything, even a military mission, in terms of electoral result, ignoring human and financial costs. A war against Iran would not be a few airstrikes. Elimination of Iran's hardened nuclear facilities would require a sustained campaign against modern air defenses, with massive collateral damage and, arguably, a ground component. A tanker or two sunk in the Gulf by mines or torpedoes would send insurance rates soaring and with them, the price of oil. Iranian ability to cause trouble in Iraq, Lebanon and Afghanistan — already a problem — would be unleashed.

Naturally, I'm not the only one to find this suggestion bizarre. Marc Lynch (who has returned to regular blogging after a hiatus) addresses the issue here, and notes that the last person to suggest this was Elliott Abrams, not usually on the same page as Broder. Blake Hounshell asks at Foreign Policy, "Has David Broder Lost His Mind?" Helena Cobban sees it as a symptom of "War Fever in Washington." Andrew Sullivan says simply, "There is so much clinically nuts about this, one doesn't know where to start."

It's disappointing to see a seasoned analyst like Broder making this argument. But the howls of derision (and not just from the left) are somewhat reassuring.