Let Your Enemies Crumble

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It was that deeper argument for containment that war supporters like me neglected in the debate over Iraq. When U.N. inspectors re-entered the country in late 2002, they did not find Saddam growing inexorably stronger; they found a corrupt, isolated regime with an infrastructure degrading to the Stone Age. Had America not gone to war, containing Saddam would have been a diplomatic challenge for years to come. But if containment was taking its toll on the U.S., it was taking an even greater toll on Saddam.

Now America faces Iran, another tyranny apparently seeking nuclear weapons. And again, some hear the clock ticking, with time supposedly on the mullahs' side. No one knows how long the Iranian clerics--widely loathed by their own people-- can hold onto power. And no one in Washington knows how close they actually are to the Bomb. But our ability to endure a standoff requires fostering a stable democracy on Iran's borders so Afghanistan and Iraq become bulwarks against theocracy rather than conduits for it. It requires leading our Western allies by persuasion, not command, once again. And it requires confronting great challenges at home: above all, our dependence on foreign oil. There is no guarantee containment will succeed; there never was. But patience, combined with self- improvement, can be a sign of strength. Panic never is.

Peter Beinart is the author of The Good Fight: Why Liberals--and Only Liberals--Can Win the War on Terror and Make America Great Again