Iran

Is Iran a threat to Israel or stabilty in the Middle East?

The concern is that Iran is in the final stages of acquiring a nuclear weapon and that they plan to "wipe Israel off the map".

I don't know this for sure, but lets assume a couple things; yes Iran does want a Nuke and yes, Iran doesn't count Israel as one of its bestest buddies. Fair enough.

That said... is it likely that Iran would use this new found weapon aggressively against Israel or anyone else?

A couple of questions should help clear this up.

Q) Is the leadership in Iran willing to sentence all of its citizens to death?
A) While there are certainly radicals willing to commit religious suicide, it is not usually the leaders or the masses who are signing up to be martyrs. After all wasn't Osama Bin Laden found hiding in Pakistan while training other people to kill themselves for Ala? You really think that Ahmadinejad has a death wish? I don't.

Q) Has a sovereign nation ever used a nuclear weapon aggressively against another nation who also possessed "the bomb"?
A) No.

It seems to me to me that having a nuclear weapon is much more a defensive tactic than an offensive one. Consider this, no nation possessing a nuclear weapon has ever been attacked by another sovereign nation. Not with nukes, not with tanks, not with anything. Seems like a pretty good deterrent to me.