Posted on: Friday, March 18, 2005

EDITORIAL
Bush policy reversal on Iran is welcome

It takes courage to admit that a policy is coming up dry and then to change course.

That's the case with the Bush administration's new Iran policy.

Its previous refusal to "reward misbehavior" by negotiating with Iran over its nuclear enrichment program has helped build political capital at home. But tough talk and veiled threats were getting nowhere with Tehran, and the White House now sees pragmatism in the European approach.

Indeed, the point is to prevent Iran from joining the nuclear weapons club. Iran is well on its way toward developing the capacity to enrich uranium, which alternately can be used for peaceful electrical power or to build weapons.

What makes this awkward is that Iran has the right, under the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, to enrich uranium for power generation, as it claims to be doing.

It still may be possible to convince the mullahs to abandon that right, and with it the ability to make weapons, and instead to buy fuel for their nuclear power plants abroad.

The Europeans have been inclined to offer Iran incentives for this change, while threatening sanctions from the U.N. Security Council if that change isn't forthcoming. In the new trans-Atlantic meeting of minds, Washington promises to sweeten the incentive for Iran, while the Europeans promise not to "go wobbly" on sanctions if needed.

There should be no disagreement between Europeans and Americans that negotiations going forward must be based on President Reagan's "trust but verify" approach. Iran must agree to intrusive international inspections.

While some justifiably see the new Iran policy as a "flip-flop," it clearly is a much wiser approach.

The administration must now begin thinking about extending similar logic in the case of North Korea.

That would come as a relief to South Korea and China, which worry about catastrophic consequences should Bush's hostile approach cause the Pyongyang regime to implode.

President Bush has famously said he loathes the North's "dear leader," Kim Jong Il. That approach hasn't been at all productive.

Iran and North Korea are different cases, but our policies have not deterred either from moving closer to becoming nuclear powers, which no one should want.

Switching gears where Iran is concerned is a wise move. Now it's time to try something else with North Korea.