The U.S. Government’s excitable accusation that Iran paid a Mexican drug dealer to blow up the Saudi ambassador in a Washington restaurant adds a further destabilising factor to an already dangerously unstable Middle East. It moves the interminable U.S.-Iranian quarrel one step closer to an armed conflict and it fans into flame the latent antagonism between the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the Islamic Republic of Iran.
A U.S.-Iranian war would have potentially devastating consequences for the region, for the United States and the world. The smaller Gulf States, several of them home to large U.S. military bases, would find themselves in the line of fire. Their spectacular accomplishments of recent decades could be turned to rubble. Attacks against U.S. targets in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere would undoubtedly multiply. The Arab world’s sectarian tensions between Sunnis and Shi ‘is, already greatly exacerbated by America’s war in Iraq, would be further increased. For the industrial world, a regional war would immediately disrupt oil supplies, further worsening the current economic crisis...