NUKES: Why Iran is not North Korea

Before the comparisons between Iran and North Korea get out of hand, lets get somethings straight:

North Korea blocked IAEA inspections, withdrew from the Non-Proliferation Treaty, and built nuclear weapons.

Iran's nuclear program started with the encouragement and support of the United States because it makes economic sense. Rather than withdrawing from the NPT, Iran signed the Additional Protocol (which implements more stringent inspections) and implemented it for 2 years, offering to do so permanently if its nuclear rights were recognized, suspended its nuclear program, opened it up to inspections beyond what it was legally required to permit, and the IAEA says that after 5 years of inspections there's still no evidence of nuclear weapons there.

In fact, Iran has offered to open its nuclear program to international participation, to further ensure that it can't even theoretically be secretly diverted to weapons use - a suggestion widely endorsed by international experts as a perfectly peaceful solution to the current standoff.

Here's the real difference: in the case of North Korea, there is no Israel to act as a spoiler. Israel sees any potential improvement of US relations with Iran as a threat to its own strategic position and value. That (and not a threat of hypothetical Iranian nukes) is the real reason why Israel has been pushing for a war on Iran.

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Agreed. The more divided, weaker, less sophisticated, and less technologically advanced the Middle East countries are, the better off Israel is. Divide and Conquer. The Zionists were behind the invasion and decimation of Iraq. They are very proud of it, too.