Senior Dem 'concerned' about calls to strike Iranian nuke sites

House Armed Services Committee Ranking Member Rep. Adam Smith (D-Wash.) said Friday he is “concerned” by a growing drumbeat for using military force against Iranian nuclear facilities.

At issue are escalating calls for U.S. or Israeli military planes to bomb sites in Iran that are believed to house the country’s nuclear weapons program. Those calls picked up after an International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) report last week that said Iran is closer than ever to having a nuclear weapon.

The drumbeat for military strikes “concerns me,” Smith said at the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington.

Smith said Washington must keep the option of using military force on the table. But because “that would be problematic in the region,” Smith favors the administration’s current strategy: using economic sanctions to dissuade Tehran from continuing its nuclear weapons work.

The way Smith sees it, there are three “bad approaches.” One is to simply allow Iran to build a nuke, another is to enact “severe economic sanctions,” and the third is a military strike.

The second is “the wisest approach,” Smith said.

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