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Iran and its nuclear program will be a top issue for the Obama administration. Both U.S. political parties have declared an Iranian nuclear weapons capability to be “unacceptable.” We all believe that we would better off if we lived in a world of fewer nuclear powers, and if erratic and ambitious states such as Iran did not develop nuclear weapons.

Unfortunately, Iran is headed in that direction. We may be forced to accept the unacceptable. Fear, interest and honor can create powerful incentives for today’s middle powers to develop nuclear weapons. States that feel isolated, live in bad neighborhoods or are in existential rivalries will warm to the thought of building nuclear weapons. Prestige-hungry, rising powers may also be prone to proliferation. Iran meets all of these criteria.

Barring new and enlightened leadership, Iran is unlikely to stop developing nuclear power and nuclear weapons. To date, U.S., U.N. and European pressures have not been enough to stop Iran from pursuing what it perceives as a vital interest.

Sadly, the weakness of our non-military instruments has caused many strategists to advocate “taking out” Iran’s nascent nuclear capability, preferably before it becomes fully operational. Unfortunately, while this option has some support in the U.S., and perhaps even more in Israel, it does not stand up to analysis. Iran’s nationwide nuclear program is robust, well-protected, redundant and often underground. A minor surgical strike would be feckless, and even a massive air operation could not be certain to get the job done. Any strike on Iran would convince the Iranian government that it was right to develop nuclear weapons, and it would drive the young people back into the arms of the hard-liners. An attack could set Iran back technologically, but it would enhance Iranian motivation to develop the bomb. Short of a massive strike, followed by an (unthinkable) invasion, an occupation and regime change in a nation several times larger than Iraq, there are no reliable military options to take out an emerging Iranian nuclear capability with a high degree of confidence.

After any preventive Israeli or U.S. strike on Iran, we would all have to live with the day after. What would Iran do in Iraq and Afghanistan? How would this affect the price of oil, or the situation in Lebanon? What effect would this have on Iran’s already considerable support for international terrorism?

Small states with nuclear weapons have never been able to use them as decisive levers to force their enemies to do their will. While threats to nuke your adversaries have been relatively frequent, nuclear weapons have not been used since 1945. Nuclear weapons have limited utility beyond basic deterrence and prestige because the downsides of using them are huge and mostly incalculable. Iran, for all of its harsh rhetoric and indirect aggression in Lebanon and Iraq, is neither wild nor stupid. It is unlikely to give one of its precious nuclear weapons to a surrogate state or terrorist group. The international community, having been burned by Pakistan and North Korea, should be able to monitor or control state-to-state proliferation efforts emanating from Tehran. Iran may want nuclear weapons for protection and prestige, but it has to be made to understand that the use of a nuclear weapon in the region or in Europe would lead to a devastating response.

While we lack the leverage to force Iran’s leaders to cease their weapons-development program, we do have significant capabilities to make them regret their efforts and to contain the effects of proliferation. To begin, we must maintain strong international pressure on the current regime, with a special emphasis on sanctions on the finances, accounts and travel of Iranian leaders. To add to Iran’s cost of developing nuclear weapons, the U.S. should declare that any nation threatened by Iranian nuclear weapons would be under the protection of the U.S. If Iran were ever to use nuclear weapons in the region or in Europe, U.S. policy would be that such an act of aggression would be seen as an attack on the U.S. We should also offer to any allies our best defensive anti-missile systems and accelerate their deployment in Europe and the Persian Gulf. Finally, we should do our best to prevent other acts of proliferation in and from the region by reassuring our allies.

In the end, an Iranian nuclear capability may not be preventable, but it is containable and of limited utility. If we use our heads, we won’t again adopt a policy of preventive war because we have convinced ourselves that that we don’t have any other options.