My post has been met by primarily two types of skepticism: First, is Iran really a threat to the West, and not just to Israel? And second, is Israel really a "domino" whose fall would definitely hurt the U.S.?

In particular, many people seem not to buy the analogy with Hitler and the 1930s, in terms of the nature of Iran's threat to world peace.

All these doubts are fair enough. People are right to be skeptical of scaremongering. But the skeptics also need to think some basic things through.

Iran alone would not be sufficient to pose a global threat. The problem is that there is a struggle going on for the control of the Muslim world. Sunni and Shiite Islamists are slowly succeeding in radicalizing the Muslim world. Existing corrupt, authoritarian governments are trying to resist this, but they understandably have little moral authority, particularly if it looks like the Islamists are winning.

My point is that if the Islamists succeed, and among them is a nuclear-armed Iran, it poses a serious threat to the entire West, including the U.S. This threat would not necessarily come in the form of a direct military attack, but in increasing intimidation through terror, and growing Islamist influence in global politics, economy, and even culture.

Hitler did not have the potential of leading a billion people, but the Iran/Hezbollah/Hamas/Al Qaeda axis could conceivably come to dominate a billion Muslims. Hitler also never managed to build nuclear weapons; Iran could.

This is certainly the openly-expressed Iranian plan, but none of it is unstoppable or inevitable. Moreover, the headline added to my original post conveyed a domino-like certainty that my post itself did not state. I don't believe that if Israel falls, the West will automatically fall. What I said, and what I believe, is that if Israel falls, this will accelerate Islamist attempts to dominate the West.

As it happens, I believe the West will ultimately win, regardless of Israel's fortunes, just as the West eventually won World War II and the Cold War. In fact, Iran is much weaker today in balance of power terms than Nazi Germany or the Soviet Union were at the height of their power.

The question is what price the West will have to pay to win. The price is still low, but will rise steadily. Churchill was absolutely right that World War II could have been avoided had Hitler been confronted earlier, saving tens of millions of lives.

Iran can still probably be stopped without firing a shot. I do not believe that the regime could withstand complete economic and diplomatic isolation, backed by the credible threat of force and combined with support for the Iranian people against their regime. An invasion is neither advisable nor necessary.

The fact that right now the chances of such concerted Western action seem slim does not change my assessment that it is necessary and it could work, nor of the consequences of inaction. Unfortunately, it seems the West is waiting for a major disaster or deterioration of the situation before rising to its own defense, as if 9/11 and subsequent attacks were not enough.

I don't know what it will take to wake us up. I do know that militant Islam will continue to gain power so long as the West remains too intimidated to take basic non-military actions, authorized and demanded by the United Nations Charter, to force the Iranian regime to choose between its power and verifiably abandoning its nuclear quest.

The irony is that the West has many ways to win, while has Iran has only one: Depending on the West volunteering not to defend itself.

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