Despite strong support for diplomatic engagement with Iran, most U.S. citizens believe such efforts will ultimately fail and that Washington should be prepared to use military force to prevent Tehran from obtaining a nuclear weapon, according to a new poll released here Tuesday by the Pew Research Centre for the People and the Press.
Sixty-one percent of the 1,500 respondents interviewed by Pew said it was “more important to prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons, even if it means taking military action” than to “avoid military conflict”, according to the survey, which was conducted over a five-day period ending Monday.
At the same time, 63 percent of respondents – an increase of nine percent since last time Pew posed the question, in 2006 – said they approved of Washington negotiating directly with Iran over the future of its nuclear programme, as it began doing last Thursday in Geneva where the two countries held their highest-level public talks in 30 years.
Bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb Iran
