Cotton: Well you never know these things for sure, but I think history provides me precedents. I mean not just, for instance, [the Israeli attack on the Iraqi reactor at] Osirak or the [Syrian nuclear reactor], but also, for instance, in the tanker operations in '87 and '88, when we helped secure free transit in the Persian Gulf. Iran did ultimately pull in its horns to some degree because they realized that Ronald Reagan was serious when he made those promises, when we flagged those vessels. And we do have amazing capability gaps over a country like Iran, as Israel does. We also have the support of allies throughout the region that traditionally have not been as supportive as we might like for operations like these.

Goldberg: What is Obama seeking here, in your mind?

Cotton: Well, I think he clearly wants to have a kind of grand rapprochement with Iran. This goes back to his actions in his earliest days, when he was silent in the face of [Iran's] Green Revolution, and even some of his statements in the campaign.

Goldberg: What's wrong with wanting a grand rapprochement with Iran?

Cotton: I would love to see that happen. As Secretary Schultz and Secretary Kissinger wrote, they've been in government when Iran was an ally, not just of the United States but of Israel. The Iranian people, if you look at their demographics and their level of education, could be a strong source for stability in the Middle East. The problem is they're run by an apocalyptic cult of ayatollahs.

Goldberg: How do you know they're apocalyptic?

Cotton: Their own words.

Goldberg: They seem to respond to incentives unlike, say, North Korea. Obviously, in 2003, when they thought that George W. Bush was pivoting their direction, they ceased doing work on their nuclear program, correct? They do seem to respond to reality.

Cotton: They react to threats that are severe enough. But it would be different if they had nuclear weapons. They refer to Israel as a “one-bomb state,” which as you know means that Israel can be annihilated with one bomb. And they know as long as they don't have nuclear weapons that they are susceptible to the United States military, whether it was Reagan's actions in the tanker war or a fear of being next in 2003, as Muammar Qaddafi was at the time. But I think you can't count on that kind of attitude if they were to get nuclear weapons. I also think that Iran is more skillful at playing off of Western delusions than is the Kim regime [in North Korea].

Goldberg: Come back to the grand rapprochement that you talked about. One school of thought holds that President Obama wants to simply create equilibrium in the Middle East that would allow us to actually get out of the Middle East.

Cotton: I think there's something to that, if he wants to try and create a balance of power between Sunni and Shiites and simply exit the Middle East, or at least continue an ill-advised pivot to East Asia. I say ill-advised not because East Asia is not an important part of the world, but because the global superpower can't pivot. You have to be focused everywhere. So I think there's some of that. I mean, I think he believes fundamentally that American strength and leadership in the world has been as much a source of instability and disorder as it has been stability and order.