(Angus Reid Global Monitor) - The vast majority of people in the United States think the best way to persuade Iran to drop its nuclear aspirations is by relying on economic and diplomatic efforts, according to a poll by Gallup released by USA Today. 73 per cent of respondents share this opinion, while 18 per cent think it would be best to take military action against Iran.

After being branded as part of an "axis of evil" by U.S. president George W. Bush in January 2002, Iran has contended that its nuclear program aims to produce energy, not weapons. In June 2005, former Tehran mayor Mahmoud Ahmadinejad won Iran’s presidential election in a run-off over Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani with 61.6 per cent of all cast ballots.

In December 2006 and March 2007, the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) imposed sanctions against Iran after it failed to stop uranium enrichment—a process needed both to make nuclear weapons and produce electricity.

On Oct. 25, Bush announced a new set of unilateral sanctions against Iran, which include the designations of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps as a "proliferator of weapons of mass destruction" and of the elite Quds Force as a "supporter of terrorism." The resolution has significant economic implications for Iran.

On Nov. 8, Ahmadinejad announced that Iran now has 3,000 centrifuges to enrich uranium, and declared to loyalists: "The Iranian nation has entered the phase of industrial scale of nuclear fuel (production) and the train of the Iranian nation’s progress is irreversible."

Polling Data

What do you think the United States should do to get Iran to shut down its nuclear program?

Source: Gallup / USA Today
Methodology: Telephone interviews with 1,024 American adults, conducted from Nov. 2 to Nov. 4, 2007. Margin of error is 3 per cent.

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