The United States should reserve the option of bombing Iran?s nuclear program into oblivion, but it would be a massive military venture that would invite heavy retribution from Tehran. That seemed to be the prevailing view from debate at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, where Iran was absent but figured high on the agenda.

?We have to keep the military option as the last option but not take it off the table,? said US Senator John McCain, a leading Republican presidential contender for the 2008 election. The commander in chief of Iran?s Revolutionary Guard, Yahya Rahim Safavi, said on Saturday: ?If we come under a military attack, we will respond with our very effective missile defense.? Military experts say Iran?s Shahab-3 missiles have a range of about 2 000 km (1 250 miles), meaning Israel, US bases in Iraq and foreign troops in Iraq lie within striking distance.

A panel on Iran at the Davos forum identified three other options: diplomacy, Iraq-style ?regime change?, and doing nothing and hoping for the best.

Mark TREVELYAN