Congress has an important opportunity to encourage the Bush administration to step up nonmilitary measures to stop Iran from continuing its dangerous nuclear-weapons program.

In his recent commentary ("Congress is about to pour lighter fluid on Iran," Sept. 4), Prof. William Beeman claims that the nonbinding measures pending in the House and Senate would require a naval blockade, amounting to an act of war by the United States. But the measures explicitly state that they do not authorize the use of force, and both the legislative sponsors and the administration repeatedly have declared that no blockade or other use of force is included. What the resolutions do call for is stepping up economic, political and diplomatic pressure on Tehran, and supporting other Middle East countries against Iranian leaders' efforts to intimidate and destabilize them with a potential nuclear arsenal.

All of the steps contained in the resolutions are authorized by the United Nations Security Council. The council has voted three times that Iran is a threat to international peace and security; has demanded that Iran immediately suspend uranium enrichment, and has sanctioned Iran under Chapter VII of the U.N. Charter, an international legal step reserved only for grave threats to world peace. Iran has cavalierly ignored the Security Council and has proceeded openly and aggressively to pursue its uranium-enrichment program.

In May, the International Atomic Energy Agency accused Iran of willfully refusing to answer questions about military activities related to its nuclear program. The IAEA's director general recently said that Iran could produce enough enriched uranium for a nuclear bomb within six months to a year. Iran has conducted and proudly touted long-range missile tests that show its capability to strike U.S. forces in the region, as well as Israel and our other Middle Eastern and European allies.

Why is the international community so fearful of a nuclear-armed Iran? For starters, the State Department lists the current fundamentalist government in Tehran as the world's leading state sponsor of terrorism. Iran openly trains, finances and arms Hezbollah, Hamas, Islamic Jihad and other terrorist groups. It has sponsored airplane hijackings, deadly attacks against U.S. soldiers, and kidnappings of Americans and Europeans. It has supplied arms to the Taliban and has hosted Al-Qaida terrorists. Harboring such cozy relationships with terrorists, the current Tehran government would be an especially dangerous and unpredictable member of the nuclear club.

Second, Iran's acquisition of nuclear weapons would be likely to spark a nuclear-arms race in the region. Turkey, Egypt and Saudi Arabia would feel especially vulnerable to intimidation from a nuclear-armed, belligerent Shiite government and would seek atomic weapons of their own. This would destroy the already fragile global nonproliferation regime and make the Middle East an even more dangerous neighborhood. As French President Nicolas Sarkozy stated, a nuclear-armed Iran "would pave the way for an arms race in the region and directly threaten Israel and southeast Europe."

Finally, Iran's current president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, is part of an Islamist theocracy obsessed with extreme anti-Western, fundamentalist ideas. Among them is the obliteration of the United States, the United Kingdom and Israel. "Today, it is the United States, Britain and the Zionist regime which are doomed to disappear as they have moved far away from the teachings of God," Ahmadinejad proclaimed in a speech in Javanroud. "It is a divine promise." Ahmadinejad recently called Israel a "germ of corruption" that will be "removed soon" and has declared that Israel should be "wiped off the map." No other government leader in the world makes such routine, brazen threats against another U.N. member state.

If there is anything to be learned from the barbarisms of the 20th century, it is that threats of ideologically crazed national leaders should be taken seriously and their appetites for weapons of mass destruction curbed before it is too late. Doing nothing is a prescription for catastrophe.

Increasing diplomatic and economic pressure while holding out generous political and economic incentives is the best way to convince Iran's theocrats to stop their reckless drive for nuclear weapons and to maintain peace and stability in the region. As British Foreign Secretary David Miliband observed this spring regarding Iran, "We cannot be afraid of diplomacy with teeth. The alternatives are all worse." Congress should pass the proposed resolutions that show Iran some diplomacy with teeth, before Iran shows its neighbors -- and the world -- something far more deadly.

Mark B. Rotenberg is general counsel and adjunct professor of law at the University of Minnesota.