A full century ago, Germany’s first Jewish foreign minister, Walther Rathenau, was assassinated by a far-right anti-Semite. Rathenau, the son of one of Germany’s richest men, was also the author of important works on philosophy, the director of one of its largest corporations, an influential journalist, and the inspiration for the character of Paul Arnheim in Robert Musil’s novel The Man Without Qualities. David Herman surveys his life and legacy:

Rathenau was the older son of Emil Rathenau, one of the great industrialists of late 19th-century Germany, founder of the Allgemeine Elektrizitäts-Gesellschaft (AEG), Germany’s pre-eminent electrical-engineering company. . . . Walther Rathenau held senior posts in the Raw Materials Department of the War Ministry during the First World War and became chairman of AEG upon his father’s death in 1915. Appointed foreign minister in February 1922, he soon angered right-wing extremists by negotiating the Treaty of Rapallo with the Soviet Union.

When Rathenau was murdered, Kafka famously remarked that it was “incomprehensible that they should have let him live as long as that.” . . .

On the subject of Rathenau’s appointment as Germany’s first Jewish foreign minister, [his friend, the popular author Stefan] Zweig wrote, “He was fully aware of the twofold responsibility he bore because he was a Jew. There can have been few men in history who have taken on a challenge with so much skepticism and so full of inner misgivings, knowing that the problem could not be solved by him but only by time—and fully aware of the risk to him.”

If Iran succeeds in obtaining nuclear weapons, the war in Gaza, let alone the protests on college campuses, will seem like a minor complication. Jonathan Schachter fears that this danger could be much more imminent than decisionmakers in Jerusalem and Washington believe. In his view, Israel seems to be repeating the mistake that allowed it to be taken by surprise on Simchat Torah of 2023 and Yom Kippur of 1973: putting too much faith in an intelligence concept that could be wrong.

Israel and the United States apparently believe that despite Iran’s well-documented progress in developing capabilities necessary for producing and delivering nuclear weapons, as well as its extensive and ongoing record of violating its international nuclear obligations, there is no acute crisis because building a bomb would take time, would be observable, and could be stopped by force. Taken together, these assumptions and their moderating impact on Israeli and American policy form a new Iran concept reminiscent of its 1973 namesake and of the systemic failures that preceded the October 7 massacre.

Meanwhile, most of the restrictions put in place by the 2015 nuclear deal will expire by the end of next year, rendering the question of Iran’s adherence moot. And the forces that could be taking action aren’t:

The European Union regularly issues boilerplate press releases asserting its members’ “grave concern.” American decisionmakers and spokespeople have created the unmistakable impression that their reservations about the use of force are stronger than their commitment to use force to prevent an Iranian atomic bomb. At the same time, the U.S. refuses to enforce its own sanctions comprehensively: Iranian oil exports (especially to China) and foreign-currency reserves have ballooned since January 2021, when the Biden administration took office.

Israel’s response has also been sluggish and ambiguous. Despite its oft-stated policy of never allowing a nuclear Iran, Israel’s words and deeds have sent mixed messages to allies and adversaries—perhaps inadvertently reinforcing the prevailing sense in Washington and elsewhere that Iran’s nuclear efforts do not present an exigent crisis.