In June, Richard Holbrooke paid a visit to German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder in Berlin. After a short chat with Holbrooke, who is seen as a possible Secretary of State in a John Kerry White House, Schroeder got straight to the point: "What would Kerry do if he were president?"

"The first thing he would do," Bill Clinton's former ambassador to the United Nations said, "would be to invite you and French President Jacques Chirac to the White House." Schroeder could read between the lines. A joint invitation to the Iraq war opponents could only mean one thing -- Kerry would want a military contribution in Iraq.

"That's what I was afraid of," Schroeder replied.

An attempt by a new American president to seek military aid could throw Schroeder into a serious dilemma. If he refused, he would be ruining his chance to kick-start foundering German-American relations. Unlike George W. Bush, with his penchant for going it alone, Kerry has said he would pursue a "multilateral" foreign policy and consult America's allies on important issues. A "no" from Schroeder could be a major and early embarrassment for Kerry. If he agreed, he would be undermining one of the strongest pillars of the pact he made with voters: that German troops wouldn't set foot in Iraq.

Candidate Kerry has been pledging the opposite. He wants to bring as many allies as possible to Iraq -- including Germany's army, the Bundeswehr. "Kerry is taking a big risk," said Gernot Erler, deputy of the parliamentary group of the Social Democrats, before ruling out the possibility Berlin would accept any troop request -- even from a Democratic president.

A Bush win wouldn't leave German politicians breathing any easier. Nor would German voters be any happier, with recent polls showing as many as 74 percent saying they would vote for Kerry if they had the chance. Part of Bush's German problem is style -- the hometown swagger doesn't play well to a German crowd used to more intellectually-oriented leaders. But there is also substance, specifically Iraq, where Bush's unwavering unilateralism has angered Germans and made it easy to stick to a "no troops" mantra. A Bush re-election would make maintaining that firm stance more plausible. Popularity problems aside, Bush comes with even greater baggage than Kerry. The overarching concern in Germany is that he could shift the current row from Iraq to Iran, where evidence is strong that the country has ambitions to produce weapons of mass destruction.

Trouble in Teheran

Since it began its program to produce enriched uranium, Iran has catapulted itself to the top of the list of the world's most dangerous nations. Teheran is building missiles and warheads that can already reach Israel and may, in the future, travel as far as Europe -- and they could soon be tipped with nuclear weapons. Add to that the mullah's decades-long support of terrorist networks in their battle against Israel and it's easy to understand the growing concern.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has given the mullahs until November 25 to cease all nuclear-bomb-related building. But what happens if Teheran doesn't budge? Based on his track record, a re-elected Bush wouldn't wait too long before threatening military strikes. John Kerry has also taken a firm stance against Iran, but he has also said he would offer to sell nuclear fuel to the country so it wouldn't have to enrich its own uranium. The candidate says it's a "test" to determine whether Teheran is pursuing a nuclear program for peaceful purposes.

The language used by the Bush administration today to discuss Iran isn't much different from the vocabulary it used before the Iraq war. "Iran is a country that is not part of the civilized world in terms of its behavior," Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said on Tuesday. John Bolton, an undersecretary of state in the State Department, confirms that the Bush administration is "determined" to ensure that Teheran does not become capable of producing nuclear weapons.

The similarities don't stop there. After Bush brought the Iraq case to the UN Security Council in September 2002, western governments bickered for six months over whether a violation of a Security Council resolution automatically justified going to war. Now, in autumn 2004, the fight has been over whether the IAEA should refer Iran's clandestine nuclear weapons program to the Security Council for disciplinary action even before the November 25 deadline. Observers in Berlin also believe any US attempt at a resolution would be vetoed by China and Russia.

It's a sequence of events European diplomats have carefully sought to avoid. One year ago, the foreign ministers of Germany, France and Britain got the mullahs to agree to abandon their uranium enrichment efforts. In return, Europe guaranteed it would help technologically deficient Iran develop its civilian nuclear energy program. Even Bush spoke of a "very positive development." But it was an empty victory. In June, Teheran announced it would resume production of centrifuges that can be used in the enrichment process. On Thursay, diplomats from the EU trio are meeting with Iranian negotiators in Vienna, where they will sweeten the pot by offering to help them purchase a civilian reactor from Russia. But this time around, the US has said it would not support the European offer.

A ticking time bomb

If Iran continues with its nuclear program, one German diplomat told DER SPIEGEL, the "clock will start ticking" towards a US military attack. If Washington doesn't strike, then Israel likely will.

Just as certain as the possibility of a US or Israeli strike is the expectation of a counter strike from the Iranians. In fact, they've promised one. "We're not going to wait with tied hands for someone to do something to us," Iranian Defense Minister Ali Shamkhani warned. In Berlin, officials fear retaliation could pull Iran's crisis-plagued neighbors into the crisis, causing the entire Middle East and Central Asia to erupt.

As happened in the run-up to Iraq, the issue could again divide America's allies, who will this time ask more probing questions. How far are we allowed to go in our fight against rogue states? And which poses a greater danger for world peace: weapons of mass destruction in the hands of Islamic terrorist states or an arrogant US superpower that goes to war unilaterally wherever and whenever it wants?

Of course, with over 1,000 soldiers already dead in the Iraq war and the US military already stretched thin with missions in the Persian Gulf, in Afghanistan and elsewhere, it's unlikely Washington could create a new battlefront. But would those considerations stop it from engaging in targeted strikes against Iranian nuclear installations and from prompting Teheran to retaliate?