A majority of Americans would support U.S. military action against Iran if there was tangible evidence that Tehran was building nuclear weapons, even if such action led to higher gasoline prices, according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll released Tuesday.
The poll encompassed 1,084 adults across the U.S., and was conducted between March 8 and 11. The margin of error is 3.1 percent.
The results indicated that 56% of Americans would support U.S. military action against Iran if there was evidence of a nuclear weapons program, while 39% opposed a military strike.
Asked whether they would back U.S. military action even if this resulted in higher gasoline prices, 53% said they would, while 42% said they would not. The poll also found that 62% of Americans would back Israel taking military action against Iran for the same reasons.
U.S. President Barack Obama has said all options are on the table in dealing with Iran’s nuclear program, but he has encouraged Israel to give sanctions against Iran more time to take effect. Iran insists its nuclear program is peaceful, but many Western countries believe its aim is to develop nuclear weapons.
Rising gasoline prices, in part due to tension in the Middle East, have put political pressure on Obama as he fights for re-election later this year. The Democrat president has also faced criticism from his potential Republican rivals for being too soft on Iran and not supportive enough of Israel.
The poll showed Republicans were more willing to support military action by the U.S. or Israel than Democrats, with 70% of Republicans saying they would back U.S. action, and only 46% of Democrats and 51% of independents saying the same.
“What we’re seeing is kind of a general trend that we always see, that Republicans tend to be more hawkish than Democrats or independents,” said Ipsos pollster Cliff Young. “Historically Republicans have been much more security-centric.”
The breakdown was similar when respondents were asked to factor in gasoline prices or their support of an Israeli military move.
Obama said on Tuesday that rising tensions with Iran and talk of an imminent military operation against it have caused the price of oil in the U.S. to rise. The statement came as polls showed American support for the president was dropping.
According to a poll published by ABC on Tuesday, only 38% of Americans support Obama’s economic policies -- a number that becomes more significant in the midst of a presidential election year.
The New York Times also published a poll on Tuesday which found that Obama’s approval rating had dropped by 9% recently and was now down to 41%, his lowest rating since he entered the White House in 2009.
In an interview with WFTV in Orlando, Florida, Obama said the main reason behind the global oil price hike was speculation over war in the Middle East, and that government officials had to curb their talk of a possible war with Iran.
In the U.S., the price of gasoline has risen by 12 cents over the past two weeks and now stands at $3.81 per gallon. In Los Angeles, the cost per gallon reached a record $4.35. In comparison, between the years 1998 and 2004, the price range per gallon was between $2 and $4.
The ABC poll showed that 54% of Americans felt Obama could do more to prevent the price of oil from rising.
Further signaling Obama’s waning support, the ABC poll also showed that GOP presidential candidate frontrunner Mitt Romney would defeat Obama if the elections were held today. The results indicated that Romney would receive 49% of the votes against 47% for Obama.
According to the poll, Obama would defeat GOP candidate Rick Santorum only by a narrow margin of 49% against 46%.
Meanwhile, the U.S. has reached out to an unlikely ally -- Russia -- in its bid to keep Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons.
According to a report in Russia’s Kommersant daily, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has held talks with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov in which she told him that the situation with Iran was near the point of no return. Clinton was seeking to employ Russia as a go-between as the U.S. has no formal diplomatic relations with Tehran. If Iran does not change course soon, the report said, the U.S. feels military action will be the only remaining option.
“She asked her Russian colleague to make this clear to the Iranian authorities,” Lebanon’s Daily Star newspaper translated the report as saying.
Clinton spoke to Lavrov in New York on the sidelines of the U.N. Security Council meeting on Syria.
In related news, a CNN blog reported Wednesday that a think tank in Washington believes it has pinpointed the location in Iran where secret explosives tests, connected with a covert nuclear weapons program, took place.
David Albright, president of the Institute for Science and International Security, gave an exclusive interview to the CNN blog Security Clearance and told the news network that his organization had located a building in the Parchin military complex, south of Tehran, that, according to CNN, “may be the location of a high-explosive test chamber.”
The International Atomic Energy Agency, the U.N.’s nuclear watchdog, has repeatedly requested, and been denied, access to Parchin.