(Washington, D.C., October 19, 2011) -- CNN's Anderson Cooper failed to ask a single question about Iran at the Western Republican Presidential Debate in Las Vegas on Tuesday night. Why not? It is time for the GOP candidates to tell us how they would protect America and our allies from Iran.

Clearly the Iran threat -- and the mullahs' audacity -- is growing. Consider the latest headlines:

*Reuters: Iran could make atom bomb material despite hurdles, says new report
*Reuters: Iran nuclear issue to grow more urgent: UK's Hague
*Agence France Presse: Iran 'most significant' threat to world: Canada PM
*Time magazine: Will the Washington Bomb Plot Force Obama into War with Iran?
*Fox News: Iran Says Its New Cruise Missile Can 'Sink Giant Warships'
*ABC News: Iran to Send Navy Ships Near U.S. Coast

I wrote "The Tehran Initiative" to encourage the American people to imagine the chilling implications of the Iran threat and to imagine a world in which the U.S. and our NATO allies don't take decisive action to neutralize Iran's nuclear program and terror infrastructure. What could happen if the West waits too long and Iran does, in fact, get the Bomb? Would Iran attach nuclear warheads to ballistic missiles and fire them at the U.S. and Israel? Would Iran give nuclear warheads to terrorists and smuggle such bombs inside the U.S. to annihilate several American cities and decapitate our government? Or would Israel launch a preemptive military strike against Iran so as to thwart a Second Holocaust? And if so, would Washington back up Israel, our most faithful ally in the Middle East, or cut her loose? These are critical questions. Unfortunately, they are not fictional. They are real and pressing. Yet CNN ignored all of them last night.

The good news is that several of the GOP candidates did reference the Iran threat on their own at the CNN debate in Las Vegas....