The Republican debates took on a more serious air on Saturday when the topic turned to foreign policy. Iran and a nuclear watchdog report was the top of the debate's agenda with each of the candidates weighing in on how they would deal with that volatile nation if they were elected president. Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich announced that he would use secret missions meant to stop Iran from building nuclear weapons by whatever means were necessary. Gingrich went on to say that if it meant "taking out" the Iranian scientists or destroying the current regime, he would so order it but that all of these actions would be covert and that the US would disavow any knowledge of those actions.

Former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney called President Obama's current policy on Iran one of his greatest failings as a president. Romney's solutions included enacting crippling sanctions on the nation and a willingness to take swift and decisive military action if it came down to it. Herman Cain, whose foreign policy knowledge has frequently been called into question, said that he would work to help overthrow the strict regime currently in power in Iran.

Representative Ron Paul, from Texas took a more reasonable stance, warning his colleagues against the war mongering progaganda, comparing the tone of the debate to the dialogue that led to the 2003 US invasion of Iraq. He also said that if were President and it was necessary, that he would seek the legal, Constitutional route, asking Congress to formally declare war.

Paul also was drawn into a heated discussion with Michele Bachmann on the topic of torture after the Minnesota Representative said that she supported the use of waterboarding with terrorist suspects. Paul dismissed waterboarding as torture which he described as " unAmerican, uncivilized, illegal, immoral and impractical." Most experts agree that torture is never a successful means to get information from certain suspects because they are prepared to die for their mission.

Texas Governor Rick Perry, recovering from his embarrassing gaffe from the previous debate, stuck to his foreign policy from an economic standpoint saying that he would start foreign aid from zero each year, determining whether it would be extended or not at the start of each year.

While Romney dismissed President Obama's handling of Iran as a failing, his public opinon polls in regard to foreign policy are high. Fifty two percent of those polled gave the president a "good" rating for his foreign policy while nearly three quarters of those polled felt that the removal of all American troops Iraq by the end of year was a good plan.