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Iran’s Record Justifies Military Action Against It

From: www.newsmax.com
By Luis Fleischman

It’s remarkable to witness the level of ignorance displayed by certain public officials, segments of the media, and various analysts when evaluating the rationale behind the joint American–Israeli military operation against Iran.

For Americans, it’s natural to perceive Russia and China as primary threats, given how deeply U.S. strategic thinking has been shaped by the Cold War.

Yet this perspective often overlooks another adversary that operates through asymmetric warfare and can pose dangers comparable to — if not greater than — those presented by China or Russia: radical Islamist movements.

The attacks of Sept. 11, 2001 took place nearly a quarter of a century ago.

The passage of time, however, does not mean the threat has disappeared, as some commentators have suggested.

Iran continues to pursue uranium enrichment in its effort to develop nuclear weapons.

It also manufactures missiles capable of striking U.S. allies in the Persian Gulf and Europe, while the regime remains one of the world’s principal sponsors of asymmetric warfare.

Iran’s use of Hezbollah to carry out attacks against American servicemen in Beirut in 1983, as well as the bombings of the Israeli Embassy and the Jewish Community Center in Buenos Aires in the early 1990s, helped shape and inspire terrorist tactics later adopted by al-Qaida.

Indeed, the 9/11 attacks against the United States must be understood within the broader evolution of mass-casualty terrorism that emerged during the 1980s and 1990s.

Whether Sunni or Shia, when the adversary is the United States, the West, or Israel, these traditional religious rivals have at times drawn inspiration from one another and even cooperated.

After the 9/11 attacks, several founding leaders of al-Qaida reportedly fled to Iran, where they lived for years before some eventually returned to Pakistan to rejoin the organization

Additionally, Iran has cultivated ties with Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad — both Sunni movements — allowing Tehran to project itself as a broader Islamist power rather than solely a Shiite one.

The Sunni-Shiite divide remains real, but the political role of Islam has often proven more important than sectarian differences.

In the past, Sunni Sudan maintained close relations with Tehran, while in recent years Sunni Turkey and Shiite Iran have expanded cooperation in several areas despite finding themselves on opposite sides of the Syrian conflict.

Iran has thus become the principal sovereign state supporting terrorist groups, contributing to instability across the Mideast.

The Islamic Republic has also extended its reach into Europe. Iranian operatives have reportedly used criminal organizations to carry out terrorist activities and surveillance.

In the United Kingdom alone, authorities have identified roughly twenty Iranian-linked plots targeting British citizens and residents.

Similar concerns have emerged in Germany and France, where Iranian operatives allegedly used criminal networks to conduct surveillance on Jewish individuals and businesses.

Most recently, a terrorist associated with ISIS attacked Old Dominion, an ROTC military program located in Virginia.

Although the assailant had previous connections to ISIS, the possibility that his attack was a reaction to the U.S.-Israel war against Iran should not be ruled out.

Likewise, the attack on a Michigan synagogue on March 13 was carried out by a Lebanese-American individual who was reportedly a member of the Iran-backed group Hezbollah..

Iran has also cultivated relationships with several far-left governments in Latin America, including Venezuela, Nicaragua, Cuba, and Bolivia.

Through these partnerships, Tehran appears to be seeking a strategic presence in the Western Hemisphere that could strengthen its deterrence capabilities against the United States.

This development raises concerns because of the geographic proximity of some of these countries to the United States.

Reports indicate the existence of facilities in Venezuela dedicated to assembling Iranian-designed drones as part of long-standing military cooperation between Caracas and Tehran.

According to former Colombian Vice President Francisco Santos, Iran has provided logistical support and missile-related training to Venezuelan personnel and has also trained Colombian guerrilla groups in drone operations.

The continued development of Iranian missile and drone capabilities raises the possibility that such systems could one day be deployed from Latin American territory, amplifying potential strategic risks for the United States.

Iran’s regional activities are further reinforced through Hezbollah, which has built extensive connections with criminal networks involved in drug trafficking, smuggling, and money laundering across Latin America.

The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration’s “Project Cassandra” documented extensive links between Hezbollah’s financial networks and South American drug cartels, showing how operatives connected to the group facilitated cocaine trafficking to Europe and the United States.

Hezbollah’s links with powerful criminal organizations such as the very dangerous criminal gang Primeiro Comando da Capital (PCC) further contributes to the chaos and anarchy in the Western Hemisphere.

Likewise, it makes more likely the possibility that those criminal groups could be used, like in Europe, against American targets.

Given this extensive record, it is difficult to justify opposition to military action against Iran on the grounds that the regime does not constitute an imminent threat.

Such reasoning risks leaving the free world dangerously vulnerable.

International law recognizes the right to self-defense, even though preventive wars remain controversial. But the question remains: must we wait for another tragedy on the scale of 9/11 before acting to defend the security of the United States and its allies?

Luis Fleischman, Ph.D., is a professor of Sociology at Palm Beach State College, co-president of the Palm Beach Center for Democracy and Policy Research, and the author of the book “The Middle East Riddle: The Peace Process and Israeli-Arab Relations in Changing Times.”