Iran’s War Against the U.S. Started Long Ago

Yesterday on American University’s campus, President Obama delivered a heated speech about the nuclear deal with Iran and stated that, “The choice we face is ultimately between diplomacy and some sort of war”. The President is implying that if those who are trying to block the nuke deal from passing are successful, the next president will undoubtedly have a war with Iran on their hands.

This is an erroneous claim given the behaviors of Iran following the nuclear agreement, as well as the fact that Iran has essentially been at war with the United States since 1979.

Additionally, a US Navy official confirmed that two weeks ago, “An Iranian frigate pointed a mounted weapon at a US Navy helicopter and a coalition auxiliary ship in the Gulf of Aden”. While the majority of US-Iranian naval operations interactions have been “conducted in a safe and professional manner,” this situation proved different. Iranian crewmen were also seen filming the event for unknown purposes. Thankfully, the event resulted in no further conflict and only lasted a couple minutes.

Looking back at events that have transpired between the US and Iran from 1979 to the present, it is evident that the Islamic Republic of Iran is not interested in a deal with the US, but solely interested in war. The following events sheds some light on this reality:

• In 1979, 52 American diplomats and citizens were held hostage for 444 days after the US Embassy in Tehran was taken over by Iranian revolutionaries closely tied to Supreme Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeinei. This was a organized assault on American sovereignty was intended to help to “solidify their hold on power.“

• In 1983, the Iranian-proxy terrorist group Hezbollah conducted a suicide bomb on the US Embassy in Lebanon, leaving 63 people dead. Of these 63 killed, 17 were Americans. This attack, “the deadliest attack on a US diplomatic mission up to that point”.

• In 1996, the Khobar Towers housing US Air Force personnel in Saudi Arabia were bombed in a suicide bombing terrorist attack. 19 US servicemen were killed and appoximately 500 were wounded. In December 2006, Iran and Hezbollah were found legally liable of “orchestrating the attack” in U.S. Federal court.

• In 2007, armed militants disguised as U.S. security personnel raided the Provincial Joint Coordination Center in Karbala attempting to abduct U.S. servicemen. The militants, suspected of being Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-Quds Force operatives, killed five American service men, and wounded another 3.

• In 2004 and again in 2007, Royal Navy personnel from one the US’s NATO allies, the UK, were captured and detained by Iranian IRGC, who falsely claimed the British forces had entered Iranian waters.

• Throughout the Iraq War, Iranian leadership supplied EFPs (explosively formed perpetrators) to Iraqi insurgents who used them to target and kill American servicemen. According to a Military Times article recently released, “At least 500 US military deaths in Iraq and Afghanistan were directly linked to Iran and its support for anti-American militants”.

• In October of 2011, the US Department of Treasury announced that members of the IRGC-Quds Force were “connected to a plot to assassinate the Saudi Arabian Ambassador to the United States…while he was in the United States and carry out follow-on attacks against other countries’ interests inside the United States…”

• On December 22, 2011, US District Judge George B. Daniels ruled that, “Iran and Hezbollah materially and directly supported al Qaeda in the September 11, 2001 attacks”. In the 9/11 Commission Report, it is stated that Iranian border guards facilitated 8 of the 10 hijackers’ travel.

• In late April of this year, Iranian naval forces boarded the cargo ship MV Maersk Tigris in the Strait of Hormuz. While there were no Americans on board, the US is obligated to protect the Marshall Islands.

• Iran has been supplying weapons, ammunition, funding, and training for Taliban forces. Part of Iran’s strategy is to counter “US influence in the region”. A man named Abdullah, a Taliban commander in central Afghanistan, expressed that, “Iran supplies us with whatever we need”.

In Obama’s speech yesterday he stated that,

“Just because Iranian hard-liners chant ‘death to America’ does not mean that that’s what all Iranians believe. In fact, it’s those hard-liners who are most comfortable with the status quo. It’s those hard-liners chanting ‘death to America’ who have been most opposed to the deal”.

The president seems to be missing the significant aspect that the “hard-liners” chanting “death to America” are the Iranian leadership with whom he negotiated. It’s irrelevant if this not what all Iranians believe. Those who don’t sympathize which such rhetoric, lack the freedom to indicate as much. The “hard-liners” are the most comfortable with the status quo, because they control the status quo.

Then again, it’s consistent of an administration unaware of the true nature of the party they are pursuing a diplomatic agreement with, to also be unaware that said party has effectively been waging war against us for more than three decades.