Time for a New Strategy on Iran is Now
By Colonel (Retired) Wes Martin
April 9, 2024

Having served as the Senior Antiterrorism Officer for all Coalition Forces in Iraq, I saw firsthand the viciousness of Tehran’s radical proxies. Hundreds of coalition force members were killed and many more severely wounded by these groups, particularly by their explosive devices. It was obvious that the groups were not only armed, trained, and financed by the Quds Force of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), but also took their orders directly from it.

When Iraqi militias undertook operations during the US occupation, they invariably did so with Tehran’s prior approval. IRGC operatives were often on the ground closely overseeing or directly commanding terrorist militias whose ultimate allegiance was to Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. Inexcusably, Western diplomats either failed to grasp this reality or refused to address the Iranian regime’s malign influence. Those failures persist even now. For more than three months, Iran-backed militias have been relentlessly attacking US military personnel in Iraq and Syria.

Although the White House authorized strikes against those militias and emphasized that some of the targeted facilities were also used by Iran’s IRGC, there has been little effort to directly deter Tehran. This has allowed the attacks to escalate. Three American service members were killed when a drone struck a base in Jordan near the Syrian border.

Tehran denied involvement in this incident, just as it has denied involvement in more than 150 drone and rocket attacks that preceded it. Iran maintains those denials even after the militia tactics evolved into the use of ballistic missiles.

But while the arsenals of Iran’s proxies have grown, their command structure and procedures have not changed. The so-called Popular Mobilization Units in Iraq were largely modeled after Hezbollah. That model has been copied time and again in recent years. Case in point is the Houthi rebels in Yemen.

With the terrorist network expanding and still wholly controlled by Iran, it is naive to think that there is any workable strategy for containing it without focusing on Tehran itself. It was certainly appropriate for the US to target facilities used by the IRGC. An altogether new and more assertive strategy is needed.

Even if the US and its allies retaliate against the terrorists’ overseers, their strategy will still fall short if the ultimate aim is anything less than the removal of very regime behind the decades-long growth of organized Islamic militancy in the Middle East and beyond.

This is not to say that the US or anyone else should instigate war with the Iranian regime in pursuit of that aim. There are other choices besides appeasement and war.

To think otherwise is to embrace talking points pushed by Tehran in hopes of winning more concessions.

The Iranian regime already came to the brink of overthrow more than a year ago, following the nationwide uprising that was sparked when morality police killed Mahsa Amini. The uprising manifested people’s unwavering determination to bring an end to the religious dictatorship.

This was the fifth uprising since 2017. Each uprising has been influenced in a large part by the country’s leading pro-democracy opposition group, the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (MEK) and its affiliated “Resistance Units”.

Despite the regime’s heavy crackdown, the Resistance Units have carried out 3,000 anti-repression operations since last year, setting the stage for another, even more powerful uprising in the near future.

Meanwhile, the 10-point plan of Maryam Rajavi, the President -elect of the National Council of Resistance of Iran has been gaining more international recognition. The plan advocates the establishment of a democratic alternative that upholds the separation of religion and state, gender equality, autonomy for ethnic minorities, abolition of the death penalty, an end to Sharia Law which is exercised by the religious extremists, and a commitment to a non-nuclear Iran. The ultimate goals of the ten-point plan are a republic living in peace, stability in the Middle East, and unity with the entire democratic world.

The resistance and the Iranian people have been missing factors in Western policies toward the Islamic Republic since the extremists took power in 1979. Ignoring these factors and their growing role have caused leaders of the free world to overlook the existing opportunities for removing the head of the entire terrorist network that is strangling the surrounding region.

It is time for the US, UK, and their allies to adopt a new strategy aligning itself with the Iranian people and their aspirations. This includes place the IRGC on the list of terrorist entities; activating the “snapback” mechanism as outlined in the UN Security Council Resolution 2231; and enabling the reactivation of sanctions resolutions against the regime's nuclear project. Above all, we should recognize the Iranian people's ongoing struggle to overthrow the ruling theocracy.

The ayatollahs fear international accountability almost as much as they fear internal and external opposition of the Iranian people. It’s time for the international community to back the opposition. Stability in the Middle East and global security freed from Iranian sponsored or executed terrorism will not be achieved until the religious extremists in Tehran are overthrown and brought to justice.

©2024 Wes Martin