By: Johathan Feldstein
On January 16, 1979, Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi was forced to flee Iran along with his family due to the US and European countries withdrawing their support. This ushered in what’s called the Islamic Revolution, the return of exiled Ayatollah Khomeini, and the hijacking of a country that had been prosperous and source of peace and stability in the Middle East. In the 47 years since then, chaos, death, terror have reigned.
Since then, Iran devolved into a failed state with the Islamist leaders not even able to provide water and electricity, and its currency devalued to record lows, more than one million rials per dollar.
Since then, the Islamic Republic of Iran has become the world’s biggest funder of terrorism, with terrorist proxies literally all over the world. Tens of thousands or more have been killed at the hands of the Islamic regime and it’s proxies. Millions have been impacted, threatened, and suffered.
As we mark this anniversary of the West failing to support a stable ally, ushering in the evil terrorist regime, reports indicate that President Trump may have balked and failed the Iranian people as Carter did in 1979, as Obama did in 2009, and as Biden did in 2022. But if Trump has truly backed down from his harsh rhetoric to take action, and now may be seeking a “diplomatic solution,” the outcome of his actions will be worse than Obama and Biden. His harsh rhetoric emboldened the Iranian people who took to the streets in more than 100 cities in record numbers to protest the regime. They believed that Trump had their back, and were prepared to risk their lives to take back their country after almost half a century. And they were slaughtered by the Islamic regime and its agents in record numbers, at least thousands, if not tens of thousands.
Here’s the thing however. Trump’s threats were based on a false premise. He calculated whether the US would take action based on the number of Iranians being killed. As horrific as tens of thousands being killed by forces of their own government is, the massacre of people in their own country is not sufficient pretext for the United States to take military action.
Therefore, if it’s correct that Trump received reports that the Iranians have “halted executions” of some 800 people who were arrested amid the ongoing recent protests, that is ridiculous. “Halting” is a temporary action. No doubt these 800, along with thousands more who have been arrested, still remain in Iranian prison and can be executed at any moment. If not all at once, the regime could execute a few a week and stay below Trump’s radar of “too many” people being killed.
Let’s also recognize the fact that the protests have taken place for less than three weeks. It is a remarkable injustice that anyone can be arrested and sentenced to death in such a short period. So much for due process. This casts the spotlight on another face of evil in the Islamic regime.
But all this – as horrible, evil and unjust as it is – is not a pretext for military action. The reason for military action are the threats that the Islamic Republic has made and continues to make, as the single greatest source of instability and terror in the world. The Iranian President recently openly declared that Iran is at war with the United States, with Israel, and with Europe. These are threats, not to be taken lightly. They include military threats, but they also include terror, and infiltration of the West to carry out its nefarious goals of spreading radical Islam globally.
While Trump was correct to offer support for the Iranian citizens who are protesting for their own freedom, the basis for that support should never have been the number of people killed. It’s a perverse inversion of the Biblical story of Abraham negotiating with God to save Sodom and Gemorah. How many people are too many? 10? 100? 500? 1000? 10,000? And in any event if that was the measure, reports of at least 12,000 to more than 20,000 civilians being slaughtered in the streets is, and should have been, good enough for the US to take action. “Halting” 800 extra-judicial executions on top of the many thousands who were slaughtered in the streets is also not grounds for not taking action.
I fear that Trump has not only failed the Iranian people, but the West, and the world. His rhetoric put a wind in the sails of Iranian citizens who took to the streets, risking their lives only to see them shot down in cold blood. This has been the single greatest opportunity since 1979 to eliminate the Islamic Republic once and for all. THAT should have been the stated goal of any US action, and it should not have been qualified based on the number of Iranians that their government massacred.
An additional failure is that China, Russia, and numerous Arab and Islamic nations are watching and measuring what they can get away with. They saw Trump sweep in to arrest Maduro in Venezuela next door, but are seeing the US now inept at doing anything about the ayatollahs on the other side of the world. That gives American adversaries around the world license to invade other countries, support terror, engage in direct and indirect threats to the United States and the world, and even slaughter their own citizens and others with impunity.
I’m not saying that making an example of the Islamic regime is a suitable goal of military action, but threatening military action and not pulling the trigger risks losing on a global scale in ways that will not only keep the ayatollah in power for another generation, but also in embolden terrorists around the world.
It is remarkable that by doing nothing, one can lose a war as big as what seems to have taken place.
So, what is the pretext for any future American action if 800 extrajudicial executions have been halted? Why even care? What can America do and what should it do? Tariffs are a joke. Negotiations with Islamists are foolish.
There are reports that American military action might not have been enough to bring down the Islamic regime, and that may be one of the calculations as to why the US has not yet – and may not take – military action. I’m reminded of the sage words of my rabbi in college. When asked what someone should do, if the outcome of taking action provides bad results either way. I responded that you should choose the action with the least bad results. My rabbi taught me that the correct answer is to find another solution.
If the necessary goal of American action in Iran is, as it should be, to eliminate the Islamic regime once and for all, rather than calculating that US action would not be sufficient what should have happened is to find a solution that would achieve these results.
It’s horrific if hundreds, thousands, or tens of thousands have been executed in the streets of Iran with impunity. To the extent that they protested and lost their lives because of a threat that Trump made and was never prepared to carry out, their blood is on his hands. And if that’s the case, he has let down the Iranian people even more radically than his predecessors by setting them up and not following through.
But let’s be clear, if we ever want to see peace in the Middle East, add a cessation of threats around the world, the only way is the elimination of the Islamic Republic. That does not require counting how many more people have been slaughtered. That is just necessary domestic and foreign policy. On this 47th anniversary of the US withdrawing support for the Shah causing him and his family to flee, it seems that Iran and it’s people may have been let down once again. They and the world will continue to suffer.
If I am wrong, and I hope I am, I will publicly apologize. But if I’m right, then President Trump should apologize to the Iranian people, to Americans, and to the world. Even Obama recognized in retrospect his inaction in 2009 was a miscalculation. The negative consequences of his (in)action will be felt for years to come.
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