Iran's war in Iraq

Fouad Ajami:

We tell the Iranians that the military option is "on the table." But three decades of playing cat-and-mouse with American power have emboldened Iran's rulers. We have played by their rules, and always came up second best.

Next door, in Iraq, Iranians played arsonists and firemen at the same time. They could fly under the radar, secure in the belief that the U.S., so deeply engaged there and in Afghanistan, would be reluctant to embark on another military engagement in the lands of Islam.

This is all part of a larger pattern. As Tehran has wreaked havoc on regional order and peace over the last three decades, the world has indulged it. To be sure, Saddam Hussein launched a brutal war in 1980 against his nemesis, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. That cruel conflict, which sought to quarantine the revolution, ended in a terrible stalemate; and it never posed an existential threat to the clerical state that Khomeini had built. Quite to the contrary, that war enabled the new rulers to consolidate their hold.

Over the course of its three decades in power, this revolutionary regime has made its way in the world with relative ease. No "White Army" gathered to restore the lost dominion of the Pahlavis; the privileged classes and the beneficiaries of the old order made their way to Los Angeles and Paris, and infidel armies never showed up. Even in the face of great violation – the holding of American hostages for more than 400 days – the indulgence of outside powers held.

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In the past the indulgences have been more a matter of Iran not being worth the trouble of defeating than concern about success. That needs to change if we are to see them change their conduct. They have been at war with us for 29 years. Sometimes they have been like a mosquito bothering and elephant and other times a dog nipping at its feet. It is time to step on the tormentor.

When the attacks come, we should not waste time on a messaging strategy where we give them a tit for tat response to their mischief in Iraq. They will only lash out with terrorist attacks in other areas and attacks on our ships in the Persian Gulf. What is needed is a sustained campaign against the infrastructure of the Qods forces including the weapons factories that supply it and the militia as well as all of Iran's navy. That is the only way to show them their goals are without hope.