Iran’s Carte Blanche Terrorism is Over

In my last post on this topic, I expressed some degree of what I thought was healthy skepticism about our latest military adventure in the Middle East. It seemed reasonable given our history there. Upon further consideration, I think now I might consider myself “bullish,” not necessarily because we’ll get the right leader in place or it will be over in no time, but rather because I don’t see how things can end up being anything other than better than what they’ve been for the last 47 years.

And, at least for the time being, even Bill Maher is down with Trump on this one.

Speaking of getting the right leader in place, that may take a while because Iran’s “Assembly of Experts” — an appellation begging for a punchline — has already named the deceased Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s son, Mojtaba, to the position. Every bit as hardline as his papa, Trump’s demand for “unconditional surrender” is unlikely to be forthcoming on his watch. On the other hand, given American and Israeli intelligence and technology, there’s no particular certainty he’ll still be around by the time I hit “send” on this post.

In any case, the Islamic Republic of Iran would appear to be in its final death throes—unless the Twelfth Imam makes his appearance, posthaste. Barring that, though, the entire geopolitical situation in the Middle East, and to some extent globally, is being changed most likely for the better. If the world’s worst sponsor of terrorism is no longer able to keep the region in a constant state of turmoil, then maybe, possibly, conceivably, hopefully, the region could, perchance, gain some semblance of “normality” and countries could simply engage in commerce, trade and the like rather than acting like inhuman monsters.

Am I expecting way too much? Could the whole thing come crashing down in failure? Could it turn out to be another quagmire, another “forever war,” which Trump always claimed to be against? Well, yes, that’s possible, but is it likely? I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt until I see a massive, boots-on-the-ground occupation (which is also Maher’s deal-breaker) and house-to-house fighting in Tehran. Until then, I’ll enjoy seeing the world’s worst terror state being dismantled and the world made a better, safer place in the process.

But to address one of the biggest concerns of skeptics about this action, let’s say for the sake of argument that Mojtaba Khamenei, or any other hardliner, ends up hanging on for a significant amount of time as the supreme leader of Iran. Would it then all have been for naught? I don’t think so. Hard to imagine it would just be business as usual and he’d proceed right on with trying to get nukes, and using Hamas and Hezbollah to strike at Israel, and backing up the Houthis to disrupt shipping, and so on and so forth. Why? Because he would know that could be his last day on earth—and there’s the grand, extraordinary and magnificent difference.

You see, the days of sitting in Tehran in the safety and comfort of the palace while terrorist proxies go about the ayatollahs’ dirty work are quite obviously over. There was a time when the idea of either Israel or America striking within the sovereign territory of Iran itself was unthinkable because of the certain negative reaction of the vaunted “International Community,” and of course because it would purportedly lead to the gratuitously over-predicted World War III. That paradigm has been as obliterated as the late supreme leader and his inner circle.

However this all turns out, the days of Iranian carte blanche terrorism are over. They know that no Iranian leader is immune from getting smoked by infidel technology, nor are the infidels any longer constrained by hypersensitive international proprieties. You pull any more crap, you die. Again, that is the difference between now and the past. We don’t have to occupy or nation-build; all we have to do is crush you. Yes, I know these guys are apocalyptic fanatics, but nobody becomes the leader of a country intent upon personal suicide.

As for World War III, there’s been no headlong rush to jump into that long-predicted conflagration. For instance, where are China and Russia? Not much of a World War III without them. This Reuters headline says it all: “Isolated and Under Fire: Iran Strikes Out as Russia and China Stand Aside.” Why haven’t they entered the fray to help their “strategic partner?” Maybe Russia could drop Ukraine for a while and pitch in to help Iran? Not so much. Putin did, however, take time out of his busy schedule to call for an immediate cessation to the hostilities in Iran, stressing Russia’s “principled stance” on the matter. Ha! That’s a real knee-slapper coming from him. But he should probably leave the funny stuff to his Ukrainian rival, Zelenskyy, an actual former comedian. (You can’t make this stuff up.)

As for China, “a hard-nosed pragmatism is at play.” What does that mean? According to Craig Singleton of the DC-based Foundation for Defense of Democracies, “China is a fair-weather friend – long on words, short on risk.” And since nearly half of China’s oil imports pass through the Strait of Hormuz, it wouldn’t make much sense to help Iran and risk the Strait being shut down.

So there’s your World War III—a little inconvenient for the supposed big players and a total nonstarter for all the rest. But if not that, then what about a less bad but still significant “larger regional war?” With Iran firing rockets and missiles in every direction, isn’t that a risk? No, it’s just the last desperate, sputtering spasms of an evil regime that knows it’s finished and has nothing to lose. And those scattershot attacks have reportedly been reduced by 90 percent.

Another criticism making the rounds is that Israel dragged us into this. So . . . It’s the Jews, the Jews, always the Jews! And Trump is Netanyahu’s lapdog. This is basically the Tucker Carlson position and has become disagreeably common in certain conservative circles. The only problem with that analysis is that we’ve already seen Trump going against Netanyahu on numerous occasions.

For instance, Trump basically strong-armed Netanyahu into accepting a U.S.-sponsored 20-point Gaza ceasefire and peace plan back in September. Trump also pushed for a second phase to that plan, which included Palestinian governance that Netanyahu opposed. Trump also urged Israel to withdraw from seized Syrian territories post-Assad and end strikes on Syrian assets, which, again, went against Netanyahu's preferences. Shall I go on? Okay. Trump also nixed Netanyahu's calls for more strikes on Iranian missile sites after their June 2025 clash. And Trump prioritized diplomacy and even protected Qatar-based Hamas leaders via executive order, shielding them from Israeli action.

Netanyahu’s lap dog? I don’t think so. It may well be that Netanyahu convinced Trump that now is the time to finish the Islamist terror state, but so what? Maybe now is the time, and Trump agreed. But if Trump had not agreed, I don’t buy that Netanyahu could have pushed him into it.

One thing’s for sure. Trump is the leader without whom the toppling of the world’s worst terror state would have never happened. I’m cautiously optimistic that after the dust has totally settled, we might even be asking the question: Why didn’t we do this a long time ago? If America and the vaunted “International Community” had simply put its foot down instead of playing footsie with Iran, decades worth of terror and instability might have been avoided.