The More Things Change: The War Presidency Won't Necessarily End with Bush

by Tom Qualtere, Saratoga YRs

As the final six months of President Bush’s administration appear on the horizon, Americans must remember that the global war on terror has no realistic end in sight. Iran’s volatile past—both distant and recent—is intensely relevant to our military’s future. Voters would do well to start studying up on it.

Over the past several years it has been made very clear that an American victory in Iraq is directly tied to standing up to Iranian hostility throughout the region. As the 2007 troop surge continues to pave the way for an historic peace and stability in Iraq, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and his regime in Iran continue to train and finance terror against coalition and Iraqi forces. Many have declared the Iranian Revolutionary Guard’s Quds Force’s support for the dying insurgency in Iraq a “proxy war” against the United States. However, the gruesome truth in the matter is that Iran has been waging war on our country for almost thirty years.

In November 1979, Iran’s new Shia Islamist government supported the now infamous attack and seizure of our embassy that led to 52 of our countrymen being held hostage for 444 days. In April 1983, 63 Americans were murdered when Iranian-sponsored terrorists bombed our embassy in Beirut, Lebanon. Six months later, U.S. Marine barracks located in Beirut were destroyed by Muslim extremists leaving 241 servicemen dead. Once again, the attackers were sponsored by the Islamic Republic of Iran. The attack on a U.S. Air Force housing complex in Saudi Arabia (the Kolbar Towers) in 1996 that killed 19 Americans is suspected to be the indirect work of the Iranian mullahs as well. In fact, without direct funding, arming and training from Iran, the terrorist organizations Hezbollah, Hamas and Islamic Jihad would see their strength and influence decrease dramatically. Our own attackers—Osama bin Laden’s al Qaeda network—would see their power (that which they’ve yet to lose to American forces) rapidly dwindle as well. Nevertheless, Iran’s greatest disturbance to world peace and the immediate safety of us and our allies is not its Taliban-like policies or alliances.

Unlike the old regimes of the Taliban in Afghanistan or Saddam Hussein in Iraq, the current government of Iran is developing vast nuclear technologies, and at a rate nobody in the world community thought possible. Considering the value of a democratic peace in Iraq for American security and interests, as well as the safety of our most vital Middle Eastern ally Israel—whose very existence has been taunted by Iran’s leadership, America must prepare itself to face down Iranian aggression by any means necessary.

The facts emanating from our current bases of military operation tell a much different story than the hard-spun political fantasies being churned by many here on the home front. It will be up to Americans to decide which narrative of our current conflicts we wish to follow, and which conclusion to the crises at hand we ought to ensure. It will be up to Republicans to bring accuracy and, yes, optimism to the debate. After all, the initial decision over how to deal with Iran will soon rest with the American electorate. Needless to say, with one candidate already planning for lunch with their tyrant-in-chief, our work is cut out for us.

Tom Qualtere is Chairman Emeritus of the Saratoga County YRs.