By: Marisa Herman
Tuesday, October 3, 2023
Iran’s increasingly provocative and aggressive interactions with the U.S. in the aftermath of a prisoner swap between the nations that saw the U.S. unfreeze $6 billion in the Islamic Republic’s assets proves why that negotiation was so ill-advised in the first place, Middle East experts say. While the deal, which was reached in early August and set in motion last
month, ultimately won the freedom of 5 Americans detained in Iran, it has done little to quell the larger dispute between the West and Tehran over Iran’s nuclear program and other security matters.
“The Biden administration’s approach to Iran has been a pattern of appeasement which feeds aggression,” said Robert Greenway, director of the Center for National Defense at The Heritage Foundation. “Iran has been emboldened by the $6 billion and the lack of enforcement of sanctions, along with their record oil exports.”
On Thursday, the U.S. military issued a statement about an “unsafe and unprofessional” interaction between a U.S. Marine Corps attack helicopter and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Navy. The reckless encounter came on the heels of Iran successfully launching an imaging satellite into space and the IRGC navy unveiling new vessels equipped with missiles that can strike targets more than 370 miles away.
“We shouldn’t be surprised in the least that Tehran is immediately flexing their military muscles against the United States following the release of the unfrozen funds,” said Newsmax insider Bryan Leib, who serves as executive director of CASEPAC, a federal PAC dedicated to combating antisemitism. Leib is also a former executive director of Iranian Americans for Liberty.
Greenway notes that Iran’s aggression toward the U.S. has been a regular occurrence since President Joe Biden took office. “Since Biden has taken office, Iran has increased its escalatory behavior against the United States and its allies in the region,” he said. “The United States has consistently failed to respond to the escalations and that is the reason why the behavior continues.”
Dr. Majid Sadeghpour, an Iranian-born human rights activist who serves as political director for the Organization of Iranian American Communities, points out that the Iranian regime has a “history of engaging in provocative behavior in the aftermath of diplomatic agreements.” He notes that following the signing of 2015’s Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action JCPOA – the official name of the Obama administration-era nuclear deal – Iran “increased its ballistic missile testing and its support for terrorist groups in the region.”
“This is yet another example of Iran’s hegemonic maneuvering in the region in light of a weak U.S. policy on Iran,” Sadeghpour said. Last week, U.S. Naval Forces Central Command reported that IRGCN vessels shone a laser multiple times at a U.S. AH-1Z Viper attack helicopter on Wednesday night as it conducted “routine operations” in international airspace above the Arabian Gulf.
While there were no reported injuries or damage to the aircraft, Cmdr. Rick Chernitzer slammed the encounter as “irresponsible.” “These are not the actions of a professional maritime force,” Chernitzer said in a statement. “This unsafe, unprofessional, and irresponsible behavior by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps Navy risks U.S. and partner nation
lives and needs to cease immediately.”
The helicopter is part of the 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit and attached to the Wasp-class amphibious assault ship USS Bataan, which is in the middle of a deployment geared at countering Iranian harassment. The incident was far from the first time that Iranian ships have harassed U.S. military aircraft with lasers and the most recent dangerous interaction hasn’t
surprised experts.
The military force that reports directly to the regime’s supreme leader has a history of harassing – and even seizing – internationally flagged commercial vessels transiting Middle Eastern waters. In addition to routinely condemning the aggression, the Pentagon deployed an array of fighter jets and warships to dissuade the behavior earlier this summer.
In August, more than 3,000 U.S. sailors and Marines from the Bataan Amphibious Ready Group and 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit were sent to the region.
But those efforts to curb the maritime security threats may have been undercut by the recent prisoner deal. Leib said that when the Biden administration authorized the unfreezing of assets, it sent a “direct message to Tehran and American enemies that the United States of America will continue to turn a blind eye to the vast human rights abuses committed by the Islamic Republic and of their continued support of U.S. designated foreign terrorist organizations FTO such as Hamas and Hezbollah.”
He contends that “diplomacy with the world’s leading sponsor of terrorism and a leading human rights abuser is never going to end well for the American people, the Iranian people, or our allies in the Middle East.” The pattern of repeatedly engaging in one-sided diplomacy, loosening sanctions, and now releasing $6 billion to Tehran exemplifies putting
“America last and terrorists first,” Leib said.
While the U.S. maintains the unfrozen funds will be held in restricted accounts that can be accessed only to purchase humanitarian goods, including medicine and food, there still are concerns that Iran will game the system. The cash released is money owed to Iran by South Korea for oil purchased before the Trump administration imposed sanctions on such transactions in 2019.
“The Biden administration would be wise to take a page out of the Trump administration’s playbook in dealing with Tehran, which included maximum pressure, maximum sanctions, maximum isolation,” Leib said. Also concerning is that Iran’s military isn’t just flexing its capabilities at sea. On Wednesday, Tehran successfully launched an imaging satellite into
space, which the U.S. contends is a violation of a U.N. Security Council resolution.
The state-run IRNA news agency reported an announcement from Iran’s Communication Minister Isa Zarepour that the Noor-3 satellite had been placed in an orbit 280 miles above Earth. The U.S. military quietly acknowledged the test on Friday after the 18th Space Defense Squadron of the U.S. Space Force published data about the launch on the website space-track.org.
Gen. Hossein Salami, the top commander of the Guard, touted the launch as a “victory” on state TV. He said the satellite will collect data and images. The successful satellite launch signals a major leap for Iran after its space program had endured several recent failures. While the Noor-2 satellite, launched in March 2022, is still in orbit, Noor-1, launched in 2020, fell back to Earth last year. U.S. Space Command characterized Noor-1 as a “tumbling webcam in space” that wasn’t capable of
intelligence gathering.
Guard space commander Gen. Ali Jafarabadi told Iranian state TV that the new satellite has “image accuracy that is two and a half times that of the Noor-2 satellite,” however, details of what image-capturing capabilities the new satellite possesses remain unclear. The West has long feared that Iran’s satellite endeavors are helping its ballistic missile program. U.N. sanctions related to Iran’s ballistic missile program are scheduled to expire on Oct. 18. Iran has maintained that its space program is solely for civilian programs. The high tensions between the U.S. and Iran have also played out on land.
Earlier this year, American troops stationed in Iraq and Syria found themselves in the middle of deadly dustups with militias backed by Iran. Last week, White House National Security Council Spokesperson John Kirby told reporters that despite seeing a “significant decrease” in the attacks on U.S. troops by militias supported by Iran, Tehran is still harassing commercial shipping vessels in waters off the coast of the Middle East.
Overall, Kirby said, “they continue their destabilizing behaviors.” Greenway said all these trends are “pointed in the wrong direction.” “The threats made against the U.S., personnel, our commercial shipping, and others in the region is a reflection of poor policy,” he said. “Iran is interpreting the Biden administration’s policy as weakness and continues to respond
accordingly and exploit.”
