President Trump's Middle East Policy to Deal with Iran and ISIS -- Will He Consider the Kirkpatrick Doctrine?

THE REAL NEWS TODAY IS THAT PRESIDENT TRUMP HAS THE IRAN HOTSPOT TO HANDLE. And, Progressive Swamp Creatures and their mainstream media are not telling the full story. • • • IRAN HOSTILITIES. The Washington Free Beacon has reported that Iran is preparing to send a flotilla of warships to the Atlantic Ocean following the announcement of a massive $500 million investment in military spending, according to Iranian leaders, who say the military moves are in response to recent efforts by the United States to impose a package of new economic sanctions on Teheran. The Free Beacon says the Iranian military investment and build-up follows weeks of tense interactions between Iran and the United States in regional waters, where Iranian military ships have carried out several dangerous maneuvers near US vessels. US military officials reported in early August about another "unsafe" encounter with an Iranian drone that was shadowing a US carrier in the Persian Gulf region and reportedly came close enough to an American F-18 jet to risk the pilot's life. As with similar recent encounters, the Iranians did not respond to repeated radio calls by the United States. While the drone is said to have been unarmed, it is capable of carrying missiles. The interactions have irritated US military leaders and prompted tough talk from the Trump administration, which is reportedly examining potential ways to leave the Obama nuclear deal. • Tensions are rising over sanctions and Iran's compliance with the nuclear agreement, followed by the Iranian parliament vote to increase war spending by more than $500 million -- the second recent cash influx to Iran's military since the nuclear deal that unfroze billions in Iranian assets and saw Barack Obama sending Teheran millions in cash. The Free Beacon reports that the Iranian lawmakers shouted "Death to America" as they passed the measure, which boosts spending to Iran's contested missile programs by $260 million. The Iranian bill also imposes sanctions on US military officials in the region. Additionally, Iran is setting up courts to prosecute the United States for the recent sanctions, which Iran claims are in violation of the nuclear deal. • The Iranian military leaders announcement that they would be leading a flotilla of warships into the Atlantic Ocean cconfirmed Iranian Navy Commander Rear Admiral Habibollah Sayyari's recent statement : "No military official in the world thought that we can go round Africa to the Atlantic Ocean through the Suez Canal but we did it as we had declared that we would go to the Atlantic and its Western waters. We moved into the Atlantic and will go to its Western waters in the near future." • • • US IRAN SANCTIONS AND UN INACTION. Iranian leaders have refused to halt work on ballistic missile technology, which could be used to carry nuclear weapons. The US has issued several new packages of sanctions as a result, but UN members have not addressed the issue, despite a recent UN report that found Iran is violating international accords barring such behavior. Iran Watch, a nuclear watchdog group, says : "Little-noticed biannual reporting by the UN Secretary General alleges that Iran is repeatedly violating these non-nuclear provisions....However, the UN and its member states have not responded. More must be done to investigate allegations of noncompliance and to punish violations of the resolution." • Representative Sean Duffy, a Wisconsin Republican and a proponent of a more forceful policy on Iranian intransigence in the region, told the Free Beacon that the Trump administration must make it a priority to address Teheran's increasingly bold military activity. Duffy told the Free Beacon : "Iran was emboldened to flex its military muscle after eight years of President Obama’s passivity and his delivery of cold, hard cash to the regime, but they should make no mistake : President Trump was elected to put a stop to rogue regimes pushing America around, and the American people know he will address the world’s lead sponsor of terrorism with resolve." • Michael Rubin, a former Pentagon advisor and expert on rogue regimes, said that Iran's recent behavior shows the regime has not moderated since the nuclear deal was implemented. The Obama administration sold the deal in part on promises that it could help bring Teheran into the community of nations. But, says Rubin : "Every time the Islamic Republic has cash, it chooses guns over butter. What the [nuclear deal] and subsequent hostage ransom did was fill Iran's coffers, and now we see the result of that. What Obama and Kerry essentially did was gamble that if they funded a mad scientist's lab, the scientist would rather make unicorns than nukes. News flash for the echo chamber : Iranian reformist are just hardliners who smile more. Neither their basic philosophy nor their commitment to terrorism have changed." • On August 15, US ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley said Iran is trying to "hold the world hostage" by warning that it might abandon the 2015 nuclear agreement because of continued US "sanctions and coercion." Haley was responding to a warning from Iranian President Hassan Rohani earlier the same day that US President Trump, who has imposed several rounds of new sanctions on Iran, has shown he is "not a good partner" by repeatedly threatening to walk away from the agreement. Rohani said that could lead Iran to abandon its commitment to curb nuclear activities under the deal. • Haley, in a statement at the UN in New York, said the sanctions imposed by Trump were unrelated to the nuclear deal, under which the United States and other world powers agreed to lift most economic sanctions on Iran. Teheran must be held responsible for "its missile launches, support for terrorism, disregard for human rights, and violations of UN Security Council resolutions. Iran cannot be allowed to use the nuclear deal to hold the world hostage," Haley said, adding, "the nuclear deal must not become 'too big to fail.' " Haley said "Iran, under no circumstances, can ever be allowed to have nuclear weapons." • US State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert didn't address Rohani's comments directly, but she told the press on August 15 that Washington was in full compliance with its side of the nuclear agreement. Nauert also said Washington was reviewing its policy toward Iran and that it believes the nuclear deal didn't put an end to Teheran's other "destabilizing activities" in the region. The State Department statement echoed President Trump's assertions earlier in August that Iran was not "living up to the spirit" of the nuclear deal, which he described as a "horrible agreement." • • • IRANIAN REBELS AND SAUDI ARABIA CONDEMN IRAN'S AGGRESSION. On August 14, Mojahedin -- the media outlet of The People's Mojahedin Organization of Iran (MEK), an Iranian political-militant organization in exile that advocates the overthrow of the Iran regime -- published an article stating that Jordan said it will not tolerate the presence of shiite militia on its borders, just days after pro-Iran militias took a stretch of land near the country's borders. During a press conference, Jordanian government spokesman Mohammad al Moumani said having the militia on its borders was : "unacceptable and rejected. We consider this a strategic threat. We will take measures necessary to ensure the stability and security of our borders." He also hinted that the US and Israel, strong allies of the kingdom, would not accept the presence of these groups near the kingdom's northern border, but did not directly name Washington and Tel Aviv. MEK sources say that Jordan-backed rebels evacuated about 30 km of border land with Syria, leading Iran-backed militia to capture the land. Rebels have exchanged accusations of shirking responsibility in protecting the border area, which fell into the hands of rebels in 2011. The US has stopped providing rebels with weapons and other types of support, which is believed to have contributed to the advancement of the militias. Jordan, a sunni nation, considers Iran and its shiite groups a major threat to its borders. • Saudi Arabia filled in details on the border situation. the Riyadh Daily said last Thursday that the Iranian regime is attempting to secure a corridor through Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon, providing a supply route for its numerous terrorist proxies in the region. The Riyadh Daily says : "Iran’s clandestine nuclear and ballistic missile drive, support for terrorism and domestic crackdown are all aimed at maintaining Teheran’s mullahs in power to pursue their regional policies. This objective, in direct conflict with those of the regional and global coalitions to fight terrorism and extremism, can be stopped. Eviction of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and all its proxy forces from the Middle East must complete the new US Congress sanctions....The US House of Representatives voted overwhelmingly to rally major new sanctions on Iran, parallel to measures on North Korea and Russia. To impose additional sanctions on Iran’s defense sector, the House voted 419-3. Coming after three weeks of negotiations, this bill 'tightens the screws on our most dangerous adversaries,' explained House Speaker Paul Ryan. Maryam Rajavi, the President-elect of the National Council of Resistance of Iran and head of the MEK, welcomed the adoption of a bill by both chambers of the US Congress, which imposes new sanctions on the Iranian regime for violating human rights and pursuing ballistic missiles." The Saudi Riyadh Daily states that Iran’s highest officials have time and again acknowledged funding and supporting Iranian criminal militias in Iraq and Syria, expressing their vested interest in occupying neighboring countries through whatever means possible : "The Obama administration’s hands-off approach vis-à-vis Iran’s regional ambitions provided Teheran a far better opportunity to pursue its nefarious agendas under the pretext of fighting ISIS. Speculation raised by US officials on possible cooperation with Iran in the fight against terrorism only made matters worse. Now, as ISIS is losing influence and ground, Iran is attempting to fill the gap. Letting it have its way would be a recipe for disaster, as proven in the past eight years." • The Saudi newspaper says that despite the threats and taunts broadcast regularly by Iran’s state media, "the regime is far from capable or inclined to enter open warfare with any other state in the region or across the globe. Teheran’s proxies are only as good as the funding and supplies the regime provides. Without IRGC support, Iran’s proxies will be hard-pressed to spread their mayhem in the region." • But, says the Riyadh Daily, sanctions alone will not be enough -- regime change in Iran is required. One of the greatest manifestations of the Iranian people’s desire for change was expressed at the July 1st Free Iran gathering in Paris. Tens of thousands of Iranian expats as well as politicians, activists and religious figures from across the world attended the rally to express their solidarity and support for the cause of freedom and democracy in Iran. The event delivered a clear message : regime change in Iran is the only viable solution for both the people of Iran and the region’s nations. There’s no need for another foreign conflict. Saudi Prince 'Turki Al Faisal' addressed the large Paris gathering, telling the participants : “So, you have coming together now a mighty coalition of forces, joining with the Resistance, and that should give us hope that we can make that [regime] change. The people of Iran and their organized resistance have the will, power and means necessary to realize this change." • Will President Trump and the US military agree to become enmeshed in another Middle East regime change? Trump has said regime change is not his policy. • • • TURKEY'S ROLE IN THE IRAN PROBLEM. Reuters reported on August 1 that Turkey and Iran have agreed to boost military cooperation after talks in Ankara between the Iranian armed forces chief of staff and Turkish leaders. President Tayyip Erdogan's spokesman said Iran's military chief General Mohammad Baqeri met Erdogan on a visit that Turkish media labelled as the first to Turkey by an Iranian military chief of staff since the 1979 Islamic revolution in Iran. Erdogan spokesman Ibrahim Kalin described the visit as "fruitful and successful," adding that the talks focused on counter-terrorism, the battle with ISIS, and a joint effort by Iran, Turkey and Russia to stem the fighting in parts of Syria. Kalin told reporters : "An agreement was reached to hold further high-level visits from now on. A series of activities will also be held to boost military cooperation." Iran's semi-official Tasnim news agency quoted Baqeri, confirming that he had agreed with Turkey to hold joint training courses, and increase counter-terrorism intelligence sharing. He said Erdogan would visit Iran in the near future. • Baqeri's trip to Ankara came shortly before a planned visit by US Defense Secretary Jim Mattis. Ties between NATO allies Turkey and the United States have been strained by Washington's support for Kurdish YPG fighters leading the assault on Islamic State in the Syrian city of Raqqa. Turkey says the YPG is related to the outlawed Kurdish PKK which has been waging an insurgency in southeast Turkey for more than 30 years. Washington sees the YPG as a vital ally in the fight to defeat ISIS, but Turkey and its large armed forces and leases for US air bases are also vital to the US. • • • THE MIDDLE EAST'S GROWING CRISIS. Israel Today reported on Sunday that the Palestinian terrorist orgnaization Hamas has now seen one of its top commanders in Gaza killed by an ISIS suicide bomber. The attack occurred on Thursday morning along the Gaza-Egypt border -- four members of a local ISIS cell were trying to cross from Gaza into the Egyptian Sinai when they were apparently stopped by both Hamas security personnel and the Egyptian military; one of the ISIS terrorists later identified as Mustafa Kullab then detonated his bomb vest, killing the Hamas commander and wounding five of his men. Kullab was revealed to have been a former Hamas member who was apparently left disillusioned by the group. His victim was a member of Hamas' "elite" forces and commander of the snipers' division. • I suppose we have to admit that one suicide bomb in the Middle Est has long since ceased to be a 'crisis.' But, ISIS has been making inroads into Gaza for some time, and that could lead to crisis with a capital C. The pro-Israel German newspaper Algemeiner reported on February 17 that "terrorists affiliated with ISIS are challenging Hamas rule in the Gaza Strip and trying to topple the regime there, which they accuse of being un-Islamic and lacking in jihadist spirit." Algemeiner calls this an "explosive and complex situation" that reflects the fact that Hamas prefers to exploit the current absence of a full-scale conflict with Israel to build up its military wing, fill up its rocket depots and dig tunnels for future cross-border attacks. But, ISIS-affiliated groups, known as Salafi jihadists, insist on armed conflict with Israel right now. The division, according to Algemeiner, is not merely tactical. At its core, ISIS considers Hamas to be a counterfeit movement because of its willingness to embrace Palestinian nationalism and blend it with an Islamic identity. In ISIS's worldview, all forms of nationalism must be discarded in favor of a single global Islamic identity. • Professor Boaz Ganor, the founder and executive director of the International Institute for Counter-Terrorism in Herzliya says that Hamas’ challenges in dealing with the Salafi jihadists are similar to the issues Fatah and the Palestinian Authority had -- and continue to have -- with Hamas itself. Ganor says : “One of the central mistakes made by Yasser Arafat in the 1990s after he returned to the [Gaza] Strip and to the West Bank in the context of the Oslo Accords was that, when Fatah could have, they chose not to harm Hamas’ infrastructure. They never fought Hamas, and actually chose to safeguard the organization’s capabilities. It was convenient for Arafat to paint Fatah as the moderate side, while the alternatives are the radical Hamas members. He tried to ride on the Hamas tiger. But in 2007, the tiger devoured Fatah in Gaza, and in the future, perhaps it will do the same in the West Bank. Now, Hamas is making exactly the same mistake.” Ganor means that if Hamas chose to crush the Salafi jihadists in Gaza, it could do so “without difficulties,” but they don’t want to do this. It is comfortable for them to have a more extreme element than them in the Palestinian arena. This portrays Hamas as a rational and stabilizing force in the arena." • The implications of this for Israel are large. Ganor believes that Israel refrained from destroying Hamas during the two-month Gaza conflict in the summer of 2014, out of a deep concern that such a result would create a vacuum filled by the Salafi jihadists. And, Ganor says, Salafis could easily devour Hamas in the future” by creating a sudden security escalation that will drag Hamas into a large-scale conflict with Israel, even if neither Hamas nor Israel desire one. • The situation has gotten even more complex, says Ganor, with the recent ascension to power of Yayha Sinwar, a Hamas hard-liner even by the terror group’s brutal standards. Sinwar, who is a prominent figure in Hamas’ military wing, is urging cooperation with ISIS in the Sinai Peninsula. The “Sinai Province” ISIS is sympathetic to the conflict being waged by its brother Salafis in Gaza against Hamas, but Sinai Province ISIS also works with Hamas to smuggle weapons into the region. Sinwar promoted these ties and ignored objections from Hamas’ political wing. Shlomo Brom, who heads the Israeli-Palestinian Relations Program at the Tel Aviv-based Institute for National Security Studies told Algemeiner that despite the many reports claiming to forecast Sinwar’s conduct : “I have no idea how he will behave. Brom said that once Sinwar takes up leadership of Hamas’ political bureau in Gaza, he will have a different view than he did in the military wing. Brom, who served as the head of the IDF’s Strategic Planning Division in the General Staff Planning Branch, believes that the main goal of the Salafi jihadists is to delegitimize Hamas’ regime : “I don’t think the Salafi jihadists can pose a significant challenge to the Hamas regime at this stage. But they are a problem for Hamas. They outflank them on the jihadist map, as seen through rocket attacks, and statements. They aim to tell the Palestinian public that there is no difference between Hamas and Fatah. Just like Fatah is seen as an ineffective collaborator of Israel, Hamas is portrayed by the Salafis as the same." Brom says that Salafi launches rocket attacks into Israel in order to use the Israeli Air Force to expose Hamas to Israeli retaliation. But, Hamas, seeking to avoid an escalation with Israel, does not respond to Israel’s retaliatory strikes, and this further reinforces the Salafi message that Hamas has turned into “Fatah two." • Algemeiner says that in order to counter the Salafi challenge, Hamas is seeking closer relations with Egypt. Hamas has had a series of recent high-level meetings in Cairo, to which Hamas sent both military wing and political wing delegations as part of a bid to improve ties with the powerful regime of President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi. Relations with Egypt have, until now, been openly hostile, with Cairo identifying Hamas as a core partner of its domestic Islamist enemies and an active supporter of the ISIS insurgency in the Sinai. Hamas could try to play a double game, Brom says, by improving ties with Egypt and maintaining links with Sinai Province, though this approach could blow up in Hamas’ face." And, replacing Hamas with Salafi terrorsits on the Israeli border with Gaza could only spell more trouble for Israel. • • • DOES THE DEEP STATE FIGHT AGAINST TRUMP MIDDLE EAST EFFORTS? In July, American Thinker reported that the State Department has released the Country Reports on Terrorism for 2016. In it, the State Department authors say it is the "frustration" with and "perception" of Israel's policies that drives Palestinian terrorists to murder Israelis : "the continued drivers of [Palestinian] violence" are Israel's policies. So, we are led to believe that Palestinian terrorists commit violence not because schools, television, newspapers, mosques, and social media are constantly inciting to violence against Israel and its Jewish citizens. The report also praises Mahmoud Abbas's "commitment to fight terrorism" and call for "culture of peace and tolerance and the renunciation of violence and extremism." It also notes that the "PA's Palestinian Broadcasting Company's code of conduct does not allow programming that encourages 'violence against any person or institution on the basis of race, religion, political beliefs, or sex.' " Apparently, in a thin effort to disguise State's siding with the Palestinians, the report admits that "[i]n practice, however, some instances of incitement took place via official media. There were also some instances of inflammatory rhetoric and the posting of political cartoons glorifying violence on official Fatah Facebook pages." (???) • That is certainly not President Trump's opinion, so it cannot be Secretary Tillerson's opinion. But, the question is who read and approved the report for Tillerson?? And why isn't somebody looking out for Deep State holdovers from the Obama era hidden in the State Department and geared up to sabotage Trump policy at every opportunity. The Palestinian terrorists, according to the State Department report, are driven to such extreme violence because of "lack of hope in achieving Palestinian statehood, Israeli settlement construction in the West Bank." The report also blames the Israeli Defense Forces for its effort to curb such violence "with tactics that the Palestinians considered overly aggressive." The authors of the report evidently don't consider Palestinians murdering Israelis at their homes, streets, bus stations, stores, and coffee houses, "overly aggressive." • American Thinker says the report's justification of Palestinian terrorism and violence while blaming Israel reads like an Al Jazeera propaganda piece. For example, says American Thinker : "last week, Palestinians were violently clashing with Israeli security forces because Israel had finally installed metal detectors and additional security cameras at the entrance to Temple Mount, the holy site to Jews and to Moslems. Israel installed them to prevent terrorist attacks only after Moslems carried weapons into the al-Aqsa mosque to kill three Israeli soldiers. Similar and much stricter security measures exist in Mecca and are present at major mosques in the Moslem world. Nonetheless, the Palestinians used deadly violence to force Israel to remove the metal detectors. They are violently rioting again because they know that no matter what President Trump says, the State Department most likely, as evidenced in the latest report, would claim Israel efforts to prevent terrorism on Temple Mount as 'the driver' of Palestinian violence." • The Deep State is alive in the US State Department and it must be rooted out. • • • DEAR READERS, Iran's tentacles are long and reach into every corner of the Middle East. President Trump must gain firm control of all policy regarding Iran, ISIS and Palestine coming out of the White House and the State Department. There is no room for Deep State sabotage of any part of Trump's Middle East policy package, especially now that Iran is becoming ever more bellicose because of its increased access to funds and weaponry under the Obama nuclear deal. • "Aggressors," observed the late Jeane J. Kirkpatrick in her final book Making War to Keep Peace, "are a constant in history." The pattern is always the same. "They seek to impose their will on governed masses, which are denied any voice in their own destinies and any recourse to justice." • According to Kirkpatrick, authoritarian regimes merely try to control and/or punish their subjects' behaviors, while totalitarian regimes moved beyond that into attempting to control the thoughts of their subjects, using not only propaganda, but by brainwashing, re-education, widespread domestic espionage, and mass political repression based on state ideology. Totalitarian regimes also often attempt to undermine or destroy community institutions deemed ideologically tainted -- including religious ones, or even the nuclear family -- while authoritarian regimes by and large leave these alone. For this reason, she argued that the process of restoring democracy is easier in formerly authoritarian than in formerly totalitarian states, and that authoritarian states are more amenable to gradual reform in a democratic direction than are totalitarian states. President Reagan often used what became known as the Kirkpatrick Doctrine. President Trump would do well to consider it as he formulates Middle East policy. • American Thinker, using the Kirkpatrick Doctrine, recently observes : "It is difficult to pinpoint the moment with precision, but the regional order in the Middle East that emerged following the Arab-Israeli war of 1973 fell apart sometime during Obama's tenure as President. Two key features of the old order in the Middle East were America's stabilizing role and the absence of a permanent Russian military presence. In 2011, Obama withdrew troops from Iraq despite warnings from military advisors that the withdrawal was premature. ISIS quickly filled the resulting power vacuum...on the sunni side, while Iranian agents and clients filled the vacuum...on the shiite side. In 2013, after Syria used chemical weapons against its own people, Obama accepted Putin's overture to allow Russia to work with Syria to remove Assad's chemical weapons from the country, inflating Putin's perceived stature so much that hardly a protest was registered when, in September 2015, the Russian military unilaterally intervened in the Syrian Civil War -- and thus definitively established itself as a military power in the Middle East. The rise of ISIS destabilized not only Iraq but Syria and Lebanon, and the power vacuums created by Obama's withdrawals and sustained by his calculated adherence to nonintervention created the perfect openings for Iran and Russia to entrench themselves much more deeply into the Middle East." • Now that the United States under President Trump has re-engaged in the Middle East, the Kirkpatrick Doctrine -- which does not insist on either intervention, nonintervention, or withdrawal as tactics but which supports engaging to maintain peace -- can be a strategy for dealing with Iran, ISIS and Palestine. President Trump has already begun the serious work of destroying ISIS, which threatens to become a permanent totalitarian school for terrorists. American Thinker points out that, after ISIS is dismantled, it will be necessary to empower non-radical sunnis in Syria -- "an enormous challenge, given how thoroughly al-Qaida's offshoots have integrated with sunnis there." But, analysts at the Institute for the Study of War and the Critical Threats Project at the American Enterprise Institute, for example, have developed comprehensive strategic plans for dealing with these sunni populations, according American Thinker. With respect to Iran, Trump's goal must be to eliminate Iran's and Hezbollah's tight control over the administrative and military levers in Syria, Lebanon, and Iraq. This would re-establish America in the position it had prior to Obama' s premature withdrawal from Iraq. • History shows clearly what happens when despotic actors gain administrative control over states. Jeane Kirkpatrick said : "We cannot protect ourselves or others against the resurgence of aggressive powers or the reoccurrence of evil unless we face the fact that tyranny and war have the same source -- in persons who use force to expand their control of others." • What President Trump requires for success in the Middle East is the resolve to preserve civilized order while, in Kirkpatrick's words, "preserving our military and reserving our sovereign right to wage war to maintain true peace." • President Trump's Afghanistan speech will give us a first look at his Middle East policy.