Iran’s people are key to the success of new U.S. strategy to deal with Tehran’s threats

Published Thursday, Nov. 2, 2017, 1:10 pm

Front Page » Government/Politics » Iran’s people are key to the success of new U.S. strategy to deal with Tehran’s threats

1. By Homeira Hesami

When the nuclear deal between Iran and the P5+1 world powers was engineered by the Obama administration in 2015, the globe was cloaked in a false security blanket. Last June, unsurprisingly, the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) in Washington, DC revealed disturbingly current details concerning the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps’ (IRGC) both testing and launching ballistic missiles. Such evidence demonstrates that Iran’s clerical regime had no intention of curbing its agenda. What to do?

Before we ask “how,” we must ask “why?”

Simply put by U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley, “Judging any international agreement begins and ends with the nature of the government that signed it.” Waynesboro YMCA Tri for the pool. 

Trump Takes Aim At The IRGC

October 18, 2017  •  Al-Hurra Digital

You wouldn't know it from the media coverage surrounding President Trump's October 13th speech on Iran, but the most notable element of the Administration's new, "comprehensive" strategy toward the Islamic Republic isn't its plan to revisit the 2015 nuclear deal formally known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). Of course, President Trump's decision to formally "decertify" that agreement should have come as a surprise to no one. During last year's presidential election, candidate Trump campaigned heavily on his opposition to the Obama administration's signature foreign policy achievement. And, since taking office in January, Mr. Trump has consistently maintained that the deal concluded two years ago between Iran and the P5+1 powers—the U.S., UK, Russia, China, France and Germany—is deeply damaging to American national security interests. That his White House would begin to rethink it, therefore, was simply a matter of time. Rather, the most notable aspect of the Administration's new approach toward Iran is its plan for a full-scale assault on regime's most powerful strategic asset: the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).

Trump's Iranian nuclear deal speech ricochets across the Middle East

President Trump’s Iran strategy speech of Oct. 13 rattled Tehran and excited a large portion of the Iranian population, including the Iranian opposition. Trump’s speech, while going over a long list of Tehran’s nefarious activities, referred to the people of Iran as the main victims of the Iranian regime. He also refrained from certifying that Iran complied with the deal but did not withdraw from the political commitment the major powers and Tehran made to abide by the accord for 10 years from Aug. 2015.

After punting the decision to Congress for 60 days, research conducted for this post suggests Trump should gain congressional support to withdraw from the deal, renegotiate a better accord, and press our allies to adopt a strategy against Iran of renewal of sanctions until the Iranian regime changes its unacceptable behavior.

Showing he was upset, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said, “Trump’s speech against the Islamic Republic was nothing but insults and delirious talk.”

He also stated, “Iran has demonstrated its good will by entering into and its conclusion of nuclear negotiations with the P5+1 (permanent members of the UN Security Council + Germany with Tehran as a partner) to resolve a fabricated crisis.” But, “United States fulfillment of its commitments has been lackluster and deficient from the very beginning.”

How Iran Fears MEK as Its Opposition

 Pooya Stone

The regime in Iran has come under immense domestic and international pressure recently. Most vivid are the sweeping sanctions imposed by US Congress and signed into law by President Donald Trump.

These developments are sparking an endless stream of reactions from Iran’s senior officials and various media outlets. Over 500 interviews, reports, posts, sessions, book introductions and others events have been discussed in this regime’s official outlets, all regarding the opposition People's Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK).

The reason behind this chorus of remarks and attacks aimed at the MEK is obvious. It is crystal clear for Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and his entire regime apparatus how the MEK represent the source of all their strategic defeats.

Iran’s Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) has recently been classified as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist entity. This is mainly due to the hundreds of revelations, press conferences, articles, posts and other activities by the MEK and its umbrella group, the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI).

The IRGC blacklisting is considered a strategic setback for Tehran, especially since 40% of the regime’s economy is controlled by the Guards.

The MEK also delivered major blow to Khamenei’s blueprints aimed at unifying his regime through engineering the May 19th presidential election. Conservative cleric Ebrahim Raisi, 

 preferred candidate, was groomed by the hardliners to replace the incumbent Hassan Rouhani as president.

The MEK’s vast network of activists inside Iran, coupled with a variety of measures abroad, shed light on Raisi’s past as a member of an infamous “Death Commission” in charge of supervising the 1988 massacre of over 30,000 political prisoners across the country who mostly were members of MEK.

As Raisi failed to reach the presidency, the mullahs’ entire apparatus suffered a major defeat, understood best by Khamenei himself.

The MEK best gained international credibility in 2002 after blowing the whistle on Iran’s clandestine nuclear weapons program. In the years since the MEK has maintained a solid record of revealing Iran’s secret and underground nuclear sites, forcing Tehran to succumb to a still highly-flawed agreement with the P5+1 aimed at curbing its nuclear program.