Is Iran the biggest state sponsor of terrorism?
By Kent R. Kroeger (May 16, 2019)
In announcing the U.S. designation of the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), a branch of Iran’s armed forces, as a “terrorist organization,” U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo told the State Department press corps, “This historic step will deprive the world’s leading state sponsor of terror the financial means to spread misery and death around the world.”
Coupled with the Trump administration’s ratcheting up of sanctions against Iran in early May and the recent sabotage attacks on Saudi-flagged oil tankers, the possibility of a shooting war between the U.S. and Iran has not been higher perhaps since the start of the Islamic Republic in 1979.
According to The New York Times, the Pentagon is updating its Iran war plans, similar to pre-planning associated with the 2003 Iraq War. While President Donald Trump denies such a process is ongoing, it would be consistent with standard Pentagon operating procedures anytime the heightened possibility of a U.S. military engagement exists.
But with any commitment of U.S. military personnel to combat, the administration’s justification to the U.S. public requires a consensus view that the enemy — in this case, Iran — is an unequivocal and imminent threat to U.S. national security.
