The United States and the Iranian regime ‘stand at opposite ends of the spectrum of Middle East politics’ and ‘the coincidence of mutual opposition to a radical Sunni terrorist group should not blind us to the enduring threat that the mullahs represent,’ says an article published in The Washington Post.
Eric Edelman, former undersecretary of defense for policy, Dennis Ross, former special assistant to the president for the Middle East and South Asia and Ray Takeyh a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations write: “The ebbs and flows of the war on terrorism should not be allowed to conceal the fact that the theocratic Iranian regime and its attempt to upend the regional order remains the United States’ most consequential long-term challenge in the Middle East.”
“Today, in the two central battlefronts of the Middle East — Syria and Iraq — Iran’s interests are inimical to those of the United States. Iran’s stake in Syria has been made clear by its provision of money, oil, arms, advisers and, most important, Hezbollah shock troops to prop up the regime of Bashar al-Assad. The United States’ interests, meanwhile, strongly argue against working with Iran against the Islamic State in Syria lest we lose the very Sunni support that will be necessary to eradicate the group. By taking a firm stand in Syria against both Assad and the Islamic State, we can send a strong signal to Iran’s leaders that the price for its troublemaking is going to rise.”
The writer argue: “Similarly in Iraq, any putative alliance with Iran would undo much of what the United States has attempted to accomplish there — the creation of a pluralistic, unitary state that does not represent a threat to itself or its neighbors and which is not a base for terrorism.”
“The only way that President Obama’s objective of not only ‘degrading’ but also ‘destroying’ the Islamic State can be achieved is by taking back, over time, much of the territory seized by its fighters in Nineveh and Anbar provinces. This will require not only airstrikes in support of the Kurdish pesh merga troops and Iraqi security forces but also significant buy-in from the Sunni tribes who formed the backbone of the uprising against al-Qaeda during the surge.”
“In addition, the sine qua non of the administration’s policy is an inclusive government in Iraq that can draw support from neighboring Sunni states such as Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. Both of these will be unattainable if there is a perception that the United States is seeking a de facto alliance with Iran.”
