From Lebanon to Iraq, and from Argentina to the high seas, the mullahs of Iran long have spread and sponsored terror in an attempt to exert their will on the rest of the world. They’re at it again in Saudi Arabia, propping up Houthi Shiite rebels and reportedly sponsoring attacks on that nation’s oil infrastructure. As Iran’s leaders feel the squeeze of the Trump administration’s decision to reinforce economic sanctions, they predictably are acting out to try to extort a better outcome for themselves.
Along with other veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, I’ve seen firsthand the effects of Iran’s state-sponsored terror. In 2008 and 2009, I led a counter-improvised explosive device (IED) team in Afghanistan and we found an explosively formed penetrator (EFP), a type of IED that was most certainly of Iranian origin. During the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, the U.S. Department of Defense estimates that at least 608 (and likely more) Americans were killed by Iranian EFPs and other Iranian methods.
The EFP is one of the few devices that has the capacity to consistently pierce the armor of American mine-resistant vehicles and to kill those inside; hence, the reason that Iran seeded the battlefields of Iraq and Afghanistan with these devices. The Iranian government sought to kill as many American service members as possible. This is the true nature and desire of those who lead the Iranian government, and there is no sign of this changing anytime soon.