The revolutionary
Iranian regime — which may possibly find itself in a war with the United
States in the coming days — has positioned itself as an adversary of
the U.S. ever since it came into power decades ago in 1979.
President Donald Trump appears to be moving toward
striking Iran, with the U.S. military moving significant military
assets into the region, insisting he would prefer to strike a deal with
the Iranian regime but that, if it comes to war, his top general has
told him “it will be something easily won.”
Much of the discussion around possible conflict has focused on the Iranian regime’s nuclear program,
its ballistic missiles, and its support of regional terrorist proxies —
but not as much attention has been placed on a host of Iranian-directed
terrorist attacks against U.S. troops, diplomats, and citizens which
have killed hundreds of Americans. Iran has also sought to carry out a
number of attempted plots on U.S. soil as well.
“Hezbollah has been involved in numerous anti-U.S.
terrorist attacks, including the suicide truck bombings of the U.S.
Embassy in Beirut in April 1983, the U.S. Marine barracks in Beirut in
October 1983, and the U.S. Embassy annex in Beirut in September 1984, as
well as the hijacking of TWA 847 in 1985 and the Khobar Towers attack
in Saudi Arabia in 1996,” the Office of the Director of National
Intelligence says.
Iranian regime uses terror proxies to target Americans across the Middle East
Radical Iranian students and operatives backed by since-deceased Ayatollah Khomeini took dozens of American embassy staffers hostage in 1979 and held them for 444 days.
Since then, Iranian-backed terrorists have been determined to be behind the 1983 bombing of the U.S. Marine barracks in Beirut, Lebanon which killed
241 U.S. service members, as well as the deadly bombing of the U.S.
Embassy in Lebanon that year. That attack killed 17 Americans. The
Iranian regime was behind the 1996 Khobar Towers bombing in Saudi Arabia which killed 19 U.S. Air Force personnel.
Iran and its Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) played a key role in fueling the deadly insurgency in Iraq after the U.S. invaded in 2003, with a spokesman for the Defense Department stating in 2019 that Iran was responsible for “at least 603” U.S. service member deaths.
There is also significant evidence
that Iran collaborated with the Taliban and al-Qaeda to carry out
attacks against U.S. troops, international coalition forces, and the
Afghan republic’s military in an effort to eject the West from
Afghanistan.
The State Department also assessed
that, after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, "Iran has allowed al-Qaeda
facilitators to operate a core facilitation pipeline through Iran since
at least 2009, enabling AQ to move funds and fighters” and that “senior
AQ leaders continued to reside in Iran and facilitate terrorist
operations from there."
Just the News reported this week
on how al-Qaeda leader Saif Al-Adel — the successor to al-Qaeda founder
Osama bin Laden and his deputy Ayman Al-Zawahiri — had been shielded by
the Iranian government for decades and is believed to currently run the
terrorist group behind the 9/11 attacks under the protection of Tehran.
The Treasury Department has noted that “until September 11, 2001, Hezbollah was responsible for more American deaths than any other terrorist organization.”
Iranian regime has sought to conduct kidnappings and assassinations on U.S. soil
The Justice Department announced
in 2011 that Manssor Arbabsiar, a naturalized U.S. citizen who held an
Iranian passport, had been arrested in an Iranian military-linked plot
to assassinate the Saudi ambassador to the U.S. at Café Milano in
Washington, D.C.
Then-Attorney General Eric Holder said
at the time that Arbabsiar “is accused of working with members of an
arm of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps to devise an international
murder-for-hire scheme targeting the Saudi Arabian Ambassador.”
Arbabsiar pleaded guilty in 2012 and was sentenced to 25 years in prison.
The Justice Department announced
in 2021 that “Iranian intelligence services allegedly plotted to kidnap
a U.S. journalist and human rights activist” — Masih Alinejad — “from
New York City for rendition to Iran.” A number of those involved in the
plot were convicted, while others remain at large in Iran.
The DOJ again announced
in 2024 that another man, Carlisle Rivera, had been hired “to murder
Masih Alinejad on instructions from high-ranking members of the Islamic
Revolutionary Guard Corps.” He pleaded guilty.
Federal prosecutors have also alleged that two Iranian-linked plots
to assassinate then-candidate Donald Trump — including one plot
directly linked to Iranian intelligence services — were launched in 2024
as Iran sought to meddle in the election to stop Trump’s return to the White House.
The Justice Department filed charges against Pakistani national Asif Merchant and against Afghan national Farhad Shakeri
in 2024 for their alleged roles in Iranian-backed assassination plots.
The former defendant’s murky plot seemed to target Trump, while the
latter defendant’s more sophisticated plot was definitely aimed at the
now-president.
Merchant has pleaded not guilty, and the trial against him is slated to begin late this month. Shakeri remains at large in Iran.
U.S. Embassy bombing in Beirut: 2,000 pounds of explosives
The CIA noted
that “a suicide bomber crashed a truck into the front of the U.S.
Embassy in Beirut and detonated 2,000 pounds of explosives” in April
1983, and that “the massive blast killed 63 people, including 17
Americans, eight of whom were CIA officers, and wounded more than 100
others.”
“The Islamic Jihad Organization, which later became part of
Hezbollah, claimed responsibility,” the agency said. “The terrorists
targeted the Embassy in an effort to force Americans to leave the
country.”
A federal court ruling from 2005 noted
that now-former Ambassador Robert Oakley — who had coordinated the
State Department's counterterrorism efforts and was tasked with figuring
out who conducted the 1983 embassy bombing, testified that it was"very
clear that Islamic Jihad [Hezbollah] was behind the bombing in 1983."
The judge noted
that Oakley further had "confiden[ce] that the government of Iran was
involved directly in the Hezbollah organization, which was created,
armed, trained, protected, [and] provided technical assistance by the
Iranian Revolutionary Guards."
The State Department’s Patterns of Global Terrorism: 1983 report
— released in 1984 — assessed at the time that “most instances of
state-supported terrorism occurred in Lebanon” and that “there, radical
Lebanese Shias, using the nom de guerre Islamic Jihad, operated with
Iranian support and encouragement from Syrian-controlled territory.”
The department found
that these Iranian-backed terrorist groups “were responsible for the
suicide bombing attacks against the U.S. Embassy and the headquarters of
the US and French contingents of the Multinational Force in Beirut.”
“It turns out that the embassy was hit essentially by
Hezbollah, even though that was not clear at the time,” Robert Dillon,
the U.S. Ambassador to Lebanon at the time of the attack, said
in 2013. “Hezbollah had Iranian support. It was simply a blow at the
most visible symbol of American presence. … My outrage over Lebanon has
shaped my career.”
The Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training, founded by retired foreign service officers, says that “the attack is thought of as the beginning of anti-U.S. attacks from Islamist groups.”
An even deadlier Iranian-backed Hezbollah attack on the U.S. in Lebanon was still in the offing.
Marine barracks bombing in Beirut: “Over 12,000 pounds of TNT”
The U.S. Marine Corps memorial website says
that “220 Marines, 18 U.S. Navy sailors, and 3 U.S. Army soldiers lost
their lives in the Marine Barracks at the Beirut Airport” in October
1983.
The Defense Department’s December 1983 "Report of the DoD Commission on Beirut International Airport Terrorist Act" assessed
that “a truck laden with the equivalent of over 12,000 pounds of TNT
crashed through the perimeter of the compound of the U.S. contingent of
the Multinational Force at Beirut International Airport” and that “the
force of the explosion destroyed the building resulting in the deaths of
241 U.S. military personnel.”
The Pentagon report said
that the FBI’s Forensic Laboratory “described the terrorist bomb as the
largest conventional blast ever seen by the FBI's forensic explosive
experts.” The Pentagon said its commission “concludes that international
terrorist acts endemic to the Middle East are indicative of an alarming
world-wide phenomenon that poses an increasing threat to U.S. personnel
and facilities.”
Judge Royce Lamberth issued a 2003 court opinion
where “the Court finds that it is beyond question that Hezbollah and
its agents received massive material and technical support from the
Iranian government” and that “the sophistication demonstrated” in the
attack along with “the devastating effect of the detonation” made it
“highly unlikely that this attack could have resulted in such loss of
life without the assistance of regular military forces, such as those of
Iran.”
Lamberth ruled that “the complicity of Iran in the 1983
attack was established conclusively at trial by the testimony” of
Admiral James Lyons, who had been the deputy chief of naval operations
for plans, policy and operation at the time of the attack.
“It is clear that the formation and emergence of Hezbollah
as a major terrorist organization is due to the government of Iran,”
Lamberth ruled. “Hezbollah presently receives extensive financial and
military technical support from Iran, which funds and supports terrorist
activities. The primary agency through which the Iranian government
both established and exercised operational control over Hezbollah was
the” Iranian MOIS.
Lamberth said that the Iranian ministry “acted as a conduit
for the Islamic Republic of Iran's provision of funds to Hezbollah,
provided explosives to Hezbollah and, at all times relevant to these
proceedings, exercised operational control over Hezbollah.”
Khobar Towers bombing was “largest non-nuclear explosion ever up to that time”
Then-Defense Secretary William Perry published
a report later in 1996 which said that “Khobar Towers is a residential
compound built by the Saudi Government near Dhahran that housed the
residential quarters of almost 3,000 U. S. military personnel” along
with military personnel from the United Kingdom, France, and Saudi
Arabia. Perry said that “on Tuesday, June 25, 1996, a fuel truck parked
next to the northern perimeter fence at the Khobar Towers complex” and
that “Air Force guards began to evacuate the building, but were unable
to complete this task before a tremendous explosion occurred.”
“The blast completely destroyed the northern face of the
building, blew out windows from surrounding buildings, and was heard for
miles,” the defense secretary said. “Nineteen American servicemen were
killed and hundreds more were seriously injured [...] In addition, many
Saudis and other nationals were injured.”
A federal court ruling said
that “the investigation determined that the force of the explosion was
the equivalent of 20,000 pounds of TNT” and that “the Defense Department
said that it was the largest non-nuclear explosion ever up to that
time.”
Then-Attorney General John Ashcroft announced in June 2001 — just a few months before 9/11 — that a federal grand jury had charged
“fourteen individuals with murder, attempted murder of federal
employees, conspiracy to commit murder, and conspiracy to use a weapon
of mass destruction” related to the Khobar Towers attack which had
killed nineteen U.S. airmen and wounded 372 other Americans.
“Named as defendants are the leader of the Saudi Hezbollah
terrorist organization, as well as several prominent members, including
the head of the Saudi Hezbollah's military wing, along with members of
terrorist cells in Saudi Arabia who planned and carried out the Khobar
attack,” Ashcroft said.
The attorney general added that “the indictment explains
that elements of the Iranian government inspired, supported, and
supervised members of the Saudi Hezbollah” and that “the charged
defendants reported their surveillance activities to Iranian officials
and were supported and directed in those activities by Iranian
officials.”
The FBI said
that month that Iranian officials were kept apprised of planning for
the attack, and that, in 1995, “an Iranian military officer directed”
Hezbollah members “to conduct surveillance on the Red Sea coast of Saudi
Arabia for sites of possible future attacks against Americans.” The
indictment also said that “the attack would serve Iran by driving the
Americans from the Gulf region.”
Lamberth ruled
in 2006 that “the attack was carried out by individuals recruited
principally by a senior official of the IRGC, Brigadier General Ahmed
Sharifi” and that Sharifi “planned the operation and recruited
individuals for the operation at the Iranian embassy in Damascus,
Syria.” The judge also concluded that this Iranian general “provided
the passports, the paperwork, and the funds for the individuals who
carried out the attack.”
The judge also ruled that “the terrorist attack on the
Khobar Towers was approved by Ayatollah Khameini, the Supreme leader of
Iran at the time” and that “it was also approved and supported by the
Iranian Minister of Intelligence and Security at the time, Ali
Fallahian, who was involved in providing intelligence security support
for the operation. Fallahian’s representative in Damascus, a man named
Nurani, also provided support for the operation.”
“The six individuals also indicated that the selection of
the target and the authorization to proceed was done collectively by
Iran, MOIS, and IRGC, though the actual preparation and carrying out of
the attack was done by the IRGC,” the judge ruled.
Qassem Soleimani and the IRGC helped kill over 600 U.S. troops in Iraq
The Iranian regime — in particular the IRGC — was also
responsible for the deaths of hundreds of U.S. troops in Iraq through
the provision of explosives and weapons to Shiite terrorist insurgents
in the country, according to multiple U.S. government assessments.
General Joe Dunford testified
to the Senate in 2015 that “I know the total number of soldiers,
sailors, airmen, and marines that were killed by Iranian activities, and
the number has been recently reported as about 500. We were not always
able to attribute the casualties that we had to Iranian activity,
although many times we suspected it was Iranian activity, even though we
did not necessarily have the forensics to support that.”
Later that year, U.S. Central Command spokeswoman Major
Genieve David echoed the estimate of 500 Americans killed through a
hidden Iranian hand.
“It is important to understand that the CENTCOM statistics
on EFP [explosively formed penetrator] detonations are a subset of all
the Iranian activities estimated to have killed approximately 500 U.S.
troops in Iraq during OIF [Operation Iraqi Freedom],” David said at the time.
A spokesperson for the Defense Department revealed
in 2019 that the Iranian regime was behind the deaths of “at least” 603
troops in Iraq, and that “the casualties were the result of explosively
formed penetrators, other improvised explosive devices, improvised
rocket-assisted munitions, rockets, mortars, rocket-propelled grenades,
small-arms, sniper, and other attacks in Iraq.”
“In Iraq, I can announce today, based on declassified U.S.
military reports, that Iran is responsible for the deaths of at least
608 American service members,” then-Special Representative for Iran
Brian Hook also said
in 2019. “This accounts for 17 percent of all deaths of U.S. personnel
in Iraq from 2003 to 2011. This death toll is in addition to the many
thousands of Iraqis killed by the IRGC’s proxies.”
The Defense Intelligence Agency assessed
later that year that “during the Iraq War, Iran established strong ties
with Shia militia groups, some of which have received Iranian financial
backing for decades” and that “using Iranian-provided weapons, these
groups were responsible for at least 603 U.S. personnel killed in Iraq
between 2003 and 2011.”
The U.S. military struck and killed
IRGC-Quds Force General Qasem Soleimani in early January 2020, with the
Defense Department stating that “General Soleimani and his Quds Force
were responsible for the deaths of hundreds of American and coalition
service members and the wounding of thousands more.”
A couple weeks after deadly Hamas terrorist attacks of October 7, 2023, former State Department official Nathan Sales stressed
to Congress that “the IRGC was responsible for killing 603 American
soldiers in Iraq, in part due to the advanced explosively formed
penetrators it provided to its terror proxies in the country” and that
“that is one-sixth of all U.S. fatalities during the war in Iraq.”
Iran helped the Taliban kill Americans
A report
from the U.S. military’s Joint Improvised Explosive Device Defeat
Organization assessed in 2006 that “the smuggling of Iranian weapons to
Afghan insurgent groups is simply another tool to leverage against
foreign threats while maintaining overall cooperation in the
stabilization of Afghanistan.” The report said at the time that Iran’s
goal was to “actively extend Iranian influence and maintain strategic
awareness of important actors at the state, substate, and non-state
levels.”
Thomas Joscelyn, then a senior fellow at Foundation for Defense of Democracies, wrote in 2010 that it had been reported
that “based on Taliban sources, that the Iranians are paying bounties
to the Taliban to kill American soldiers” and that “we learn that the
going rate is $1,000 per dead American and $6,000 for each American
vehicle that is destroyed.”
“This isn’t the first time we’ve heard of Iran paying out rewards for dead Americans,” the FDD terrorism analyst added.
“When WikiLeaks released tens of thousands of U.S. military documents
earlier this year, a number of intelligence reports pointing to
collusion between Iran and the Taliban (as well as al-Qaeda) came to
light.”
The Defense Intelligence Agency assessed
in 2019 that “since at least 2007, Iran has provided calibrated support
— including weapons, training, and funding — to the Taliban” in an
effort to “counter U.S. and Western influence in Afghanistan … and
increase Tehran’s influence in any post-reconciliation government.”
It was reported
by CNN in 2020 that U.S. intelligence agencies had assessed that the
Iranian regime had offered bounties to Taliban fighters to encourage
them to target U.S. and coalition troops, with Iran making the bounty
payments to the Haqqani Network after successful Taliban attacks on
troops in Afghanistan.
Long War Journal senior editor Bill Roggio tweeted
in 2022 that “we found evidence that Iran’s IRGC was providing funds to
Taliban and al-Qaeda-led terror cells operating in and around Kabul.”
“These IRGC-supported cells were known as the Kabul Attack Network,” Roggio said.
“The IRGC was financing some of the most spectacular attacks in the
heart of Afghanistan, against U.S., NATO and Afghan security forces, as
well as civilians.”
The Long War Journal analyst said
that “Iran found common ground with the Taliban, al-Qaeda, & other
groups as they all wanted to kill & wound U.S. servicemen, &
drive up the cost for the U.S. to remain in Afghanistan. Iran feared the
U.S. on its eastern & western borders (Afghanistan & Iraq),
& wanted the U.S. out.”
“Iran (along with Pakistan) succeeded in helping the
Taliban/Syndicate wear down the U.S. and force it to abandon
Afghanistan,” Roggio concluded. “Iran achieved its primary goal – force the U.S. to leave.”
The Taliban — which protected al-Qaeda before and after
9/11 — rapidly took over Afghanistan in August 2021 amid a chaotic U.S.
withdrawal and evacuation.
