LOS ANGELS.–President Joe Biden, 81, ordered airstrikes on Iran-backed, Iraqi Shiite militia Kataim Hezbollah today, retaliating for drone strikes on the U.S. base in Baghdad that injured three U.S. soldiers, one seriously. Kataib Hezbollah is part of Iran’s “axis of resistance” against Israel, most ironic since Shiites are a separate wing of Islam not part of Palestinians Sunni Muslim religion. Yet Iran, finding ways to attack the United States, uses Shiite groups to attack U.S. and Israeli targets in the Mideast. Iran’s 84-year-old Supreme Leader Aytollah Ali Khamenei funds-and-arms Yemen’s Houthi rebels, Hamas terrorists in Gaza, Hezbollah militia in Lebanon and Kataib Hezbollah militants in Iraq and Syria, all of which designed to attack U.S. or its allies. Attacks have stepped up since the Oct. 7 Israeli Hamas War, where Iran ramped up its proxy attacks on Israel and U.S. targets.
Whatever escalation in attacks happened after the Israeli-Hamas war, Iran’s paid Shiite militias have actively attacked freedom of navigation in the Persian Gulf, Gulf of Oman and Red Sea, creating havoc not for Israeli-flagged ships but for everyone sending oil tankers trough international waters. Biden has failed to enforce international commerce from Iran’s attacks through its Houthi militia. Ordering airstrikes on Katib Hezbollah in Baghndad does nothing to deal with the source of the terrorism in Iran. Israeli deals with Hezbollah in Lebanon and Syria, most recently bombing a Hezbollah bases in outside Damascus killing Iranian Revolutionary Guard Gen. Sayed Razi Mousavi, an underling of the late Al Quds Gen. Qasem Soleimani.
Soleimani, a close friend of Khamenei, killed by a U.S. drone strike Jan. 3, 2020 on orders of former President Donald Trump
Biden finds himself buried in the Ukraine War, defending Ukraine against a Russian invasion, arming-and-funding the bankrupt Kiev government. Funding the Ukraine proxy war against the Kremlin has turned U.S. foreign policy on its head, destroying U.S.-Russian relations for the foreseeable future. While Russia has dug into Ukraine more than ever, Biden continues to fund a losing war, where Ukraine finds itself destroying its infrastructure, killing thousands and exiling millions of its citizens due to the war. Ukraine’s 45-year-old President Volodymyr Zelensky refuses to enter peace talks with Russia, demanding that every Russian solider leave Ukrainian territory. Russia controlled Ukrainian territory in Crimea and Donbas before the Feb. 24 invasion and has no intent of leaving Ukraine anytime soon. Biden and Zelensky badly miscalculated Russian President Vladimr Putin.
Putin offered to settle the Ukraine War in March 2022, shortly after the invasion, if Zelensky would accept Russian sovereignty over Crimea and independence of Dontesk and Luhank, two Russian enclaves in Ukraine’s Donbas region. Zelensky rejected Putin’s overture and launched his war against the Kremlin getting Biden to pay for it. Costing nearly $200 billion to date, Biden shows no sign to ending the conflict. Biden refusal to face reality in Ukraine has hobbled the U.S. military in the Mideast and elsewhere where there are many conflict areas requiring U.S. intervention. Biden’s Kremlin proxy war has spread the Pentagon so thin it can’t deal with emerging hot spots around the globe, including the Houthi attacks on oil tankers in the Red Sea. Biden could use cooperative relations with Putin to deal with many of the global crises confronting the U.S. and its allies.
Biden can’t blame escalated attacks due to the Israeli-Hamas war because Iran funded its militias before the latest conflict, to continue attacking the United States and its allies. Unwilling to go to the source, Biden finds himself hogtied, all because of the failed Ukraine War. Without the Ukraine War bogging down the Pentagon, it could fashion a more effective strategy dealing with Iran directly to slow or stop attack from Iran’s proxies. “These attack are intended to hold accountable those elements directly responsible for attack on coalition forces in Iraq and Syria, and degrade their ability yto continue attacks. We will always protect our forces,” said Centcom Commander Gen. Erik Kurilla. Kurilla knows that throw away missile strikes on Hezbollah targets in Iraq, Syria or elsewhere do not deal with Iran, the source of the ongoing attacks, Biden’s Ukraine War prevents an effective Pentagon response.
Former President Bill Clinton found out the hard way ordering throw-away missile attacks against Osama bin Laden in 1998. Three years later, Biden Laden struck the World Trade Center and Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001. Unless Biden deals with Iran directly, Iran will continue its state-sponsored terrorism through its Shiite proxies around the Mideast and North Africa. Fighting the costly Ukraine War does more than drain the U.S. Treasury, it spreads the Pentagon too thin at a time when multiple crisis points must be dealt with around the globe. Letting Iran’s Houthi rebels interfere with petroleum commerce in the Red Sea has already affected oil prices around the globe. Biden ties his own hands with his reckless proxy war in Ukraine against the Kremlin. U.S. foreign policy needs a cooperative, pragmatic relationship with the Kremlin to resume effective global diplomacy.
About the Author
John M. Curtis writes politically neutral commentary analyzing spin in national and global news. He’s editor of OnlineColumnist.com and author of Dodging The Bullet and Operation Charisma.
