Reacting to 72-year-old President Donald Trump’s July 22 Twitter warning to not threaten the United States, Iran’s commander of the elite Revolutionary Guard Al-Quds force Major-Gen. Qassem Solemani returned the threat. “As a soldier, it its my duty to respond to your threats . . . If you want to use the language of threat . . . talk to me, not the president [Hassan Rouhani]. It is not our president’s dignity to respond to you,” Solemani said to Iran’s semi-official Tasnin news agency. Solemani forgets that Trump responded to Rouhani’s warning about the “mother of all wars” if Trump goes ahead with his plan to block sales of Iranian oil. Trump pulled out May 8 of the Iranian Nuke Deal, deciding to re-impose U.S. sanctions to stop Iran from its three-year-old proxy war in Yemen against Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia reported that one of its oil tankers was hit in the Red Sea by Iran-backed Houthi rebels.
Saudi Arabia announced today that it will suspend oil shipment through the Red Sea’s Strait of al-Mandab until Iran-backed Houthi rebels can be neurtralized. Solemani’s threat to Trump won’t pass unnoticed with the U.S. likely to help Saudi Arabia neutralize Houthi missile attacks in the Red Sea. “We are near you, where you can’t even imagine . . . Come. We are ready . . . If you begin the war, we will end the war,” said Solemani, knowing that Iran battled Iraq’s Saddam Hussein to loggerheads from 1980 to 1988, without any clear victor. Solemani’s no fool, knowing that any war with the U.S would result in devastating losses to Iran’s Mullah regime. Talking tough on the world stage to Trump makes headlines but would present a crushing blow to Iran’s already battered economy. “You know that this war will destroy all that you possess,” Solemani told the Tasmin news agency.
Defying Trump’s warnings to not threaten the United States, Solemani walks on thin ice threatening the U.S. Israel’s Energy Minister Yuval Steintz said Solemani’s talk was all show, knowing any confrontation with the U.S. would deal a devastating blow to Iran’s military. Trump responded July 22 to Rouhani when the Iranians president threatened to shut down the Strait of Hormuz, a major shipping lane in the Persian Gulf. “President Trump told me that if Iran does anything at all to the negative, they will pay a price like few countries have ever paid before,” said National Security Adviser John Bolton. Solemani crosses the line when he starts threatening Trump, given the Iran’s Yemen proxy war already impacts Saudi Arabia in the Red Sea. Regardless of Solemani’s hype, Trump may be forced to intervene to stop Iran-backed Houthi rebels from attacking Saudi oil tankers.
Solemani ratcheted up the rhetoric in response to Trump’s warning to Rouhani. “You [Trump] threaten us with paying a price like few countries have every paid. Trump, this is the language of nigh clubs and gambling halls,” said Solemani, walking a dangerous line escalating the rhetoric. Iran’s 56-year-old U.S.-educated Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif got into the fray July 22, the day after Trump issued his Tweet. “Color us unimpressed,” tweeted Zarif July 23, urging Trump to be “cautious” with his threats against Iran. Javad wasn’t happy May 8 when Trump pulled out of the Iran Nuke Deal he negotiated for two years with former Secretary of State John Kerry. Trump .called the Nuke Deal the worst deal ever negotiated by the U.S, giving Iran $1.6 billion in cash and $150 billion in sanctions relief, paving the way for Iran’s aggressive actions in the Middle East.
Iran thinks the Iraq War cured the U.S. from intervening in the Middle East, suffering 4,497 deaths, costing over $1 trillion. But Trump’s idea of military intervention is very different from former President George W. Bush, whose goal was democratizing Iraq and the broader Middle East. Trump has no such ambitions and would be content to degrade the Iran military to stop its intervention in Syria and Yemen. More threats and hostile rhetoric from Tehran could result in the U.S. getting more involved helping the Saudis end the Yemen conflict. “This is a war of words. Neither side wants a military confrontation. But, of course, if America attacks Iran, our response will be crushing,” said an unnamed Iranian official. More talk won’t discourage Trump from helping the Saudis beat back Houthi attacks on Saudi’s oil tankers. With crude oil prices near $70 a barrel, the Saudis need U.S. help.
If Trump decides to intervene to beat back Yemen’s Houthi rebels, Russian President Vladimir Putin won’t try to get in the way. Putin has tried to get Iran’s al-Quds force to end operations near Israeli-controlled Golan Heights to no avail. With Iran supplying rockets to Hamas terrorists in the Gaza Strip and arming Lebanon’s Hezbollah militia, they’re sowing too much instability in the volatile Middle East. Conventional wisdom says the U.S. wants to stay out of another confrontation in the Middle East. But with 54-year-old Secretary of State Mike Pompeo heading a more muscular U.S. foreign policy, it’s more likely the U.S. will intervene to help Saudi Arabia. “The Red Sea which was secure is no longer secure today with the presence of American forces,” said Solemani, saying the opposite of reality. With Iran supplying arms-and missiles to the Houthis, Red Sea shipping lanes are no longer safe.
