Former Special Ops Soldier: Iran's Strategy Is Backfiring

Brett Velicovich is a former U.S. Army intelligence and special operations soldier with multiple tours in Afghanistan and Iraq. He has experience in counter-terrorism and drone strikes against leaders of various terrorist groups.

So, when it comes to the Middle East and the kind of conflict that happens in that region, he knows a thing or two. On Thursday, speaking to Fox News's Harris Faulkner, he expressed his opinion that Iran's "death by a thousand cuts" strategy in the current dust-up is backfiring on them, badly.

"Iran's strategy has always been this death by a thousand cuts. Launch a few drones here, arm a proxy militia there, threaten shipping lanes somewhere else," Brett Velicovich said Thursday on "The Faulkner Focus."
"But that strategy only works if the United States hesitates," he added, arguing that the United States has responded reservedly in the past.
"But we are done abandoning our red lines, and it's clear our leadership is no longer going to play nuclear roulette with this regime. ... We're watching the entire chessboard," he said. "We're prepared to respond wherever American interests are threatened."

That's a polite way of saying that the United States and Israel aren't playing anymore, and that it's time to get serious. And these are some good points indeed:

Velicovich made his comments as U.S. forces launch precision strikes on Iranian missile infrastructure.
Rather than sending neighbors into a tailspin, Velicovich said Tehran's attempt at regional escalation has instead unified adversaries and triggered a more forceful response.
Iran has fired on Israel, Turkey, Azerbaijan, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Cyprus and Bahrain, among others.
"This is not a country defending itself anymore," Velicovich said. "It's a regime exporting chaos in every direction. It's a regime full of psychopaths that should not exist in modern society."

That last statement is key: A regime full of psychopaths. It's been just that since the 1979 revolution, it is that now, and it will be until the mullahs, their henchmen, and their system of government are swept aside and replaced by something civilized. That's a task that it sure looks like the vast majority of the Iranian people are not only willing but anxious to take on, and they may even have a flood of returning Iranian ex-pats to help with the effort.

For now, though, Iran seems to be following an insane policy of making sure the entire Middle East will be allied against them, not just the United States and Israel. That, as someone once said, could be a big freakin' deal.

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The Iranian regime has never been what you would call stable, or even particularly intelligent. Then again, this is the kind of thing Iran has done in the past, and before now, it has always worked for them. A little blood here, a little mayhem there, and before now, the USA and other regional powers have regularly backed off. If there's one thing we've learned from the last few days, though, it's that the United States, Israel, and now, very likely, the other nations of the region aren't backing off anymore.

Here's the interesting bit: If all these local powers join in, in any capacity, it may do more to bring some unity of purpose and better relationships between the various states than anything else could possibly have done. Now the entire Middle East has a common foe - Iran. That may be as much of a game-changer as the fall of the mullahs.

Editor's Note: For decades, former presidents have been all talk and no action. Now, Donald Trump is eliminating the threat from Iran once and for all.

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