Biden-Harris should help destroy Iran’s nuclear and missile infrastructure

Excerpt

Iran on Tuesday launched 180 ballistic missiles against Israel, a democracy the size of New Jersey. It was the largest escalation to date in a year-long, seven-front war waged by the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism against Israel, the United States, and global maritime shipping. President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris must come to terms with the fact that this attack resulted from their own foreign policy — subsidized by billions of dollars in US sanctions relief, legitimized by strategic accommodations to Tehran, encouraged by pressure on Israel and invited by the non-stop signaling of American fear of escalation.

As a candidate for office in 2020, President Joe Biden vowed to return to the 2015 Iran nuclear deal and to end the Trump administration’s maximum pressure campaign. After taking office, there was simply nothing Iran could do to convince Biden that this was a terrible mistake.

Richard Goldberg, a senior adviser at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, is a former National Security Council official, senior US Senate aide, gubernatorial chief of staff and Navy Reserve Intelligence Officer.