FDD Experts Express Concern Over Possibility of U.S.-Iran Cooperation in Iraq

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WASHINGTON – Experts at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD) expressed concern over reports that the U.S. government is considering cooperating with Iran to address the security crisis in Iraq:

“It would be a grave mistake for the U.S. to partner with Qasem Soleimani and Ali Khamenei, the two men most responsible for fueling the flames of the Iraqi and Syrian sectarian inferno. It is a delusion to think such a partnership would not significantly strengthen Iranian negotiating leverage over its nuclear program,” said FDD executive director Mark Dubowitz.

FDD senior fellow and editor of The Long War Journal Thomas Joscelyn said: “Iran doesn't want stability. What Iran wants is power and influence. Iran won't do anything to stabilize the Sunni areas of Iraq. They want to consolidate their influence in the Shiite areas.”

FDD vice president for research Dr. Jonathan Schanzer said: “The Obama Administration seeks to disengage from the Middle East and to stay out of conflict. But it is exactly this approach that has yielded the ISIS crisis in Syria and Iraq. At some point, the White House is going to have to realize that hoping for help from the likes of the Turks, the Qataris, the Saudis – and now the Iranians – is not help at all. If we continue to delegate to frenemies and enemies on crucial foreign policy challenges, we'll only get more of the same.”

FDD senior fellow Reuel Marc Gerecht, a former Middle Eastern specialist at the CIA's Directorate of Operations, observed: “The Iranian regime has fanned Sunni extremism since its birth. Former Iranian president Ali Akbar Hashemi-Rafsanjani, with current President Hassan Rouhani always at his side, developed and institutionalized the regime's outreach to Sunni radicals in the 1980s and 1990s. The tocsin call was (and remains) anti-Americanism. And unlike the Arab Sunni jihadists who now threaten Iraq and Syria, in great part because of the Obama administration's passivity, they are striving to obtain nuclear weapons. And as with Iran's radical ecumenicalism, Rouhani is a founding father of the nuclear drive.”

FDD president Clifford D. May said: “Is it plausible that Iran, for years ranked by the U.S. government as the world's primary state sponsor of terrorism, could be a reliable ally in a war against terrorists? Would you stock a river with crocodiles to address a piranha problem?”

About the Foundation for Defense of Democracies:

The Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD) is a non-profit, non-partisan 501(c)3 policy institute focusing on foreign policy and national security. Founded in 2001, FDD combines policy research, democracy and counterterrorism education, strategic communications and investigative journalism in support of its mission to promote pluralism, defend democratic values and fight the ideologies that drive terrorism. Visit our website at www.defenddemocracy.org and connect with us on Twitter, Facebook and YouTube.

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