President Biden can\u2019t avoid responding to the killing of three American soldiers in Jordan. But his response shouldn’t include a strike on Iran.<\/b>
\nThe\u00a0attack Sunday\u00a0by Iranian-backed militias against a U.S. facility in northeastern Jordan, which killed three U.S. troops\u00a0and injured more than 30 more, has understandably caused shock and outrage in Washington. U.S. retaliation is assured, although we don\u2019t know what form that retaliation will take. President Joe Biden said Tuesday that he has made a decision about how to respond, and it wouldn\u2019t be a stretch to assume any U.S. military action will be broader in scope than\u00a0the U.S. strikes\u00a0against Iraqi and Syrian militia sites over the last three months.
Some pundits\u00a0and lawmakers want Biden to include Iran itself on its list of targets.\u00a0\u201cThe only thing the Iranian regime understands is force,\u201d Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., wrote in a statement after the attack in Jordan. \u201cUntil they pay a price with their infrastructure and their personnel, the attacks on U.S. troops will continue.\u201d Sen. Tom Cotton,\u00a0R-Ark., said anything less than an attack on Iran itself would amount to cowardice on our part and embolden Iran\u2019s leaders.
Underlying all of this chest-thumping is the assumption that U.S. military action would be so painful that Iranian leaders would respond the way we would like them to: by standing down and ordering their proxies in the Middle East to cease further attacks against U.S. troops and installations in the region. Unfortunately, this is a low-probability scenario. Iran\u2019s reaction might confound our expectations. Embarrassed and angered after being struck by American bombs, Iran could up the ante and attack U.S. troops and bases. Washington\u2019s extensive military presence in the region, while commonly viewed as a source of strength, may prove to be a vulnerability by providing Iran a long menu of targets to strike.
U.S. officials are quick to say the U.S. will act \u201cat a time and place of its choosing.\u201d But the U.S. doesn\u2019t have a monopoly on choosing when and where to attack. If Iran were attacked, then it, too, would most likely take time to explore its options before responding, and that response might not be immediate. It also might not be what American leaders anticipate. The roughly 45,000 U.S. troops stationed in the Middle East would have to be placed on high alert for an extended period, if only to prepare for the worst. U.S. forces in Iraq and Syria, who have already been attacked more than 160 times since mid-October, would be at the most risk.
Iran\u2019s retaliation could range from using ballistic missiles to strike U.S. bases in Iraq and Syria to stepping up its shipments of weapons to militias aligned with it. The commander of U.S. forces in the Middle East estimates that\u00a0Iran possesses thousands\u00a0of ballistic and cruise missiles, more than any other state in the region. At least some of those missiles can reach large U.S. bases, including Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar, the U.S. Navy\u2019s Fifth Fleet based in Bahrain and Al Dhafra Air Base in the United Arab Emirates, as well as Jordan\u2019s Muwaffaq Salti Air Base.
Iran could also retaliate more discreetly and decide not to go against the U.S. in a conventional conflict it would surely lose. While Iran\u2019s conventional military power is lacking \u2014 its air force relies on parts from the 1970s, its land forces haven\u2019t fought a war since the 1980s, its navy can\u2019t project beyond a limited area and is primarily focused on defending Iranian territorial waters from foreign attack \u2014 Tehran\u2019s proxy network is formidable and well-suited to using asymmetric tactics against a superior adversary.
Lebanese Hezbollah, for instance, possesses about 150,000 missiles, some precision-guided, that could reach all of Israel\u2019s major cities; destroy civilian infrastructure, like airports, ports and the electricity grid; and essentially shut down the country during a full-scale conflict.
The Houthis, the militia-turned-de facto government in Yemen, have already demonstrated their resolve to fight by conducting dozens of attacks against commercial ships in the Red Sea,\u00a0disrupting global supply chains and forcing large corporations\u00a0like BP\u00a0to stay clear. Even U.S. warships\u00a0aren\u2019t immune\u00a0from Houthi anti-ship missiles.
Let\u2019s set these details aside and return to the larger point. Those pressing for U.S. military action against Iran wrongly assume that Tehran would necessarily buckle under American pressure. Tehran\u2019s behavior during the last five years invalidates this belief.
When\u00a0the Trump administration withdrew\u00a0from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action in 2018 and put maximum pressure on the Iranian economy, Iranian leaders retaliated by increasing the quality and quantity of their uranium enrichment and\u00a0targeting oil tankers\u00a0in the Persian Gulf. After Trump ordered the assassination of Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani in January 2020, Iran targeted a U.S. base in Iraq using ballistic missiles. (Miraculously, no Americans were killed.) And when Israel ratcheted up its attacks on Iranian vessels at sea, Iran mimicked Israeli tactics by\u00a0going after Israeli-owned ships.\u00a0
President Biden can\u2019t, of course, avoid a response to the killing of three American soldiers. But those advising him to go after Iran directly shouldn\u2019t assume they know how Iran will react. Nor should they assume that the consequences of an Iranian response can be predicted or managed.<\/p>\n