By Daniel DePetris
In the world of international relations, the phrase "all options are on the table" holds a special meaning: the use of military force is a possibility. It's an oft-repeated line presidents employ when they want to send a strong message to an adversary in the most diplomatic way possible.
No country has been on the receiving end of this phrase more than Iran—and usually, it's a U.S. president doing the delivering. President Joe Biden's declaration this week that the United States "is prepared to use all elements of its national power to ensure" Iran doesn't acquire a nuclear weapon is just the latest in a long line of similar statements from presidents going back to George W. Bush. The rhetoric of the last four U.S. presidents is virtually indistinguishable from one another. Former Presidents Barack Obama and Donald Trump may disagree on pretty much everything, but they were apparently aligned on one element of U.S. foreign policy—the U.S. would go to war with Iran to prevent Tehran from becoming a nuclear weapons power.
Washington, of course, prefers the military tool to be held in reserve. Other options, from negotiations and economic sanctions to covert action and cyber-attacks, are far higher on the list. It's no secret why Biden qualified his support for military action with "as a last resort" and stressed that diplomacy remains the best way to manage the Iranian nuclear file. While the U.S. could take much of Tehran's nuclear facilities off-line in a hypothetical bombing campaign, the risks of such an operation would be quite high to the tens of thousands of U.S. troops stationed in the Middle East.
We know Iran would retaliate to a U.S. military strike because it has done so before, when in response to the killing of Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps-Quds Force commander Qassem Soleimani, several dozen Iranian ballistic missiles were launched against two Iraqi bases hosting U.S. forces. If this is how Iran behaved after the death of a single individual, imagine what the response would be for the destruction of its prized nuclear enrichment program.
This piece was originally published in Newsweek on July 15, 2022. Read more HERE.