Revolutionary Guards – USA Gov Policy

A new report from the U.S. State Department outlines Iran’s aggressive activities. The document outlines “… the magnitude of the Islamic Republic’s destructive activities at home and abroad.” Many of the activities highlighted have occurred recently, while others date back to the early days of the revolution. As the analysis makes clear, the one constant is that the Iranian regime will do whatever it takes to maintain its grip on power and spread its revolutionary ideology. The New York Analysis of Policy and Government presents the Executive Summary.

The Revolutionary Guard Corps

The regime’s primary tool to execute its aggressive policies since 1979 has been the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). The IRGC is the most powerful conglomerate in Iran, spreading and consolidating its control over much of Iranian life. Its navy regularly threatens freedom of navigation in the Persian Gulf while its Aerospace Force directs the country’s ballistic missile program in defiance of Security Council resolutions. Its Ground Forces are deployed abroad to bolster the Assad regime and its Basij paramilitary force is mobilized at home to surveil and harass ordinary Iranians. Finally, its extra-territorial IRGC Qods Force (IRGC-QF) leads the Islamic Republic’s destabilizing support for proxies and terrorist groups.

State Sponsored Terrorism

The Islamic Republic’s support for terrorism [has been primarily driven by the IRGC.] Since 1979, Iran has made it a policy of state to actively direct, facilitate, and carry out terrorist activity globally. Unlike almost any other country, the Islamic Republic has supported terrorism within its own military and intelligence apparatuses: the IRGC-QF and the Ministry of Intelligence and Security (MOIS). Today, the IRGC-QF is active across the Middle East and has plotted or carried out terrorist attacks in five out of seven continents. Where it is unable or unwilling to act directly, the Iranian regime has mastered the use of terrorist proxy groups like Lebanese Hizballah, Palestine Islamic Jihad, the Bahraini AlAshtar Brigades and the Iraqi Kata’ib Hizballah to conduct terrorist attacks.

Missile Development

Iran’s development of ballistic missiles…pose a critical threat to regional security. Iran has the largest ballistic missile force in the Middle East and it is continuing to explore multiple pathways to expand its longer-range missile capabilities. Recognizing this threat, the UN Security Council had previously worked to impose tough limitations on Iran’s proliferation activities. However, this progress was rolled back following the adoption of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) in 2015, which failed to address Iran’s ballistic missile program. With a weaker nonproliferation regime to constrain its activity, Iran has continued to defy international scrutiny and its pace of missile launches and tests has not diminished following the implementation of the JCPOA.

Illegal Financial Acitivities

The Islamic Republic’s [has engaged in] illicit financing activities, which undermine the integrity and security of the global financial system. The Iranian regime relies on opaque and fraudulent financing activities to fund its proxies and support its proliferation of ballistic missiles and other weapons. In the last year, the IRGC-QF has been exposed for using front companies to move funds, procure restricted materials and technologies, exploit currency exchange networks in neighboring countries, and produce counterfeit currency.

Maritime Aggression

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Cyber Attacks

The Islamic Republic’s [has engaged in] malign behavior in cyberspace. Iran has increasingly conducted a series of cyberattacks involving surveillance and sabotage affecting critical infrastructure, financial and commercial entities, and educational institutions. It has also deployed its cyber capabilities to identify and silence critics domestically and spread its disinformation campaigns abroad.

Human Rights VIolations

The Islamic Republic’s [is guilty of] repeated and systemic abuse of human rights in violation of international laws and norms. The Islamic Republic persecutes civil society activists and marginalizes ethnic and religious minorities. The regime also denies its citizens due process, regularly falling short of its own legal standards. Its prisons are notorious for mistreatment and torture, and its use of capital punishment is excessive and extends to minors. Beyond its borders, the Islamic Republic and its proxies have committed numerous human rights abuses, including targeting innocent civilians in Syria and arbitrarily detaining Sunnis in Iraq.

Environmental Degradation

[There is an] enduring and increasingly irreversible tragedy of environmental degradation at the hands of the Islamic Republic’s self-serving leaders. Following decades of misguided agricultural policies and IRGC-driven dam projects, Iran is inching ever closer to an environmental crisis. The regime’s failure to respond to worsening environmental conditions has led to a significant depletion of Iran’s water resources and forced the migration of millions of Iranians. Instead of addressing these existential issues, the Islamic Republic has responded with force against those calling for reform.

Photo: Iranian Air Defense missile system (Iranian Military)

As Moscow’s army and Navy invaded the Ukraine last week, Russian warships again docked in Cuba, part of President Putin’s goal of reconstituting the influence of the former Soviet Union in some Latin American nations.

Moscow is not the only anti-American nation to make military advances on our southern border.

China has spent vast sums on developing both military and civilian infrastructure facilities in the region. Much of Beijing’s investment has been in strategic infrastructure, including port facilities on both the East and West sides of the Panama Canal, and, as expert Dr. Evan Ellis has noted, airport facility in Freeport, The Bahamas, just 65 miles from the USA, and a deep sea port in Suriname.

Familiarizing its military with the region, China has deployed peacekeeping forces to Haiti, and a naval hospital ship to Cuba. Ellis notes that “The PRC also conducts significant interactions with the militaries of virtually all of the Caribbean nations with which it has diplomatic relations. A series of senior level Caribbean military leaders have visited China in the past two years…At a lower level, people-to-people military interactions have included inviting uniformed Caribbean military personnel and defense civilians for professional education trips to the PRC…The PLA donated $3.5 million in non-lethal military equipment to the Jamaica defense Force in 2010….The PLA is also reported to have personnel at Soviet-era intelligence collection facilities in Bejucal, Lourdes, and Santiago de Cuba…”

The U.S.-China Economic & Security Review Commission reports that Venezuela, Chile, Bolivia and Cuba now maintain strong ties to the Chinese military “through a high number of official visits, military officer exchanges, port calls, and limited arms sales.” Venezuela, Bolivia and Ecuador have begun to buy Chinese arms and military equipment, including radar and aircraft. Bolivia has signed a military cooperation agreement with China.
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Iran’s Revolutionary Guard has also been active in supporting forces hostile to U.S. interests.

Despite all of those facts, and the ongoing repression of freedom in Cuba and Venezuela, the White House has chosen to remain oblivious. When President Obama’s Director of National Intelligence, James Clapper, delivered the 2014 Worldwide Threat Assessment to Congress, he made no mention of Russian, Chinese and Iranian military moves.

The willful blindness of U.S. officials, symbolized by President Obama’s handshake with Raul Castro, extends to a number of elected officials. Rep. Jose Serrano (D-NY) has long been friendly with both the Castro regime in Havana and the successors to Venezuela’s socialist strongman Hugo Chavez. NYC’s Mayor, Bill DiBlasio, was an ardent supporter of Nicaragua’s Sandinista movement, which had, during the 1980’s, invited the Soviet military onto its shores.

As all of this has occurred, indeed, has accelerated, as the White House continues to defund the U.S. military.

Quick Analysis

Ukraine’s Frozen Conflict

As we approach winter in the northern hemisphere, the war in Ukraine is beginning to resemble a “frozen conflict” from many perspectives. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky recently told the media he hopes the war will end faster once President-elect Trump takes over in January. Opinions in Moscow, however, differ from that of the Ukrainian leader. Russian President Vladimir Putin argues that the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) needs to exclude Ukraine from joining in “exchange” for peace. If it does not, he says, then no end to the war is in sight. So far there is no Christmas solution. Several NATO countries, according to Vladimir Socor of the Jamestown Foundation, are tentatively considering “coalitions-of-the-willing” to provide security for Ukraine outside of the formal NATO framework. There is, however, no collective mechanism today under which such an arrangement is viable. According to the NATO Charter, while Ukraine is a NATO partner country, it may not join as a full member since it has not fulfilled the requirements for membership. That has not stopped NATO and allies from continuing “to provide Ukraine with unprecedented levels of support, helping to uphold its fundamental right to self-defence,” according to the organization. Socor says that keeping Ukraine out of NATO will not advance peace with Russia. Waiting for a peace settlement, he suggests, would only serve to encourage Moscow to continue the war indefinitely. Although the Biden Administration officially withdrew its support for Ukrainian membership in 2021, NATO maintains an “open door” policy toward membership-seeking countries. The current White House position led the way for European states to oppose Ukraine’s membership saying that a decision should be delayed until “conditions are met.” Biden pushed for changing “open door” to a “bridge” metaphor. It is not intended as an across-the-board NATO policy and has been implemented in the past on a case-by-case basis, says Socor. “The alliance’s open-door policy was not fully insulated from Russia’s non-statutory blocking power, and NATO-aspirant countries’ path toward membership was not always irreversible.” Russia has successfully blocked states like Georgia from joining, first in 2008 and again after the war in Ukraine began in 2014. Russia recognizes the value add of Ukraine to NATO is enormous and that Kyiv has a better case than some other nations. Putin’s invasion was, in part, intended to foreclose that option. By 2021, Moscow was pushing hard to maximize its war objectives, which included further annexations of Ukrainian territory. A main goal for Putin was, and is, to ensure there is no Ukraine left to join NATO. As President-elect Trump prepares to assume office in January, he is faced with the historical challenges presented by the war. Post-conflict security guarantees were the center of several proposals made during the 2023 military stalemate. The incoming Trump Administration has yet to outline how it intends to handle the Russia-Ukraine war. Analysts in Washington believe that the new Administration will expect its European allies to guarantee the majority of Ukraine’s security needs. As we approach 2025, several European nations have acknowledged that they do not view Ukraine as eligible for NATO membership as it would draw the organization into the middle of the conflict. Others want to wait until the war is over or pending a “peace” settlement before considering Ukrainian membership. Socor reports that some “influential voices” are suggesting that “Kyiv should join NATO after “freezing” the war along a stable armistice line, de facto accepting Ukraine’s partition, with NATO security guarantees applying de jure to the government-controlled territory only.” This would mean starting accession talks soon with the actual talks to commence only after a ceasefire is in place. Trump arrives in Washington at a time when Putin’s hybrid strategies of war in Ukraine have eviscerated commonly-held differences between war and peace. “Absent a political consensus in NATO over Ukrainian membership, certain European allies, including France’s President Emmanuel Macron, are holding informal consultations about post-conflict security guarantees to Kyiv by NATO members outside of NATO’s framework,” according to the Jamestown Foundation. The Biden Administration downplayed the discussions on possible forms of military assistance and defense industry cooperation by sending only an Assistant Secretary of State. For a European peace to hold the Trump Administration would need to formally extend the United States’ nuclear deterrence to Ukraine. Options under discussion in Europe include a “coalition of the resolute” to deploy forces to Ukraine as part of a possible armistice package, deterring further Russian attacks, says Secor. European officials are also debating, without any agreement, whether its military forces could perform non-combat logistical roles to free Ukrainian forces to fight. None of the possible courses of action has moved forward as all eyes are waiting on the incoming Trump Administration for clues about its intended level of support for a NATO framework and other non-NATO proposals. Daria Novak served in the U.S. State Dept.