There wasn’t much good news in the 1970s. But the Entebbe raid in 1976 was a cause for celebration. An Air France civilian passenger plane had been hijacked in Athens by terrorists from a Palestinian group and a West German Communist group. It was flown to Uganda – to the delight of that country’s dictator, Idi Amin. Most passengers were flown back to Paris. But the Israelis, and the non-Israeli Jews, were kept detained along with the Air France crew. The Israelis flew in and rescued over a hundred hostages.
I was reminded of the audacity of that mission by the triumphant rescue, by US special forces, of the two-person crew from a downed F-15E Strike Eagle deep inside Iran in remote mountainous terrain. The pilot was found quickly, but the rescue of the second airman was an agonising 36 hours. The Iranian regime had put a price on his head and diverted considerable military resources to capturing him. They were closing in on home territory. But the Americans got there first.
Donald Trump announced:
“Over the past several hours, the United States military pulled off one of the most daring search and rescue operations in US history.”
I fear the President has allowed himself to lapse into hyperbole on occasion. Not this time. The skill and courage of what was undertaken can not be disputed. Perhaps there was also a bit of luck. But consider the other side. What did the failure of the Iranian regime signify? The odds should have been greatly in their favour. Yet they failed to kill or capture any of the US forces. Any IRGC forces that got in their way were killed. A deception campaign sent Iranian forces in the wrong direction. It was an extraordinarily challenging task for the US – the helicopters flying dangerously low over the mountains. Yet they pulled it off.
The episode might give pause to the Lord Haw-Haw element. We keep hearing from “experts” that the Americans and Israelis are losing. That they have got themselves in a quagmire. The Iranian regime is simply being made stronger by the attacks as the Iranians “rally to the flag.”
Contrast that with reality. In the course of a month, Iran has been overwhelmingly demilitarised. That is despite its military machines having been built up over decades at a cost of billions of dollars. The number of US and Israeli casualties has been remarkably low. Of course, the task is not complete. Iran is still firing off missiles – albeit at a greatly reduced rate. We need to safely reopen the Strait of Hormuz.
Then there is the imperative of regime change. It is silly of Trump to pretend this has already taken place. Killing key figures in the regime’s leadership has been important. But swapping one bunch of bloodthirsty fanatics for another does not amount to regime change. It is the same regime, with different personnel. No doubt Trump understands this full well, but wishes to avoid disclosing his plans for genuine regime change.
Ultimately, it is a challenge for the Iranian people to secure their freedom. But we have an interest in helping them to succeed. If the regime stays in place, then after a few years and a few more billions of oil revenues spent of weapons then we will be back where we started. That is why it is welcome that it is not only Iran’s military that is being destroyed but also its infrastructure for internal repression.
Some suggest that we will not see an Iranian uprising after around 40,000 of them were massacred for protesting in January. When some Iranian troops refused to fire on civilians, the regime brought in it ruthless allies from the PMF in Iraq to do the killing. The executions continue. Will that save the regime? More plausible is that the determination to overthrow it remains strong but there is responsibility over the timing of the uprising to ensure success. Naturally, there is a wish to avoid futile deaths. Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi, who though in exile is a figure of great authority, has yet to give the signal. Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu had not yet got arms supplies to them. Just because they haven’t announced their plan to the enemy does not mean they don’t have a plan.
In any case, news of some preliminary Iranian resistance work does come out occasionally – despite the internet blackout. Basij, the internal security force, has faced defections and assassinations.
What’s this got to do with us? The Prime Minister keeps repeating that this is “not our war.” But appeasement does not keep us safe. The Iranian regime treats it with contempt. They chant “Death to Britain”, the “Little Satan.” We have had Iranian spies attempting to enter a nuclear base in Faslane. We have had those linked to the regime setting fire to ambulances in Golders Green. We have seen the regime fire missiles at our base in the Chagos Islands. That’s 2,350 miles from Iran – which shows they could also reach western Europe, quite possibly including the UK.
So obviously it is “our war.” It’s just that the Americans and Israelis are fighting it for us. The initial refusal to allow the US forces to launch attacks from RAF Fairford, in Gloucestershire, and the Chagos Islands was just an inconvenience to them in military terms. It did not prevent them from achieving a spectacular success. But it was a diplomatic disaster. They were expending all the blood and treasure – they just wanted to use our bases, which they pay for. Our refusal to help our allies when it counted was not only unheroic. It was a betrayal of our national interest and morally bankrupt given the evil nature of the Iranian dictatorship. The tone of some of the pundits gives the impressions that they dislike Trump so much that they are rooting for the ayatollahs. The good news is that our enemies are being defeated. No thanks to us.